- It has been 10 years since a group of young people from the Old Town, occupying the vacant space on the stairs of the Solokoetxea, started the 7Gato Youth Center project. Based on self-management, they made a decisive commitment to reforming the space and offering a cultural and political alternative to the neighborhood.
Years after the fall of the industrial period, Bilbao began to become a showcase city, favoring the privatization of leisure, the speculation of housing, the "official" culture or the invasion of franchises and multinationals. As a result of this orientation, the young people saw themselves condemned to individualism, and without the opportunity and meeting point to find solutions to their needs and concerns. In the face of this impatience, the occupation of the 7Gato Youth Center was essential, which would propose a real alternative to the speculative and commercial situation that the neighborhood was going through.
Unfortunately, in these long years, the situation in the Old Town and Bilbao has only worsened, following the strategy originally proposed. Among other things, we have suffered the loss of the identity of neighborhoods that is the result of globalization, the disappearance of neighborhood life, the invasion of multinationals and franchises, the speculation of housing, the rise of the values of individualism, the increase of the police presence, the massification of tourism, the expansion of a one-way culture, the attacks on self-managed projects and the evictions of youth centers during these 10 years. They have turned our neighborhood into a commercial center without roofs, to the favors of capital and without humanity. All this promoted and supported by the complicit look of the institutions.
As a result of this neoliberal turn, the importance of real alternatives has become indispensable, since we can not imagine that the direction adopted by our city during these 10 years, from now on, will undergo any change. Among these alternatives are 7Gatos and many other youth centers and projects that, in the face of this urban model that they impose on us, consider occupation and self-management as tools, and whose objective is to continue creating alternatives. All these projects, as meeting points and reference areas for young people’s struggles, are the necessary resources to respond critically to this system that unites us and the possibility of transforming ourselves and the area that surrounds us. We are not ready to live in their reality.
7Now that the Young Cat is 10 years old, we must say more loudly than ever that we will continue to incite, to transform the neighborhood, to build alternatives, to refute their evidence, to be rebellious and nonconformist. In joy or sadness, in wickedness or goodness, in love or hatred, in occupation or resistance. Just so you know, strawberry or miau, we're gonna keep fighting.
Long live the occupation! Long live self-management! Happy Birthday 7Cat!
The programme
Monday, 23 January
- 18:30. The speech was: 'Critical View and Occupation of the Old Town'
Tuesday, 24 January
- 18:30. Release the bodies! World Dance Studio.
Wednesday, 25 January
- 18:30. The round table: Young people and creation.
Thursday, 26 January
- 20:00. The concerts are: In Wheat and Koba.
Friday, 27 January
- 17:00. Children's games in Plaza Nueva.
- 18:30. The young gymkhana.
- 21:00. The concerts are: Skabidean; Euskatalites; and K-Billy (Boppers DJ).
Saturday, January 28. Zumarraga Square (Solokoetxe)
- 12:00. Singing and dancing with Friends of Smiles.
- 13:30. Giant photo (in the Plaza de la Castilla).
- 14:30. Popular food: giant paella. After lunch the music was quiet.
- 17:00. Fabe de Fuka electrocharanga.
- 19:00. The concerts are: Wood and Kitto; Thrown Tremenda; and Bad Sound System. The guests are: La Basu, Aneguria and Fermin Muguruza.
Sunday, 29 January
- 18:30. Verse session with Oihana Bartra, Maialen Lujanbio, Agin Abbreviated and Igor Elortza.
This news has been published by Uriola and we have brought it to LUZ thanks to the CC-by-sa license.