All News Feeds

The Trump resistance can be best described in one adjective: female | LA Kaufman

The Guardian | Protest -

With the anti-Trump resistance, the preponderance of women is so noteworthy that failing to name it obscures the movement’s basic nature

  • LA Kauffman is a longtime grassroots organizer and author of Direct Action: Protest and the Reinvention of American Radicalism

It’s now been six dizzying and nauseating months since Donald Trump took the oath of office, and the brightest spot on the American political landscape is the grassroots resistance that has sprung up to counter his regime. No previous president ever faced so many protests so early in his term, and the millions who have taken to the streets since January can already take significant credit for stalling and frustrating key aspects of Trump’s agenda, from his Muslim ban to his bid to repeal the Affordable Care Act.

There are numerous qualities that distinguish this organizing upsurge from past waves of protest in the United States, but the most striking and significant is its composition: the resistance, by and large, is women.

Continue reading...

Protests erupt as Minneapolis mayor announces police chief’s resignation – video

The Guardian | Protest -

Demonstrators take over a news conference held by Betsy Hodges on Friday, asking her to resign following the shooting of unarmed Australian Justine Damond by a police officer. The conference took place hours after the Minneapolis police chief, Janeé Harteau, resigned at Hodges’s request

Continue reading...

'Never been about race': black activists on how Minneapolis reacted to Damond shooting

The Guardian | Protest -

Some questioned whether activists had protested less over the death of a White Australian woman. Friday night’s anger at mayor Betsy Hodges and the departure of the city’s police chief answered that

In the aftermath of the police shooting of Justine Damond, many on the right of the political spectrum asked on social media: “Where are the protests now?”

The claim was clear: when a black cop killed a white woman, Black Lives Matter, or other African American activists pushing for police reform, would not be quick to protest.

Related: Minneapolis protests as police chief resigns over Justine Damond shooting

The Mayor'a press conference to announce the new police chief was taken over by community activists tonight. This is Jonathan Thompson, the friend and coworker of Philando Castile who became an activist after Castile'a death. And that is community activist Chauntyll Allen in the blue hat #justinedamond #justineruszczyk #onassignment

It’s never been about race. It’s been about police accountability.

Related: Justine Damond's death is a tragedy – as every police killing in America is | Steven W Thrasher

The similarity is that the police are trigger happy.

Continue reading...

Vladimir Putin: 'I may not leave Russian presidency'

The Guardian | Protest -

A question-and-answer session at a Sochi school was designed to make Putin seem youth-friendly after recent youth demonstrations

Asked what he plans to do when he leaves the presidency, Vladimir Putin paused and smiled. “But I haven’t decided yet if I will leave the presidency,” the Russian leader replied, to laughter and applause from an audience made up almost entirely of Russians who were born after he first became president in 2000.

Related: Russian courts sentence protesters arrested at anti-corruption rallies

Continue reading...

Solidarity statement from Rosa de Foc Squat in Athens, Greece, to anti-airport struggle ZAD in France

House Occupation News -

As an international housing squat we think solidarity is our weapon, and as we all know weapons have categories, from handguns to nuclear bombs. Revolutionary solidarity doesn’t have boundaries and can only benefit the struggle. We are already starting to try our theories in practice about this.

International solidarity means bringing and taking ideas from one place to another, placing priorities and supporting the place that needs our help the most. Help is not only texts, supplies and solidarity demonstrations in our territory, but also our physical presence there. Working with the people, learning their language and their culture. Basic ingredients if we want to be effective and helpful, because every battle ground is different.

To become more specific we will now bring up the example of ZAD in France, a community that repels the cops for five years and manage their self-defence. They construct their own houses from scratch, and an alternative independent economy.
They develop their community based on anti-authoritarian and libertarian principles.

The state of France still wants to destroy the forest and build an airport, and gave a deadline for November. This is the right time for us to go and participate in a struggle worth our effort.

We are breaking the borders and making the revolutionary movement one and global. We’re expanding our borders, building theconfederation.

We salute the comrades from ZAD and from all the territories inside the French State, and we accept the honor and responsibility to have this crucial fight side by side with them. We will respond to any kind of attack from the State, and we will consider it as an attack on ourselves.

This is a statement and a greeting from ROSA DE FOC and the movement. Let’s make all the little sparks into one big and dangerous fire.

If they touch one, they touch us all.

Rosa De Foc

[325 – Posted on Friday, July 21st, 2017.]

Coalition paves way for Palestinian homecoming after 20-year displacement

Waging Nonviolence -

by Jim Haber

The group arrives at Sarura on May 19, having walked a mile or two from Al Tuwani, just outside of Firing Zone 918. Ashley Bohrer, in the black leather jacket has co-led the last two CJNV delegations. (WNV/Gili Getz)

A new project in the rural hills of the West Bank, called Sumud: Freedom Camp, is the latest sign of a resurgence of strategic, nonviolent organizing in Palestine that is creating strong bonds between Palestinians and Jewish activists from Israel and around the world.

I traveled to Palestine in May with a delegation organized by the Center for Jewish Nonviolence, or CJNV, to help build Sumud, which means steadfastness, following a call by Palestinian communities. Using the hashtag #WeAreSumud, the camp was organized by an unique coalition of Palestinians, Israelis, Jews and international justice seekers standing in solidarity with the village of Sarura.

The families of Sarura were displaced from their homes in the 1980s and 1990s, and want to return to their lands and sustain their homes, which they still legally own. The land of Sarura was declared a restricted military zone as part of Firing Zone 918, when 1,300 Bedouins were cleared out of a dozen hamlets south of Hebron, just north of the Israeli border. The residents have faced continuous settler violence and harassment including the poisoning of livestock and wells. After decades of injustice, marginalization and occupation, the Sumud Coalition is calling for an end to the systematic displacement of Palestinians, the dismantling of Firing Zone 918, and a future of justice, dignity, freedom and equality for all.

How it began

On May 19, after walking to Sarura from nearby Al-Tuwani, Issa Amro of Hebron’s Youth Against Settlements welcomed everyone with a brief history of the area and a call to steadfast nonviolence.

“We encourage everyone to do nonviolent resistance. Historically, our prisoners have one of the best nonviolent movements ever in Palestine,” Amro said, speaking of the political prisoners who were on hunger strike at that time. “They motivate us to go on with our nonviolent resistance that will change the situation on the ground. We’re going to start work now. If the army comes, ignore them. It’s our land. You are in solidarity with the landowners. We are here, and we’re not leaving.”

Fadal Aamer and family outside their open and restored cave having returned after 20 years. (WNV/Gili Getz)

Fadal Aamer and his family have led this return to Sarura. We laid a concrete floor in Aamer’s family cave, which Israel evicted them from 20 years ago, and where they’ve lived since their return. We restored walking paths and paved a portion of road which helps reduce costs of supplying such outlying communities. We erected large tents over old stone-walled areas and danced exuberant, semi-traditional, Palestinian dabkah around a fire. People observed Shabbat in different ways as they saw fit.

On the second night, a little before midnight, the Israeli army violently showed up and seized, illegally, Palestinian-owned tents, a generator and food, while also pouring water on sleeping gear and wrecking a projector. They pushed and pulled people as we created nonviolent walls by linking arms to hold or reclaim our space. While we were not able to block their vehicles from leaving with our supplies, it was clear that they were ordered to take things away, not people.

The next night, Aamer’s oven made the first pita bread in Sarura in 20 years. The camp has persevered, despite the army taking more gear in subsequent incursions. They impounded a car owned by Aamer’s son and detained him. The coalition is raising money to replace items rather than pay exorbitant ransoms for their return.

The second phase of the Sumud camp was to hold on at least through the holy month of Ramadan. International and local supporters worked days and vigiled all night. All That’s Left, an Israeli-based collective unequivocally opposed to the occupation and committed to building the diaspora angle of resistance, helped coordinate rides from Israel. Members of the popular committee of nearby Um Il-Kheir were key to keeping Sumud going through the nights of Ramadan. On June 26, there was a celebration in Sarura for Eid al Fitr, which marked the successful conclusion of this phase.

“I especially want to thank the internationals who came,” Aamer told the group. ” God willing, we will continue in our steadfastness and our resiliency in this camp. This is our land, and we will remain in it until we die in this land. No settler, no soldier is going to take us out of this land. Only God will take us out of this place.”

The significance of solidarity

Those with the CJNV delegation readily agreed to follow the direction of our group leaders like Isaac Kates-Rose and Palestinians like Issa Amro and Sami Awad of Holy Land Trust to leave interactions with settlers, military and police to them. During the night raid’s chaos, they simultaneously argued about our rights with the army in Hebrew, Arabic and English, joined and led chants, told us when to hold space and when to regroup, kept an amazing sense of humor and helped us find success, despite the partial destruction of our camp.

A relaxing moment under the tent at Sumud: Freedom Camp. (WNV/Gili Getz)

A Palestinian-led steering committee — that includes partners like CJNV, Holy Land Trust, Combatants for Peace and others — was formed months in advance for Sumud and continues to map out a strategy going forward. International and Israeli Jews were asked to consciously apply the privilege granted to them by the oppressive state to get in its way.

“Your presence here has an effect on the occupation more than the effect of using weapons,” said Mahmoud, an elder from al-Mufaqarah, a Palestinian community near Sarura. “Any of you who carries a passport other than a Palestinian passport is an obstacle to the occupation, and I thank you for coming here. You represent the Palestinians in nonviolence and will go into the world and tell people that God willing, together we will end the occupation.”

A vital feature of the Sumud effort is how it has brought together various “popular committees” from small, rural communities in the hills south of Hebron — which coordinate much of the activism and community engagement resisting the occupation — with more urban, nonviolent organizing groups like Holy Land Trust and Youth Against Settlements.

What comes next

After the 2016 delegation, some of the people and communities CJNV visited and worked with were quickly targeted by Israel and settler groups with extra-judicial demolitions and legal action. Nonetheless they have been very involved in the return to Sarura.

Restoring walkways in Sarura by removing thistles and rocks, using boulders to make walls and line paths. (WNV/Gili Getz)

Issa Amro, who is often referred to as “a Palestinian Gandhi,” was back in military court on July 9 over old, trumped-up charges filed shortly after a CJNV delegation in 2016. In the Occupied Territories, Palestinians are legally treated as guilty until proven innocent under a set of laws that apply only to them, not to Israeli citizens or internationals. Despite the 99.74 percent conviction rate of Palestinians in Israeli military courts, Amro’s case was extended until October for his next hearing.

The people of Um Il-Kheir have suffered through two more rounds of demolitions since CJNV and local children painted a mural on the side of their soon-to-be destroyed community center. The third phase for Sumud will see a continuation of international support and attention, but less of a presence on the ground.

New lines of communication were devised and strengthened for Sumud with the hope that they will continue to be helpful even if Israel re-evicts Palestinians from Sarura. Communities that are very close geographically have united around the current effort with renewed cohesion. Palestinians are steadfast in sharing mutual aid despite the various types of roadblocks put up by Israel and its hostile settlers. Unjust scrutiny and attack are already part of Palestinians’ daily life, and the coalition behind Sumud is encouraging internationals — and Jews in particular — to join them in their struggle on the ground.

Tensions rise at fracking site in UK after police and activists clashes

The Guardian | Protest -

Scuffles and accusations of aggression increase at Cuadrilla’s Preston New Road shale gas exploration site

Tensions at Britain’s most high-profile fracking site have risen following an increase in violent clashes between protesters, security guards and police. One demonstrator said she had been left unconscious following a “pretty brutal” scuffle with security officers on Wednesday, and another activist fell from his wheelchair, the same day, when police officers pulled him out of the way of a 40-tonne lorry.

Both protesters said they planned to report the incidents that had occurred – at Cuadrilla’s Preston New Road site, near Blackpool – to the Lancashire police.

Related: Fracking inquiry launched after Blackpool tremors

Related: Fracking site approval by government based on legal errors, court hears

Continue reading...

Randy Newman writes comic song about Donald Trump's penis

The Guardian | Protest -

Oscar-winning songwriter left vulgar song off new album Dark Matter so he wouldn’t ‘add to the problem of how ugly the conversation we’re all having is’

Veteran songwriter Randy Newman has revealed he wrote a song about Donald Trump for his latest album – comparing the relative size of their penises.

In an interview with Vulture, Newman revealed the lyrics to the song:

My dick’s bigger than your dick / It ain’t braggin’ if it’s true / My dick’s bigger than your dick / I can prove it too / There it is! There’s my dick / Isn’t that a wonderful sight? / Run to the village, to town, to the countryside / Tell the people what you’ve seen here tonight.

Continue reading...

Pennsylvania nuns oppose fracking gas pipeline through 'holy' land

The Guardian | Protest -

Catholic order builds chapel in middle of cornfield in attempt to use religious freedom protections to block Atlantic Sunrise pipeline

Catholic nuns in Pennsylvania are resisting plans to build a $3bn pipeline for gas obtained by fracking through its land by creating a rudimentary chapel along the proposed route and launching a legal challenge, citing religious freedom.

The Adorers of the Blood of Christ order has filed a complaint against the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) in a bid to keep the pipeline off their land. The nuns’ lawyers argue in court papers that a decision by FERC to force them to accommodate the pipeline is “antithetical to the deeply held religious beliefs and convictions of the Adorers”.

#standwiththesisters Details for today's outdoor chapel dedication: https://t.co/fACEtnY0Mm pic.twitter.com/qH2f0lOlEt

At a vigil held by the Adorers of the Blood of Christ, a group of nuns who, w/ Lancaster Against Pipelines, oppose Atlantic Sunrise pipeline pic.twitter.com/TPk1gB5L8z

Continue reading...

Why are the Danes so happy? Because their economy makes sense

Waging Nonviolence -

by George Lakey

The waterfront district in Copenhagen. (Wikimedia / Srvora)

The World Happiness Report puts Danes consistently in the top tier. Twice in the past four years Denmark came in first. Danes also report more satisfaction with their health care than anyone else in Europe, which makes sense, since happiness is related to a sense of security and others being there for you. A fine health care system makes that real.

The Danish approach is especially interesting to Americans because of the U.S. suspicion of centralization. Danes prefer to administer their health care locally. On the other hand, they’ve found that the fairest and most efficient way of paying for their system is through income tax, most of which is routed through Copenhagen.

The system delivers quality health care to all and costs Denmark only two-thirds what the United States spends. I’d like to hear Democratic U.S. senators, who mostly reject single-payer health care (except for themselves), try to sell Obamacare to the Danes.

“What?” I imagine the Danes exclaiming. “You want us to spend one-third more of our national wealth on health care, and still leave many Danes without coverage? And end up with inferior health outcomes?”

The continuing attempt by most Democratic leaders to sell health care as a market-based commodity would strike Danes as both unethical (more people die from preventable causes) and a waste of money. What sense would that make?

How did the Danes force their own economy to make sense?

Denmark wasn’t always like this. A century ago its economic system was deeply irrational and poverty was endemic. Despite having a parliament and free elections, a growing number of Danes came to realize that they had a sham democracy. The major decisions were actually made by their economic elite. Many Danes were so discouraged that they left for North America, hoping for something better.

People left behind in Denmark decided to turn their country around, which meant organizing movements to override the will of their contented 1 percent. The people pulled off what might be called a nonviolent revolution.

In the 19th century, their struggle focused on the first two stages that I describe in “Toward a Living Revolution:” cultural preparation and organization-building. A lot of leadership came from N.F.S. Grundtvig, a writer and bishop. He invented the Danish folk schools, which taught adults whose agricultural rhythm gave them some free time during the winter. At folk schools they learned some of the basics of literacy and participatory democracy.

Grundtvig used his religious influence to restore people’s confidence in themselves — he saw spirituality as empowerment rather than “the opium of the people.” He also supported the growth of coops, a form of socialism that rebelled against the merchant class’ deification of the private market. The agricultural coops provided a way to retain the wealth that farmers and agricultural workers sweated for.

Other creative Danes found ways to show that, even in a small Northern European country with few natural resources and frequent gloom-inducing weather, the people could find abundant meaning by developing their collective life, their Danishness.

The intensity of this cultural preparation paid off later in the Danish resistance to Nazi German occupation, when by collective effort the Resistance saved nearly all the Danish Jews from the Holocaust. Rallying around Danishness, however, can have its down side, showing up recently as reluctance to integrate immigrants to Denmark, who now total over 8 percent of the population.

As Danes industrialized, they continued their cultural preparation and organization-building through worker study groups and unions. The industrial workers tested their strength through a wave of strikes in 1899 that forced the employers association to bargain with them on a national level.

The workers movement organized itself into three parts: unions to deal with wages and workplace issues, consumer coops to retain wealth that otherwise would go to the capitalists, and a political party to represent them in parliament — the Social Democrats. Unlike the U.S. unions’ choice largely to support the Democratic Party, the Danish unions decided to create a party that would be would be strictly accountable to the movement. Their choice paid off.

The class struggle intensifies

After World War I Danish workers grew more radical and escalated. Syndicalists sometimes led the strikes. The Danish economic elite’s worries were compounded by looking across the border and seeing radicalized German workers mounting large-scale revolutionary insurgencies.

The combination of disruption inside Denmark and radicalism outside the country eroded the elite’s opposition to change, much as the United States experienced in the 1960s and ‘70s. During the civil rights and other movements, the United States took to nonviolent direct action internally while the empire was experiencing uproar in Southeast Asia and Latin America. The American 1 percent felt compelled to make concessions as a result.

Social Democrat poster from 1931. (The National Museum of Denmark)

For Danish workers, farmworkers and middle-class allies, the post-World War I struggle won two major victories. Industrial workers gained a nationwide guarantee that wages would increase along with inflation. This is huge, as contemporary U.S. workers who have lost so much ground in the past few decades can tell us.

The second victory favored the other large group of poor and near-poor people, the farmworkers in Denmark’s large agricultural sector. Major landowners were forced to give up a substantial part of their land, which were then re-distributed to the farmworkers. The landowners were also forced to pay a substantial new tax on their remaining land. This win took away the last remaining privilege of Denmark’s old landed aristocracy.

The movement’s nonviolent struggle won over the Danish majority, enabling the Social Democrats to begin in 1924 a stretch of governing that ran almost continuously through the 20th century. Because direct action had reduced the elite’s power, the Danes could take leadership in co-creating what economists would later call “the Nordic model.”

Sweden and Norway work to catch up

The Viking cousins in Sweden and Norway imported folk high schools. They developed their own coops and vision-developing study groups. Their goal was to push the 1 percent out of dominance. In my new book “Viking Economics,” I tell the dramatic story of mounting nonviolent confrontations with their economic elites.

In 1931, in Sweden, the struggle came to a head. The elite called out the army to suppress the workers. Troops killed unarmed strikers. Retaliating, the movement staged a widespread general strike. The government fell.

In the years following that victory, the Norwegians escalated the number of their strikes and were joined in nonviolent militancy by the farmers and the movement’s student allies. Norwegians succeeded in making their country ungovernable by the economic elite. The 1 percent was forced to the bargaining table in 1936, where they gave up their dominance of the country’s direction.

While the revolutionary struggles in Sweden and Norway each came to a single breakthrough point in the 1930s, the Danish movement did a two-step. The first breakthrough moment came early, in the years following 1918. The second came in the 1930s.

Disaster hits in the 1930s, and vision saves Denmark

The real measure of a movement is how much it is able to turn crisis into opportunity. That’s what author Naomi Klein sees in the combination of the global climate change crisis with the messes made by capitalism. Will movement people today focus on using the opportunity, as did the Danes in the 1930s.

As the Depression deepened existing inequality, Danes polarized. Fascism grew, inspired by Hitler in next door Germany. The attractiveness of communism also increased. The majority, however, was hungry for a solution that would heighten democracy and individual freedom and be in alignment with “Danishness.”

The Danish economic elite was eager to regain their firm hegemonic rule that was shaken by the post-war class struggle. They were tired of being pushed around by the Social Democrats who had been governing since 1924. To stage a comeback, however, the 1 percent needed a solution to the Depression, a breakdown of capitalism. With Denmark’s largely agricultural economy unable to sell its produce to foreign markets, half the population was left with no purchasing power at all.

The 1 percent decided to hold out for market-based solutions: reliance on the private insurance approach to ill-health, for example. They proposed governmental austerity, which under the circumstances was laughable.

Successful movements generate a positive vision of what they want, rather than simply relying on protests about what’s wrong.

The Social Democrats came up with a vision adopting Keynesian stimulation for the macro-economy. The vision flatly rejected austerity. It also rejected insurance and philanthropy as the solutions to misfortune and poverty. The Social Democrats turned decisively toward universal services financed by the government through progressive taxation.

Using the crisis as an opportunity, the Social Democrats secured the foundation of the Nordic model, the most successful economic national model yet invented for the common good. The Danish majority loved it, and the unions and family farmers retained political control of the country for the rest of the century. The model became so hegemonic that all the parties were forced to embrace it to remain relevant at all, even the new “right-wing” party that hates immigration while still promoting a robust version of the Nordic model.

What shall we call that model? Describing Denmark as a “welfare state” is, I think, seriously misleading. The Nordic design isn’t welfare for the needy — that’s the old approach that has not worked for any nation in the world, ever. Instead, the Nordic model provides universal services given to all, whatever their income, as a matter or right, supported by progressive taxation that re-distributes income and wealth.

If you like poverty, continue to think “welfare,” because welfare is mainly about poverty. If you like equality, think “universal services,” because the universal approach has been shown by the Nordics to promote the abolition of poverty.

For the Danes, fully implementing the promise of the Nordic model took a while. The country’s economy improved in the 1930s, but the Nazi occupation set them back. By the late 1950s, the Social Democrats were moving rapidly toward the shared abundance that shows up in their happiness ratings.

Shall we call the change process a nonviolent revolution?

The Danish people did not produce utopia, nor are they first in every measure. Norway has more social ownership of the means of production than Denmark does, and Sweden generates more innovation as measured by patents. The Danes did not end the push-back from the economic elite. Class struggle remains a reality in Denmark, as it does everywhere.

The Danes did, however, end centuries of domination by their 1 percent and empowered the democratic majority to make decisions about the future direction of the economy. They designed a different economy, one that centers labor instead of capital, correctly understanding this shift to be the pre-condition for the abolition of poverty. They also turn to nonviolent direct action to do the heavy lifting when they see it is needed, rather than putting all their eggs in the parliamentary basket.

However we debate definitions, the Danish story of struggle offers valuable lessons for the rest of us. Especially those of us who want to be happy.

Indigenous weavers organize for collective intellectual property rights

Waging Nonviolence -

by Jeff Abbott

A woman weaves in Santiago Atitlan, Sololá, Guatemala using a traditional backstrap loom. (WNV/Jeff Abbott)

On July 9, Kaqchikel Maya weavers in Guatemala gathered in the town of Santiago Sacatepéquez’s central park to celebrate a small victory in their struggle to protect their weavings from appropriation by transnational companies. In the historic event, the municipality declared that the weavings and designs of the traditional clothing of the town were part of the heritage of the Kaqchikel town, about an hour outside Guatemala City.

“This is part of our history as residents of Santiago,” declared municipal mayor Juan Carlos Barrios, following the reading of an accord about the recognition of the connection of the weavings to the heritage of their town. The action would require any company that wishes to use weavings from the town to consult the weavers prior to use.

This announcement by the municipality comes after years of organizing by the Women’s Association for the Development of Sacatepéquez, or AFEDES, which is based in Santiago Sacatepéquez and is at the forefront of a movement of weavers to protect their weavings.

“This is a historic moment,” Angelina Aspuac, the director of AFEDES, said. “This is the first town that has declared the weavings and designs as cultural heritage. This declaration will begin the means to protect our weavings from companies that seek to take our traditional designs. If they want to use our weavings, they must ask permission from the community.”

The town of Santiago Sacatepéquez is currently forming the mechanisms to facilitate these consultations of weavers, in accordance with the International Labor Organization’s Convention 169 on the Rights of Indigenous and Tribal Peoples.

“This declaration is a message to businesses to inform them that these weavings do have an owner, and it is us, the residents of the community,” Aspuac said. “If they want to talk about using them, then they have to talk with us.”

Municipal mayor, Juan Carlos Barrios, reads the declaration declaring the weavings as part of the cultural heritage of Santiago Sacatepéquez. (WNV/Jeff Abbott)

The declaration by the municipality of Santiago Sacatepéquez is already inspiring other communities to work to protect their designs. One such place where this organizing is occurring is the town of Patzún, in the department of Chimaltenango.

“We are currently working on setting up a similar process in Patzún to the one in Santiago Sacatepéquez,” said Sandra Xinico, a young writer and organizer from Patzún. “We are looking for an immediate means of protecting our cultural heritage through the municipality. The idea is to locally look for a means to guard our weavings, because we know that it is very difficult for the state to implement the reforms that we demand in a timely manner.”

Since May 2016, indigenous Maya weavers have organized a campaign to demand the recognition of their intellectual property rights to their weavings and designs. The movement grows out of the concern over the appropriation and the threat of patenting of the designs and weavings.

The movement works on the local level, as well as through the national assembly Ruchajixik Ri Qana’ojbäl, which means Guardians of Our Knowledge in the Maya Kaqchikel language.

In November 2016, the weavers presented these demands and reforms to the Guatemalan National Congress, where they are slowly advancing. There are six major parts to the reforms, but the key aspects propose a new definition of what are collective intellectual property rights that is in accordance to the organization of the communities of Guatemala, and the recognition of the communities as collective authors of these designs.

The women have carried out a number of actions demanding the protection of the weavings. These actions have included protests, community meetings and meetings with congressional officials. They seek to continue to put pressure on the government to protect the weavings from appropriation by companies.

Denouncing structural racism

Guatemala’s indigenous populations face a constant barrage of racism. Women that continue to use the traditional clothing items face discrimination and harassment across the country.

The appropriation of indigenous weavings by companies is driven by the structural racism that exists in Guatemala.

In July 2017, the image of a white, blonde woman surrounded by Mayan women, in Look Magazine drew outrage across social media.

“The representation of the Maya population and women in particular is carried out under a racist approach, using an essentialist language that also tends to be prejudiced, discriminatory, paternalistic or hostile,” wrote María Aguilar, a columnist for the national paper, El Periodico. “As Mayas, we are the servants, the merchants, those who have a marimba of children, the disposable, the poor, ugly, dirty.”

Xinico points out that in part, this has to do with the devaluation of indigenous designs, which is based on the myth that the weavings and their designs came following the Spanish invasion in 1524.

“We are combating a very strong racist context that primarily comes through education that imposes the idea that our textiles and clothing were imposed during the colonial period,” said Xinico. “That it is a uniform that we use. This is form of dispossession because people believe that these designs are not ours, and that companies can use them for whatever they please.”

A young woman holds a sign that reads “We are the daughters of the grandmothers that never die. They live on in the universe of our weavings.” (WNV/Jeff Abbott)

In fact, images of women using the traditional back-strap looms exist in pre-Hispanic glyphs and images pre-dating the Spanish across the country.

Indigenous communities are regularly left out of the national discourse, and are viewed as being backwards and anti-progress. As a result of this social exclusion, indigenous communities suffer from the highest levels of extreme poverty, and the ramifications that come with this exclusion, such as child malnutrition, migration and the lack of social services.

The racism in Guatemala is also reflected by the use of racist terminologies by companies.

On May 22, representatives from the Guatemalan movement in defense of indigenous weavings along with the Presidential Commission Against Discrimination and Racism presented a complaint to the Public Prosecutors office denouncing the Guatemalan company María Chulu, or Cool María. Activists charge that the name of the company is a common racist slur for indigenous women — stemming from the false belief that all indigenous women are named María — and that they are appropriating and commercializing indigenous weavings without consulting the communities from which the designs come from.

These same accusations of racism have been aimed at María’s Bags as well over its name.

Organizing the movement against appropriation

The intricate designs and symbols that make up the traditional clothing of Mayan communities, and catch the eyes of designers and tourists, are more than just elaborate decoration. The guipiles — the traditional women’s blouses — and other weavings are the transmitters of history and the knowledge of the Maya people. Learning to understand the stories told by these weavings is like learning another language.

But the bright, colorful and intricate designs of the Maya weavings are renowned globally. These traditional and sacred items are regularly used to promote tourism in Guatemala, and tourists often seek to return home with a colorful weaving as a souvenir.

In tourist centers across the country, women will sell used guipiles in the streets for prices far below the value of the weaving.

“The textiles are maintained and sustained because it is only the women that make and use the weavings,” said Gladys Tzul Tzul, a sociologist and consultant with the movement. “They know what they cost.”

This demand for weavings has led many companies, both national and transnational, to produce products that utilize the Mayan weavings. Products range from boots that incorporate the weavings to designer purses made with parts of guipiles.

“We have seen our designs used in products such as purses from María’s Bags, and by other companies, such as Saul Mendez,” Aspuac said. “These products are sold nationally and internationally.”

Members of the national movement of weavers demonstrate outside the Guatemalan Constitutional Court prior to marching to Congress to deliver demands in November 2016. (WNV/Jeff Abbott)

The movement has targeted these companies demanding that they cease appropriating the weavings for their products. One company in particular that the movement has denounced is called María’s Bags, which uses Mayan weavings in their high-end designer bags without the consultation of the communities. These products sell for hundreds of dollars, with little going back to the women that produce the weavings.

Making this information available to the women that produce the weavings is key in organizing the movement, and making weavers aware of the national situation.

“We organized the meetings in order to show the weavers who do not have access to newspapers or social networks how companies are appropriating our weavings, and how they are profiting from our work,” Aspuac said.

“Today we have more access to visual resources — be it the internet or through other media,” Xinico said. “This made the appropriation, as well as the failure to respect the authors of the weavings, far more visible. This produced widespread indignation.”

According to Tzul Tzul, this sharing of information has made it easy to organize the women across the country, and the movement has expanded rapidly as a result.

“They have self-organized,” Tzul Tzul said. “At the beginning, the proposals for the defense of weavings presented by the women in Santiago Sacatepéquez were a spark that fueled the movement. They created the space for associations and organizations of weavers that are dedicated to protecting weavings in the whole republic.”

This led to the establishment of a national network of weavers that has brought different communities into the movement. This has been led by women such as Tzul Tzul, who continue the legacy of the weavings in Guatemala.

“We held a meeting where we thought that only 50 weavers would show up,” Tzul Tzul said. “But the day of the meeting, it tripled, and over 150 weavers showed up. This showed us that this is an issue and a problem that is extremely important.”

'This has been my life for past six years': on the anti-fracking frontline

The Guardian | Protest -

Inside the Lancashire protest camp aiming to disrupt new Cuadrilla wells with direct action tactics

It is a battle that has gone on for years, pitting tireless local residents and environmentalists against a major gas exploration company hoping to get rich – and solve a future energy crisis – by fracking under the Fylde coast.

Last October the government overruled Lancashire county council and gave Cuadrilla the green light to begin drilling, but anti-fracking activists have refused to give up their fight.

Related: Fracking activists have a right to protest. We must support them | Jonathan Bartley

Continue reading...

Wine, protest and Macron: why southern French wine producers are so angry

The Guardian | Protest -

The ‘vinuous terrorists’ of Languedoc-Roussillon are battling changing French drinking habits and a new president as they seek to preserve the region’s traditions

There is no love for politicians among the winemakers of the Languedoc-Roussillon. But in the vast stretch of vineyard that covers the south of France from the Rhône in the east down to the Spanish border, protest and dissent are as much a part of life as pétanque and vin rouge.

It’s a sentiment with a long tradition. Just over a century ago, in the spring and early summer of 1907, the Midi’s wine industry was at the centre of one of the most violent eruptions of civil unrest in the country’s modern history, as angry crowds in the hundreds of thousands brought the region to a standstill, battling with the army and railing against what they saw as neglect from Paris after sales of local wine had collapsed in the face of competition from Algeria and adulterated wines from elsewhere in France.

Continue reading...

Liu Xiaobo: dissident's friends angry after hastily arranged sea burial

The Guardian | Protest -

Rights activists concerned for Nobel laureate’s wife, Liu Xia, who attended cremation but has not been heard from for days

Friends of the late Nobel laureate, Liu Xiaobo, have voiced rage and disgust after the announcement that the dissident’s ashes had been cast into the ocean off north-eastern China in a hastily arranged sea burial they believe was designed to deny supporters a place of pilgrimage.

“This is too evil, too evil,” the exiled author Liao Yiwu, a close friend, told the Guardian after the details of Liu’s cremation and sea burial emerged on Saturday afternoon. “They are a bunch of gangsters.”

Related: The Guardian view on Liu Xiaobo’s death: free the Nobel laureate’s wife now | Editorial

Related: China tells world to stay out of its 'domestic affairs' over Liu Xiaobo's death

Continue reading...

Women's March leads hundreds in gun control protest at NRA headquarters

The Guardian | Protest -

Friday’s protest, organized by Women’s March on Washington, honored those who gather monthly to remember Sandy Hook and sought to expand agenda

For 55 months, protesters have demonstrated outside National Rifle Association headquarters in Fairfax, Virginia. In snow, rain and blazing sun, they have met to mark another month since 14 December 2012, when 20 children and six adults were shot dead at Sandy Hook elementary school in Newtown, Connecticut, and to protest NRA influence over the lack of action by Congress on stricter gun control laws.

On Friday, between 400 and 500 people lined both sides of the street outside the gleaming, modern NRA building. Usually, the 14th of each month brings a dedicated crowd of 30.

Related: Women's March organizers to protest NRA video that 'endorses violence'

Related: Why join the National Rifle Association? To defeat liberal enemies, apparently | Francine Prose

Continue reading...

How movements can succeed in the face of government repression

Waging Nonviolence -

by Molly Wallace

Published in collaboration with the Peace Science Digest, which summarizes and reflects on current academic research in the field of peace and conflict studies.

A greater number of resistance movements are choosing to adopt nonviolent forms of struggle as the effectiveness of nonviolent resistance becomes more widely known. At the same time, however, the success rate of these nonviolent movements is decreasing. What accounts for this lower rate of success, just as the effectiveness of nonviolent strategies is catching on? In “Trends in nonviolent resistance and state response,” in Global Responsibility to Protect, Erica Chenoweth suggests that part of the answer lies in target governments becoming increasingly savvy in their responses to nonviolent movements, now that such movements are recognized to pose a real threat to their power. In light of this possibility, how can nonviolent resistance persist and succeed in repressive contexts?

Chenoweth begins by reviewing data on major episodes of nonviolent and violent contention over the 20th and early 21st centuries to discuss changes in the adoption and effectiveness of nonviolent resistance. She finds that, over the last several decades, there has been a substantial rise in the adoption of nonviolent resistance and a corresponding drop in violent resistance in cases of anti-regime or self-determination struggles. This shift, she argues, is likely due to three factors: knowledge of the increasing effectiveness of nonviolent resistance, the development of global norms regarding human rights and a related willingness to challenge tyrants, and technological advances that facilitate communication.

Turning to the question of effectiveness, Chenoweth notes that nonviolent resistance has been remarkably successful, achieving an average success rate of over 50 percent between 1940 and 2010 (compared to a much lower success rate for violent resistance). From 2010 to 2016, however, there has been a marked decrease in the success rate of nonviolent movements. She argues that this is not due to an increase in brutality against these movements; in fact, nonviolent resistance movements are actually much less frequently subjected to mass killings than violent resistance movements are (23 percent of nonviolent campaigns and 68 percent of violent campaigns, from 1955 to 2013), and this frequency has even declined over the last several years. However, more limited lethal violence is still very much a common response to resistance movements, including nonviolent ones, and its use has actually recently increased: 92 percent of nonviolent campaigns since 2007 experienced some form of lethal violence against them compared to 80 percent of nonviolent campaigns from 1900 to 2006.

Lethal repression is just one of several tools that regimes have developed to counter nonviolent resistance movements, and Chenoweth suggests that it is the development of “more politically savvy” responses that may account for the recent lower success rate. She sorts these refined responses into three categories: “reinforcing the loyalty of elites,” “infiltrating and dividing opposition movements,” and “reinforcing public claims to legitimacy.” Other possible reasons she suggests for the recent lower success rate include inadequate skills in nonviolent resistance strategy among the greater number of groups now adopting these methods; the higher percentage of predominantly nonviolent movements since 2010 nonetheless containing elements that “destroy property, engage in street fighting, or use lethal violence” (which diminish the distinct power of a nonviolent movement); and the greater skill with which governments have recently been able to keep security forces from defecting.

If “smart” repression does not work for the regime and escalates to mass killings, how can nonviolent movements persist or even succeed in highly repressive contexts? Although violent repression can sometimes have its intended effect of dampening a movement, Chenoweth reminds us that violence against nonviolent movements can also backfire against the regime using it — galvanizing public support and participation and creating rifts within the regime itself. In addition, she catalogues the various ways in which nonviolent movements/methods can overcome, resist, prevent or protect people from violence in the midst of war or violent repression by pressuring the adversary to address grievances and resolve the conflict; rescuing or hiding those being targeted through a refusal to cooperate with the repressive regime (as happened during the Nazi Holocaust); accompanying or providing proactive presence for threatened activists or communities in war zones; or resisting local armed activity by carving out zones of peace.

Chenoweth also discusses how activists (and their allies) can improve the ability of nonviolence to respond to and persist amid violence. One important way they can do this, according to Brian Martin whom she cites, is to be strategic in the way they represent and publicize the actions of the movement in contrast to the actions of the regime to highlight the regime’s repressive methods. Second, she suggests that communities and movements build their organizational capacity — and strengthen civil society institutions more broadly — as those that have greater capacity are more likely to be resilient. Finally, because security force compliance is so instrumental to a regime’s ability to carry out violent repression, including mass killings, she urges foreign governments to help facilitate security force defections by making escape from the country less risky for those wishing to defect.

Contemporary relevance

In the first few months of 2011, during the so-called Arab Spring, it began to feel like anything was possible: first, Tunisia’s President Ben Ali stepped down, then after over two weeks of protest and repression Egypt’s President Mubarak stepped down, with throngs celebrating in Tahrir Square; there was even a brief glimpse of hope in Bahrain, Syria and Libya, among other countries. But of these cases, Tunisia stands out as the lone country that has secured democratic gains from its nonviolent resistance movement.

The other cases were less successful: for instance, one year after a democratically elected president took office, military rule returned to Egypt; Bahrain’s movement was unable to sustain itself in the face of severe repression; after persisting for quite some time in the midst of violent repression, Syria’s nonviolent movement was steadily over-run by an armed movement composed of defected Syrian soldiers, leading to the civil war that has brought massive destruction to that country over the past six years; and threats of mass killing in Libya in response to its uprising resulted in NATO military intervention, the death of Qaddafi, and subsequent widespread instability and violence, providing a haven for the extremist group ISIS.

These cases all have a bearing on the recent finding that nonviolent resistance — though still more effective than violent resistance in achieving its goals — is becoming less reliably effective. The fact that leaders may be learning about nonviolent resistance, noting its effectiveness, and adapting their responses when targeted by such movements means that nonviolent activists must stay on their toes and maintain versatility in their own adaptive responses. It also provides an unsettling illustration of the way in which academic research and its objects of study are deeply intertwined, with the researcher potentially influencing the phenomenon being studied in unintended ways — such as when research on the operation and effectiveness of nonviolent resistance may better inform the strategies of governments who wish to counter such movements.

Practical implications

If targeted regimes are adapting their responses to be more effective against usually highly effective nonviolent resistance movements, nonviolent activists (and scholars of nonviolent action) will have to devote even greater attention to studying these more politically savvy techniques and how they might be confronted more successfully.

This study already suggests three possible approaches for at least persisting amid such violence, or even trying to prevent further violence: strategically publicizing the contrast between the activists’ own actions and those of their opponent to highlight the repressive nature of the opponent, building organizational/civil society capacity for greater resilience, and taking measures to facilitate security force defection.

These suggestions are consistent with other recommendations of scholars such as Robert Burrowes, Erica Chenoweth and Maria Stephan, Sharon Erickson Nepstad, and Kurt Schock for how to make a nonviolent movement succeed: consider those actions — including the creation of a mass, broad-based movement — that will strengthen the will and capacity of the nonviolent movement to persist (even in the face of repression), while weakening the will and capacity of the opponent to do so (including by creating cracks in the opponent group, especially among security forces).

What this means in terms of relations with security forces might be counterintuitive: rather than seeing and treating soldiers and police as the “enemy,” nonviolent movements should find creative ways to engage them and to draw many of them to the side of the movement — an approach facilitated by the movement’s maintenance of nonviolent discipline.

 

To subscribe or download the full special issue on “nonviolent resistance,” which includes additional resources for each article, visit their website.

Ken Loach accused of exempting himself from cultural boycott of Israel

The Guardian | Protest -

Films by the director, a vocal critic of artists who perform in Israel, have been widely shown in the country

Ken Loach has been accused of seeing himself as exempt from the cultural boycott of Israel that he promotes, after claims that he allowed his films to be distributed in the country without objection.

Loach has vocally condemned artists who perform in Israel as supporting an “apartheid regime” and his long-standing producer insisted it was down to a “mistake” that the Palme d’Or winning I, Daniel Blake is currently showing in Israeli cinemas.

Continue reading...

Fracking activists have a right to protest. We must support them | Jonathan Bartley

The Guardian | Protest -

Across the world, environmental protesters, like those in Lancashire, are putting their bodies on the line. In the future we will remember them as heroes

• Jonathan Bartley is co-leader of the Green party

In every corner of the globe people are taking action on climate change as governments refuse to tackle the greatest threat we face. In the US, the Standing Rock protesters stood tall against the Keystone pipeline. In Brazil, brave defenders are standing in the way of the destruction of the rainforest. This week we learned that in 2016, 200 activists lost their lives while defending the environment, with another 98 killed in the first five months of this year. Here in Britain, too, people are putting their bodies on the line in a fight against the frackers carving up green spaces.

Related: UK support for fracking hits new low

Related: Earth's sixth mass extinction event under way, scientists warn

Continue reading...

Pages