Contributors to elenemigocomun.net

The large part of the material published on elenemigocomun.net is produced by activists who participate in social–political organizations, media collectives and solidarity groups mainly based in Mexico and the USA. At the website, you can access audio, video, photos and articles that provide up-to-date information on people struggling for justice in defense of their territory, resources and way of life against government-backed corporate plunder and increasing military and paramilitary violence in the name of national security. Our contributors document community organization and social, political and cultural resistance; expose the state repression of activists, and do in-depth analyses of US military intervention in Mexico. We also translate and publish communiqués about key events, as well as calls for people to take action, such as contacting their electoral representatives or demonstrating at one of the many Mexican Consulates in the USA and around the world.

Contributors

Bradley Allen is a reporter and editorial volunteer with Indybay. In February of 2006, he created the website elenemigocomun.net to support the documentary film, El Enemigo Común. Bradley has been responsible for maintaining the website. His photographs have been widely-published and featured in numerous video documentaries about the 2006 uprising in Oaxaca. Bradley covered the 2003 protest against the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) in Miami, Florida, and his photos were included in the groundbreaking exposé film The Miami Model. He also documented the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans and Houston, the 2008 Republican National Convention in St. Paul, Minnesota, and many other significant events. [BradleyAllen.net]
Carolina is an activist, reporter and translator whose work is published on a number of different free and independent media outlets in Mexico and other countries, including CML-DF, Noticias de la Rebelión, Regeneración Radio, Zapateando, Multimedios Cronopios, Radio Zapote, Ke Huelga Radio, Desinformémonos, México Indymedia, La Haine, Abu-Jamal News, Angola 3 News, Poor Magazine, Defenestrator, and Indybay Indymedia. Whether on city streets, indigenous communities, university campuses, occupied spaces or outside prisons, she takes down the words of people in resistance and spreads them far and wide. Her translation skills have been especially useful in getting out calls for urgent solidarity action to people around the world when repression has come down on activists in Oaxaca as well as in Atenco, Guerrero, Michoacán, Chiapas, Ciudad Juárez or Mexico City. The struggle to free political prisoners and abolish the prison system is one of her top priorities. [Some articles by Carolina]
Scott Campbell is an organizer, writer and translator from Oakland, CA, where he works on a variety of issues regarding war, occupation, migration, and resistance. He is actively involved in Occupy Oakland and Palestine solidarity work. Scott has spent much time traveling and living in Mexico, including Chiapas and Oaxaca. As well as El Enemigo Común, his observations, articles, and translations have been published in CounterPunch, Monthly Review Zine, ZNet, Dissident Voice, Rebelión, OaxacaLibre and more. El Enemigo Común published this statement after Scott was shot with a beanbag projectile as he filmed Oakland police following the Oakland General Strike on November 2, 2011. His photos and videos from Palestine can be seen on his Flickr and YouTube accounts. He blogs at Angry White Kid and can be found on Twitter.
Simón Sedillo has contributed to the production of a wide variety of documentary films, which focus primarily on the effects of neoliberalism and militarism on indigenous communities, immigrant communities, and communities of color in the US and Mexico. Sedillo tours universities and community centers throughout the USA screening films and facilitating discussions and workshops on political economy and geopolitics in Mexico and the USA. [Read More]

Acknowledgements

We would like to thank all the folks who helped in the production of the documentary El Enemigo Común and who helped get this site off the ground with articles, photos and videos.

Volunteers from the Austin Independent Media Center made numerous visits to Oaxaca as journalists and human rights observers, worked with community-based organizations, and collaborated with the Oaxacan Popular Magonista Antineoliberal Coordination (COMPA) on the production of El Enemigo Común.

One of their members, Brent Perdue, captured dramatic footage for the documentary and reported from Oaxaca after the film’s release. His articles include “Oaxaca Explodes” and “With Impunity, Ruiz Ortiz, the Face of Repression.”

Some of the other important contributors to the site have been:

  • danielsan, who traveled to Mexico in 2006 to learn from the teachers struggle and popular resistance in Oaxaca and published audios, photos and videos, featuring important aspects of the rebellion and the subsequent government crackdown. [Audio, photos and video by danielsan on elenemigocomun.net]
  • Barucha Calamity Peller, whose photos and analysis of the events in Oaxaca have also been widely distributed through alternative media outlets such as CounterPunch and the Independent Media Center. Peller reported from Lebanon during the 2006 Israeli-Lebanon war just before entering Oaxaca. [Read her articles on elenemigocomun.net]
  • Jen Lawhorne, who helped to relay breaking news from Oaxaca and translated crucial information into English. Lawhorne filmed and produced short video documentaries about the women involved in the historic take over of Oaxaca state television station Channel 9 as well as 13 privately owned radio stations, including The Taking of the Media in Oaxaca.

El Enemigo Común would like to give special thanks to the Friends of Brad Will, a network of social and environmental activists based in the USA. It was founded in memory of Brad Will, a New York City Indymedia journalist who was shot and killed in Oaxaca, Mexico on October 27th, 2006 by paramilitaries affiliated with the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI). Friends and family members of Brad Will are working to expose the Mexican government’s assassination of Brad Will and are vocal and active opponents of expanding the failed US ‘drug war’ into Mexico under the guise of “Plan Mexico.”