We want to honor her as the amazing musician, songwriter & singer of the punk band The Gits. May her friendship, mentorship, creativity & passion be remembered today and always. With the recent news of multiple senseless acts of violence in the past months, that we acknowledge happen all the time all over the place, we want to continue to share these free resources: 1) Home Alive Curriculum: http://www.teachhomealive.org/curriculum/ 2) Rock, Rage & Self Defense: https://youtu.be/IPemvIkUHIw May we all continue to be a part of the change to end violence in our communities and in our world. ¡Viva Zapata!

Thank you to everyone who shared their stories and supported this film.

Rock, Rage & Self Defense was reviewed in German! Read the English translation below: Seattle, early nineties.  A vital local music scene that nourishes itself from the original Punk-Underground, the political Hardcore and Alternative-Rock, comes lightening-like into the  focus   of the global music business with Nirvana’s surprising success.  A few disillusioned, even depressive boys conquer MTV first, then the front pages of the big music magazines and finally the whole world. That, at least, is the current narrative. That there was neither a dominant homogenous scene nor a homogenous sound in Seattle, that for every successfully launched project of the majors a dozen indie bands remained unnoticed, has in the meantime made the rounds.  But the women of the Seattle scene have up to now remained strikingly excluded even from these subsequent clarifications.  And yet there were a lot of them – and they have a damned lot to tell as can be seen on the basis of the oral history documentary “Rock, Rage and Self-Defense” which tells about the founding of the Initiative “Home Alive” arising from the punk spirit of “Do it yourself.”  This was a grassroots democratic initiative that – years before the triumphant march of the World Wide Web, which democratized access to knowledge – not only spread information about rape culture and countered the normative rhetoric that made women responsible when they were raped but also and most importantly transmitted in affordable courses the practical knowledge to women necessary for defending themselves against attackers in case of an emergency.  The sad impetus for this self-help networking was the rape and murder of Mia Zapata, front woman of the punk band The Gits in 1993. For their oral history, the directors Leah Michaels and Rozz Therrrien allow the numerous founders and protagonists of the organization, looked after since the beginning by many other women, to tell their story.   Unlike the usual feel-good rockumentaries about underdogs coming together, the story here isn’t just about the emblematic condensation of a doubtlessly impressive success; it’s also about concrete experiences.  That is the reason that alongside the numerous scenes of exhaustion and gnawing discussions that every initiative seeking consensus decisions suffers, the shock waves that the Zapata case sent through the scene are at the center of the film:  Was it possible that previous meeting spaces for the scene were not safe spaces?  Did Zapata know her rapist and murderer?  Was he himself perhaps a part of the scene?Unlike Kathleen Hanna’s much more well-known Riot Grrrl movement, also rising from the punk scene, Home Alive remained for a long time a primarily regional phenomenon.  An unsung piece of feminist history that has been saved somewhat from oblivion by this film.  As a result of the resources available to them ,the film looks somewhat raw and a little like “learning by doing” but this is quite appropriate to the content: the self-empowerment of the marginalized.  Michaels and Therrien don’t have a professional film background; they ran across the topic of Home Alive during a university seminar on indie rock and underground music scenes. And so the story of Home Alive and that of the film come together well:   networking, solidarity, and a commonly born initiative can make things better.  It is therefore also a component of the success story of “Rock, Rage and Self Defense” that this one-time seminar project has gone on an international film tour – independent of the approval of established film distributors and festivals and on the basis of an international network of activists. This film is therefore valuable not only because it records the historical experiences of the Home Alive founders, but also because of its message for contemporary feminist movements, long fragmented by single subcultures:  Get out of your isolation – together we are strong!

Rock, Rage & Self Defense screens TONIGHT in Berlin at Moviemento at 8 pm. Film is an hour. Q&A to follow. Be there. Also check out this awesome review of our film: http://filmtagebuch.blogger.de/stories/2467362/ It is in German, so throw it into a translator if you need some assistance.

We made it to Berlin! This is us with the awesome Atlanta, the woman who helped schedule all our German screenings. She took us to this awesome bar. The first showing in Europe is tomorrow. Tell all your friends!: Monday, January 12th 2015 Berlin at 20:00 (8:00 pm) moviemento, kottbusser damm 22 berlin-kreuzberg www.moviemento.de

It's official! "Rock, Rage & Self Defense: An Oral History of Home Alive" will be traveling to Europe in January of 2015 for 7 screenings. Here are the tour dates: Germany Monday, January 12th 2015 Berlin at 20:00 (8:00 pm) moviemento, kottbusser damm 22 berlin-kreuzberg www.moviemento.de Tuesday, January 13th 2015 at 20:00 hamburg b-movie, brigittenstraße 5 hamburg, st. pauli www.bildwechsel.org www.b-movie.de www.dokumentarfilmsalon.org Wednesday, January 14th 2015 Frankfurt, Café Exzess, Leipziger Straße, - 20:00 Uhr Friday, January 16th Oldenburg cine-k, bahnhofsstraße 11 oldenburg France Sunday, January 18th 2015 Paris Screening @ 7:30 La Muntinerie 176-178 Rue Saint-Martin 75003 Paris Monday, January 19th 2015 Grenoble Details to come Ireland Thursday, January 22nd 2015 @ 7   Dublin Screening Filmbase Curved St. Dublin 2 For questions e-mail us: [email protected] Spread the word!

Jinji of Pure Chocolate by Jinji is rocking our rad t-shirt. Want one or know someone who would? E-mail us! T-shirts are $20. Could be the perfect gift for the holiday season. 

"Rock, Rage & Self Defense" will be screening in Roma on November 9th at 5 pm. Extreme thanks to those putting on the event. If you live in Rome or know someone who does, spread the word! 

Stopped by Force's quilt making workshop for The Monument Quilt with Hollaback Bmore. Awesome to meet new members of a community working towards the same goals in amazing and diverse ways. If you're local to Baltimore or DC stop by our screening tomorrow at 4:30 at The Windup Space hosted by Hollaback Bmore. Enjoy "Laura Palmer" drinks that benefit Hollaback, stay for a panel and Q&A after the film, and purchase some rad merch to help share Rock, Rage & Self Defense with other communities. 

Hey Baltimore & DC! Don't forget! This Sunday, October 19th, Hollaback Bmore is hosting a screening of "Rock, Rage & Self Defense" at The Windup Space in Baltimore @4:30. The film will be followed by a Q&A with filmmakers. Suggested $5 donation. No one will be turned away. Check out event here. Be there & Share!

We are excited to see the Obama administration take on sexual assault by  offering ACCESSIBLE SOLUTIONS and TOOLS!

NO [STILL] MEANS NO.

We are constantly on the lookout for what people/groups/communities are doing to end rape culture. Please send us what you, your community, or anyone/thing that is doing this work [email protected] !

For Instagram & Twitter 1) Take a photo of graffiti/street art that has to do with combating violence  2) Tag us on Instagram @rockrageselfdefense OR tweet at us on Twitter @rockrageselfdef 3) Add the hashtag ‪#‎RRSDart‬ , hashtag the place (city, town, state or country) where the art is located, & hashtag the artist if known

Would you use it?

Rad combo of the Girls Rock Pittsburgh t-shirt & our Rock, Rage & Self Defense tote. The t-shirt was made as a fundraiser item for Girls Rock Pittsburgh and has lyrics from girl fronted & all girl bands. The third tape is Second Skin by The Gits! Got so many compliments today.  Check out WolfPack Goods to learn about the origin of this t-shirt & what it benefits.