Category — Justice Now!

The US Response to Iraq, Afghanistan, Katrina, Honduras and now Haiti is simply business (be it military or corporate) as usual for an imperialist and capitalistic regime.  The following is a statement from the International Action Center on Justice for Haiti.

Also there are some excellent informational pieces at Commondreams.org such as Please Don’t Superdome Haiti,  US Accused of Occupying Haiti as Troops Flood In, Disaster Profiteering: US ‘Security’ Companies offer ‘Services’ in Haiti.

Statement from the International Action Center

Justice for Haiti means immediate aid, reparations, debt cancelation, restoration of President Aristide, asylum for all Haitians and self-determination not military occupation.

The International Action Center expresses its full solidarity with the Haitian people at this time of greatest crisis following the devastating Jan.12 earthquake. In the Haitian capital, tens of thousands of lives have been lost and the lives of hundreds of thousands of additional people are at stake. It is essential that there be an all-out effort for immediate and massive humanitarian relief effort.

Tons of supplies could be parachuted to desperate people in immediate need of food and especially water. The delivery of this essential aid, plus the placement of rescue and medical teams must be the priority. Dozens of countries from all over the world, rich and poor, immediately sent hundreds of doctors and emergency medical teams and search and rescue teams and supplies. Cuba already had 344 health workers in Haiti and is ready to send 152 more. [Read more →]

forwarded from our comrade Billy.

Iranian  transsexuals in fact experience humiliation, assault and abuse, if not  outright death - and not just by government agents, but also by neighbours,  family members, and those considered friends.  We have received reports  very recently from our contacts in Iran exemplifying the torment endured by  transgendered persons.  On Saturday October 10, members of Basiji forces  fired a gun at Sahar, an Iranian transgender, in the Abbasabad Street of  Tehran.  Sahar was hit in the shoulder and was taken to hospital by her  friends.  Once she is out of hospital, however, her safety is not  assured.

According to another report, on Wednesday October 14, Iranian  transgender Mahsa was knifed by two motorcyclists at an intersection in  Tehran.  Her lung injured, Mahsa was taken to hospital by a friend.   So far no one knows who attacked her. We asked one of our representatives in  Tehran to see Mahsa at hospital, but she is not allowed to accept visitors  now. Our representative did talk to her by phone and reported that she may be  well enough for release from hospital in the near term. 

[Read more →]

from justdetention international

Prison officials need to do more to protect inmates from sexual assault. And there is one group of inmates whose vulnerability has gone all but unnoticed — and that’s people who are transgender.

The majority of U.S. corrections systems house inmates based on their birth gender, disregarding other factors, such as physical appearance that may be entirely feminine (including breasts) or government identity documents that categorize these individuals as female.

Not surprisingly, while in men’s detention facilities, most transgender women are sexually assaulted.

A recent academic study of the experiences of hundreds of transgender women in California’s men’s prisons — a survey that was commissioned by the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation — revealed that 59 percent of male-to-female transgender prisoners had been sexually assaulted while incarcerated. A shocking 0 percent of these inmates considered prison officials to be allies in protecting their physical safety. [Read more →]

Michaelangelo Galloza at the memorial for Sylvia Rivera noted that he and Rivera had been “lifted up by  the Young Lords and the Black Panther Party.” He said the oppressors “still haven’t realized that all the oppression fuels the flames of desire. Galloza described the common ties that he and Sylvia Rivera shared with their revolutionary heroes, including Pedro Albizu Campos, Lolita Lebron and Marsha P. Johnson. What they shared, he said, is that “we are survivors of a war against us, a war we were born into.” With a call to continue the struggle for liberation, Galloza concluded, “We have to work on what separates us from our own spirits by the tools of the oppressors. … By following the truth, we will win.”

[Excerpt from Vicente “Panama” Alba]

Forty years ago this summer the presence of the Young Lords came into the consciousness of all New Yorkers.   What had

On Sunday, August 23rd, at 12 noon, many of those who made up this movement will gather at the First Spanish Methodist Church on 111th St and Lexington in NYC’s El Barrio.  This is an invitation to our friends and allies to join us. [Read more →]

From Human Rights Watch
Click here to view in full screen at HRW

A new list was created to facilitate relations between LGBTQI people and their friends around the world interested in solidarity with Palestinians by learning, promoting and actualizing the Palestinian call for boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) against Israel.

About The BDS Initiative
The Nakba (1948’s ethnic cleansing of Palestine during the formation of Israel) still occurs for 61+ years to this very day. Millions of Palestinian are living as stateless refugees. Gaza is the world’s largest open prison, forcefully separated even from the West Bank. The West Bank itself is divided into separate segregated areas, sometimes even sole cities - by the apartheid wall, apartheid (Jewish only) roads, and a set of blockades and checkpoints.

[Read more →]

From jason at www.blackandpink.org 

URGENT PRESS CONFERENCE ON MONDAY AT 3PM IN DUDLEY SQUARE
END YOUR SILENCE, END THE VIOLENCE!!!
NO MORE YOUTH DEATHS
LET DARRELL OUT OF SOLITARY
INVESTIGATE MASSACHUSETTS PRISONS

Darrell Jones is a prisoner at Old Colony prison. He has been working mad hard from the inside to stay connected with the community and harness the influence of OG’s in prison to support young folks in the street by encouraging them to stop violence and stay out of prison. They created a video series to share with young people in our communities. They are horrified by the lack of relevant support for youth, and are scared like many of us for what the summer will bring without resources or jobs.

Darrell also created the only program in Old Colony to serve black men called African Heritage. It was the best attended program in

[Read more →]

The Sex Workers Empowerment Project (SWEP), $pread Magazine, and WITNESS are hosting a full-day training on video advocacy, specifically for sex worker organizing and advocacy. This training will provide participants with a range of effective strategies for using video in their human rights documentation and advocacy, including a basic overview of filming. The training focuses on Setting up a “cop watch” program, including effectively utilizing video to be used in legislative advocacy and to present to UN treaty bodies in order to pressure responsible parties to take action to stop abuse by police.

.
WHO: Sex Worker advocates and organizers
WHEN: 9am - 4pm, Friday May 8th at the WITNESS conference center in Brooklyn. Morning coffee and lunch provided (with vegan-friendly options).
COST: $20 (covers the basic costs– use of facilities, lunch, etc.). If someone would like to attend and cannot afford the entire $20, please contact Email SWEP@gmail.com

..
. THERE IS A LIMITED SPACE. Please rsvp to SWEP@gmail.com  if you plan to come. Your input about what else might be useful to learn or incorporate in this training would be greatly appreciated.  Please include any and all suggestions in your RSVP. Thank you!

More About the Training: [Read more →]

Thanks to circle(a)matt for this article.

by Jeff Subhumyn

Wobbly City newsletter

Monday, February 16th The New York branch of the Starbucks Workers Union held an energetic 8 hour picket outside two separate Starbucks locations. Originally planned as a “loose informal picket” outside the Union Square East Starbucks location, managerial stupidity and increased union-busting activity on the part of Starbucks turned it into a media circus and all night protest. Between the time when the picket was planned and when it actually took place Starbucks decided to fire yet another union barista, Sharon Bell from the 17th and Broadway location, conveniently located across the park from Union Square East.

The picket was called to protest the recent wave of Starbucks lay offs and draw attention to the refusal of Starbucks to pay severance, in spite of claiming in several press releases to the media that they will be providing severance pay to all laid off workers. The message was expanded to include the demand for the reinstatement of Sharon Bell and an immediate end to the illegal, unethical, nationally coordinated union-busting operations of Starbucks Coffee. [Read more →]

Dear Friends
Below is an excellent Radical Women column about women’s rights in Nicaragua that ran in the Freedom Socialist newspaper. We owe many thanks to the Freedom Socialist for their continuous coverage of liberation struggles in the U.S. and around the world. You can read other articles and subscribe to the newspaper online.

In solidarity,
Anne Slater
Radical Women

Freedom Socialist • Vol. 30, No. 1 • February-March 2009

RADICAL WOMEN

The government war on women’s rights in Nicaragua
Feminists stand up against anti-abortion crusade and Daniel Ortega’s rightward turn

By Laura Mannen

On Nov. 25, 2008, police blocked 400 women’s rights activists from marching in Managua’s annual commemoration of the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women. This shocking action came at the behest of Daniel Ortega, former revolutionary leader and current Nicaraguan president, in a bid to silence opponents of his harsh anti-abortion policies. [Read more →]

Below is a great piece of activism by Kelli Busey and the folks in Dallas.   Though first some personal perspective to this gloabl issue.

As many of us know, homelessness and  finding safe shelter are critical issues facing the trans community.  Atlanta at one time had a sign in their shelters “No Transgender Allowed” and on Dec 14th 2003 Alice Johnston took her life leaving behind the message: As of 14 Dec. I’m one of the homeless. Shelters don’t take transsexuals and I’m not changing back. Looks like I’m a goner. Thanks for the support over the past few years. Hugs, Alice;  and of course we recently had the tragic death of Jennifer Gale in Austin who was homeless.

[Read more →]

Authorities Should Act Against Increasing Violence

January 12, 2009, Human Rights Watch
(New York, January 12, 2009) - the Honduran authorities should fully investigate the murder of Cynthia Nicole, a leading Honduras transgender rights defender, and other attacks on the transgender community, Human Rights Watch said today. Nicole’s killing is the latest in a series of violent attacks against transgender people in Honduras.

Unknown assailants murdered Nicole, 32, in the early hours of January 9, 2009. According to testimonies by other rights activists, three unknown men in a blue car shot Nicole in a drive-by shooting in Barrio Guaserique in Comayaguela, a town just outside the Honduran capital, Tegucigalpa. The transgender rights activist received three shots in the chest and one in the head. [Read more →]

The rights violated in this case include: the right to be free from discrimination, the right to freedom of expression and the right to be protected as a human rights defender.

The Issue
On November 29, 2008, transgender activists Mía Albarracín and Diane Rodriguez, were fired from their jobs at Hotel Oro Verde, where each had been employed as a bilingual cashier.  The dismissals came one day after Ms. Albarracín and Ms. Rodriguez had attended an event for the transgender community at the Ministry of the Litoral in Guayaquil. The event-a roundtable discussion on the increase in HIV/AIDS in the transgender population and a cultural fair for transgender women-was widely publicized beforehand and organized by the group Silueta X, which Ms. Rodriguez leads. We strongly suspect that the activists’ dismissal is related to their attendance at this event. Ms. Rodriguez was fired during the process of transitioning from male to female-a process she began while working at Hotel Oro Verde. Hotel management initially [Read more →]

Protest the continuing bombing and possible ground invasion of Gaza by the Israeli army.

Wednesday, December 31, 2008

12 Noon

Federal Building, 150 Court Street, New Haven

• Call on President-elect Obama to break his silence and condemn this human rights atrocity!
• Call for an end to all US economic and military aid to Israel until it respects Palestinian human rights.
• Call for a just peace in Palestine based in part on:

Israel’s full withdrawal from land seized in 1967;  The right of return of Palestinian refugees; An end to the segregation and second class status of Palestinians who are Israeli citizens.

Sponsored by the Middle East Crisis Committee.

Take a visit on over at Rowland’s site, “By Any Means Necessary,” to read one of the best postings on Rick Warren. Rowland’s post “No Bigots At The Inauguration,” begins, “I really hate to say “I told you so,” often because it seems to relate to something that is not so positive, but, unfortunately, this seems to be another case of “I told you so.” Despite the illusions of some people on the “left” about him, this past week President-elect Barack Obama has continued down the path he has cut that demonstrates his ultimate faithfulness to the politics of the ruling-class in the United States. He has done this with every single one of his post-election decisions, beginning with his choice of cabinet officials and now continuing with his announcement that the right-wing evangelical pastor Rick Warren will be his choice for delivering the invocation at the presidential inauguration ceremony on Jan. 20, 2009.”  The full posting can be read by clicking HERE.

Another posting follows. [Read more →]