39: Supporting the Filton 25 w/ Lisa Matthews

39: Supporting the Filton 25 w/ Lisa Matthews

In August 2024, six Palestine Action activists breached Elbit Systems UK's newly built facility in Filton, Bristol, and used sledgehammers to sabotage drones, computers, and manufacturing equipment. Elbit is Israel's largest private defence contractor, and supplies armaments to the IDF used in their genocidal attack on Gaza. Twenty-five activists were charged under a "joint enterprise" provision in relation to the direct action. Four have been convicted and sentenced as terrorists, under a provision the judge concealed from the jury. My guest this week is Lisa Matthews, step mother of Finn Collins, one of 19 defendants still awaiting trial. Finn faces criminal damage and violent disorder charges, with his trial scheduled for February 2027. Lisa walks me through the retroactive use of counter-terror powers against activists who acted before Palestine Action was proscribed, the judicial rulings that stripped the defendants' right to explain themselves, and what it's like to hold an antifascist family together when one's vision is clear but one's future is uncertain.  SOURCES Free the Filton 25 — campaign site and legal timeline [https://filtonactionists.com] Support Finn — GoFundMe (Michael Collins) [https://www.gofundme.com/f/support-finn-political-prisoner] Geoffrey Robertson KC on the Filton Four — Free the Filton 25 [https://filtonactionists.com/geoffrey-robertson-kc-speaks-out-on-the-filton-4/] Re: Rajiv Menon KC — contempt ruling, full text [https://www.judiciary.uk/wp-content/uploads/2026/06/Re-Rajiv-Menon-KC.pdf] Menon KC closing speech, Trial 1 — Real Media [https://realmedia.press/the-filton-trial-defence-speeches/] Inside the Palestine Action trial that could redefine protest as terrorism — openDemocracy [https://www.opendemocracy.net/inside-the-palestine-action-trial-that-could-redefine-protest-as-terrorism/] Palestine Action activists sentenced as terrorists — Novara Media [https://novaramedia.com/2026/06/12/palestine-action-activists-will-be-sentenced-as-terrorists-court-confirms/] Amnesty International and lawyers condemn terrorism sentencing — Peace Brigades International Canada [https://pbicanada.org/2026/06/12/amnesty-international-lawyers-and-public-figures-comment-on-the-terrorism-related-provisions-in-the-sentencing-of-the-filton-4/] Gaza toll could exceed 186,000 — Lancet letter, Al Jazeera [https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/7/8/gaza-toll-could-exceed-186000-lancet-study-says] Prairieland defendant sentenced to 30 years for moving a box of antifascist zines — The Intercept [https://theintercept.com/2026/06/23/prairieland-texas-ice-protest-prison-sentences/] SOCIALS * Bluesky: matthewremski.bsky.social [https://bsky.app/profile/matthewremski.bsky.social] * Instagram: @matthew_remski [https://www.instagram.com/matthew_remski] * YouTube: @antifascistdad [https://www.youtube.com/@antifascistdad] * TikTok: @antifascistdad [https://www.tiktok.com/@antifascistdad] * Patreon: antifascistdadpodcast [https://www.patreon.com/antifascistdadpodcast] * Order Antifascist Dad [https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/807656/antifascist-dad-by-matthew-remski/]

UNLOCK 37.1 Enough is Enough, Again w/ Dean and Matt of Magnificast (pt 2)

Part 2 of my convo with Dean Dettloff and Matt Bernico of the Magnificast podcast, digging into the forensic heart of their great new book, Enough is Enough: Degrowth, Capitalism, and Liberation Theology. We work through Walter Benjamin's fragmentary essay on capitalism as religion, the liberation theology critique of GDP as a modern idol, what degrowth actually looks like in practice, and the difference between retreat and cooperation. We close with an urgent question: would the Berrigan brothers be sabotaging data centers today?  * Bluesky: matthewremski.bsky.social [https://bsky.app/profile/matthewremski.bsky.social] * Instagram: @matthew_remski [https://www.instagram.com/matthew_remski/] * YouTube: @antifascistdad [https://www.youtube.com/@antifascistdad] * TikTok: [@antifascistdad] * Patreon: antifascistdadpodcast [https://www.patreon.com/antifascistdadpodcast] * Order Antifascist Dad [https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/807656/antifascist-dad-by-matthew-remski/] SOURCES Enough is Enough: Degrowth, Capitalism, and Liberation Theology — Bernico and Dettloff, Fortress Press [https://www.fortresspress.com/store/product/9798889830795/Enough-Is-Enough] The Magnificast podcast [https://themagnificast.com/] Walter Benjamin, "Capitalism as Religion" — fragment, 1921, available via Verso [https://www.versobooks.com/blogs/news/3226-capitalism-as-religion] Franz Hinkelammert — theology and economics [https://www.amazon.com/s?k=Franz+Hinkelammert] Pablo Richard — Chilean liberation theologian [https://www.amazon.com/s?k=Pablo+Richard+liberation+theology] Ignacio Ellacuría, "The Crucified People" — in Mysterium Liberationis [https://www.amazon.com/Mysterium-Liberationis-Fundamental-Concepts-Liberation/dp/0883448750] Sebastian Kappen — Indian liberation theologian [https://www.amazon.com/s?k=Sebastian+Kappen] The Iona Community [https://iona.org.uk/] A Theology of Liberation — Gustavo Gutierrez [https://www.amazon.com/Theology-Liberation-History-Politics-Salvation/dp/0883441632] Laudato Si — Pope Francis [https://www.vatican.va/content/francesco/en/encyclicals/documents/papa-francesco_20150524_enciclica-laudato-si.html]

38. Radicalized at 15 by Climate and Corporate Greed w/ Emily Lowan

Today I'm sitting down with Emily Lowan, leader of the BC Green Party and the first GenZ leader of a major political party in Canada. Emily was radicalized at 15 during the 2016 US election while on a cross-country school trip. She built a decade of movement work through climate organizing, Wet'suwet'en solidarity, and pipeline fights, then won an insurgent party leadership campaign in two weeks at age 25. We talk about heat domes, Kristi Noem advising a BC mining company and American oligarchs buying up 1.2M acres in the interior. Emily also shares a visualization practice for doing this work without burning out that she learned from an ecosocialist movement elder.  SOURCES Emily Lowan on Instagram [https://www.instagram.com/emilylowan/] BC Green Party [https://bcgreens.ca/] Harsha Walia, Border and Rule [https://www.haymarketbooks.org/books/1553-border-and-rule] National Farmers Union BC [https://www.nfu.ca/] Corporate Mapping Project, Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives [https://www.corporatemapping.ca/] Climate Action Network Canada [https://climateactionnetwork.ca/] Stan Kroenke landholdings — investigative background [https://thetyee.ca] Wet'suwet'en land defenders and Coastal GasLink resistance [https://unistoten.camp/] Jewish Faculty Network report on CIJA [https://jewishfacultynetwork.ca/] Rifflandia Festival [https://rifflandia.com/] Michelle Remembers — background [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michelle_Remembers] matthewremski.bsky.social [https://bsky.app/profile/matthewremski.bsky.social] @matthew_remski [https://www.instagram.com/matthew_remski/] @antifascistdad [https://www.youtube.com/@antifascistdad] [@antifascistdad on TikTok] antifascistdadpodcast [https://www.patreon.com/antifascistdadpodcast] Order Antifascist Dad [https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/807656/antifascist-dad-by-matthew-remski/]

UNLOCK 36.1 Asking Liberals: “Do You Condemn Imperialism?”

Following up on my conversation with Toronto comedian Nour Hadidi: I'm haunted by one detail from the harassment campaign against her. It's about how she posted the clip of Al Jazeera bureau chief Wael Al-Dahdouh refusing Christiane Amanpour's question, "Do you wish Hamas had never committed October 7th?" by dismantling its premise entirely. I look at Adam Johnson's research on the "Do you condemn Hamas" formula as a media disciplining strategy, Frantz Fanon's analysis of the colonized intellectual required to perform Western values before being heard, Charles Cobb's history of the nonviolence demand inside the civil rights movement, and communications scholar Zohar Kampf's empirical study of adversarial ethnopolitical interviews. Kampf identifies six options for interviewees facing the condemnation ritual, and only one of them doesn't feel like caving.  SOURCES Al Jazeera Journalist Wael Al-Dahdouh Slammed CNN — YouTube [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f0UmkvOYMco] Adam Johnson and Nima Shirazi — Citations Needed podcast [https://citationsneeded.com/] Noura Erakat — Justice for Some: Law and the Question of Palestine — Stanford University Press [https://www.sup.org/books/law/justice-some] Frantz Fanon — The Wretched of the Earth — Grove Press [https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/118753/the-wretched-of-the-earth-by-frantz-fanon/] Charles Cobb — This Nonviolence Stuff'll Get You Killed — Duke University Press [https://www.dukeupress.edu/this-nonviolence-stuff-ll-get-you-killed] Zohar Kampf — "Do You Condemn?" chapter in The Discourse of Indirectness — John Benjamins [https://benjamins.com/catalog/pbns.331] Edward Said — Covering Islam — Penguin Random House [https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/159777/covering-islam-by-edward-w-said/] Ramzy Baroud — My Father Was a Freedom Fighter — Pluto Press [https://www.plutobooks.com/9781783714124/my-father-was-a-freedom-fighter/] The Onion — Dying Gazans Criticized for Not Using Last Words to Condemn Hamas [https://www.theonion.com/] Order Antifascist Dad [https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/807656/antifascist-dad-by-matthew-remski/] * Bluesky: matthewremski.bsky.social [https://bsky.app/profile/matthewremski.bsky.social] * Instagram: @matthew_remski [https://www.instagram.com/matthew_remski/] * YouTube: @antifascistdad [https://www.youtube.com/@antifascistdad] * TikTok: [@antifascistdad] * Patreon: antifascistdadpodcast [https://www.patreon.com/antifascistdadpodcast] * Order Antifascist Dad [https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/807656/antifascist-dad-by-matthew-remski/]

37. Enough is Enough w/ Dean and Matt of The Magnificast, pt 1

I'm joined today by Dean Dettloff and Matt Bernico, co-hosts of The Magnificast podcast and the authors of a brilliant new book, Enough is Enough: Degrowth, Capitalism, and Liberation Theology, out now from Fortress Press. We start with some basics: what the Magnificat is and why secular leftists should care about it, what "enough is enough" actually means across its political, economic, and spiritual dimensions, and why working within a contradictory religious tradition might be a lot like keeping one's faith in leftism. Also: was St. Francis of Assisi a proto-socialist? Was he neurodivergent? And how about the Global South rise and Global North suppression of liberation theology? In this era of Pope Leo: does the church still metabolize radical ideas into liberal poetry?  Cool stuff for anyone trying to understand the antifascist religious left that JD Vance doesn't want you to know exists. * Bluesky: matthewremski.bsky.social [https://bsky.app/profile/matthewremski.bsky.social] * Instagram: @matthew_remski [https://www.instagram.com/matthew_remski/] * YouTube: @antifascistdad [https://www.youtube.com/@antifascistdad] * TikTok: [@antifascistdad] * Patreon: antifascistdadpodcast [https://www.patreon.com/antifascistdadpodcast] * Order Antifascist Dad [https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/807656/antifascist-dad-by-matthew-remski/] SOURCES Enough is Enough: Degrowth, Capitalism, and Liberation Theology — Bernico and Dettloff, Fortress Press [https://www.fortresspress.com/store/product/9798889830795/Enough-Is-Enough] The Magnificast podcast [https://themagnificast.com/] Christianity on the Spectrum podcast [https://christianityonthespectrum.podbean.com/] A Theology of Failure — Marika Rose, Fordham University Press [https://fordhampress.com/a-theology-of-failure-hb-9780823284078.html] Vampyroteuthis Infernalis — Vilém Flusser, University of Minnesota Press [https://www.upress.umn.edu/9780816678228/vampyroteuthis-infernalis/] The Silencing of Leonardo Boff — Harvey Cox [https://www.amazon.com/Silencing-Leonardo-Boff-Vatican-Christianity/dp/0940989352] People of God: The Struggle for World Catholicism — Penny Lernoux [https://www.amazon.com/People-God-Struggle-World-Catholicism/dp/014009816X] A Theology of Liberation — Gustavo Gutierrez [https://www.amazon.com/Theology-Liberation-History-Politics-Salvation/dp/0883441632] Laudato Si — Pope Francis [https://www.vatican.va/content/francesco/en/encyclicals/documents/papa-francesco_20150524_enciclica-laudato-si.html]