THE ASSISTED DYING BILL CLEARED THE HOUSE OF COMMONS IN THE SAME WEEK THE GOVERNMENT CONFIRMED ITS COMMITMENT TO SLASHING FINANCIAL SUPPORT FOR DISABLED AND CHRONICALLY-ILL PEOPLE ~ punkacademic ~ The Labour government’s commitment to finish the job started by its Tory and Liberal Democrat predecessors has taken vivid form in the proposed cuts to the health component of Universal Credit and restrictions to claims for Personal Independence Payment. The proposed cuts—to welfare support already cut to the bone—are savage. But the language used to couch the proposals is that of empowerment, of getting people back into work, of restoring dignity. To paraphrase Proudhon on Malthus, this is ‘the theory of political murder; of murder from motive of philanthropy and for love of God’. When Rachel Reeves said—more than a decade ago—that Labour would be ‘tougher on welfare’ than the Tories, it would have been wise to believe her. Starmer’s Labour sees citizens simply as human resources. As the HR department for the capitalist state, extractivism is the order of the day. Disquiet with Labour’s merciless attacks on the disabled has stretched even to the columns of Guardian journalists who had lambasted Corbyn for his mild social democracy. The government whip Vicky Foxcroft resigned her post rather than support the cuts. Foxcroft’s resignation, and the publication of the formal legislative proposals on the cuts, came the day before the Third Reading of Kim Leadbeater’s Assisted Dying Bill in the House of Commons, where it was approved with a majority of 23. Few anarchists would dispute someone’s right to end their lives on their own terms as they see fit. But equally, few anarchists would dispute the centrality of those most likely to be affected to any discussion of actions to be taken. As ever, means must prefigure ends and not be justified by them. Yet disabled voices were often marginalised in the ‘debate’ over the Assisted Dying Bill. Disability Rights UK and Disabled People Against the Cuts (DPAC) both came out steadfastly against it. They argued that, given our societal context and the gross devaluing of disabled lives, the Bill as currently constructed would pressure disabled and chronically ill people to choose death for fear of being a burden on their relatives or wider society. It’s important to note that disabled and chronically ill people do not speak with one voice. The late Debbie Purdy, a music journalist with progressive multiple sclerosis, fought for her partner’s right to assist her death without fear of prosecution. In the run-up to the votes in Parliament, however, stories such as Purdy’s were privileged to the exclusion of others; the campaign Dignity in Dying had greater resources and reach than DPAC, and newspaper and media outlets were keen to frame the ‘debate’ as one between rational individuals who wanted a peaceful and dignified death and religiously-motivated figures who appealed for them to ‘have faith’. The real concerns of representative bodies were not addressed; nor were those of sections of the medical profession, who—alarmed at the removal of safeguards at committee stage—withdrew their support for the legislation. As someone living with progressive multiple sclerosis, I can attest to the endless the casual indignities of living with disability under capitalism. As an anarchist, I also believe firmly that people should have the right to end their lives and if necessary have support to do so. But that doesn’t translate into support for legislation promoted by a state hell-bent on the eradication of disabled people through the withdrawal of vital support. In her book The War Against Disabled People, published on the eve of the COVID-19 pandemic, Ellen Clifford argues that since 2010, the Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition’s austerity policies have led to casualties in the hundreds of thousands. As Clifford notes, in practical terms the most severe penalties for capitalism’s spectacular failures have been visited on those whom it deems less than human; disabled people. Clifford, who is herself disabled and active in DPAV, is unsparing in the horrors she chronicles. It is the story of a neoliberal politics of death, where disabled and chronically ill people become unwanted columns in a fiscal balance sheet that needs amending.  Through the introduction of a much harsher welfare regime, deaths mounted rapidly. The UN itself responded to a DPAC complaint in 2016 with the verdict that the UK government had engaged in “grave and systematic” violations of disabled people’s rights. One of the most powerful aspects of Clifford’s book is its clear elaboration of how these deaths were rendered invisible, how the disabled were compelled to die in the dark. When Jeremy Corbyn, as Labour Party leader, attempted to cite numbers of deaths due to the government’s austerity measures, he was roundly decried in the House and ridiculed by political correspondents who thought this a demonstration of his rhetorical incompetence. The COVID pandemic, which came after the publication of Clifford’s book, only made her points more strongly. Disabled and chronically ill people were disproportionately likely to die. The ominous use of the phrase ‘excluding Clinically Extremely Vulnerable’ in the context of death statistics rendered seemingly-neutral what was actually a eugenicist sleight of hand. Now, this Labour government seems committed to carry on with its Tory predecessors’ pathologisation and demonisation of disabled and chronically ill people, deeming ‘work’ as the only acceptable form of identity, and going so far as to deliberately mislead the public on the nature of their cuts—claiming that Personal Independence Payment is an out-of-work benefit (it isn’t) and talking about “pathways to work” for people who are often already in work but struggling to survive. Disabled people need to be enabled to live before they are assisted to die. Disability—rather than impairment—is caused by society, and specifically by capitalism, against which anarchism has waged war since its origins as a movement in the mid-nineteenth century. This is not just about benefit cuts or assisted dying; it is a foundational struggle over the definition of the true value of life, the possibility of cooperation over competition, and the role of mutual aid in constituting a society worth living in. The post Assisted Dying Bill: The neoliberal politics of death appeared first on Freedom News.

“THERE’S A STRONG TRADITION OF FAR-RIGHT ACTIVISM IN UNIVERSITIES, ANTI-FASCISTS HAVE BEEN TRYING TO COMBAT THAT AND THEY’VE BEEN DEMONISED FOR IT” ~ Mike Finn joins us to talk about Austria’s targeting of anti-fascists barely a month after being forced into a three-party coalition to shut out the far-right, and how “liberal order” governments across Europe often still seem to think of the left as the greater threat. We also talk about the chaos of tariff imposition and its ideological underpinnings, especially in the context of a globalisation project we have never been huge fans of. Back at home, an attempt is being made to pile pressure on Israel-supporting companies with a revived boycott campaign alongside direct action from Youth Demand, and the government has unveiled its latest dystopian brain fart … The post Anarchist News Review: Anti-fascist crackdown, Stock market falls, new BDS and predicting murder appeared first on Freedom News.

IT’S WAS INEVITABLE THAT STARMERITE LABOUR WOULD COME FOR WELFARE IN A VAIN ATTEMPT TO LOOK TOUGH ON THE POOR ~ We discuss the implications of that, talk about the factors which make the sort of international solidarity of the IWD marches so important, and on the (somewhat related) shameful behaviour of the State as it attempts to sideline testimony on spycops’ abuse. The post Anarchist News Review: Spycops victims, IWD and protest sentencing results appeared first on Freedom News.

LONG COVID PATIENTS SUFFER FROM THE SAME SOCIETAL ATTITUDES THAT AFFECT MANY PEOPLE WITH INVISIBLE AND FLUCTUATING DISABILITIES ~ Fingers Malone ~ The government’s “let it rip” attitude to COVID-19 led to the preventable death of large numbers of people, most infamously vulnerable elderly people in care homes. Lack of protections for vulnerable people, failure to provide adequate PPE, and forcing people to work in dangerous conditions exposed many people unnecessarily to the virus. It has also led to large numbers of people now suffering long COVID. Long COVID can cause a wide range of symptoms but the most common are fatigue, brain fog, muscle aches and breathlessness. Fatigue is not just feeling tired, but is a very debilitating condition that can leave people unable to walk or take a shower without help. Women are more likely to develop it than men, and it’s most common in the 45-54 age group. The newspapers, when they cover long COVID at all, are now reporting that patients have mostly gotten better (not the case) and that the current strains are not as dangerous. Having up-to-date boosters does provide some protection (so it is scandalous that the government is not providing free boosters to the general population) and the especially virulent early strains are more likely to lead to long covid than the later variants. However nobody is immune and every COVID infection still has a risk. Immunocompromised people are especially at risk of their condition getting worse with reinfection, which makes the current “COVID is over” assumptions very difficult to navigate for people. Long COVID sufferers, and other people who are especially vulnerable to COVID infection, are currently having to deal with a situation where buildings do not have air purifiers, people do not wear masks anywhere even in hospitals, employers are telling people to come to work with COVID, basically vulnerable people are written off and told to deal with the risk by themselves. Some people wearing masks are abused on buses. Others have said they are marked down as difficult patients for asking staff to wear masks on hospital visits. Doctors are too inclined to write off long COVID as ”just a mental health condition”. The push for attendance in schools, including telling children to come in when they are sick, puts both children and staff who are vulnerable at risk of infection, and puts pressure on pupils with any chronic illness to attend to the detriment of their health. Doctors like patients to come in with a condition that has a straightforward test and then a recognised treatment plan and there is often mistreatment and neglect of patients with conditions that don’t fit this model. Long COVID patients suffer from a lot of the same societal attitudes that affect many people with invisible and fluctuating disabilities. Many people perceive “genuine” disabilities to exist only when a person cannot do anything at all and when their condition is always the same. A classic example is that a wheelchair user should not be able to move their legs — there was a lot of fuss when Doctor Who had a character in a wheelchair who crossed hers. This actor, in real life, does use a wheelchair, and she can cross her legs. Many people who use wheelchairs can walk short distances, and people are afraid to get out of their wheelchairs in public due to hostile reactions. The only criteria for whether somebody has the “right” to use a wheelchair is if that person benefits from using a wheelchair, and bystanders can mind their own business. Long COVID is a post-viral condition and these are not new or unknown, after the SARS epidemic large numbers of patients were ill long term with them. The government was warned about this by scientists when COVID started, but appear to have ignored it. A lot of patients reporting feeling ill after the acute infection passed were told by GPs to exercise, which is now understood to be harmful. People underestimate the prevalence of long COVID for various reasons. Many who have long COVID don’t know it, as they don’t connect a COVID infection months ago with what appears to be a separate health problem that has turned up. There isn’t a straightforward long COVID test, or at least not one that GPs are habitually using. People who are not well enough to work and be part of social activities drop out of sight of everyone except people who make the effort to stay in contact with them. The treatment of patients with ME or chronic fatigue is very relevant to long COVID patients. ME was identified in the 1950s at a London hospital and was considered from the start to be a real condition with a physical cause. It was studied and investigated as a post-viral condition. The widely held view of ME as fake, basically hysteria, comes from the views of a small number of scientists who have been given a lot of legitimacy by the government, who preferred to be dismissive of other scientists because it meant they could just ignore and disregard ME patients. The shocking mistreatment of ME patients is a very serious injustice and long COVID patients need to be in solidarity with them struggling for research and compassionate medical treatment. The government’s increasingly shrill announcements that too many people are “economically inactive” and about returning the long term sick to the workplace are causing anxiety and fear amongst sick and disabled people of all conditions. People being pushed into work that they can’t do can cause serious damage to their health. Reports on long COVID minimising the severity of the condition is in this context very worrying. Many long COVID patients have lost their jobs due to their employers refusal to make accommodations, and many others are too sick to work even with accommodations. The government likes to announce yet more crackdowns on claimants, crackdowns that increase hostility, including violent attacks on disabled people, but don’t tackle workplace discrimination, inaccessible transport and lack of accommodations. Clean air inside buildings, especially hospitals and schools, would do a lot to prevent COVID spread. Masking in key places such as hospitals would help protect the most vulnerable. This society is not a caring and supportive place for people with a chronic health condition. Our movement should be, but in practice isn’t always much better. People who have become disabled by a virus need support with rest and recovery, not judgement about whether they are really trying hard enough. Covid safety is difficult to think about for people who feel burned out after years of the pandemic, but immunocompromised people can’t be treated as disposable. Thinking about and including people with long COVID will involve measures that are helpful for lots of other people as well. Air purifiers help people with allergies, bringing a chair to pickets helps people with bad knees or who are pregnant. Ill health isn’t a moral failure or people being annoying, the vulnerability of the body is a part of being human. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- This article first appeared in the Winter 2024/25 issue of Freedom Anarchist Journal To read more about the anarchist and mutual aid approaches during the pandemic, check out Fight For a New Normal? The post Disappearing COVID’s victims appeared first on Freedom News.