L Agitation / Education

Activism Using Zines

by, Anthony Rayson

| Presentation at the Children's School

200S. Oak Park Avenue, Oak Park, IL
5:30-7:30 pm

‘i ‘Wednesday, February Sth, 2020
Agitation / Education - Activism Using Zines

| grew up in a very politically active household. | was
right in the middle of a large family (fourth child of seven)
right in the eye of the "Baby Boom” generation. | came of
age in the explosive sixties and was fortunate to see for
myself, what was going on i the streets, as my father
would actually take us to several demonstrations while we
were children. | listened to underground radio and read
many underground publications, both counter cultural stuff
and radical political analysis. | totally bought in to being an
anti-war activist, longing for real freedom for those
struggling to achieve it, home and abroad and was also an
enthusiastic, pot-smoking hippie. Right on, Abbie!

| was a prime candidate for home schooling, as |
detested public.grade school and especially high school, but
it wasn't really a thing, then. | loved to learn and especially,
read, | was lucky as our house was full of serious books,
magazines and political discussion. | was a paperboy and
had three different routes - morning, afternoon and Sunday.
So, | read the papers voraciously, too. | never wanted to
“be" anything - except a writer. 1 wanted to write about
what was happening in our country; and by extensiori, the
dreadful things our government was-doing to other «
countries. | didn't see any money in doing this and 1 had no
idea how | was going to pull it off and somehow, have a real
adult life - a wife, children, a house and steady income to be
viable. B

I'did above average in school, despite hating every
minute of it: At seventeen, | graduated high school and was
accepted by Grinnell College, in lowa. | hated this place,
tool | got stuck taking complicated math and physics
courses, which | had zero interest in. | got high and drunk a
lot and blew off my classes. In the middle of the second
semester, Nixon & Kissinger invadéd Caifibodia (again) and
the whole countril seemed to:g6 onstrike, in protest. Our
school only struck for one day. | was totally alienated and
stayed on strike., They.were. cryin' about “academic
pressure.” Who gives a damn when the world's on fire!
Within a couple weeks, my good friend Greg came to 3
visit and we struck out hitchhiking, aiming to hook up with
our friend in Salt Lake City. We had Dave's address (or
thought we did.) We crashed in on a guy named Doc who
we didn't know and stayed at his apartment for a week.
One night we saw police lights from up in the hills as we
were looking down at the city, so we rushed down to see
\what was going on. We found.Dave in the middle of a

. demonstration, being led by Bobby Seale, the co-founder of
the Black Panther Party. What does this have to do'with
zines? Nothing - yet! This was the beginning of my real
education. After a couple of years of this hand-to-mouth
existence, | was ready to explode with ideas. I'd seen and
experienced a lot.

| started pecking furiously on my lvpe'wfllen beginning

' with a lengthy index of subjects, | wished to cover. | was

! speaking in rhymes a lot and wrote down things, constantly,
in notebooks. | had no idea there even was such a thing as
a zine, but | came up with all this material, anyway. |was
hoping to help spur those around me into being dedicated
activists, but they just wanted to not have to go to Vietnam.
This was in May of 1974, while Agnew & Nixon were going
down, and the Vietnamese people were soon to shake off
the monstrous U.S. slaughtering, going on for a decade.

1 was just a twenty year old kid, working in a factory.
When | put all this material together and made copies, my
friends thought it was really cool - and that | was crazy. |
titled it, Peoples’ Polar Express. A great friend of mine
named Jack Reedy, ran a grotto in.DeKalb, IL and had all the
underground publications from all over the country. But
nobody wanted to “join the revolution.” They wanted to go
to the disco, instead. That was very depressing to me.

I'd been through a lot during my journeys, and | came to
realize that the only person | would be able to rely upon,
| was myself. I'd almost been killed a couple times and had
some wild adventures. | stayed in the Reno area for about
| four months, and ended up, thrown In Jail, twice. | was
! facing a 6-year bid for possession of a half a nickel of
PEOPLES' POLAR EXPRE&S"

Noei Ignatiev

‘Noel Ngnatiev (/' natiev/; December 27,1940 — November 9,
2019) was an American author and historian. He was best known
for his work on rice and social cass and for his call o sbolish
“whitemess". Ignatiev was fhe co-founder ofthe New Aboliionist
Society snd co-editor of the journal Race Traitor, which
promoted the idea that “resson o whiteness is loyaty 10
bumanity ) He also wrote a book 00 antebellum porthern
xenophobia againet Irsh immigrants, How the Irish Became
White. His publisher billed him as "one of Americas leading and
most controversial historians” 41

ragweed, which | couldn't give away, although I had tried. |
couldn't believe it! My Dad came through and got mea &~
lawyer, who was able to get me a reduced sentence of two
years of probation. If | had so much as smirked at the
judge, | believe he would have given me hard time. There
was a saying out there - "Reno is so close to hell, you can see
the sparks!® Sparks is the town next to Reno.

1 was only in county jail for ten days, but | learned a lot.
This experience stuck with me, in the back of my mind. |
knew if | wasn't "white" | would be stuck in there, a long
time. Like many people, | was very alienated and angst-
riddled. Lots of my friends were dying of suicide, heroin
overdoses and car crashes. | didn't know what to do. So, |
impulsively got married. That was a mistake which only
lasted three years, but | ended up with a starter house in
Hazel Crest, IL. | had to pay her off for five years. |was
working in a toll booth on I-80, 5o | had a steady incoms
had one of my brothers and a couple of my party buddies,
move in with me and we had fun, being in our twenties.

1 still wanted to write, but | put my treatise away. | got
subscriptions to various radical magazines and just seethed.
| did write various pieces, but didn't know what to do with
them. | felt no connection to the various protests going on
around the country which were really tame as all the
genuine radicals, seemingly, had been killed, jalled or
otherwise co-opted. | didn't know how to connect with real
activists or how to find thém. There was no internet.

Then | had an epiphany. | read an interview, published
in Progressive magazine, with then Harvard professor, Noel
Ignatiev. He was fundamental in creating an awesome
Journal, entitled, Race Traitor. Soon after, he got fired.
That figures. | met him in Chicago - cool!

I thought to myself - "Wow! Somebody is finally telling
the damn truth about things!” It got me off my ass and |
started writing letters and essays and sending them around
to various radical groups. | found out about the zine culture
and ordered a million zines and began to look up activists
in the city of Chicago and getting involved in various
projects. | created a new personal zine, entitled, Thought
Bombs, which | ended up making 33 different issues of. At
first, | had my older son, Stanton, who was nine at the time,
draw the covers and add a little bit of content.

But, we're getting ahead of ourselves. | met a truly
wonderful woman and we got married. This was in 1986.
The Bears won, the Challenger blew up and we got hitched.
1 went back to school, too - and became the Valedictorian, in
1995. We had two small sons - Stanton aged seven and
Stephen, who was only one. | thought of switching jobs and
becoming a grade school teacher. Then | thought | can't do
that because they wouldn't let me really teach. I'd have
gotten fired the first day... | wouldn't have put the gag on.

I had positioned myself to a really nice spot on the road.
The boss only came once a week and it wasn't that busy.
So, I had time to read, study and write - and organize.

We moved to another house out in the woods in Eastern
Will County. This was 1990. Unbeknownst to us, the state
and their business associates were trying to build a mega
airport in our area - three times the size of O'Hare, which
the airlines wanted nothing to do with. | got with the group
fighting this thing and went to a few meetings. It was called
RURAL - Residents United to Retain Agricultural Land. A co-
worker moved near this menace and said, "We got to do
something about this!" | knew he was right & that I'd be up
to my ears. | spent an enormous amount of time on STAND.

So, | got heavily involved in this endless fight. Right
around this time, the authorities were also trying to close
down a couple of grade schools, including the one our older
son was attending. | reached out to the organizers and we
quickly put togethier a dynamite demo in front of the
Matteson Holiday Inn, where a coterie of politicians were
meeting to cut up the Peotone spoils. These included then
alive, O'Hare area Congressman Henry Hyde, ex-Governor
Jim Edgar, the smarmy Morris Congressman, Gerald Weller,
‘We have come a long way!

And yes, we have a long way to go, but-

Together we just might have a future.

So let’s STAND together!

SHUT
THIS
AIRPORT
Secretary of Corrupt State, George Ryan and the newcomer -
Congressman Jesse Jackson, Jr. We barged into the hotel
and chanted away. They lined maids in a corridor to stop us
from directly.confronting the big shots, why they frantically
called for the cops. As they finally came out, we "escorted”
them to their cars. "The People, United, Will Never Be
Defeated! The People, United, Will Never Be Defeated! The
People, United, Will Never Be Defeated!" 9

Weller, who | sat next to during my valedictorian address
in 1995 (where | went off on the college for supporting the
airport) married the daughter of Rios Montt - the most
genocidal monster at the time, who decimated Guatemala.
Who do you think trained the death squads?2? Sickening!

Now it is early in 1998. The lady spearheading RURAL
got a job as a reporter for the Kankakee Daily Journal, so
she had to step down from RURAL. | was working closely
with George Ochsenfeld, who was the prominent activist,
who lived in this threatened "airport footprint.” We decided
‘we would have to create another organization that was more
activist-oriented to take this fight to higher levels. | came
up with the name - STAND - Shut This Airport Nightmare
Down! George would be President, Mike (my co-worker)
would be Vice-President and I'd be Secretary.

This was a very busy year for me. | started another
group, South Chicago ARA (Anti-Racist Action) as well as my
distro, South Chicago ABC (Anarchist Black Cross) Distro. |
would create an educational service, with and for, prisoners.
For, it dawned on me that, one, prisoners were sending the
most erudite material (letters and analysis) and two, the
prisons were ground zero, in the struggle here at home.

. Anyway, after that demo in Matteson, | immediately
started to write and collect newspaper articles about the
airport and this demo and put them together into an
informational zine of about twenty pages. | made fifty
copies, titled, Anti-Airport Alert and took them to a meeting
at a church in Peotone and passed them out to the farmers,
ANARCHIST BLACK. CROSS to
e o SOUTH GHIBAGO
ARA AEERT

)

79

OVR GOVERNOR IS A
BIGGER CROOK THAN
YOUR GOVERNOR.

*This was one of our bumper stickers while George Ryan
was Governor. Sure enough, he went from the
Governor's Mansion, to the Big House!
like hotcakes. And, boy did they eat 'em up! Yum, yum!
Let's go get 'em! | soon made more and bigger issues. )N

1 also employed the d.Ly. zine / punk ethic for protest
sign-making and they were unique. | lined the church foyer
with them. | came to realize that this type of "next level”
written and visual activism could prove to be very effective.
I'made all kinds of cool things, buttons, necklaces, big
banners, bumper stickers, yard signs (usually 4' x 4'
plywood with our No Airport symbol on it

| was always making protest signs! A farmer taught me
how to make big No Airport signs and gave me a wooden
stencil, so | could make many more - quickly. Other farmers
donated the plywood and paint. | spent a lot of my own
money doing this - to make sure it got done. | got the
major airlines to pop us some grant money and they even
flew my family and me to lobby in Washington. We weren't
a shrinking violet outfit! We spent it as we saw fit.

1 wrote editorials and analyses for the local and city
papers and worked on issues of Anti-Airport Alert. Later, |
even made four No Airport crop circles, which were huge
and landed on the front page of the Sun-Times. One was In
USA Today. My sister called me. | was born on her seventh
birthday. She said: “Tony! I saw your crop circle in the
European version of USA Today!" OK, cool!

By now, | was making zines like crazy and working with
some brilliant prisoner writers and artists. | got a couple of
the artists to draw No Airport graphics. | always had a
literature table at all our meetings - and it was continuously
expanding. Another thing | did was repurpose those
annoying yard campaign signs. After the election, the
township picked up the left over signs - and gave them to
me. I'd have sign-making parties.

1 was getting to know all kinds of activists in the
Chicagoland area, going to endless meetings and involving
myself, fully. | combed the literature tables and added
zines to my distro, which | believed were worthy. Later, |
put together an actual quarterly newspaper, which | named,
Rural Life Standard. We made thousands of copies and
mailed them out bulk rate. Our membership went from 300
(RURAL) to over 2,500! We were a force to be reckoned with
and we even crashed the gatherings of the pro-airport ) 2.
people. The footprint folks were starting to lose their fear.

One time, a milk farmer, named Rocky Batterman, loaned
us a semi. We had two graffiti artists from the city come
down and spray paint both sides all night. I read poetry to
them, while they worked. One side had a picture of a little
kid, standing up to a gigantic bulldozer. Then, we
caravanned down and parked it in front of the state capitol,
in Springfield, where we held a news conference. This was
before 911, when you could get away with that kinda stuff.

Another time, my older son, Stanton & |, confronted then
Governor Ryan, in his office. We also picketed the
governor's mansion. There's nothing like a day trip, right?
The funny thing was, my union, SEIU (which | was steward of
for twelve years,) had an office directly across the street
from the Guv's digs & | printed my ass off, while | was there.
They'd come down to kiss up to his jobs plan. | was there
o go off on the airport. Hey! I'm my own Man.

Another time, we had a big parade through Peotone and
held a big rally in the high school. | lined up a dozen
speakers. We did all kinds of cool things and we didn't back
down from anybody. At every event, I'd lay out a big
literature table, with protest signs all over. We'd have
children draw pictures of what they thought of the airport
and laminated them. We'd be in parades on hay wagons
with huge banners, passing out candy and bumper stickers!

1 saw a recent Chicago Tribune editorial that mentioned
our group of "farmers, environmentalists and renegades.” |
would have to think, she was referring to me... Now, the
latest governor, Pritzker, another billionaire, has allocated
$150 million for an exit ramp off of 57 to Eagle Lake Road,
in the center of their idiotic scheme. It's a huge waste of
taxpayer money in an area forty miles from the loop, with
#= ' RURAL LIFE

e STANDARD iy
S TEEEC

RYAN PUSHES THOUSAND
LANDBANKING CITIZENS

ST R PARADE &
'?‘;‘;_-_-.:_._,n.;..uq_:;._
e T Y

EiiEstsresr, PEOTONE!

‘Winter / Spring 2004

WORKNEWSLETTER
)

no infrastructure, whatsoever. Well, we're still out here and
will spring to action, when it becomes necessary. 14

Remember, Ryan, Blagoyevich and Jesse Junior - all went
to prison! But yet, the authorities would line the room with
cops, when we went to their bs meetings! Who are the real
crooks? You're messin' with a hornets nest full of alley cats!
We used these same, non-threatening, although very
forthright tactics in other fights against prisons, tollways,
school closings, etc. You've got to fight off predation!

In 2002, 1 helped to organize the Anarchist Black Cross
Network at a conference in Austin, Texas. | wrote
newsletters for them and so forth. All the while, | was
making zines at a blazing clip - about two a week! | now
have well over 1,200 zines, which | make freely available to
prisoners. | organized a Prison Abolition Conference here in
Chicago in 2004 and | had 10,000 newspapers made forit-
radical as hell - that | was able to get the Peotone printers to
make! | was the main organizer for this 3-day event.

I've been involved with many people throughout the
country. Ive gone to countless conferences, meetings and
demonstrations, all over the place. The great thing for me
is the fact that | can do all of this from my own home. |
don't need an office or a "board of directors" or anything
that would put a damper on my work or attempt to censor
what | have to say. | don't have to count on other people.

1 get to collaborate with some of the most brilliant
thinkers and artists in the world and this project is
genuinely useful for an amazing amount of prisoners.

In 2006, a horrible event happened. Our son's best
friend, Dylan Drapeau, who was only 17, was killed ina
horrific accident caused by'an off-duty cop. It was a
complete cover-up and the poor kid was cast as the guilty
one. The cop turned into him at a busy (no light)
intersection, going 100 miles an hour - while turning!

He wasn't checked for alcohol intoxication until the next
morning. He never lost a minute of pay as a cop, either.
ail

5 COOK COUNTY JAIL

FRIDAY the 13* (August
3to5pm 2004

Help us kick-off this weekend of

Parole violators cram

Brothers and Sisters warehoused
this vile urban concentration car

MEMORIAL RALLY
For
DYLAN DRAPEAU

Sunday, August 20™ at 5 pm

Crete-Monee High School
760 W. Exchange Ave. Crete

Contact: Anthony Rayson
anthonyrayson@hotmail.com
(708) - 534 - 1334

We will never forget Dylan!

26th & California

Events! National convergence for the
PRISON ABOLITION CONFERENC]

ABU GHRATB or Cook County?

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1 put flyers all over these towns and a witness came to
the wake, which had an overflow crowd. This kid, who was
killed - murdered, actually, was an amazing piano player -
snuffed out like road kill. | spoke with the witness and he
agreed to testify. This young man lived in the corrupt town
of Chicago Heights. The cops menaced him and his girl,
who just had a new baby. He was a courageous guy. A

| contacted a pro-marijuana lawyer who set me up with a
big shot loop lawyer for the civil suit. The witness was
almost killed himself. He was a draftsman and wrote out an
explanation of what happened, as well as a nuanced
drawing of the accident. The cops blew him off and told the
parents there were no witnesses and that Dylan, basically
got himself killed, by being reckless. They were lying! |
brought the parents to the Will County Prosecutor’s Office to
plead with them to press real charges.

| knew it would be futile, knowing how cops, prosecutors
and judges are, but | had to do it, anyway. There was a half-
assed "trial" in Joliet. This disgusting cop and his pig-like
lawyer were snickering up a storm at a recess. | went right
in their face. The bailiff singled me out and | was banned
from further entry into the courtroom. It turned out, that
the bailiff was the Mother of the judge. The misdemeanors
were reduced to one - speeding. It was a painful farce.

Of course, | made a zine out of it. We held a memorial
for him, a month after this horrific tragedy in front Crete-
Monee High School. We finally got his Mother out of their
mournful house. A block from my house, the cops were
waiting to escort me to the event - as if we were going to
cause a ruckus. He was buried in a grave meant for his
Grandmother. How do you like American society, now?

After a couple of years, the family received a settlement
from the civil suit. A few years later, the cop, named Brian
Dorian, was arrested as the *Honey Bee Killer.” It tumed
out, it wasn't him, but he ended up getting a settlement for
$200,000 for his four day stint in Will County Jail. The
bumbling cops and prosecutors obviously felt that he was
17

Wartime Experience Remembered
by el H.Rayson

INTRODUCTION: 1940 - 1943

Living in Oak Park, Tinois in 1939, [ was working atthe bank to raise money
for college. T had a small scholarship (1940) at Coe College lowa. Tworked as.a bus
oy for meals- the food was bad, the soup was good. [1et Coe College and entered
the Universiy of Rochester, NY in 1940 on a dearts scholaship. 1 volunteered in
the USN Reserve V-7 program for ofcers, 1941. 1 also met my wife at Rochester
University. She had a Prize Scholarship.

Afte the Pearl Harbor bombings, [ became very eager to et into action after
secing the Nazi Blitzkriegs invading all over Europe. In 1982 the V-7 program was
abolished 50 T had new orders to contne for naval offcr training i a V-12
program. 1 graduted from this program at Rochester Universiy with three short
credits needed for college graduation. In October, [ was one of seven to be appoted
to Midshipmen's School in New York Gity at Columbia University.
capable of murder because they rarely arrest a cop for
anything, much less murder. His alibi was he was watching
porn at the time. The cops never did catch the real killer. A
regular Joe came across him in a tanning salon, where the
killer was menacing the girl working there. The creep was
trying to rob and killed her and now him. He set his gun
down and our hero offed him with his own gun. Nice work,
guy! He was the cat's meow at the year end tanning party,
up in Shaumburg. Glad someone's willing to take on the
“bads" instead of just being useless! Will Countywas | §
notorious for botching cases. Remember the Kevin Fox
case, where they charged a guy for killing his daughter?

That was a very horrible time. My son became suicidal.
It was the worst ordeal | ever went through. That boy was
like a son to me and the two of them were going to make
music together. He's doing OK now. He's the grade school
teacher and he and his wife, just had their second son, last
month. | 5o detest this evil system of mundane
monstrosity, endless genocide, a putrid culture and all
things despicable. | hate this world police garbage! We're
not the "chosen ones" folks! We're the biggest threat.

Shortly before my father died, in January of 2001, my
brother, Jim, called me and told me i had to hightail it down
to Florida - NOW! So, | left work and bundied my family
together and flew down there - out of Gary Airport! A
couple of days later, he died. We had a service for him and |
recorded all the testimony and eulogies and transcribed
them, along with a story of this adventure and made a zine
of It. George W. hadn't finished stealing the election, yet.
My Dad voted for Ralph Nader. No hanging chad, there!

A couple years earlier, my Father wrote his own zine, he
titled, Wartime Experience Remembered. He had
alzheimer's disease, but he still had his long-term memory.
Check it out! Il read a little from both zines.

Luckily, my Mother is still alive. She's 95 now. She used
1o tell me | was "too sensitive.” Now, she thinks I'm a good
guy. I've always been a good guy, who was hard on himself.
So, every day, I'm working away at my distro, as we get
many letters every week, overwhelmingly from prisoners,
looking for zines. | put catalogs together listing all the / l)
titles. In 2007, | believe, | approached DePaul University
with a massive amount (maybe 600) of zines. They have a
Special Collections Library, including a zine library. There
policy is to grant twenty pages of whatever a person wants,
free of charge. Many prisoners access this service and they
do a terrific job. I'm extremely pleased with their efforts! |
send them more zines every year. This year, | will also
donate to them, hundreds of audio and video cassettes,
VHS, CD's and etc. These are mainly from other activist
organizations and dedicated individual film makers.

I must say, for the past fifteen or sixteen years, I've had
but one true comrade - Mike Ploski - who has also worked
tirelessly, day after day, on this distro. Without him, the
most | could have possibly done was 1/2 of what we
actually do and if | couldn't find such a partner, it would be
exceedingly difficult to do all this, by myself. So, thank you,
Man! You have really stepped up to the plate and smoked
that balll He's very involved in many other activist projects.

I've been involved in other struggles, as well. In 2011, 1
think, the cat got out of the bag, and we found out that
Crete was in the process of laying the red carpet out for a
regional Immigration Detention Center. The Mayor was
trying to keep it a secret. Crete is the sister town to Monee,
where | lived. So, | felt an overwhelming disgust and was
highly alarmed at these developments. We went to the
house of an awesome activist / teacher named Consetta
Smart and held an organizing meeting. This was a whole
new animal, for these vile places were run by unscrupulous
bastards running private prisons. City activists hipped us to
the danger. Obama & ICE wanted five regional deportation
gulags. How he became the Great Savior, I'll never know.

1 quickly started collecting all the literature | could on
private prisons, contacted other activists around the country
and went to work. My brother Bill was living in Pembroke
Pines, right outside Miami, where they were trying to put
another of these abominations, so 1 got hooked up with
those activists. We went to Chicago and met the activists in
Little Village who were fighting for their people. 20

One of the main Crete area organizers was a milquetoast
Democrat. She didn't like me - and | didn't like her. These
things happen. At an important meeting at a big church in
the south side, we hashed over our options. A lady and her
young daughter were there to represent the people in
: Chicago, fighting deportation. Her name is Rozalinda'

’ Borcilla.”For, the great Barack Obama was deporting people
lat a horrific rate - double that of even George W. Two
-, hundred thousand people were deported per year, under
Obama. What a fraud! He won the Nobel Peace Prize and
then started six wars! He was so proud that he was the
nation's dedicated assassin. It was extremely sickening.

Now, Trump is trying his hand at assassinating leaders in
other countries to distract from his other crimes. This is
how World War | was started - by a key assassination...

| remember before Obama became a senator. | was
working with a bunch of progressive black preachers from
the south side of Chicago and south suburbs. We'd put on
candidate forums to see where these schmoes stood.
Obama was too gutless to show up. He'd send a flunkey.
Boo on you! | remember when he was an Emil Jones toady.

| confronted him one time as a gala event held in the
Conrad Hilton ballroom. He gave the keynote address and
afterwards, stood while people lined up to get his autograph
and fawn over him. This was right before he won the
cakewalk for Senator. When it was my turn, | said, "l don't
want your autograph. Just tell me how in the hell can you
consider yourself an environmentalist, if you are for the
Peotone Airport?” He gave me a dead fish handshake and
said, "We'll talk, later.” He did come down to our area and
met with the local Democratic honchos. Needless to say, |
wasn't invited. Republicans &/or Democrats = Lies & Death!
21

Moo on eprsons Campon

Immigrants Walk to Crete
March 30" -April 1% *

No Borders! No Cages! Reunion: 3:30PM

i chic o it the Intront of Cook County Jalt
We walk from Chicago 1o rete 1o resist 1 pekenimy
immgrant Prison planaed by ICE. W watk to | 2 -85 a
aftem 1hat borders and cages do not create asafe | +Back of the Yards

3nd just world. We walk n soidariy it 3l hose. )

e system seeks o exlude, scapegoat ang | T Wrightwood
imaae Our familes are beg tom apan 30\ Evergreen Park

‘We walkogether as onelarge (amily.

Who ls walking: Immigrants and our
Jamilies, groups committed to immigront
justice and YOU!

Wiil you:walka mile with us?

This action s organised by: Our Lady of Gusdabupe
Mission, Morstorium On Deportions Campeign, No.
Nama Callctive and otbar organizations.

Foriflo on how to endorse, support, or walk with
us visit: MoratorumOnDeportatl
MoratoriumOnDeportations @gmailcom

773-632:9992/813-789.0123

Rallyin Crete

(N GRE
‘\N.q {’msflN
So anyway, back to my story. We posed the question -
what should we do to stop this prison - at this big church
meeting. The democrat lady said, "Write to Senator Durbin."
Durbin was too gutless to even have an opinion onthe 5
issue. | said, "No way. We must go to direct action!” The
Little Village lady, Rozalinda Borcilla, went off, as well.
Shortly thereafter, the folks in Chicago decided to walk all
the way from Little Village to the proposed site of the
prison, in Crete. We kicked off the event with a big rousing
rally at Cook County Jail, which was shouting distance from
the entrance to Little Village. | spoke with honesty &
passion! | helped to coordinate rallies at the various stops.
They made dozens of homemade protest signs and flags.

1 got my anarchist friends involved and they were part of
the march to Crete. They trained to be useful as medical
support people. This was at the time when a whole bunch
of people came to Chicago (2012) to protest the gathering
of NATO. Mayor Emmanuel spent over $100 million for
security for these international wonks for the lousy 36 hours
they spent in Chicago. The march was historic and
extremely powerful! Crete had never had any kind of
demonstration in their town and here comes the big black
flag! ICE cancelled a big meeting at the high school for fear
that the anarchists would be coming down to Crete. The
real reason they canceled was because there would have
been an overwhelming number of townspeople. Boo!

We then canvassed the whole town to educate people as
to why this was a horrible idea for their town and area. |
took the business district. We badgered the Mayor and the
trustees, relentlessly. Before long, the Trustees voted
unanimously to forget it. Too bad Mayor, you won't be a
warden. Soon, the jailers reared their ugly heads, nearby.
Obama got the message and pulled the plug on the
proposed prison down in Pembroke Pines, Florida too!

Years earlier, in rural Kankakee County, then Governor
George Ryan, was looking to help a poor black farming
community (Hopkins Park) economically, by building a
women's prison there. Yeah, right! Having their sisters
from the cities, living in cages would be the ticket. Not! %>
They organized a militant group to fight it off. | teamed up
with one of the organizers and we went around the towns to
various libraries to explain why the prison and the airport
were both very bad ideas. They were organic farmers. They
wanted a community center, a grocery store, a laundromat
and a gas station. Only three people wanted the prison -

the Mayor, the Police Chief and a preacher. The people

there put on an event each summer - Marcus Garvey Days.

While we were putting the finishing touches to the death
of the Crete prison, another government / business assault
was happening in our area. IDOT wanted to build a
privately-run, foreign-owned toliway from I-55 to I-65, south
of I-80, from Channahon to past Lowell, IN. There were
little pockets of resistance all along the way. So, I made it
my mission to-collect all these groups into an umbrella
group, we titled NO ILLIANA 4 US. At a meeting at the Will
Township Center, a farm lady named Virginia Haaman, from
Peotone, was fit to be tied. Her place was to be bulldozed
for this latest boondoggle. Immediately, | knew she should
head this group, which she did admirably. We held a march
and rally at the Will County fairgrounds in Peotone. Some
folks started at I-55 and went east and others started at I1-65
and marched west. We made a shambles of their meetings.

Before | get to the nuts and bolts of zinemaking, | have
another little story for you. After my fourth crop circle, |
wanted to draw publicity for another event | organized,
which | called Harvest Fest. This took place at a farmers
place in Beecher, a nearby farm town, also menaced by the
airport. Their scheme had the end of a runway about a 1/2
mile from a grade school in Beecher. That's real planning,
there! It was always a big bluff of massive jobs for votes.
Problem was, no real jobs were ever created for anyone
actually needing them. They (Jackson) cried racism - not!
They bussed people out to the footprint and threw a few
shovels of dirt around, which they cordoned us off from.
1T LOOKS LIKE, WE MAY FI
GET GOVERNMENT OFF OUR BACKS!

PEOTONE DEFENSE FUND
P.0. BOX 993 PEOTONE, IL 60468

A

Shut This Airport Nightmare Down

P.O. Box 433, Monee, IL 60449
ww.standnoairperst.org
Anyway, our friend had a big barn and | loaded up ten
full tables of literature and signs. My son and his wife came
and played music for us. We had a nice time. The media
came and found out we were a.peaceable bunch of people.

S0, to drum up publicity, | decided to have a ceremony at
the crop circle. The idea was to take the goat curse off the
Cubs and stick it on the Peotone Airport. My younger son,
Stephen, was dressed as a joker and | procured a goat,
which | named "Gary." | put a little NO AIRPORT medallion
around his neck. Earlier, | had contacted a videographer
from Will County News, an online news service. She filmed
our thing and put it on YouTube. | had about a dozen
farmers with me and we marched around the circle up to
the front of the airplane. 24

Opposite, | put a John Deere tractor with a scarecrow of
Carlos Zambrano, the poster child of Cubbie failure. He was
stuffed with straw, driving the tractor. | ranted and raved
until we got to the tractor. Then | read my poem, officially
ending the Cubs curse and stuck it right into the rotten
heart of the Peotone Airport. It was hilarious! I'd also
contacted the Powered Parachute operators in the area and
they came out - twice - to take pictures. They spooked the
goat. So, we had to let him eat clover for a while. | then
wrote a piece called, Field of Schemes.

Before we set out to do this, | contacted, Phil Kadner, the
columnist for the Star Tribune, the south suburban paper.
His column was about what I told him | was going to do.
Whammo! Here was the publicity for the event. Sure
enough, the Peotone Airport was pretty dead and the Cubs
actually did win the World Series! After | read my poem, |
looked back and saw a black man wearing a Cubs uniform.
Was it Danny Woowoo? | dunno, but it sure seemed fitting.

Well, enough about me. Let's get into specifics about
zinemaking and how to effectively use them.

Almost everybody has no idea that zines even exist or
why. Most people nowadays don't even read the papers.
They just stare at their stupid smart phones. OK, whatever.
27
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| ead nthe Cicago paper (Sun-Times) todey Ourielves._ s, th poca system 3

(Frday, Sep. 23% tht Compresmen Jese comstiuted tody, 4 complote - repest -3
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s forthe Haparicsofthe sate, who gt ehaved i thee selliorying precatons o, we
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a4 By repreerting” s, ctherl e ae Stepping up o artciate the rea Haues and
For years Jee hascaimed the “Peotone ofering genuine scutions o these very seris
Arport wes i s it That wes a e, Now, Problemsthes compt poliicians and their
magicaly € ight the idcleof b o Contrllers - the (e

it 1t ooks the he's a King on huge Uvonel workersand th poos, a 1 s al cur fauly

it s alsoseeped desply o W i ane andal 10 ur Footprint Harvest
i area 1o the west of Jackso’s pancramic Fest on Sunday, October 9, rom 3 a7 pm at Jim.
efdom. Gae, s cryng “crocadls teas™ for B Bty Verdult threatened fa locatad ot 1851
157 Wi has the guts to g0 gainst “The Combiner” W, Church Road n Beeche.

Racetty,the leghlature has slahed Qs Leam about what the rea s are, swiling
bacene 11 i o alegedy “buy" nd (forciby, around this area. Discove what the Aviation
t ollpied market prces - ot the tax evis - Justice Movement sl bout. Find ot how a
tvoughthe viepractice of eminent domin.)
"Anyothr egitimate project sahed by 213
‘would be et withscrearns and v by thse.

sayng he won {avor eminent domain on the
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kncw what the aine ncutry needs and wold
‘chusly use and can bufld and un , somehin.

"Wel, il for i and hisglassy-eyed “moral
nderpirriogs.” The vilures re ccln...
ek s presuring Governor Qulan 10 {0k
the potciwork qult o and already trong-amed
rom this area, fo iscontrived group, ALVAC,
‘which s headed by one of i aides. Gt toghe It
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ver the Pootone e, Nor do we wan 10 5ee 3 - -
et of the double-dealing Debbie Habvoron,
ervousy biig hr fingermalls on th sidelne. o toundts of
e become il too dovious hat ol the
politiciams - county, state and foderal are ‘St Tis Arport Mightare Down!

Schemers, lars and crooks and deseve “thre hots
i Goorge Ry anc soom, Blago, P AN oo expremed i 4 plce s sty my o
That's not the target audience I'm interested in, anyway. |
decided to focus on the prisons. | saw a serious need and
figured I'd see what | could do.| wasn't satisfied with the
tepid writing | saw and being such a humble fellow, | figured
1 could do way better! No wonder | work mostly alone, eh?
But, you know? If you don't like it, "become the '"‘d'a";{,g'

Prisoners don't have real access to computers or phones
or even many books. Their libraries have been gutted, as
has their rehab programs, exercise equipment, etc. All they
have is the idiot box, which actually makes people stupider!
I made hundreds of mixed tapes all the time and even used
songs in demos. | started a protest at Operation Push with
this song. Great Men, by Burning Spear.

So, | flooded the "underground” with my contact
information, paid for advertisements and wrote to every
prisoner | could find in all the various publications | came
across that printed their letters or their addresses, being
“political” prisoners. Well, | saw the system from the inside
and saw all the harmless drug war prisoners and other non-
violent "offenders” who were having their lives wasted, by
being warehoused in this Insane mass incarceration system.

1 was extremely lucky to run across an amazing young
mentor, named Sean Lambert, a bi-sexual prison
abolitionist. He put together these unbelievably stuffed
prisoner zines. He lived at the time in Buffalo, NY - I think.
1 love ya, Man! He hipped me to many prisoners who | then
collaborated with. | had no idea where all this was going to
go. My first prisoner zine was called, Decidedly Radical,
written by Frank . Atwood, a lifer in Arizona.

There was a sick malaise in the country. People saw the
Kremlin collapse and were looking for a "peace dividend.”
Also, some folks scoffed at political agitation, for the "end
of history” was upon us. | knew these naive pipedreams
were not going to pan out. Before long, Cheney & Company
had us all girding for more endless horrific warfare (i.e. one-
way mass slaughtering of Afghanis, Iragis & many others.)
YOURE NT NORMAL
fi’fi ® SSLE

HELP THE fmucs\l

BEAT YOURSELF UP!
W3HL Lv3 L.NOa
STYININY 01 ONIX 39

I stuck my nose to the grindstone and worked away,
night and day on new zines, getting them written, edited,
formatted, copied, stapled and mailed to those who wanted
them - overwhelmingly prisoners. Yeah, itwasvery 3o
expensive, but | developed a mindset of resourcefulness
that stood me well. | developed intense relationships with
certain prolific prison writers and artists. | never paid for
cable TV and we bought our stuff from thrift stores and
garage sales. We lived in a little 2 bedroom, 1 bath house.

Atfirst, | had no respect for graphics. | figured - hellt
The writing is what must be focused on. | was never an
artist or musician, just a writer / rabble rouser. | learned
how powerful political artwork can be and now have well
over 500 pieces of original prisoner artwork, which | have
used extensively to illustrate these zines. Sometimes, a
person is both a writer and an artist. Some are extremely
talented in both areas. We've put on several art shows, too.

I'll show you what | mean. Kevin "Rashid" Johnson is a
longtime collaborator of mine. He's also what | consider the
world's foremost political artist. For a while, he was
sending me all of his original artwork. At one point | laid
out dozens of these on my ping pong table, while a
cameraman from a major art magazine, made high
resolution shots of them for a feature on him.

Rashid is now at an Indiana facility. He's been
horrifically targeted. He started out at a Virginia high
security joint, then was sent to Oregon, Texas, Florida and
now Indiana. He's been brutalized often. He's also the
Defense Minister-for the Prison Panthers.

Another brilliant prisoner writer / artist is Sean Swain.
He's in Ohio. He teamed up with a Brother named Travis
Washington, and wrote the classic 3-part zine, The Last Act
of the Circus Animals. They sent me a 50-paged "rough
draft." | advised them to double the size and flush out the
story better. Meanwhile, I sent the text to three prisoner
artists, who supplied awesome graphics for it. Later, it was
turned into a book, which | wrote an introduction for. He's
A Pusiicimal oF Shte SwkusS Wi
Chmbhin ol Onko otk 2K

SeressulirtoRty
one of the guys | go to when I'm looking for prisoner
contributions for, say, a workshop I'm doing at a
conference. He wrote a little piece for this zine! 32

Another long-time collaborator of mine is Khalfani Malik
Khaldun. We must have done forty zines together! He's in
Indiana, too. That state only allows you to see one prisoner
~ male or female - out of the tens of thousands they encage.

Another extremely important prisoner zine writer is
Coyote Acabo. He's out now, living in Olympia, Washington.
He was imprisoned in Neyada. Prisoners really relate to this
guy, as he focuses on the torment of incarceration, what
you'can do to stay sane (very difficult) - and how it can be
challenged. A lady from Amsterdam was editing a pub
called, Nevada Prisoners' Newsletter, which | also
distributed domestically. |did that earlier, too. A
publication entitled, The Voice of Indiana's Political
Prisoners was published in Europe and sent to me for
domestic distribution. This told me that there was not
enough real support for this enormous group of prisoners,
here in America. How prisoners are treated is very telling.

Along came a breath of fresh air. A prisoner in
Pennsylvania, named, Lemar Hybachi (Bondi Lemar DeBooth)
wrote me with a sweet zine, entitled, When All Else Feels
Lost. This was great. Hear from one of the up and coming
Afrikan anarchist writers, like James Scott, who was down in
Georgia. Lemar finally got out, after we'd done a few
excellent zines, and made his way to Chicago, where we
were able to get together, personally. He started working
with the IWW and they published a collection of his work
into a book, which | also turned into a zine. He went out
East on a book tour and ended up in prison for a few more
years on a flimsy "violation" of some sort. He's now in a
halfway house, working and organizing. Here's his latest
project - a Let’s Organize the 'Hood chapter. He calls me
and we have nice, long conversations.
Women prisoners have unique ways they are forced to
suffer. Very few women actually commit genuine crime.
They commit poor people crimes - blown out credit cards,
shoplifting - they do the bidding of unscrupulous 34
boyfriends, and often take the hit, when their partners are
targeted. As well, they are often abused and convicted for
defending themselves. Almost all women prisoners have
young children, as well. If they become “active” the state
will wrest custody from them. Very few women prisoners
are willing to collaborate with me. | want to mention two.

Lisa (Lee) Savage was stuck in the darkest dungeons for
women in Florida, when 1 first made contact with her. They
were torturing her, but she refused to stop fighting for
herself and her sisters. It was painful to know she was
constantly being assaulted. Eventually, she was released.
‘After a rough few years, she got a grip on things and now
runs the desk at a homeless shelter in Gainesville.

Anastazia Schmid is a lifer in Indiana. She defended
herself against her insanely abusive "mate.” She has
transformed herself into a very articulate researcher and
analyst concerning the history of Indiana women's prisons,
and the gruesome connection with the history of eugenics
and gynecology. 1 visited with her a couple of times, but |
can't see her until | visit Khalfani and go through the
months long paper snafu to change my visiting "privileges.”
One thing they don't tell you about the new Real ID, is that
you're going to have to have one to visit prisoners.

I've been doing this steady - for over twenty years. So, |
have managed to send many tens of thousands of zines into
prisons. I:send them to all ifty states - inside and out,
mostly in. The rule for prisons is publications must come
directly from the publisher. So, I simply made myself a
publisher. How does one do that? You simply conjure up a
hame, get a P.0. Box and buy a stamp that says the name
and address of said "publisher.” You stamp the last page of
the zine and the upper left hand comer of the 6 x 9 envelop
and, voilal You are a publisher.
35

Only the
Strong
Resist

R

‘What Can Be Done?

By In 1.2 Seconds
Lica “Lee” Savage

“The Most Virtuous
Vagina in the United

States of America”

Captive Patients:
Female Slaves and
Prisoners in 19th

Century America

“Iam the
modern version
of the women
I'mtalking

1 like to use nice clean 6 x 9 envelopes, so that digest-
sized zines fit nicely in them. 8 1/2x 11 folded in half to
make 8 1/2x 5 1/2 make the most practical, easily
reprinted zines around. Color is too expensive. 26

Occasionally, you can use colored paper for the cover
page. Prisoner graphics are not only more on point as far
2s their predicament is concerned, but also reprint much
nicer than say, computer-generated graphics. Newspapers
and photographs do not translate well, either. They're
muddy and obscure upon reprinting.

| do things the old-fashioned way - cut & paste. | use the
computer (like now) to write & edit, but | like the freedom
and creativity to actually craft these things by hand. Once
I've decided to make a zine, | let my mind think about it for
several days, unless it needs to be made quickly. Il go
about my business, working on countless projects and
melting them in with familial obligations and functions.
Sometimes, I'll write some ideas down to flesh out later or
‘make some sort of outline, or whatever seems most fitting.

since | work with prisoners, flexibility is paramount. Our
collaborations are constantly being interrupted and even
sabotaged. Prisoners who have the courage to write and
draw are targeted. They are moved around a lot. They have
their possessions destroyed. They are denied visits from
their loved ones. They are hurt in vicious assaults by
guards or thugs - o both. Thelr access to even paperor
stamps is highly limited. Let's face facts. Legally, by that
slave document - the U.S. Constitution, prisoners are still
Slaves. Legally, they are treated as if they were dead. So, it
Tay take several months for a project to reach fruition.
Some never do... | have to be flexible. Mike helps me to
prioritize. We send zines more quickly if they intend to
start study groups, are in dire straits or send stamps.

So, you want to make a zine. Here's how | start. Il take
some typing paper, fold it in half and number the pages.
You make a guesstimate of how many pages the zine will
be. These, of course, will be divisible by four. Each sheet
has four pages. OK, say | want a 10 sheet, forty-paged zine.
That's a pretty good sized zine! The material, say several
essays, an introduction, examples, graphics, whatever it is
composed of, you figure out the best way to lay it out. |
usually like to use the centerfold for a 2-paged graphic and
this may separate the 2 sections, if that's what is
happening. 37

Mostly, like everything else, it takes resolve. You must
get off the dime and attempt to do it, before you learn how
and have the confidence to do it. Like learning to play the
piano, you must practice to get better at it. Time, money
and effort are a given. But if you really have something
important to impart, whether you or somebody else wrote it,
you must go through with it! And, just like life itself, the
one person you are going to be able to rely upon is yourselft
Don't expect anything more. If you do, you'll just waste
your time and get frustrated. You can do It aill Help is
always nice, but begging for it, gets you nowhere.

This provides absolute freedom to write and craft
publications. You're not subject to the whims of some
starchy board of directors or censors or other people who
want to tamp down the fire you're bringing. Doesn't mean
being irresponsible. It means being totally responsible for
what you put out. If you've ever written something, say for
some publication, and then had it edited (homogenized)
before printing, you know how miserable a feeling that is.

Now! When you write and publish exactly what you
intended to say, it is fun as hell to reread, later - because it
hasn't been diluted! It's the real deal and people can feel it!
Top it off with no ads and no price tag and these things
become invaluable. As well, reprinting is encouragedi And!
If you're a prisoner willing to impart your story or
knowledge about a subject someone else can benefit from,
Vll get it published and incur all the expenses! Plus, I'm not
going anywhere. I'm truly loved for doing this! 1 see people
tapping into their basic humanity and making great strides.

It's very gratifying when some brilliant prisoner entrusts
his or her work in my hands and says, "I trust you. | can't
wait to see it!_Use it however you want!" | keep editing to a
minimum, as far as what a person is writing. Ifi'san 3§
obvious error they did not intend, then I'll fix it. But 'm not
going to fool with their written voice. If they spell like they
talk - finel |don't always agree with what or how they say it,
but if | feel they have something that someone can benefit
from, I'll let them have their say.

Of course, | won't print racist, sexist nor homophobic
garbage. However, | have a serious affection for the well-
| written rant. It was the great George Orwell who said
something like, "The most dangerous thing in the world is
the 50-paged tract.” He was probably referring to Karl Marx
& Friedrich Engels’ work, "The Communist Manifesto.”

Alot of zines are sort of dirty looking with smudges or
lines or obscured graphics, slapped together. That's just
laziness. | try to put them together cleanly giving each page
proper space and meticulously go over the master and
original copy with white out and a good pen to eliminate the
mess and darken parts that need to be darkened.

1 use my copying machine at home to reduce or enlarge
and make the master copy from the original. Then, Il
bundile several zines to be copied and take them to
OfficeMax or Office Depot. The price per sheet is cheapest
if your job entalls at least 10,000 impressions. That's 5,000
sheets, double-sided. It's still not cheap! Itis 5 cents an
impression, or 10 cents a sheet. That's $500 plus tax. Only
two or three years ago, it was $300 and | could get an
automatic 35% discount. So, the job would "only” cost
about $190. Now, you're lucky to get a lousy 15% off, so
this job would now cost $425, plus tax. They didn't even
use to tax it, as it was considered a service and not a thing.

So, you must be sure all the pages will print well and are
worthy of such an expense. Each page needs to have ample
margins on all sides. | like to give a 1/2 inch at least for
each side because the machines are not always calibrated
properly and the margins are not completely centered. As
well, the machine cannot print all the way to the end of the
page. I'm constantly telling prisoners not to write 39
everything using the whole sheet of paper. Often, with
Ppaper so precious, they decide to write words very tiny to
get their full message out. This makes transcribing more
difficult, but every obstacle the prisons throw at us, we
must deal with in order to complete the project. Laziness is
not an option and once a pub is "in the can® (complete) then
it can be reprinted as many times as you want!

Earlier, when | was younger, | had more energy. I'd get
up in the middle of the night and "cheat” the Sandman for a
couple hours. | went all over the place, meeting people,
cajoling them to help me, especially, with printing. | got my
union to make 300 copies of my first Thought Bombs zine. |
made zines in the police station of Peotone! This was next
to the Mayor’s office. He was fighting the airport with us.
But, I'd sneak in prison abolition pubs, too! I'made copies
at a mental hospital, and other offices and institutions.
Anywhere | found a copying machine I'd try to use it!

I'had to rely on my own resourcefulness to figure out
how to get things done. Once | resolved to focus on the
prisons, | wrote to many prisoner support organizations,
contributed articles or graphics, spread lists of activist
prisoner addresses, got their prisoner contact information
and wrote directly to those prisoners, usually with a catalog
and maybe a zine or two, | thought might interest them.

Now, the handwritten letter is the lifeblood of
<communication between prisoners and those on the "outs.”
This personal method is extremely important and | wrote
thousands of letters to prisoners over the years. Many
times | read how difficult it was for them to read them, how
it took them a week to decipher and so forth, as my hand
printing is atrocious. They would beg me to type them, but
mostly, they were begging just to receive them. For, here
was a man who actually gave a damn about their lives and
may very well help them get their story out. It was (and still
is) endless nose-to-the-grindstone work. Yo

Prisoners are a justifiably skeptical bunch, so it takes a
Herculean effort to fully gain their trust. Rumors (lies) fly
through the tiers endlessly. Supposed supporters come, say
bold things, yet still shamelessly flake off without a trace. It
takes time to build these viciously interfered with
relationships - and ongoing proof of dedication. With
writing, you can pour your feelings into it that you may not
feel comfortable talking directly to people about. Prisoners
don't have phones or computers. You can't just text ‘em.

Everyone has faults, personally. | was (and still am, |
guess) abrasive, impatient and perhaps, somewhat paranoid
around other people. | just didn't like wasting my time and |
was always chomping at the bit to get my say so in. But|
found, | could really relate to people through letter writing.

1 love music and | listen to it a lot when | work. 1 love
artwork, too. | don't like movies. | refuse to just sit.

But, | fully believe in the power of the written word as
far as having an indelible impression on a persons' thinking
and (hopefully) their evolving activities. Once an idea enters
your mind and you become entranced by It, it pushes
through many portals in your brain and takes on a life of its
own. Possibilities begin to clarify and in your sleep, while
your body and mind are repairing and readying for a new
day. Fresh ideas pop in and excite you to pursue them.

I wrote letters, everywhere - at home, on a train and
mostly, at work. Since | had to be a toll booth for eight
hours, 40+ hours a week, it was the perfect way to think
and write. It wasn't easy, as a letter might take four hours
to write, if traffic was heavy. Once it landed in a cell,
another persons’ mind would light up and a sort of Vulcan
mind meld occurred. We often became comrades and
collaborators. Needless to say, these letters and zines were
enthusiastically shared with the multitude of Brothers or
Sisters who were all around thenr.
There are brilliant people in prison and there are
illiterate ones. The raw material to make dynamite zines are
motivated writers & artists - who have experienced life in
the belly of the beast firsthand. There are those thrown
harshly into prison, who never got a chance to leam 4/ ]
anything that would help them truly develop. They are the
ones who eagerly read these zines - or have them read to
them. Everyone deserves a chance in life, but most
prisoners are products of poverty. They were brutalized
and tracked for prison. Why are they harshly sentenced?

Hey! | detest criminality and every prisoner knows it. No
one.can change the past. You can however, starting in the
present, create a real future. | say the purpose of life is to
develop your talents and interests in service to humanity.
This will provide a fulfilling life, whether you were born with
a silver spoon, or are naked and beaten in a cold, barren
cell... Itis up to each and every individual to fight their way
through this world of lies and difficulties and make
something positive happen that is unique to that person.

It's very tough without help - mentors and friends and
people who are supportive. Most people give up their
youthful hopes and dreams and sink into some sort of grim
acceptance of a truncated life. It's what this country does.
But, even Albert Einstein only used 5% of his brain. We do
have the capability to transcend and make a real life. It's
about being real, without commercials.

I took my job seriously. | was the union steward and |
looked after the well-being of my co-workers. | cleaned,
shoveled snow, pushed cars, trucks, etc. | had jumper
cables, gas, chains to drag stalled semis out, etc. I'd kill big
rats running around. | was the go to guy and | did the work
cordially and efficiently. There just wasn't much work to do.
I was insanely "busy” every day. The way | looked at it, | was
being paid to "work" and half of that work was up to me. |
hated it, but | saw it as a means to an end. | couldn't see
any other way of doing it. Nobody was going to fund this!
1 knew | could have gotten fired - any day. But again, |
wasn't going to be intimidated into a do-nothing life, like so
many people sink into. With a million laws, arbitrarily
enforced, | relied upon my own sense of fairness, not some
stupid law or rule. | always tried to treat others with
respect. | always detested bullies. | believe in the Golden
Rule. But | also was unusually self-reliant. Things other
people spent time worrying about, like religion, what other
people thought or did or whatever, | just ignored. I'm a
person, here on Earth. Shouldn't my concerns be about
what i actually happening on this planet and who and why
people and other life forms are being destroyed? I've got
children and grandchildren and we're leaving them a dying
planet. What other kinds of motivation do people need?7?

Now, we see another clown - Trump - putting us all on
the doorstep of destruction. It's a very moribund system.
Hundreds of thousands of pot smokers are still rotting away
in prison, while others buy legal weed. Lose your fear now!

| want to say some nice things about my wife, Leslie.
She was alibrarian and is a wonderful Mother and
Grandmother. Without her, none of this would have been
remotely possible. She's a dedicated humanist in her own
right and makes every day worth living in this otherwise
very sad world. Who else in this world would have put up
with such a guy - and even helped him do all this??? Thanks
for everything, my Dear! Now we have two grandsons. It's
awesome! We're both retired, yet very active, still.

What do prisoners think of zines? | asked a few.

“SERVE and PROTECT”
does not mean

“KILL and COVER-UP!”
Writings by Anastazia Schmid

Symbols signs understanding what no one else sees humanity seeing
beyond the clock speaks to me numbers numerology a sign prophecy
coming to an end all fulflled to move beyond evolve evolution of the
spritanarchist fire a missing part completes symbolism of ethercal ¢/3
symphonies symphonic movement mood swing pendulum tick tock
ticking time bomb short fuse nerves on the outside of my skin creeping
crawling nerves anger biting boiling ver roling toiling pressure explode
reload lock & load postal crazy my heart with infinite never enough
hazy. No such thing as innocent we're all fucking guilty of something
finger pointing blame in the spotlight constantly on trial in someone's
judgmental eyes am I just a mirror of all within yourself you secretly
despise? Cries & lies & no one knows how many days we just want to
die give up the ghost & throw in this filthy fucking tawel never
anticipated never asked for "criminal® taint & stain & I never seem to
have - what? What s it that I want? What does anyone want? Or even
deserve? Anything? Everything? Nothing? No- thing? Late or not
early enough? Time does nothing but taunt me, tease & haunt me mock
‘me - the joke of the clock hyper aware of the sound of the seconds
becoming minutes becoming millenniums its everlasting twisted &
knotted tied & bound - I hear all - even when there's no sound I hear the
‘words swimming inside my mind tangled a noose a sailor's knot holding
the anchor down to this ship - need to just st sail cut the rope set me free
T'm bound in a better way entirely spreading out spread cagle eagle’s
wings freedom fly hold on hang on hang glide enjoy the ride slide into
slide under slide on slide off spread out ike honey on a cracker - take a
bite communion worship the Goddess come to the temple this body - in
this moment lasts eternity - moment by moment. The sands of time
reveal it nover existed this foolish notion of hierarchy of humanity
inventing a way to make us work & pay with every breath - blood, sweat
& tears & way too many fucking years - holding on to all I know & love
to moments frozen pictures inside my mind of holding onto pulling in
recling in the memories a picture show of emotion - in motion - scene
afier scenc after scene - see in symbols - hieroglyphics written across
space & time my soul's destiny existed in life long gone to be found
‘again - resurrection of past life new life - what exists & what doesn't?
Creation comes through thought free your mind - I think I can think I can
thislitle engine could do whatever she wants ultimate destruction or
ultimate creation not another do over of this rodeo get it right in this life -
meet me in the middle - 5o this particular flavor of madness ceases to
exist - we need o find balance - does it exist? In the world of lies &
illusion - only love is real. Ana
An Inmate's Lament (in Texas Prison)
By, Antonio Lamont Edwards
Life in prison is terrible
The nolise level can be unbearable 49
Our sentences seems unendable
But what we eat is indigestible
Programmers feels we're incorrigible
And look at us like we're horrible
The public says we're unlovable
But as taxpayers they're being gullible
The health care is deplorable
Our grievances treated as ignorable

The parole board - 7 1/2 years to go on
my 22 1/2 to come up for the board

Says we're all unreformable
And never will be normal-able
The shrink think we're unreachable -

Of playing most are seeking drug addicts psych pills

Not all while unusable
And staff think we're abusable
Policies are unbelievable -

Don't play the game and get caught
Snitches has no face They can be anyone

While change is inconceivable
Shakedowns are uncontrollable

Sometimes I think mens are getting sexual kick off
by makes us grab our privated parts then stick
our fingers in our mouth and turning around
they shouldn't be able to do us like that...

Rules our pain is inconsolable
Prison - this mess is unforgivable
Let's face it, life in prison is unlivable
vs

ZINES

by, Sean Swain

When try torthink of an analogy that will best convey just
how important and Ufe-changing gines are, I'mreminded of o
scene fromthe movie; The Matrie:” It'y one of my favorite

movies.

The main character, Neo; hay searched for a-shadowy figure
named Morpheus: When they meet; Morpheus offery Neo-av
choice betweerablue plland a red pill: Bluepill, Neo-wakes
up not remembering avthing. Redpdll; Neo-will axaken to-
‘hiddentruthyhe never i

Neo; of course; chose the red pille He awakened:to-a world
\here the population & asleep andsdreaming; mesmerized by o
mmummmwwwyw
to-keep the exploitutive system.

Inthe movie, NWWWMQM»MM
oncehe sees what'ygoing ons he cannot wn-seeit: IEylife-

| changing: Therelyhiylife before this fateful encounter, ands

therey hig lifo after.

For the maliony locked tev cagey in the U.S. and aroundsthe:
world gines arethe red pille Thereareno-other means for
consciousness-raising - no-other technologies. Agentyof hyper-
controldor not permit accesy to-podcasty or internet radio; and
just ke those powerful forcey in the movie; prisonsmismanagery
secktir keep the populations sleeping andpredictuble: But; the

Keepy theny returning to- the same criminal strategiey ands
refuming to-prison:
Zinew introduce an alternative narrative, apowerful one:
By providing prisonery a-penetrating understanding of the
maluyfiatamllymnfimalbofu& sinev alio provide the:
empowering tooly that allow all of us to- challenge ands
confront out former thinking, ous prior complicity to-our own

Ziney are o mediumfor personal and social travsformation:
They area medivm for Uberation:
Alwayy choose the red il
To You Who Touch These Writings 4%
By
Hybachi LeMar

The impact of the underground zine is relatable to the way that the flame of a
single candle can light the wicks of allthat it touches.
They're made of souls which the System cements beyond the walls of obscurity.
For those who've been consumed in the absence of ight.
‘They produce an incendiary reaction!

|

“The publishing logo of So. Chicago ABC - diagonally stamped by another on the
back of an Anarchist zine on Venezuela from the El Libertario organization in
Caracas - closes a work on conscious-kindling views & Freedom Fighters arrested
‘who you most ikely have never heard nor seen nothing of from either your
tube or the web.

Autobiographies (ones not found in bookstores) ike Lisa Savage's Zero o
Anarchist in 1.2 Seconds” which documents her fife as a survivor of rape, drug
‘abuse & her evolution as an Anarchist are explosively lit underground dlassics.

These reveal intimate truths to the audience of one confined in the recesses of
systemic alienation.

They glow with the overstanding that one of the most empowering things for
people to know i to know that they re not alone, and underground zines confirm
that you're not alone when you resist, 5o much so that they're banned as threats
1o the goverment and its tactc of Divide & Conquer, implemented strategically
for calculated control. The paradox, however, lie in the fact that the cold
repression against anti-authoritarian thinkers makes the “inflammatory nature” of
Anarchist writings al the more hard to extinguish. It also reveals that, as iterary
| cariers of the light of Resistance, the zine i a vital element needed to /
intercontinentally ignite a revolution against that which deprives us of power.

Inthe dark places oflfe - where so many are beat down by enemies outside, as
‘well as the enemy within one's own mind - the zine can also fluminae parts of
the Self that the Self has been waiting to see. An enlightening passage from the
Each One Teach One, (interview Series #3) s sure to empower even the most
disempowered engaging in quiet reflection.

In this moth-atiracting writing, Anthony Rayson relates how Talib. Y. Rasheed
made “a strongly explicated case that self-analysisis the way to go to attain sel-
love, sel-respect, self-corrcting behaviors, etc... Once we forgive ourselves and

' go from there, our natural inclinations of soldarity, mutual aid, ree skool
gide our work*

This s transformational teaching!

Field-organizer manuals like “Let's Organize the 'Hood,” - a zine put together by
BAF firebrands who share over a combined 100 years of experience in Peoples’

struggles, imparts knowledge to those inclined to igniting the revolution across
the unlit streets of amerika and are as resourceful as sulfurl

“Organizing is not just about identifying an issue and mobilizing people around

that alone; it instructs. It is about building organizations that can wield collective
power for the people. We come to build a community base that can make that

‘happen.”

In condlusion.

‘The amerikan govemment, in violating its own 1st Amendment guarantee of Free
‘Speech, is breeding a decentralized underground of pyro-ziniacs with
unprecedented potential. Its an early-21t century “zine-scare,” and the US.
govemment's damping down on them from being received by prisoners across
the country. Out of sight. Out of mind. To become extirpated from memory's
view.

But one only needs to gaze unflinchingly at a flame resting on the wick of a
candiestick for no more than a minute, before the image of that flame inevtably
begins to appear behind the fids of the eyes when they're covered. It appears
erect, alt and unmoved inits stamina regardless of how heavy the hands are that
tryto repress it

f you're anything ke me, then you've probably been fighting and struggling all
of your life, now is the time for you to take that struggle to another level... Zines
are our real weapons, this s how we get powerful, dangerous, this is how we cut
through the bars, tear down the walls, and defend ourselves from our enernies,
with the knowledge we obtain from these zines.

“Zines are lie grenades, or bombs, because when you read them your mind
explodes; something goes off in your brain, and once that fire has been (it there's

1o extinguishing it It i through these zines that we get our real revolutionary
education.” (Coyote)

To you who feel consiified in unacknowledged holes: Bear rebeliously amid
the dusk of a despotic existence!

Possess a mind that attracts the moth. A

To all considering stepping foot nto the thréshold of the underground zine

world, the light of Truth beckons you to stand up reach out and get ft!
01/07/2020 Women's Prison Zines By: Norma L. DeBooth

Though physically incarcerated, an imprisoned woman who thinks with an
autonomous mind isfree, stemming from reading and writing prison zines, which
helps to iberate new ideas and perspectives, while inside, then when released.
Her voice is no longer obscured nor forgotten, nor are the community of women
‘whom read, then add their experiences into prison zines.

Incarcerated women are the most invisible members of American society, whose
thoughts, opinions and experiences are misrepresented plus ignored by the
mainstream media, and some others. Therefore, they band together to write and
share zines, many times by [fishing] or receiving help by transmitting their
messages through underground helpers.

“The prison society solates these women from nearly all the happenings of out
side actviies.

Prison societies are sexists with barely no up dated reading material nor personal
hygiene items for these females. As male prisoners have taken the first initiatives
. in filing court case after another to protest the inhumane conditions of the
institution where they re confined, females were steady fing gender
discrimination appeals in courts, pleading for reforms because they lacked equal
tights with incarcerated men. Women in prison have fewer opportunities than
men for job training and work release. Wormen have less access to sodial sevices,
yisitors and lawyers, plus are more likely o be treated fike a child by prison staff
whom often are years younger, expressing ice - cold imperial, harsh, abrasive
personaiiies. Both male and female inmates lack diverse personal products,
interesting educational programs, respect,etc.

Zine witing is communication, and is necessary in order to magnify how many
Staff institution, law enforcement employees jee, insult, assault, demean, set-up,
Set-back, lie about and murder incarcerated People. Messages within zine

{ witings are vitl, knowledgeable, helpful pent - up ralties abl to encourage the
| mind & opens understanding into communication and actions to reach in to help
those whom seem to be invisible to some others!

*Norrna DeBooth is Hybachi LeMar's Mother. She lives in Chicago.

‘South Chicago ABC
Zine Distro
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