Readers' views, September-October 2020, part one
Readers' Views takes up: Black revolt and racism; dialectics of liberation; school battles; election victories; history and freedom; class struggles; and fighting the Right wing.
Voices from the inside out: George Floyd and 13th Amendment
Prisoner columnist Robert Taliaferro explores how George Floyd's death sparked a delayed discussion of race. Will such discussions be sustained once the cameras are turned off and the reporters leave, or will they once again fall short of needed reforms and honest solutions?
South African shackdweller solidarity with George Floyd protesters
A statement of solidarity with the U.S. movement against racism and police brutality by the shackdwellers movement in South Africa, Abahlali baseMjondolo.
Readers' views: July-August 2020, part 1
Readers' views on American civilization on trial, coast to coast; Cops in schools; Police and power; Style and meaning; Sports fans speak; Revolt: where to now? and Health workers speak
Anti-racist protests across the U.S.
Protests of George Floyd's murder and police brutality in general have erupted all over the U.S. Here are in-person reports of demonstrations in Chicago and the San Francisco Bay Area.
I. The failed pandemic response and the fetishism of the economy
Draft thesis for discussion about where the world is heading, and what to do about it from a revolutionary standpoint. Part I: Leaders around the world from China's Xi Jinping to Donald Trump—have focused more on keeping production and the economy going than people's health and lives.
Prisons = death
Report on the #ClemencyCoast2Coast virtual town hall held on April 8, in which former prisoners took the floor to speak about the "death camps" that prisons have turned into in the COVID-19 pandemic and to demand early release.
II. The true pandemic war
Draft thesis for discussion about where the world is heading, and what to do about it from a revolutionary standpoint. Part II. The true pandemic war: A. The capitalists' class war; B. Subjects of revolution fight back; and C. Pandemic class war reveals the social structure.
Detroit Dispatch #2: Easter Sunday
As elsewhere, in Detroit numbers of cases and deaths continue to rise, the lockdown is intensified, school is on hold, Black citizens are sick and dying in large numbers, and unemployment grows.
With COVID-19 prisons become 'death camps'
Report on the #ClemencyCoast2Coast virtual town hall held on April 8, in which former prisoners took the floor to speak about the "death camps" that prisons have turned into in the midst COVID-19 pandemic and to demand early release.
Solidarity with Trans people under attack by Trumpism
News and Letters Committees statement on Donald Trump's latest attack on Trans people by trying to claim that the word "sex" in Title IX does not include them. Trump has chosen to dehumanize a group of people whose whole lives have often been fraught with brutal violence and discrimination, those who are Transgender.
World in View: Brazil museum burns
On Sept. 2, Brazil's National Museum in Rio de Janeiro was devastated by fire after being subject to drastic budget cuts because of its location in the more working class North Zone, as opposed to the South Zone of Rio with its glitzy tourist beaches.
Youth in Action, September-October 2018
University of North Carolina students and workers bring down statue of generic Confederate soldier; Swedish pro-asylum student Elin Errson prevents deportation of Afghan refugee; Iraqi youth and women protest unemployment, electricity shortages and lack of clean water.
The limitations of restorative justice
Prisoner Stephen Wilson comments on Faruq's article on the meaning of legal standing before the law and how restorative justice is not enough as the need is for transformative justice which focuses on the structures that create oppression and inequality in the first place.
Baby Jayden Khoza, murdered in South Africa
Baby Jayden Khoza, two weeks old, lost his life during the brutal police assault on the Foreman Road community in Clare Estate, Durban, on May 29, 2017.
Mass rallies denounce Trump and defend immigrants: Florida students rally
Florida college students rally for immigrants, against U.S. President Donald Trump's first immigrant ban and against the University of South Florida's support for companies that harm the environment or support the military.
Chicago, NYC rally for Transgender students
Reports on rallies at New York's Stonewall Inn and in Chicago to denounce the Trump administration's decision to cease to protect and defend the rights of Transgender students in U.S. schools.
Readers' Views: September-October 2016, Part 1
Readers' Views on: Racism and Revolt Put U.S. on Trial; Life and Death Under the Class Divide; Environmental Struggles; War and Atrocities; and Women's Lives at Stake.
Walking against indefinite detention
Buddy Bell of Voices for Creative Nonviolence tells of their recent 150-mile walk across the state of Illinois on the issues of indefinite detention, solitary confinement and the racist U.S. prison system.
From the writings of Raya Dunayevskaya: Racism, war and Muhammad Ali
On the same day that General William Westmoreland waved the flag before Congress, Muhammad Ali refused to be inducted into the Army. While the general was applauded even by the doves, Ali was, within hours, stripped of his title of World Heavyweight Boxing Champion. War exposed the open nerve—"the Black Question"—which has always been the touchstone of U.S. history. It placed American civilization on trial before the world much more seriously than the "war crimes tribunal" in Stockholm.
Afro-Colombian Women: Defeating invisibility
by Gerry Emmett
In the remarkable documentary film, La Toma (2012), Afro-Colombian woman activist Francia Marquez Mina is threatened by government forces and forced to spend each night sleeping in a different place for her safety. (See "Afro-Colombians Throw Off Shackles," Nov.-Dec. 2012 N&L.) She has described the experience of people in her community this [=>]
Women Worldwide, July-August 2012
by Artemis
In May, delegations of Japanese officials came to Palisades Park, N.J., where more than half the community is of Korean descent, to request the removal of a memorial to the Korean "comfort women." They shockingly claimed that the more than 200 women, who were forced to be sex slaves for the Japanese military [=>]
In Memoriam: John Alan/Allen Willis
Allen Willis/John Alan–who would have been 95 on June 10 this year–died quietly on Feb. 23 in Oakland, California. The near-century of his life was filled with thoughts and experiences of Black life in America. One of his earliest recollections was as a three-year-old witnessing the 1919 race riots, seeing Black men being attacked and [=>]