When Fish Swim Together In One Direction, The Net Breaks

Coordinated community withdrawal of compliance from systems that require our participation to extract from us.

Coordinated community withdrawal of compliance from systems that require our participation to extract from us.

Individual struggle keeps the net working. Coordinated refusal breaks it.

You feel it every month when rent takes half your income. When the credit card minimum payment comes due. When you realize you’ve been “saving for a deposit” for five years and you’re further away than when you started.
You are not failing to escape. You are caught in a net that is pulling you, along with everyone around you, toward extraction and precarity.
The net is designed to work this way.

You get a better job - the net adjusts, rent goes up.
You cut expenses - costs inflate faster than you can save.
You take on debt to cover gaps - the net holds you tighter with interest.
You compete for housing - the net profits from your desperation.
The system doesn’t need to force you. It just needs you to keep struggling alone.
They broke every legitimate channel for working-class power:
∙ They neutered unions - Enterprise bargaining killed solidarity, strikes are functionally illegal
∙ They criminalized protest - Anti-protest laws carry prison time, disruption is terrorism
∙ They captured elections - Both parties serve the same donors, agree on all economic fundamentals
It’s all up to you. Get amongst it, gather your community and be powerful.
swim_down_manifesto (docx)
Downloadswim_down_action_guide (docx)
DownloadThe western world is feeling the need for change and community, not just us in Australia. Our two party system, in world terms, moves increasingly towards the conservative right and recent changes make it more difficult for independents to break their hold on power; removing public voices from access to a political voice. Get together, talk, fill potholes, volunteer, perform random acts of kindness, protest with beauty, thought and kindness. Agitate for peace. Democracy, like love, is messy.
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