Boston Indymedia Center now
operates outside of the approved organization at Lucy Parsons Center on Columbus Ave, Boston. The
reason for this change in organizational structure is that BIMC at that
location collapsed over the summer of 2005. It collapsed because
two core members, Pete Stidman and Matthew Williams used their
extensive veto and filibustering power to hog editorial and structural
control at the organization.
This power mongering resulted in a coup in which Sofia Jarrin-Thomas
and Svea Eppler faked their resignations but stayed on as shadow
members to wage a war of libel and intrigue against Pete. They
were helped in this effort by Brian Conley, whose participation in the
founding of a few IMCs gave him the skills necessary to undermine the
power bloc of the Stidman-Williams junta.
Conley was informed by a member of the Lucy Parsons Center who acted as
mole during the general meetings. These meetings, from which
Conley, Thomas, and Eppler absented themselves, were carefully
constructed failures in which life-or-death ultimatums to address
various abuses and persons were issued, those issuers then maliciously
leaving the (lonely suckers) in attendance to wring their hands in
desperation, and later face accusations of being a lynch mob. Six
members left BIMC in disgust, leaving only the conspirators.
With new found freedom, Sofia and Svea opened the BIMC doors wide to
the causes of Socialist Alternative, and the illegal immigration
lobby. Their time tested strategy of accusing members of physical
abuse and financial mismanagement were then extended to the general
BIMC readership. In a manner similar to Scientology, Eppler and
Thomas began issuing threats to readers to sick fringe lesbian law
groups on them in revenge for criticizing the organization.
In November, Conley returned from Iraq -- after laundering his US
citizenship to establish more IMCs there -- to a comfortable
organization ruled by his two fellow agitators, where under the guise
of an international journalist, he gained unchallenged Center-Editorial
rights for his Baathist ramblings.
It is for these reasons that I, IMC member Flipside declare the
original Boston Indymedia Center to be defunct where embodied by these
three individuals. Boston Indymedia Center is now recognized only where
users post and where people claiming membership do assemble in person
and online in a truly open and inclusive local area network.
