Tidbits - Sept. 19, 2019 - Reader Comments: Climate Strike resources; Immigrants; Nuclear arms race; GM strike; Trump now controls science and weather; classical music; Vietnam war; Kikotan Massacre; lots of resources and announcements;
Re: As Immigrants Become More Aware of Their Rights, ICE Steps Up Ruses and Surveillance (Laura Owen)
Blood for Oil -- cartoon by Dan Bizarro
Re: When Wages Stagnate, Lifespans Fall. Inequality Kills. (Gordon Galland; Dan Jordan)
Re: 'Nuclear Weapons Arms Race Is Here': Russians, Anti-Nuke Experts Denounce US Missile Test (Bonnie Graham Reed; Dale Jacobson)
Re: The Real Reason General Motors Workers Are On Strike Nationwide (Joseph Maizlish)
Re: GM Strikers Have One Chance: Vote No (Beth Edelman)
Re: Trump Signs Executive Order Giving Him Control of Weather (Douglas Butler; Michel Bellefeuille; Judyth Hollub; Patricia Gardner Mielo)
Trump Cabinet -- cartoon by Christopher Weyant
Re: Strike with the Band: The meritocratic failures of classical music (Dan Robles)
Re: Single-Payer Health Care Is the First Step in the Revolution (Fred Ryan)
Re: Insurgent universality (Disraelly Gutierrez Jaime)
Re: Allende’s Last Speech (Andy Bateman; Mary Bang)
Re: Vietnam: Terror Was Absolute (Dan Jordan; Gary Bono)
Re: Did Not Know It Was Possible For a Show to Be This Stupid (Carlos F Yunqué)
Re: The Legacy of Israel’s First Refuser (Stan Nadel; John L. Dederick)
Re: How the Kikotan Massacre Prepared the Ground for the Arrival of the First Africans in 1619 (Luis RiosPerez; Brian Sip; Heather Cottin; Miguel R Aguayo)
Re: An Important Quantum Algorithm May Actually Be a Property of Nature (Richard Healey)
Re: Friday Nite Videos | September 13, 2019 (William Leffingwell)
Resources:
The Biggest Climate Strike In History. Who's In?!!! Who wants to be?!! - Social Media toolkit (AtrikeWithUs.org)
Naomi Klein on the Green New Deal - watch online
A soundtrack for tomorrow's #ClimateStrike! (Fridays for Future and Avaaz)
Rapid Response Needed to Stop the Administration from Ending Refugee Resettlement (Church World Service)
“The New American Gothic” Is A Reminder of The Quiet Warriors Still Thriving (Nena Lezama - BoldLatina)
How to Make Amends: A Lesson on Reparations (Zinn Education Project)
WELCOME TO THE UNION PAMPHLET BACK IN PRINT! (Hard Ball Press)
Announcements:
An Inter-generational Conversation with Dr. Angela Y. Davis - New York - September 23 (National Conference of Black Lawyers)
Indigenous Peoples' Day Curriculum Teach-In at National Museum of the American Indian New York - September 28
"Confronting White Supremacy" Seminar with Gerald Horne - New York - October 18 (People's Forum)
Unmasking Fake News and the Efforts to Suppress Journalists - New York - October 24 (Metro New York Labor Communications Council)
Farmworkers announce major Wendy’s Boycott mobilization in NYC, November 18, 2019 (Coalition of Immokalee Workers)
Re: As Immigrants Become More Aware of Their Rights, ICE Steps Up Ruses and Surveillance
They went on the local buses and the LIRR. People were so frightened and didn’t go to work! They are the modern day Storm Troopers, I know this for sure. We have to be strong and protect the most vulnerable.
Laura Owen
Posted on Portside's Facebook page
Blood for Oil -- cartoon by Dan Bizarro
Dan Bizarro
June 2008
Bizarro Blog
Re: When Wages Stagnate, Lifespans Fall. Inequality Kills.
Poor folks can’t buy stuff...
Gordon Galland
Posted on Portside's Facebook page
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Kate Pickett & Richard G. Wilkinson published "The Spirit Level" ten years ago summarizing a raft of worldwide research showing one conclusion: The degree of inequality in society is the single best predictor of virtually every social problem in that society. Their research, and that of others, has continued and is very well conducted and replicated. The degree of inequality in societies kills - not just poor people, but wealthy people too. Want to increase life spans, reduce the degree of inequality. Want to reduce "crime in the streets?" Reduce the degree of inequality. Want to reduce rates of abortion? Want to reduce "X"? You know the answer. It may not "intuit" well. It is simply real.
Dan Jordan
Posted on Portside's Facebook page
Re: 'Nuclear Weapons Arms Race Is Here': Russians, Anti-Nuke Experts Denounce US Missile Test
COLD WAR ROUND TWO. We almost certainly won't get out of this one alive, though, because these are cute little "usable" nukes. Worried about climate change? Global Nuclear Winter will follow immediately after even a small nuclear war, causing mass extinction of most life on earth. But... scroll on by, everyone, go watch the Broncos... Bread and Circuses can distract you. Don't get involved in trying to change things, the only thing that is at stake is a habitable planet for your children and grandchildren. Want to get involved? There is tons to do. We can change this. Join me.
Bonnie Graham Reed
Posted on Portside's Facebook page
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We have the "liberal" class promoting Russiagate as much as anyone to thank for this.
Dale Jacobson
Posted on Portside's Facebook page
Re: The Real Reason General Motors Workers Are On Strike Nationwide
Would such struggles go better with the weight of medical care insurance taken off company and workers by a well-supported Medicare For All or similar program (paid for mainly by the big accumulations of wealth, not by the general public)?
I'd like to know what those closer than I to these struggles think.
Joseph Maizlish, Los Angeles
Re: GM Strikers Have One Chance: Vote No
(posting on Portside Labor)
Got a Portside Labor tonight, the first full day of the UAW strike against GM. First time in a dozen years workers are out on strike. The article to my dismay is about the rift between workers and leadership. It's an important topic but I don't think it's the right discussion for this moment. I think the time is to mobilize support for the demands of the workers from General Motors.
Beth Edelman
Posted on Portside's Facebook page
Re: Trump Signs Executive Order Giving Him Control of Weather
Does that make him personally liable for any damage the newly controlled weather produces?
Douglas Butler
Posted on Portside's Facebook page
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he did say he has control! So yes
Michel Bellefeuille
Posted on Portside's Facebook page
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Please label this satire or Borowitz Report.
Judyth Hollub
Posted on Portside's Facebook page
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Hopefully we can make weather great again
Patricia Gardner Mielo
Posted on Portside's Facebook page
Trump Cabinet -- cartoon by Christopher Weyant
Christopher Weyant
September 15, 2019
Kennebec Journal and Morning Sentinel (Maine)
Re: Strike with the Band: The meritocratic failures of classical music
(posting on Portside Labor)
"Despite its reputation as being a pastime of the rich and cultured elite, classical musicianship is better understood as a job, a shitty job, and the people who do that job are workers just as exploited as any Teamster. Classical music has a high rate of workplace injury, especially chronic pain and hearing loss.
The prestige of classical music obscures a range of unseemly realizations: arts managers are union-busting bosses like any other; private conservatories cost hundreds of thousands of dollars to attend partially because schools figured out they can charge that much and people will still go—either out of desperation to make it or because certain students are wealthy enough to afford it. And, at the same time, scholarships are cut under austerity deanships, tenure is eliminated, and adjuncts are paid poverty wages with no benefits, while the administrators get bigger and bigger paychecks. The rest of us sacrifice to prove our dedication, go to school full-time, work under the table, and teach for free in order to get a degree."
Dan Robles
Posted on Portside's Facebook page
Re: Single-Payer Health Care Is the First Step in the Revolution
Careful with the hyperbole, please. We've had universal health care, such as it is, in Canada for several generations and remain a long way from "the Revolution". In fact, our health care system might be seen as one reason why Canada doesn't have a revolutionary movement of any maturity.
Canada's situation, probably unique in the world (except for Greenland or Siberia, maybe), of low population and incredible natural resources, where the nation's managers can use the "give a little, gain a lot" approach to social programs, may not be applicable to other nations but is at least a model for progressive people of being careful what you wish for . . . That is to say, the US could achieve single-payer care without getting anywhere nearer "the Revolution" than it now is. Listen, "Revolution" has a long historical definition; it is not an advertising opportunity.
Fred Ryan
Gatineau, Quebec, Canada
(posting on Portside Culture)
The argument that's usually framed as "identity politics" versus "class politics" is one of the animating features of today's insurgent left. Both this book and reviewer Gandesha seek to unpack this argument's complexities.
Disraelly Gutierrez Jaime
Posted on Portside's Facebook page
If you want a model of heroic dignity in defeat, read this short speech by a man about to die, and remember that political freedom exists only while we defend it......
Andy Bateman
Posted on Portside's Facebook page
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The US has done this time and time again.
Mary Bang
Posted on Portside's Facebook page
Re: Vietnam: Terror Was Absolute
(posting on Portside Culture)
"the fact the Americans had no business being there in the first place means that they and their leaders must bear primary responsibility for the catastrophe."
"The US government also allowed the myth to take hold that there were still American prisoners being held in Vietnamese prison camps. They knew this was untrue, but it proved a useful stick with which to beat their enemies."
Dan Jordan
Posted on Portside's Facebook page
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I often think about the whole "POW - MIA" mythology. It really deserves a close and careful analysis because I think it would explain a lot.
Gary Bono
Posted on Portside's Facebook page
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Just like the "hippies spat on returning soldiers at San Francisco Airport." That appears to have started with Rambo. And even if it did happen to someone, it has become a cultural icon of ALL "hippies" hated ALL those in the military vs what was really happening: we were protesting to get the war to end so that we could 1. bring home those already over there and 2. stop others from having to go. Yeah, maybe some jerk did that, but that is not the whole story. and 3. Not all those who went were heroes either, e.g., Lt Calley and his band of murderers vs Major Hugh Thompson. I gladly honor the latter and would have spit on the former given the chance.
Dan Jordan
Posted on Portside's Facebook page
Re: Did Not Know It Was Possible For a Show to Be This Stupid
(posting on Portside Culture)
Venezuela has had such an integral part in the development of a stand-alone Latin American ethos (since the early 1800s), that the mere IDEA of the country wanting to destroy its neighbors -even Colombia, with which it clashes constantly in ideological and economic terms- is a MASSIVE truckload of horseshit.
Carlos F Yunqué
Posted on Portside's Facebook page
Re: The Legacy of Israel’s First Refuser
Joseph Abileah was a pure pacifist ready to die rather than fight. He not only refused to fight against Arab forces who were waging a war to drive the Jews into the sea in 1948, he also refused to join the fight against Nazi Germany. His principles were absolute. For Electronic Intifada, which praises armed resistance against the occupation and even defends the murdering of Israeli civilians, to suddenly discover the virtues of pacifism on the part of Israeli Jews is an interesting exercise in hypocrisy (to point this out is not to be taken as a defense of the occupation). And last I heard Portside was in favor of the armed struggle against Nazi Germany and fascism in the 1940s.
Stan Nadel
=====
Joseph Abileah is considered as the first person in Israel to go on trial for refusing to join its military.
Appearing in a Haifa court a few months after Israel was founded in 1948, the violinist made clear that he would play no part in the war Israel was then fighting against its neighbors. He regarded Arabs as his brothers, not his enemies.
John L. Dederick
Posted on Portside's Facebook page
Re: How the Kikotan Massacre Prepared the Ground for the Arrival of the First Africans in 1619
"The history of English North America and what became the United States is a complex and often-violent story involving the enslavement of African peoples and the territorial dispossession and genocide of Native American communities. This is an uncomfortable history and neither the British nor Americans have fully reconciled it with the contemporary economic, political, and social dimensions of their respective societies."
Luis RiosPerez
Posted on Portside's Facebook page
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Guess Republicans will blame Democrats for that too
Brian Sip
Posted on Portside's Facebook page
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Someone -- asked why we should all hate the British government...here's another reason. "For King and Country." British Genocides.
Heather Cottin
Posted on Portside's Facebook page
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“Most Americans don’t like to think about genocide as a foundational part of US history... but...what became the United States is a complex and often-violent story involving the enslavement of African peoples and the territorial dispossession and genocide of Native American communities.”
Miguel R Aguayo
Posted on Portside's Facebook page
Re: An Important Quantum Algorithm May Actually Be a Property of Nature
I appreciate Portside carrying articles on science - that is a great rarity on the left. This article is, I think flawed, invoking "quantum processes" too loosely. Read the following article, that is a valuable corrective to the too-strong claims in this one:
Is photosynthesis quantum-ish?
Richard Healey
Re: Friday Nite Videos | September 13, 2019
What happened to very late night sci fi or similar movies on broadcast TV on Friday and Saturday nights: Elvira, mistress of the dark, and her ilk?
William Leffingwell
Posted on Portside's Facebook page
The Biggest Climate Strike In History. Who's In?!!! Who wants to be?!! - Social Media toolkit
wanted to make sure everyone has the social media toolkit for the U.S. climate strikes.
We're encouraging folks to update their profile pics to the black circle with the red halo attached here. You can also retweet this tweet to spread the word.
Sample tweet / post:
TOMORROW, young people and adults are coming together all over the U.S. and world to call on government officials to take immediate climate action. Update your profile picture in support and visit StrikeWithUs.org to find a #ClimateStrike near you! #StrikeWithUs ⚫️
Naomi Klein on the Green New Deal - watch online
Watch here:
A soundtrack for tomorrow's #ClimateStrike! (Fridays for Future and Avaaz)
A soundtrack for tomorrow's #ClimateStrike!
@Spotify worked their magic with Fridays for Future, organizing the tunes for us all to demand #climatejustice from our governments. Cue it up and get your marching (and dancing) shoes ready:
Listen here.
Last week, the administration held a meeting to discuss plans for the refugee admissions goal for Fiscal Year 2020, with some administration officials previously proposing resettling zero refugees next year. This would decimate the bipartisan refugee resettlement program and follows FY 2019’s historically low goal of 30,000.
The administration has already been dismantling the refugee resettlement program and is planning to grant authority to states and localities to deny refugee resettlement in their communities, undermining U.S. law and violating our nation’s commitment to welcome the most vulnerable refugees. As people of faith who care about refugees, we must call for a robust refugee admissions goal of 95,000 in FY20 and prepare for a rapid response as soon as we hear how many refugees the administration plans to welcome in FY 2020.
For the top ways to take rapid response action, please check out our Rapid Response Toolkit: http://bit.ly/PDRapidResponseToolkit.
For more information, please check out RCUSA’s compiled resources: http://bit.ly/FY20PDResponseResources.
It is also critical that Members of Congress continue to hear that their constituents welcome refugees. By law, the administration must consult with Congress by the end of September, prior to setting the refugee admissions goal, which means Members of Congress can and must make their voices heard. Call House and Senate Judiciary Committee Members, who are in charge of consulting with the administration, and urge them to strongly condemn a low admissions goal and call for a robust refugee admissions goal of 95,000 in FY20.
Additional Resources:
- Individual Action Alerts for Senate Judiciary Committee Members Rep. Collins (GA), Rep. Buck (CO), Sen. Graham (SC), and Sen. Cornyn (TX)
- Map of Robust Support for Refugee Resettlement Across the Country
- 361 State and Local Officials Supporting Refugees Letter
- 27 Retired Generals & Admirals Supporting Refugees Letter & WSJ Article Report on Letter
- International Religious Freedom Letter
- Bipartisan Senate Refugee Support Letter
- Bipartisan Congressional Refugee Caucus Refugee Support Letter
- Center for Strategic and International Studies article "Cutting Refugee Resettlement Would be a Strategic Mistake"
Thank you for taking action and please share this alert with your networks!
Meredith Owen
Deputy Director of Policy and Advocacy
Immigration and Refugee Program
Church World Service
110 Maryland Ave NE #110
Washington, DC 20002
“The New American Gothic” Is A Reminder of The Quiet Warriors Still Thriving
By Nena Lezama
July 9, 2018
BoldLatina
When Criselda posted her The New American Gothic oil painting in May of last year, we all instantly became captivated by the message (her following grew from hundreds to over 7-thousand) the emotion and the honesty behind the painting. In the masterpiece, Criselda powerfully catches her mother and her father’s expressions after a long day of work. As they hold cleaning supplies and stand in front of a red Chevy truck, her mother looks strong yet gentle and graceful while her father is focused and serious- perhaps the beautiful combination and balance that has helped carry the family through many obstacles. In her Instagram caption, Criselda pays homage to her parents not only through her paintings but through her words. She expressed “Sadly, they strive to be invisible every day. They don’t have to pretend to illustrate the invisible. They have dealt with constant rejection, suspicion, and fear so long, that it seems now that it comes naturally to them”.
Her painting has been praised and bought by many including the founders of Undocumedia and comedian/actor George Lopez. It has been hailed as a representation of not only the suffering of our people, but also the quiet, harmless, and gentle fight behind their need to have a better life. Criselda reminds us that it is those with a modest life path that need to be applauded for their resilience. While they fight to find better, they don’t do it with the intention of harming anyone else. They are accepting of their current circumstances without giving up hopes for better ones in the future. They have the unbreakable spirits and they should be applauded for surviving against all odds.
Through her talent, Criselda has become a voice that represents the struggle of many undocumented immigrants, many laborers, many oppressed communities. Her work has become the image of the humble necessity to carry on- a quiet and pure resilience that goes by unnoticed, un-reported, and un-applauded in today’s noisy world of media and opinion.
Criselda Vasquez’s art reminds us that while the world falls apart, it is our purpose and our celebration of one another that will uplift us and remind us that, indeed, we are the unbreakable ones.
[Silvana Lezama is a poet, blogger, and a social media activist. She was born in Perú, raised in San Francisco, and is now living in Los Angeles. She has contributed content to major social media activism pages that focus on spreading social awareness. Silvana plans to use her poetry and her writing to inspire an open dialogue for healing and empowerment for POC.]
How to Make Amends: A Lesson on Reparations (Zinn Education Project)
Source: Kelly Hayes // Zinn Education Project
How to Make Amends: A Lesson on Reparations
By Ursula Wolfe-Rocca, Alex Stegner, Chris Buehler, Angela DiPasquale, and Tom McKenna
As high school teachers of history and government, we teach about reparations at multiple points across the curriculum. Students learn about the reparations imposed upon Germany by the Treaty of Versailles following World War I; students learn about the failure of the U.S. government to enact reparations — 40 acres and a mule — for newly emancipated people during Reconstruction; students learn about the 1988 Civil Liberties Act through which Congress paid 82,000 Japanese American survivors of the U.S. government’s wartime incarceration program $20,000 each, totaling more than $1.6 billion. But when we have asked our students to grapple with the possibility of the United States paying reparations today — for slavery and its 20th- and 21st-century legacies of white supremacist violence, disenfranchisement, and exploitation — we find students struggle to unleash their critical imaginations.
Some students hold fast to the “slavery is long gone” line of thinking. Some students are frozen by the magnitude of the harm: How could any amount of money ever properly address the wickedness of slavery and racism? Other students worry about the practical questions: Who would be eligible to receive payment? What form would payment take? How long would a reparations program last and how much would it cost? These responses are understandable and important; yet, we noticed that students had trouble navigating through their initial positions to engage with a broader scope of possibilities. Students got stuck thinking of reparations only as a onetime compensatory payment intended to right the wrongs of history.
We developed this lesson to help students find a way into thinking and talking more imaginatively about reparations in general before we ask them to examine the modern debate over African American reparations specifically. (We have been piloting an African American reparations role play that will be completed and posted later this year.) We want students to consider how a legacy of injustice as deeply rooted and multidimensional as anti-Black racism in the United States requires a multifaceted strategy, not a single action.
In this mixer role play, students learn about more than a dozen different examples of reparations — ranging from cash payments to land settlements to state apologies — from a variety of historical moments and places. Students meet those who advocated for reparations, those who received them, and those who did not. They walk away from the activity with a greater understanding of the horizon of possible reparative policies and enough examples to begin to analyze and articulate their own beliefs about the appropriate context, goal, and form of reparations.
Download to read in full (pdf)
Zinn Education Project
A collaboration between Rethinking Schools and Teaching for Change
PO Box 73038
Washington, D.C. 20056
Phone: 202-588-7205 | Email: zep@zinnedproject.org
WELCOME TO THE UNION PAMPHLET BACK IN PRINT!
Don’t let management’s voice be the only one heard by new employees who hire on in your unionized workplace.
Welcome to the Union: A Pamphlet for New Employees
Don’t let management’s voice be the only one heard by new employees who hire on in your unionized workplace. Welcome them to the job with this easy-to-read, solidarity-building introduction to unionism. Suitable for both private and public sector, the pamphlet covers all the important bases, including explaining the democratic nature of union, how collective bargaining works, member rights and responsibilities and just plain basic union structure. It even has a clip-and-save Weingarten Rights card. It's a perfect ice-breaking handout from stewards or for inclusion in a new-worker membership packet.
Welcome to the Union helps new co-workers understand unionism and is designed to win their support and involvement. It’s a quick and easy read that offers a concise, to-the-point explanation of how unions operate and the vital role every employee can play helping improve the workplace for all. By Labor Attorney Michael Mauer
Available from Hard Ball Press.
Order by telephone: 917-428 1352 or use the form here.
415 Argyle Rd., 6A
Brooklyn, NY, 11218
917 428 1352
Join the Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Indian New York (NMAI) and Teaching for Change on September 28, 2019 for talks and workshops on teaching about Indigenous peoples’ histories and experiences today.
The speakers and workshops will feature classroom resources for K-12 from Native Knowledge 360°, NMAI’s initiative to transform teaching and learning about American Indians, as well as resources from the Zinn Education Project, including the campaign to abolish Columbus Day.
The keynote speaker is Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz, author and editor of more than a dozen books including An Indigenous People’s History of the United States and “All the Real Indians Died Off”: And 20 Other Myths about Native Americans. Dunbar-Ortiz has been active in the international Indigenous movement for more than four decades. Her 1977 book The Great Sioux Nation was the fundamental document at the first international conference on Indigenous peoples of the Americas at the United Nations in Geneva.
Workshops will include:
- How Do Native People and Nations Experience Belonging? NK360° Digital Lesson
- Building Critical Literacy in Your Classroom: American Indians in Children’s Literature
- The People vs. Columbus, et al.
- Taíno: Native Heritage and Identity in the Caribbean exhibit tour and discussion
- Native Innovation: ImagiNATIONS Activity Center tour and discussion
- The ABCDE’s: Activism by Children Defending the Environment
A registration fee of $25 includes continental breakfast and light snacks, a copy of Rethinking Columbus, and other classroom resources. Registered participants will receive a follow-up email to select preferred workshops. Plan to arrive by 8:30AM to allow time to pass through security and check in.
Directions to NMAI New York at One Bowling Green, New York, NY 10004.
NMAI-NY is an Approved Continuing Teacher and Leader Education (CTLE) Sponsor and CTLE Hours are awarded for your attendance at Educator Programs. Learn more.
Teaching for Change · Office: 800-763-9131 or 202-588-7205
"Confronting White Supremacy" Seminar with Gerald Horne - New York - October 18 (People's Forum)
Gerald Horne has requested your presence at our upcoming seminar for the study (and celebration) of his new book, White Supremacy Confronted: U.S. Imperialism and Anti-Communism vs. the Liberation of Southern Africa from Rhodes to Mandela (International Publishers, 2019).
The seminar will be held at The People’s Forum (320 W. 37th St. NYC) on Friday, October 18, at 4pm.
We expect this to be a bracing preliminary conversation that builds towards the next day's event, "Holding the Future Hostage: A Conference on Hybrid Wars, Sanctions and Solidarity," which will also be held at The People’s Forum where Dr. Horne will again be speaking.
If you are able to attend, please email Aya Ouais at ouais.aya@gmail.com. Looking forward to seeing you all soon.
Join Metro for a provocative discussion with leading thinkers and working journalists about:
* Communicating with members who believe fake news
* Combatting the overabundance of misinformation out there
* Best practices in response to politicians/bosses who denigrate our work in order to prevent exposure of their wrongdoing
* How the risks to journalists (from physical danger to damaged reputations) might hinder the truth from being told
* Countering this destructive effort that threatens our unions and our democracy
Thursday, October 24 -- 5:30-8pm
National Writer’s Union
256 W. 38th Street, 12th Fl.
Manhattan
Free event, light refreshments
RSVP to https://www.facebook.com/events/733967717054663/
Panel discussion:
- Kerry Paterson, Deputy Director of Advocacy, Committee to Protect Journalists. Every year, hundreds of journalists are attacked, imprisoned, or killed. CPJ has been there to defend them and fight for press freedom
- Jiore Craig, Vice President at GQR, helps governments and unions to develop rapid response programs to combat disinformation on- and offline.
- Zach Verdin, entrepreneur and artist. Verdin co-founded NewHive and Guardians.ai, where his most recent work has focused on the impact of information warfare on societies, systems, countries, presidential campaigns, and companies.
Established in 1974, the Metro New York Labor Communications Council (Metro) includes communicators from public and private sector trade unions and related organizations — all those who give voice to today’s labor movement. Metro is affiliated with the International Labor Communications Association, AFL-CIO. www.metrolabornyc.org | fb: https://www.facebook.com/metrolabornyc/ | @MetroLaborNYC
Get ready, Big Apple! Farmworkers and consumers will converge on New York City November 18th for Wendy’s Boycott march!
The Coalition of Immokalee Workers is coming back to New York!
As plans for ramping up the Wendy’s Boycott on campuses and in communities around the country begin to take root for the fall – with the Student/Farmworker Alliance Encuentro just two short weeks away – farmworkers in Immokalee want YOU to save the date for a major mobilization this November in New York City.
Following 2018’s two powerful marches through the streets of Manhattan – the Time’s Up Wendy’s March, which marked the culmination of the Freedom Fast and was joined by thousands of consumers, and the “How Much Longer, Wendy’s?” March – farmworkers and consumers from across the region will be gathering in New York to once again take to the streets to demand farm labor justice from Wendy’s on November 18th of this year.
Following the 2018 Freedom Fast and Time’s Up Wendy’s March, the fast food giant announced at the company’s annual shareholder meeting in June of that same year that it would be shifting its tomato purchases from Mexico to U.S. and Canadian greenhouses, responding to consumer pressure over the abysmal human rights conditions in Mexico’s produce industry. But as Wendy’s has seen with the major mobilizations that have followed, from the “How Much Longer, Wendy’s” March in New York to the 4 for Fair Food Tour this past spring, the Fair Food Nation will not rest until Wendy’s joins other fast-food giants – McDonald’s, Burger King, Taco Bell, Subway, and Chipotle – in supporting the only proven solution to ending human rights abuse in U.S. agriculture, the Fair Food Program.
We’ll leave the last word to the CIW’s Lupe Gonzalo, speaking to hundreds of cheering consumers in New York last July:
… Once again, we are here to demonstrate our strength. We have made it clear to Wendy’s that we will not give up until they join the Fair Food Program. After our fast of five days in this very same place, in the cold, enduring hunger, marching with 2,000 people in the streets of New York, we have taken an important step forward: Wendy’s will now only buy tomatoes from the U.S. and Canada. But another, bigger step remains – and that is to sign a Fair Food Agreement. We will not be satisfied until Wendy’s responds directly to us as workers – because to simply buy from greenhouses is not equivalent to ensuring justice and human rights.
So make sure to mark November 18th on your calendar, and stay tuned for more on November’s major mobilization in the weeks ahead!
Coalition of Immokalee Workers
P.O. Box 509
Immokalee, FL 34143
workers@ciw-online.org