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The 10 Worst Civil Liberties Violations of 2014

Dahlia Lithwick and Mark Joseph Stern Slate
While the country has evolved on marriage equality, it often appears to be backtracking on just about every other advance we have made, from the racial and gender progress of the 1960s to the most basic principles of the criminal justice system. Below, we’ve listed the top 10 civil liberties nightmares of 2014 in no particular order.

A Letter to My Nephew

James Baldwin The Progressive
It is not permissible that the authors of devastation should also be innocent. It is the innocence which constitutes the crime.

Movie: Selma

One of the decisive battles against segregation took place here, in the heart of the Old South, and in plain view of the whole world. A star cast, and talk of Oscars. Opening soon.

Remembering the Wades, the Bradens and the Struggle for Racial Integration in Louisville

Rick Howlett WFPL, The News for Louisville, an NPR affiliate
On a October morning, Ebbs is standing next to a historical marker erected near the Wade home site a few years ago. "I’ve made sure that my children understand the significance of the fact that there’s a monument here and it is our blood relatives that went through what they did to receive something like this. So I make sure that I definitely give it the respect that it’s due."

The Other America - A Riot is the Language of the Unheard

Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr Grosse Pointe Historical Society
"...it is not enough for me to stand before you tonight and condemn riots. It would be morally irresponsible for me to do that without, at the same time, condemning the contingent, intolerable conditions that exist in our society. These conditions are the things that cause individuals to feel that they have no other alternative than to engage in violent rebellions to get attention. And I must say tonight that a riot is the language of the unheard." [March 14, 1968]

The Rules - Making Sense of Race and Privilege

Lawrence Otis Graham Princeton Alumni Weekly
Herein lay the difference between my son's black childhood and my own. Not only was I assaulted by the n-word so much earlier in life - at age 7, while visiting relatives in Memphis - but I also had many other experiences that differentiated my life from the lives of my white childhood friends. There was no way that they would "forget" that I was different. The times, in fact, dictated that they should not forget; our situation would be unavoidably "racial."

Tidbits - October 9, 2014

Portside
Reader Comments - Towards a Socialist America; War on the Islamic State; Ferguson New Voter Registration; Slavery and the Making of American Capitalism; Economy - Still Failing; People's Climate March; War and Climate Change; Berkeley Free Speech Movement; Crime Fiction; Work, Leisure, & Consumption; Israel 'Blacklist'; An Israel Equal for All; Importance of Brazil's Elections; Announcements - Race, Policing & Civil Rights-Oct 14; Paint the Town Red-Oct 22-both Brooklyn

For Muslim New Yorkers, a Long Path from Surveillance to Civil Rights

Moustafa Bayoumi The Nation - September 29, 2014 edition
For years, Muslim New Yorkers have been spied on, not heard; now they're finding their political voice. As the gears of federal government have ground to a halt, a new energy has been rocking the foundations of our urban centers. From Atlanta to Seattle and points in between, cities have begun seizing the initiative, transforming themselves into laboratories for progressive innovation. This is the latest in the The Nation's series, Cities Rising.
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