‘Straight edge’ has persisted as a drug-free, hardcore punk subculture for 25 years. Its political legacy remains ambiguous and it is often associated with self-righteous macho posturing and conservative Puritanism. While certain elements of straight edge culture feed into such perception, the cultureʼs political history is far more complex.

Since straight edgeʼs origins in Washington, D.C. in the early 1980s, it has been linked to radical thought and action by countless individuals, bands, and entire scenes. Gabriel Kuhn editor of Sober Living for the Revolution (PM Press 2010) traces this history using contributions from famed straight edge punk rockers like Ian MacKaye (of Minor Threat/Fugazi), Dennis Lyxzén (Refused/The (International) Noise Conspiracy), Mark Andersen (Dance of Days) and Andy Hurley (Fall Out Boy); legendary bands like ManLiftingBanner and Point of No Return; radical collectives like CrimethInc. and Alpine Anarchist Productions; and numerous other artists and activists dedicated as much to sober living as to the fight for a better world.

Gabriel Kuhn was born in Austria but soon began moving around with his artist parents. He grew up in various countries, including Turkey, Italy, England and the US, but returned to Austria for most of his formal education and a four-year semi-professional soccer career. Active in radical politics since the late 1980s, publishing projects have always been a focus. In the early 1990s, Gabriel worked with the Austrian autonomist journal TATblatt and anarchist publisher Monte Verita, before turning his attention to DIY zine publishing. Alpine Anarchist Productions was founded in 2000, and distributes pamphlets to this day. Since 2005 Gabriel has been working closely with radical German publisher Unrast. His book ‘Neuer Anarchismus’ in den USA. Seattle und die Folgen was named “Book of the Year 2008″ by Berlin’s Library of the Free. Gabriel also contributes regularly to the Swedish anarchist journal Brand.

BRHG will be giving a short talk on the suffragette Theresa Garnett who attacked Winston Churchill on Temple Meads station 100 years ago last year (see http://www.brh.org.uk/autum2009/suffragette.html)

So if you missed our recreation of the event last year, come and find out why Thersea attacked Churchill and what happened after this famous incident.

So I left Bristol a few weeks ago to start a new life in France. I’m currently staying with friends who live in a large farmhouse close to the beautiful village of Montrésor, near the market town of Loches in Central France.

Eventually I, and my partner, Sandra, will be buying a property in the department (37) – hopefully it will have enough land on which visitors will be able to camp when visiting ~ ideally we want to set up a few yurts and hold a number of small annual events. These would include History weekends, Middle Eastern Dance, Storytelling, Yoga, etc. But it’s still early days for these ideas.

We’re still working in the UK so should be able to make the occasional BRHG gig!

On the French history side of things I’ll shortly be starting to research the history of the French Resistance in the immediate area and make my findings available in English (on the web and in booklets). There are a number of locally available publications in French which touch on the subject – though what their political slant is I’m not sure. Where I am living the events of the 2nd World War, the role of the resistance and the role of those who supported the Vichy Government are still contentious.

As well as being an historian I’m also a storyteller and while I’ve been here I created a couple of stories based in the local region – I’m going to tell them this summer at the Trowbridge and the Whytchwood (Cheltenham) Festivals. Perhaps I’ll see one or two of my BRHG friend there and we can have a jar or two.

Should anyone have information they’d like to share on any of the above do get in touch.

The clubs, pubs, cafés, squatted centres and artists’ studios of Stokes Croft have been the core of Bristol’s underground music and art scene for decades. This is the area that brought us Banksy, Roni Size, The Wild Bunch, Massive Attack, the famous Bristol club, free party and punk scene and all the other things that have made Bristol an exciting place to live since the 1960s.

Now all this is under threat as Bristol City Council and property developers such as ‘Urban Creation’ are joining together to culturally cleanse the area in the pursuit of profit. They say we really need housing. They say they want to improve the area with offices and shops. Bollocks. They’re not doing it for our benefit, they’re not even doing it for the stupid bastards who are going to buy their over priced yuppie boxes. They are doing it because the property prices are high and they can make a load of money out of it.

More shops? They’ve just built the biggest and ugliest shopping centre in Bristol’s history. More shops? We are sick of more shops, yuppie flats and offices. Stokes Croft is our place, it’s where we party, where we make music, where we produce art and where we want to be. They don’t want us doing this anymore. They want us buying music from their shops, they want rich trendies wandering around art galleries on Stokes Croft buying the latest Banksy print and posh types discussing the latest share prices whilst eating sun dried tomatoes on chiabatta drizzled in fresh virgin olive oil flown in from Tuscany, in a fake twee café. They want us out of the centre of Bristol and back in our areas where we won’t cause their wealthy customers any trouble.

Lakota, Clockwork, The Blue Mountain and The Junction are all under threat from the developers and their sickening puppets in the council. There are numerous planning applications on other properties in the Stokes Croft area, as every two-bit landlord and developer (who’d slit their grannies throat for a fiver) tries to get their hands on a bit of the action. Make no mistake, they want to sanitise Stoke Croft, to take our culture away and replace it with an empty plastic consumerism.

We made this city great. All round the world we made Bristol famous. Drum and Bass, Trip-hop, Techno, Reggae and even Crusty have all radiated out from Stokes Croft and the surrounding neighbourhoods of St. Pauls and Montpelier to make the ‘Bristol Sound’ famous the world over. This is what makes a place, its underground culture, the real living breathing heart beat of a city, not the banality of endless chain stores and yuppie rabbit-hutches filled with bored consumers.

Time is of the essence. This is how councillors and developers work, letting us know the truth five minutes before they smash our communities to the ground. Over six thousand people have joined a blog on Facebook in a couple of weeks. We have to get this energy on to the streets, it’s meaningless on the internet alone.

What you can do….

1. Get onto the streets. Come to the protest on Stokes Croft at 11.00am on Saturday 12th April and make your presence felt.
2. Object to the planning applications.
3. Let everyone know what is happening.
4. Write to your local newspaper or Venue and let ‘em have it.
5. Let your local councillor know what they have to do to get your vote in the May elections. And if they don’t agree tell them you will see them in the streets.

If we do not act now we will wake up in a few years living in Milton Keynes. Think about it….

Who are we?

We are not a political party or any such nonsense. We are just bunch of people who have lived and partied on the Croft for years and are angry about the future that is being decided for us by lying politicians and greedy businessmen.

Contact us at: savestokescroft@gmail.com