Portside

Today’s International Women's Day mobilisations echo back to the civil rights movement, the anti-Vietnam war protests, the uprisings against colonial powers, and the more recent uprisings across Africa’s north and the Middle East. Often missing from the history books, women were also in the forefront of these movements.

This International Women’s Day, women in Ireland are striking for abortion rights against a backdrop of horror stories caused by the country’s prohibition.

America’s status as a world-class cultural hub, as a proponent of free thought and lively debate, as a country that celebrates our diversity and welcomes new voices and new ideas from all corners of the world, is crumbling.

This Republican health care plan is dangerous to our health and needs to be pulled off the shelf

ICE enslaves; Muslims aid Jews; DOJ has cops’ backs; Black college heads played; Burning Zinn; Muffling Murray; Popular assemblies

There are important questions facing all those seeking the best way to protest President Trump, the GOP-led Congress, and the immigration, health care, and environmental polices the new administration seeks to impose upon a reluctant populace: what is the meaning of a strike, demonstration, or protest march? The brilliance of strikes and stoppages like the Day Without Immigrants and the Women’s Strike lies in organizers’ willingness to halt business as usual.

What is Cuba like? Since visiting there recently, I have been asked this question hundreds of times and learned that every third person harbors a desire to visit there.

On March 8 women from every part of the country and the economy will rise together to participate in #DayWithoutAWoman, also known as the Women’s Strike. A follow-up to the historic Women’s March on January 21, #DayWithoutAWoman will fall on International Women’s Day, which honors the social, political, and economic contributions of women globally.

It’s time that we take a few minutes to think about how we want to proceed, because there is no way that I can see us sustaining this level of mobilization. We have to think strategically about what we want to do.

As many community members start to plan out emergency response teams and community defense, there is a need to think out short and long term organizing strategies that we can use so that we do not fall into patterns of solely doing individual deportation cases, press and mobilizing work, but are also thinking about long-term power building.