We Are an Image from the Future

The Greek Revolt of December 2008

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April 19, 2024 | History

We Are an Image from the Future

The Greek Revolt of December 2008

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What causes a city, then a whole country, to explode? How did one neighborhoods outrage over the tragic death of one teenager transform itself into a generalized insurrection against State and capital paralyzing an entire nation for a month?

This is a book about the murder of fifteen-year-old Alexis Grigoropoulos, killed by the police in the Exarchia neighborhood of Athens on December 6thr 2008, and of the revolution in the streets that followed, bringing business as usual in Greece to a screeching, burning halt for three marvelous weeks, and putting the fear of history back into the bureaucrats of Fortress Europe and beyond.

We Are an Image From the Future delves into the December insurrection and its aftermath through interviews with those who witnessed and participated in it, alongside the communiques and texts that circulated through the networks of revolt. It provides the on-the-ground facts needed to understand these historic events, and also dispels the myths activists outside of Greece have constructed around them. What emerges is not just the intensity of the riots, but the stories of organizing and solidarity, the questions of strategy and tactics: a desperately needed examination of the fabric of the Greek movements that made December possible.

This book is just what Dr. Fucking Anarchy ordered. How to turn insurrection into revolution. The Greek revolt will inspire a generation as Paris '68 did 40 years earlier." — Ian Bone, class warrior and author of Bash the Rich

"If protest is when I say I disagree, and resistance is when I do something about it, then insurrection is when everyone else is on-board too. So it was in December of 2008, when Greece burned… We Are an Image from the Future is a quintessential portrait of revolution in action. The coming global insurrection has already begun." — Ramor Ryan, author of Clandestines

"What the Zapatista uprising of 1994 was to the antiglobalization movement, the Greek uprising of 2008 could be to the demise of capitalism itself." — CrimethInc. Ex-Workers' Collective

"This dazzling collection is not a book about the great insurrection of2008—it is a living piece of it that can become a part of us, and through us, it opens the prospect of a universe we might never otherwise have imagined possible. Future historians may well conclude that the Revolution finally began in 2008. If they do, this book will have played a crucial role in that realization." — David Graeber

Publish Date
Publisher
AK Press
Language
English
Pages
371

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Cover of: We Are an Image from the Future
We Are an Image from the Future: The Greek Revolt of December 2008
2010, AK Press
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Table of Contents

The Street Has Its Own History—Tasos Sagris
Page 1
Solidarity is a Flame—A.G. Schwarz
Page 2
1. Prologos
Page 5
Map of Greece
Page 5
Chronology: 19th-20th Century
Page 5
Alkis: December is a result of social and political processes going back many years. Part I
Page 8
Panagiotis Kalamaras: There were many people who felt we had an unfinished revolution
Page 14
23.10: I began to get involved when I was 16
Page 17
2. And Now One Slogan that Unites Us All: Cops, Pigs, Murderers!
Page 27
Chronology: September 2000-November 2008
Page 27
Argiris: Exarchia Square and the neighborhood assemblies
Page 29
Iulia: Do you join the Party to fuck or do you fuck to join the Party?
Page 31
J.: The raves and free spaces is where the collective consciousness is coming together
Page 34
Lefteria ston Yiannis Dimitraki
Page 38
The Permanent Crisis in Education—TPTG
Page 41
Nikos: The supermarket expropriations were very successful
Page 52
The Prisoners’ Hunger Strike
Page 53
N. & Mi: The prisoners gained a new ability to coordinate their actions
Page 55
You Talk About Material Damages, We Speak About Human Life—Panagiotis Papadimitropoulos
Page 56
3. These Days are for Alexis
Page 77
Map of Athens
Page 77
Chronology: December 6–25, 2008
Page 77
The World Left Behind
Page 94
Lito: Suddenly I heard a bang
Page 94
23.10: I ran to the Polytechnic
Page 98
Homo Sacer Quartet—Flesh Machine
Page 101
Mrs. S.: I was in the heart of the catastrophe
Page 102
Little John: Okay, now we’re going to fuck everything up
Page 105
Andreas: We started with three hundred people, and came back with five hundred
Page 108
Anna: That’s how big this thing was
Page 110
Yiannis: In Patras one thousand people were coming out to the demonstrations
Page 111
Vortex: That was the craziest moment of all December for me
Page 112
Pavlos and Irina: This is the spirit of the revolt
Page 116
Their Democracy Murders—the Polytechnic University Occupation
Page 131
Alexander, Thodoris, Vlasis, & Kostas: All the kids felt so much power yelling at the cops
Page 144
A Black Immigrant’s Cry of Despair
Page 150
These Days Are Ours, Too—the Haunt of Albanian Immigrants
Page 151
Invitation to the Open Popular Assembly of the Liberated City Hall of Aghios Dimitrios
Page 153
Katerina: I thought the revolution was coming
Page 154
Maria: I want to eliminate everything that represents the alienation of our lives
Page 154
Sofia, Vasilis, Bill, and Irini: Before the revolt, all the Greeks were enslaved
Page 156
Transgressio Legis: One day we jacked a fire engine, got on the CB radio, and said, “tonight, you motherfuckers, we will burn you all”
Page 161
We Are Here, We Are Everywhere, We Are an Image from the Future—Ego Te Provoco
Page 165
Ego Te Provoco: The media worked as part of the counterinsurgency
Page 169
Vortex: The occupation of the national TV
Page 173
Call for a New International
Page 176
Em: In London the response was immediate
Page 184
Pere: In Barcelona, we quickly organized a solidarity protest
Page 186
Adams: Many foreigners have been killed
Page 187
Open Letter from the Soldiers
Page 189
Eliza:The Treaty of Varkiza is broken
Page 191
The Logic of Not Demanding—A.G. Schwarz
Page 192
Not this History But this Rage is Ours—Ankara Anarchy Initiative
Page 194
To those who rise up in Greece—ABC Wellington
Page 196
A Bedouin Anytime! A Citizen Never—Ego Te Provoco
Page 197
Kostas Tsironis: I don’t care if I don’t take even one more picture, I just want to be okay with myself
Page 199
Journal entry of one of the insurrectionists
Page 205
To all those who did not speak with words
Page 206
4. Obedience Stopped, Life is Magical
Page 213
Chronology: December 28–March 4
Page 213
Alexis Grigoropoulos Street
Page 215
Koukouloforos
Page 216
The Spirit of December on a Global Scale—A.G. Schwarz
Page 219
Maya: Konstantina was the first to join the union
Page 225
Ego Te Provoco: We need to make it obvious that it is easy to attack
Page 229
Andreas: We finally understood that many people supported us
Page 232
Panagiotis Kalamaras:The myth of Sisyphus
Page 234
Transgressio Legis: When there is strong social conflict, you raise the tension of the attacks
Page 235
Assembly of Media Workers: We want to occupy the media, and use it for the movement
Page 237
December’s Riots as Mediated by the Image of Mass Media—Leandros Kyriakopoulos
Page 241
Mi: The new neighborhood assemblies
Page 244
Kill the Sexist In Your Head—the menses flow
Page 247
The Limitations of Anti-Sexism—Sissy Doutsiou
Page 248
Adriani and Flora: Now there are more social centers in Thessaloniki
Page 261
Jana: Many people were saying that they want Bulgarian society to be “like in Greece”
Page 262
Little John: The next step is to create the places where all the people can meet
Page 265
The Rebellion, the Workplaces, and the Rank’N’File Unions—TPTG
Page 266
Elina: More old people and leftists are coming nearer to the anarchist ideas
Page 269
Lito: Now I really know what terrorism means
Page 271
5. Breaking New Ground
Page 277
Chronology: March–October 2009
Page 277
Alexis Grigoropoulos Park
Page 282
Daredevil: We intervene in the daily flow of things to interrupt it
Page 283
The House of Maria Kallas
Page 286
The Assassination of Prisoner Katerina Goulioni
Page 288
Conversation on a park bench in Thessaloniki
Page 289
Sakis and Dina: Now there’s no going back
Page 291
Kostas: We decided to occupy the university rectorate
Page 292
Alkis: December is a result of social and political processes going back many years, Part II
Page 294
Kazana Poli: You could see the hatred in their eyes
Page 299
Giorgos Voutsis-Vogiatzis
Page 300
We Are Winning—A.G. Schwarz
Page 302
Iulia: I feel very lucky to be living in these times
Page 303
The Political Parties After December
Page 305
Claim of responsibility for an arson attack
Page 306
N. & Mi: The prisoners of December
Page 308
Letter from Anarchist A. Kiriakopoulos
Page 310
What the Cops Told Us
Page 311
Specialized Guerrilla, Diffuse Guerrilla
Page 313
A Hot Summer
Page 317
Conversation with the Owner of a Small Hotel on the Train from Athens to Patras
Page 319
Yiannis: Maybe it’s gotten worse
Page 321
The Media Try to Kill Memory—A.G. Schwarz
Page 322
Alexander, Thodoris, Vlasis, & Kostas: All the people went back to their private lives
Page 326
The Passage to Revolution—Transgressio Legis
Page 327
The Unanimity of the Fearful—Conspiracy of the Cells of Fire
Page 330
December Revisited—Void Network
Page 333
What Greece Means (to me) for Anarchism—A.G. Schwarz
Page 351
Nothing Changed, Everything is Different—Tasos Sagris
Page 358
Glossary
Page 368
Photo Credits
Page 371

Edition Notes

Published in
Oakland, USA
Other Titles
Wir sind ein Bild der Zukunft – auf der Straße schreiben wir Geschichte
Copyright Date
2010

Classifications

Library of Congress
HV6485.G74 W4 2010

Contributors

Editor
A. G. Schwarz
Editor
Tasos Sagris
Editor
Void Network
Cover Photographs
Elen Grigoriadou
Cover Photographs
Kostas Tsironis

The Physical Object

Format
Paperback
Pagination
371p.
Number of pages
371
Dimensions
16 x 23 x 2.5 centimeters
Weight
600 grams

ID Numbers

Open Library
OL24604918M
Internet Archive
WeAreAnImageFromTheFutureTheGreekRevoltOf2008
ISBN 10
1849350191
ISBN 13
9781849350198
LCCN
2010921020
OCLC/WorldCat
759726383, 601121186
Google
y1F7RQAACAAJ
Library Thing
9771226
Storygraph
6995188b-764a-4673-8345-c9239a3f80e1
BookBrainz
73cca2f5-8430-4fbb-b37e-22a4ea6c0adf
Goodreads
7989445

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