Our anger overflows…
Last Saturday night, the 15 years old pupil Alexis Grigoropoulos was
murdered by a police officer in Exarchia, Athens. It was an
assassination in cold blood, which demonstrated -in the most tragic and
extreme way– the real face of the government’s repressive apparatus and
the total attack which has been launched on our rights, on our life
itself. The government chooses to provide financing for bankers and
bullets for the youth. Alexis's murder cannot be considered an
isolated incident. For a long time, Greek police have been arresting
and torturing students, workers and immigrants. Without any control by
the government these modern sheriffs rule over the city. Our city. In
each demonstration there is uncalled-for and excessive use of tear gas
and persecution in the streets by the police, immigrants are kidnapped
and murdered and the beating is merciless, while at the same time
severe police crimes go unpunished. No matter how much the murderers of
Alexis grieve crocodile tears on TV, they don’t convince us. We know
very well that the special guard force of the police was armed by the
ND and PASOK governments, who have been trying by means of violence and
repression to terrify us, to control us. They have declared the war on the youthAlexis’s
murder is nothing less than the point of no return for us. Being young
nowadays in Greece equals a crime. It means that you get strangled
between the four walls of the school and the ‘frontistirio’
(extra-curricular tutoring), it means that you study without any
guarantee that your degree will be of some value, it means that you
work without any guarantees or regulations, it means that you live in
constant fear. Fear that you are not going to finish school, that
you will study something you don’t like, that you will never find a
job, that you will never get paid more than 700 ?. On top of that, the
government wants now to dictate where we will go, where to have fun,
how to behave. As adolescents, we are overtaken by fear to assert what
we really deserve and desire. They are stealing our dreams. We reclaim everything back!The
last few days thousands of pupils, students and workers have stepped
out into the streets of Greece, to demonstrate that we cannot be fooled
any longer. To declare that our life is really ours as long as we fight
for it. No matter how hard they have tried to defame us by showing
exclusively pictures of broken windows and burnt cars, in order to hide
their guilt, they haven’t succeeded. No matter how hard they have tried
to terrify us not to demonstrate again, we understand that there is no
other solution. The government insists on repression, seemingly unable
to apprehend that this society has changed and that they have to
resign. So, we are going to dethrone them. If they don’t know how to
respect a whole generation, they will learn to fear it. We won’t
stop fighting until we reclaim everything we want: comprehensive, free
public education, full-time and secure jobs, free common spaces and
green, rights and freedoms. We won’t stop fighting until we
overthrow the regime and take back control of our lives. We will join
our voices with the voices of young people all over Greece and in every
school, every university, every work place, every neighbourhood; we
will insist on all the things we have been deprived of for so long. And
even more! Our solidarity and our collective acts will be our weapons. We reclaim what belongs to us!
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