Progressive Calendar 02.23.12 /2 | <– Date –> <– Thread –> |
From: David Shove (shove001umn.edu) | |
Date: Thu, 23 Feb 2012 11:14:57 -0800 (PST) |
*P R O G R E S S I V E C A L E N D A R 02.23.12* 1. Cuban films 2.23.7pm 2. Church/state 2.23 7pm 3. Gilman/Mn protest 2.23 7pm 4. Palestine resists 2.23 7pm Northfield MN 5. Indigenous films 2.23 7:30pm 6. Bill Quigley - Bradley Manning, solitary confinement and Occupy 4 prisoners 7. Broad/Cavenaugh - Occupy vs the global race to the bottom 8. ed - Declaration of non-personhood (haiku) --------1 of 8-------- From: WAMM Cuban films 2.23.7pm Minnesota Cuba Film Festival Thursdays from February 23 through March 29, 7:00 p.m. St. Anthony Main, 115 Main Street Southeast, Minneapolis. Six contemporary Cuba films will be shown at St. Anthony Main Theatre, each Thursday for six weeks. This is a rare opportunity to explore the nation subject to a brutal U.S. blockade. In the absence of easily available literature and art from Cuba, in the absence of current information about Cuba in U.S. mainstream media, the space is filled by the story U.S. policymakers give us. That story is one of lies, half-truths and endless hostility towards a beleaguered nation that has successfully resisted U.S. economic, political and military aggression for over 50 years. In this diverse selection of films, challenging issues are faced: homeless kids in the "special period" following the collapse of the Soviet Union; economic differentiation that's become exacerbated in recent years; GLBT issues and the first sexual reassignment surgery. All films are in Spanish with English subtitles. Tickets: $8.50. Sponsored by: the Minnesota Cuba Committee and the Film Society of Minneapolis/St. Paul. FFI: Visit www.minnesotacubacommittee.org. --------2 of 8-------- From: "Americans United" auactivist [at] au.org Church/state 2.23 7pm Let's Get It Started ... the Minnesota AU Chapter Thursday, Feb 23, from 7:00 - 9:00 PM Southdale Library 7001 Your Avenue S. Edina, MN 55435 In the Ethel Berry Room, second floor Questions? Contact Scott at minnesotaau [at] gmail.com You are invited to help establish a Minnesota Chapter of Americans United for Separation of Church and State! WHY: The religious right has a very active legislative agenda across the country, which will continue to play out at the Minnesota legislature. A local chapter of the AUSCS can play an important role in speaking to the constitutional issue of separation of church and state that looms behind most of these issues. We are in the initial stages of forming a chapter, so your input is vital! We are especially urging people from faith communities to be involved in order to make the group as diverse and as relevant as possible. All are welcome to attend! Questions? Contact Scott at minnesotaau [at] gmail.com --------3 of 8-------- From: no-reply [at] mnhs.org Gilman/Mn protest 2.23 7pm Stand Up!: The Story of Minnesota’s Protest Tradition, with Rhoda Gilman 2/23/2012 Mill City Museum, Minneapolis MN, 612-341-7555 Historian Rhoda Gilman will highlight the political protest movements that have shaped Minnesota and changed the country in this presentation based on her new book "Stand Up! The Story of Minnesota’s Protest Tradition." "Stand Up" presents an overview of 150 years of major political protests in Minnesota, including the abolitionist Republican party, Grangers, antimonopolists, Populists, strikers, progressives, suffragists, Communists, Farmer-Laborites, communes and co-ops, abortion politics, and more. After the presentation Ms. Gilman will sign books, which will be available for purchase. Time: 7 p.m. Fee: Free --------4 of 8-------- Palestine resistence 2.23 7pm Northfield MN • Thursday, Feb. 23, 7pm, at St. Olaf Tomson Hall, Rm. 280, Northfield: William Parry, London-based photojournalist and author speaks about his new book, “Up Against the Wall: the Art of Resistance in Palestine.” Images and stories of graffiti and street art on Israel’s Apartheid Wall. Free, open to public. --------5 of 8-------- Indigenous films 2.23 7:30pm THIS WEEK!! Film Screenings: 7:30PM February 23 - 25, 2012 at Intermedia Arts, 2822 Lyndale Ave South Minneapolis, MN 55408 All of the feature films are Twin Cities premieres! These award-winning films have been featured at festivals throughout the Americas and beyond. FESTIVAL SCHEDULE: THURSDAY FEBRUARY 23, 7:30PM Magic Wands (2009, 7:36 minutes) A Windigo Tale (2010, 90 minutes) FRIDAY FEBRUARY 24, 7:30PM Frybread Ninja (2011, 5 minutes) The Dead Can't Dance (2009, 97 minutes) SATURDAY FEBRUARY 25, 7:30PM Life In The 7th Prophecy (2009, 7 minutes) Behind the Door of a Secret Girl (2010, 100 minutes) BUY TICKETS! $8 admissions | $20 festival pass Purchase advance tickets online, or over the phone by calling (612) 871-4444 Pre-sold tickets are available for pick-up through will call at Intermedia Arts on each performance evening. If tickets are not claimed 15 minutes after the scheduled start time of the performance, the unclaimed tickets may be released to a waiting list. FEATURED FILMS Magic Wands 2009 | 7 minutes | Directed by Elizabeth Day | Ojibwe with English subtitles In this short film directed by Elizabeth Day (Anishinabe), St. Paul, MN, a grandmother tells her granddaughter an Ojibwe story revealing why the sticks used to gather wild rice are "magic wands." Immersed in the unfamiliar terrain of lake marshes he learns to master the artful skill of knocking wild rice and discovers the strength of spirit required to harvest this staple. As the grandmother narrates the tale in Ojibwe, she answers her granddaughter's question about the sacredness and importance of wild rice to the Ojibwe people. A Windigo Tale| www.awindigotalemovie.com 2010 | 90 minutes | Directed by Armand Garnet Ruffo Winner of 2010 Best Picture, Best performance by an actress (Andrea Menard) & Best performance by an actress in a supporting role (Jani Lauzon) from The American Indian Film Festival, San Francisco, CA. Filmed on the Six Nations Reserve in Ontario and in the Ottawa Valley, A Windigo Tale is Ojibwe poet Armand Garnet Ruffo's directorial debut. Produced on a shoe-string budget, in demanding conditions, Ruffo's feature-length film moves between the breathtaking beauty of a road trip in autumn and the stark winter landscape of a First Nations community. Harold, a Native grandfather (Gary Farmer), desperate to save his troubled grandson Curtis (Elliot Simon) from a life on the street, shares the dark secrets of their family and community. In an isolated village, an estranged mother, Doris (Jani Lauzon), and daughter, Lily (Andrea Menard), must reunite to exorcise the voracious Windigo spirit tied to a painful past. Inspired by Ojibwe spirituality and based on the history of the residential school system, where generations of Native children were forcibly removed from their families and aggressively assimilated into Euro-Canadian society, A Windigo Tale is both a chilling and redeeming drama. Parental Guidance Recommended. Frybread Ninja: The Birth 2011 | 5 minutes | Directed by Hasaanah Abdul Wahid, MIGIZI Communications An assassin eats frybread and decided to become a vigilante do-gooder. Produced by students from MIGIZI Communications 2011 Summer Media Institute. The Dead Can't Dance | www.rawdzilla.com 2009 | 97 minutes| Written and Directed by Rodrick Pocowatchit The world's first Native American zombie comedy/drama! Best Native Film at the 2010 Indie Spirit Film Festival. Nominated for Best Director and Best Actor (Rodrick Pocowatchit) at the American Indian Film Festival, San Francisco, 2010. The Dead Can't Dance follows three Native American men who discover they are somehow immune to a virus that is killing everyone else and turning them into zombies. The men get stranded in the middle of Kansas, seek refuge in a remote school and must put aside their petty differences to survive the macabre night. Made in Kansas, the film is a testament to Wichita's film-loving community. More than 100 extras were used in the film, which was shot in 2009 over the course of four months. Life In The 7th Prophecy 2009 | 7 minutes | Produced by the artists of Project Preserve, IN PROGRESS Life In The Seventh Prophecy tells the story of the seven fires and the role of this generation in bringing positive change to the Anishinaabe people. Best Experimental Documentary - Cowichan Film Festival. Directed by students from Red Lake High School, 2009. Behind the Door of a Secret Girl 2010 | 100 minutes | Directed by Janessa Starkey and Jack Kohler Janessa Starkey was 14 when she began writing the film "Behind the Door of a Secret Girl," a grim drama about a depressed American Indian teenager who lives on a reservation with her meth-addicted mother and an abusive cartel-connected drug dealer. The girl, Sammy, is a cutter, wounding her wrists with a knife in order to feel alive. David, Sammy's best friend, is a foster youth and helps her to escape from this dysfunctional life she's had to endure since her father died. Starkey, a member of the United Auburn Indian Community co-wrote and directed the film with the tribe's media director, Jack Kohler. Parental Guidance Recommended. --------6 of 8-------- Bradley Manning, Solitary Confinement and Occupy 4 Prisoners by Bill Quigley Published on Thursday, February 23, 2012 by Common Dreams Today US Army Private Bradley Manning is to be formally charged with numerous crimes at Fort Meade, Maryland. Manning, who was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize by members of the Icelandic Parliament, is charged with releasing hundreds of thousands of documents exposing secrets of the US government to the whistleblower website Wikileaks. These documents exposed lies, corruption and crimes by the US and other countries. The Bradley Manning defense team points out accurately that much of what was published by Wikileaks was either not actually secret or should not have been secret. The Manning prosecution is a tragic miscarriage of justice. US officials are highly embarrassed by what Manning exposed and are shooting the messenger. As Glenn Greenwald, the terrific Salon writer, has observed, President Obama has prosecuted more whistleblowers for espionage than all other presidents combined. One of the most outrageous parts of the treatment of Bradley Manning is that the US kept him in illegal and torturous solitary confinement conditions for months at the Quantico Marine base in Virginia. Keeping Manning in solitary confinement sparked challenges from many groups including Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, the Center for Constitutional Rights, the ACLU and the New York Times. Human rights’ advocates rightly point out that solitary confinement is designed to break down people mentally. Because of that, prolonged solitary confinement is internationally recognized as a form of torture. The conditions and practices of isolation are in violation of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the UN Convention against Torture, and the UN Convention on the Elimination of all forms of Discrimination. Medical experts say that after 60 days in solidary peoples’ mental state begins to break down. That means a person will start to experience panic, anxiety, confusion, headaches, heart palpitations, sleep problems, withdrawal, anger, depression, despair, and over-sensitivity. Over time this can lead to severe psychiatric trauma and harms like psychosis, distortion of reality, hallucinations, mass anxiety and acute confusion. Essentially, the mind disintegrates. That is why the United Nations special rapporteur on torture sought to investigate Manning’s solitary confinement and reprimanded the US when the Army would not let him have an unmonitored visit. History will likely judge Manning as heroic as it has Daniel Ellsberg, who leaked the Pentagon Papers. It is important to realize that tens of thousands of other people besides Manning are held in solitary confinement in the US today and every day. Experts estimate a minimum of 20,000 people are held in solitary in supermax prisons alone, not counting thousands of others in state and local prisons who are also held in solitary confinement. And solitary confinement is often forced on Muslim prisoners, even pre-trial people who are assumed innocent, under federal Special Administrative Measures. In 1995, the U.N. Human Rights Committee stated that isolation conditions in certain U.S. maximum security prisons were incompatible with international standards. In 1996, the U.N. special rapporteur on torture reported on cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment in U.S. supermax prisons. In 2000, the U.N. Committee on Torture roundly condemned the United States for its treatment of prisoners, citing supermax prisons. In May 2006, the same committee concluded that the United States should "review the regimen imposed on detainees in supermax prisons, in particular, the practice of prolonged isolation." John McCain said his two years in solitary confinement were torture. "It crushes your spirit and weakens your resistance effectively than any other form of mistreatment." The reaction of McCain and many other victims of isolation torture were described in an excellent 2009 New Yorker article on isolation by Atul Gawande. Gawande concluded that prolonged isolation is objectively horrifying, intrinsically cruel, and more widespread in the U.S. than any country in the world. This week hundreds of members of the Occupy movement merged forces with people advocating for human rights for prisoners in demonstrations in California, New York, Ohio, and Washington DC. They call themselves Occupy 4 Prisoners. Activists are working to create a social movement for serious and fundamental changes in the US criminal system. One of the major complaints of prisoner human rights activists is the abuse of solitary confinement in prisons across the US. Prison activist Mumia Abu-Jamal said justice demands the end of solitary, “It means the abolition of solitary confinement, for it is no more than modern-day torture chambers for the poor.” Pelican Bay State Prison in California, the site of a hunger strike by hundreds of prisoners last year, holds over 1000 inmates in solitary confinement, some as long as 20 years. At the Occupy Prisoners rally outside San Quentin prison, the three American hikers who were held for a year in Iran told of the psychological impact of 14 months of solitary confinement. Sarah Shourd said the time without human contact drove her to beat the walls of her cell until her knuckles bled. When Manning was held in solitary he was kept in his cell 23 hours a day for months at a time. The US government tortured him to send a message to others who might consider blowing the whistle on US secrets. At the same time, tens of thousands of others in the US are being held in their cells 23 hours a day for months, even years at a time. That torture is also sending a message. Thousands stood up with Bradley Manning and got him released from solitary. People must likewise stand up with the thousands of others in solitary as well. So, stand in solidarity with Bradley Manning and fight against his prosecution. And stand also against solitary confinement of the tens of thousands in US jails and prisons. Check out the Bradley Manning Support Network, Solitary Watch, and Occupy 4 Prisoners for ways to participate. Bill Quigley is Associate Director of the Center for Constitutional Rights and a law professor at Loyola University New Orleans. He is a Katrina survivor and has been active in human rights in Haiti for years. He volunteers with the Institute for Justice and Democracy in Haiti (IJDH) and the Bureau de Avocats Internationaux (BAI) in Port au Prince. Contact Bill at quigley77 [at] gmail.com --------7 of 8-------- Occupy vs. the Global Race to the Bottom Incorporating corporate globalization into the Occupy analysis and agenda by Robin Broad and John Cavanagh Published on Wednesday, February 22, 2012 by YES! Magazine Ever since the first tent was pitched in Zuccotti Park in September 2011, the Occupy protests have been giving life to a “99 percent movement.” Expect to hear a lot more from them: plans for a 99 percent spring—starting as early as April—are now in the making. This still very young movement has focused attention on a well-reasoned explanation of the vast suffering in this country, an explanation that is resonating with the broader U.S. public. It is often posed this way: For thirty years, Wall Street firms have successfully lobbied the US government to give them freer reign, by removing regulations and lowering taxes. In the process, these firms became uprooted and detached from lending to Main Street businesses and instead became more like casinos making money for the one percent through risky instruments such as derivatives based in subprime mortgages. This casino Wall Street economy increased inequality, corrupted our politics and politicians, and provoked the economic crash in 2008—a crash that left tens of millions unemployed, homeless, mired in debt, and vulnerable. This narrative is not only compelling and tragic, it is also correct. But the Occupy analysis is thus far primarily a US-centric one; it often leaves out the reality that all of us in this country are part of a corporate-driven global economy. So here is a fuller picture: In addition to Wall Street speculators, the other dominant forces of the U.S. economy over the past three decades have been global firms like General Electric, Exxon Mobil, and Apple. These firms spread their global assembly lines and resource extraction to countries like Mexico, China, and the Philippines where, in a quest for cheaper costs, they can more easily evade worker rights and environmental regulations. This global corporate economy pits U.S. workers and communities against poorly enforced Third World worker rights and environmental rules in a “race to the bottom” in terms of rights and standards. These global firms simply say to governments and workers: lower your wages and standards or we will move our operations elsewhere. They either get what they want or they move. And, just as Wall Street speculators rewarded elected officials in the United States who passed local and national laws to remove regulations, so too did the global manufacturing firms reward members of Congress who passed trade and investment rules that gave corporations protections. Case in point: the 1994 North American Free Trade Agreement which granted corporations powerful rights and protections while offering only weak social and environmental “clauses.” The 1990s era of globalization accelerated the proliferation of global assembly lines with sweatshop conditions. United Students Against Sweatshops and others have exposed the horrors of garment assembly lines for decades. Today the exposès continue, most recently of Apple’s global assembly lines. As a January 2012 New York Times investigation revealed, hundreds of thousands of workers assembling Apple iPhones in China are denied basic rights, exposed to dangerous toxic chemicals, and live in squalor. With this lens, one can better assess President Obama’s recent tour of industrial states where he proclaimed that manufacturing jobs are returning to the United States in part because wages and working conditions here are now “competitive.” “Competitive” masks the grim reality that real U.S. manufacturing wages have been stagnating or falling over this period and workers have accepted lower wages to prevent the real threat of corporations moving their jobs to China. This is hardly something we should applaud; we want good jobs – good for workers, good for the environment, good for community. Adding this global component also reveals more about what needs to be part of our agenda for change. Until now, most of the 99 percent agenda has focused on reducing inequality by reining in Wall Street and cutting its influence on our corrupted politics. Many groups have advocated for fairer taxes on the wealthy and Wall Street, and various measures to prevent the one percent from purchasing elections and elected officials. These are critical starting points. But to these important proposals, let us also add new mechanisms to enforce internationally recognized worker rights and environmental standards everywhere, including workers’ rights to organize independent unions, an end to child labor, and the right for communities to know of potential environmental dangers. Another way to support this “race to the top” is by ending trade agreements that provide corporations with investor rights to sue governments but do not provide workers or communities or the environment with stronger protections. Likewise, let us also push proposals to shift the incentives away from global trade and investment and back toward revitalizing “Main Street” by encouraging more production and investment locally. Much of what is traded across borders, from food to clothing to electronic gadgets, can be produced—with less stress on the environment—much closer to home. Worker-owned co-ops in Cleveland, for example, are now producing food and linen for local hospitals and universities that used to come from far away. This expansion of the Occupy story to address to challenges of corporate globalization is one logical next step in the Occupy trajectory. Indeed, many in the Occupy movements have already embraced Occupy protests and movements in other countries, from England to Nigeria to dozens of other countries around the world. Let us embrace the 99 percent everywhere with a global analysis and a global agenda. John Cavanagh and Robin Broad wrote this article for YES! Magazine, a national, nonprofit media organization that fuses powerful ideas with practical actions. They are co-authors of three books and numerous articles on the global economy, and have been traveling the country and the world for their project Local Dreams: Finding Rootedness in the Age of Vulnerability. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License Dr. Robin Broad is Professor of international development at American University. She teaches courses on economic globalization & development as well as environment & development, with a focus on social, environmental, and economic accountability. --------8 of 8-------- Billionaires are way more bad than good. Declare them defunct non-persons. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Shove CloveGrove
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