Kids In Black is a Portland Oregon based Anarchist Punk Collective, seeking both to build the anarcho punk community locally, build revolutionary community towards destroying capitalist white supremacist patriarchy. We organize shows, potlucks, movie nights, skill-shares, and more... All of our events are fun raisers for local radical causes.
POINTS OF UNITY:
* anti-capitalist
* militant anti-fascist
* anti-authoritarian
* gender/queer positive
* revolutionary feminist
Bands looking for a tour, folks looking to do a workshop, folks wanting to contribute to our zine get in touch!
kidsinblack@gmail.com
http://www.facebook.com/kidsinblack
Kids in Black
Manifesto
It is a history-making tragedy that as our government is blowing the world to fuck and streamlining an earth-killing racist capitalist agenda of death and destruction, the punk community in one of the most “progressive” cities in the United States does fuck-all about it! Not just in radical organizing or solidarity, but there is not even community enough to simply TALK about politics.
Many punks move here from other cities/communities where they were organizing rad shit and doing more than just singing about politics, and end up divorcing punk from politics or worse, just hanging out (because there ain’t no place better to do nothing but hang out than Portland, OR). This isn’t to say that some of these folks don’t do rad things, they do. It’s just that they divorce what they do; bands, silk-screening, art, pot-lucks etc… from politics and giving a shit.
Part of this stems from the fact that so many of us are from radical anti-authoritarian left backgrounds that we take it and our potential for granted. We assume everyone is on our side because they wear black and listen to bands with radical lyrics. We assume everyone cares and that punks still pose a legitimate threat to the status quo. But those punks have become the status quo! There is no explicitness to giving a fuck anymore.
Shows become fashion shows or drinking contests rather than a space to create community around resistance to the status quo. Supposedly anarchist punks embrace elitism towards other punks, etc… What about supporting and loving one another in our resistance?! Let’s face it, it gets pretty lonely when you are punk and you give a fuck in Portland.
Kids In Black!
This project is about creating a community within punk that is explicitly caring, compassionate, and of course, PUNK! To put anarchy back into punk and feel like we are part of something bigger! Our fundamental principle is to abolish all forms of domination and hierarchy in every sphere of life; i.e. smashing capitalism, opposing sexism, homophobia, racism, earth and animal exploitation, and fighting fascism; all based on autonomy, empowerment, solidarity, mutual support, respect, and self-responsibility. The fundamental values of anarchism and anti-authoritarian thought and practice.
Kids in Black is more than the idea and structure of a collective, it is a community of resistance. It is a pole within the Portland punk milieu that means more than music, more than lifestyle. It is social punk! It is punks forever being kids in black, mourning for the future that the bastards in power designate as our inheritance, and black in the finest tradition of anarchism taken to the streets in true social upheaval!!
And of course, punk is also about fun, and giving a fuck can be fun! We are at work organizing shows, punx picnics, festivals, potlucks, mix-tape parties, vegan cook-offs, back-yard fires, yard sales, distros, workshops, trainings, conferences, demonstrations, secret cafes, writing zines, forming bands, record/tape/cd labels, and the list goes on!!! We also aim to make all of our events at least partial fund-raisers for radical causes and organizations.
The idea is that Kids in Black is an umbrella network for all of the punks who want to affiliate with this tendency in Portland punk, but it is also us organizing together. And in order to truly create community, we will do more than merely organizing events, the key is to do this intentionally, to meet people, to share resources, to always be welcoming and invite new punx into the little world we are carving out. Our volunteer-run collective is attempting to establish an autonomous DIY anarcho-punk movement in Portland that is a part of a larger social struggle to destroy this fucked up fucking white supremacist capitalist patriarchy.
So who's in?! We have many ideas and plans already in action and look forward to growing as a collective and as a movement!
For Punk and Revolution,
Kids In Black
