On this day in 2012, the Marikana Massacre took place when South African police fired on striking workers, killing 34 and injuring 76 in the most lethal use of force by the state in half a century.
The shootings have been compared to the infamous Sharpeville Massacre in 1960, when police fired on a crowd of anti-Pass Law protesters, killing 69 people, including 10 children. The Marikana Massacre took place on the 25-year anniversary of a nationwide strike by over 300,000 South African workers.
On August 10th, miners had initiated a wildcat strike at a site owned by Lonmin in the Marikana area, close to Rustenburg, South Africa. Although ten people (mostly workers) had been killed before August 16th, it was on that day that an elite force from the South African Police Service fired into a crowd of strikers with rifles, killing 34 and injuring 76.
After surveying the aftermath of the violence, photojournalist Greg Marinovich concluded that "[it is clear] that heavily armed police hunted down and killed the miners in cold blood."
Following the massacre, a massive wave of strikes occurred across the South African mining sector - in early October, analysts estimated that approximately 75,000 miners were on strike from various gold and platinum mines and companies across South Africa, most of them doing so illegally.
A year after the Marikana Massacre, author Benjamin Fogel wrote "Perhaps the most important lesson of Marikana is that the state can gun down dozens of black workers with little or no backlash from 'civil society', the judicial system or from within the institutions that supposedly form the bedrock of democracy."
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Gotta branch out with my music taste...but I am notoriously narrow/choosy. Still, I don't want to play
out. Open to recommendations in the realms of alternative/underground hip hop, industrial noise music/ambient electronic, maybe just a little seasoning of sad indie (I love Neutral Milk Hotel for example). Some flavors of more experimental alternative rock I can fuck with too (longtime Radiohead guy).
Three 6 Mafia
my favs are Tim Hecker and Burial. Max Richter's "Sleep" is also a very cool ambient project
You might also like Wicca Phase Springs Eternal, the album "Suffer On" is a cool mix of hip-hop, electronic/witch-house, and emo/alternative.
Fuckin love Burial, homie. I'll definitely check out some of the other suggestions! I've also fucked with Max Richter a bit thru his movie/tv soundtracks so I'll peep his non-media-attached work as well.
oh hell yeah. After Burial's latest release, I've been revisiting a lot of his music and falling down rabbit holes of his older songs that never got official releases
Spotify recently recommended me this artist called "AgonyOST" recently too. Their album "The Final Nail in the Coffin" seems neat at first glance, it's got similar vibes to some Burial.