#then its helpful to also boycott and since i live in the state it began in | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

lokiondisneyplus · 4 years

Link

After more than 40 years as an actor, Sheri Mann Stewart had finally taken the plunge to launch her own production company. A week after she wrapped shooting her first film for Mann Woman Productions, Atlanta went on pandemic lockdown.

Mann Stewart was suddenly left with a film on hold, an audition on hold, and the careers of her husband and two sons — all performers — on hold. Instead of ushering her first film — prophetically inspired by John Paul Sartre’s “No Exit” — through editing and post-production, she spends several hours each day on the phone trying to iron out issues with unemployment benefits that she has yet to receive.

“Nothing like this has ever happened,” said Mann Stewart an Atlanta native who most recently appeared in Tyler Perry’s Netflix feature film “A Fall from Grace.” “I think, one way or another, our industry will be changed.”

COVID-19 left actress Sheri Mann Stewart with the first film from her production company on hold, an audition on hold, and the careers of her husband and two sons – all performers – also in flux. She has spent time working on other projects including a new YouTube series to support LGBTQIA youth who may not be in supportive environments.

Like many other industries, the film and TV business has been shut down since mid-March, with only a few exceptions such as late-night talk shows and virtual versions of “American Idol” and “The Voice.” With plenty of content currently in the pipeline, streaming services and television networks have managed so far, but if production doesn’t restart soon, viewers will face a major drought of new shows to watch this fall.

Pressure is building to get production started as soon as possible, but the natural intimacy of a typical set with makeup artists, camera operators, producers, actors and production assistants constantly crossing paths, makes creating proper protocols a serious challenge.

“People are anxious to get back to work,” said Mark Wofford, general manager at Atlanta-based Production Consultants & Equipment, which provides motion-picture rental equipment. “But this has to be weighed against the need to make sure everyone is safe. It’s going to be a real balancing act.”

Georgia has become a major player in Hollywood production, courtesy of generous tax credits to film and TV production companies passed in 2008. It’s now the third-largest state for such content after California and New York. As the only state with no cap on its credits, Georgia has drawn big-budget films such as “Black Panther” and “The Hunger Games: Catching Fire.”

Despite Hollywood’s liberal leanings — some in the industry called for boycotts after Georgia’s 2016 religious liberty bill and 2019 heartbeat abortion bill — the Republican-led state legislature and three Republican governors have consistently embraced the tax credit system. At the recent Georgia Film Day on March 11, Gov. Brian Kemp spoke before 200 industry supporters in the state Capitol atrium, extolling the $2.9 billion in direct investment and 50,000-plus jobs the business brought into the state last fiscal year. Weeks later, Kemp would issue a statewide shelter-in-place order.

In May, the Georgia Film Office released a set of nonbinding best practices for film and television productions to consider during the pandemic. The guidelines included holding remote auditions and virtual location scouting as well as reducing the number of extras used on set and placing clear barriers between actors to be removed just before the director yells “Action!”

Local studios are preparing to reopen this summer as they await multiple unions to accept unified protocols. Earlier this month, a task force composed of the various unions and the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers, sent approved health and safety guidelines to governors in California and New York with plans for final protocols to follow soon. “This document is an initial set of principles and guidelines that we all agree form a relevant and realistic first step to protecting cast and crew in the reopening of the entertainment and media industry in its two largest markets,” said a joint statement from unions, including the Teamsters, the Directors Guild of America and SAG-AFTRA. Face masks for live audiences, staggered mealtimes with no buffet-style setups, and daily screenings for COVID-19 along with a designated COVID-19 compliance officer, were among the recommended guidelines.

Studios have already begun to make big investments in COVID-19 friendly infrastructure. Since March, two of the largest studios in the metro area — Pinewood Studios in Fayetteville and Blackhall Studios in Atlanta — have each invested more than $1 million to retrofit their studios. One of the biggest costs: improving the HVAC systems on their sound stages and offices so they are comparable to that of hospitals in order to reduce the chances of airborne transmission of viruses. Major film and television productions can easily have hundreds of staff members working in tight indoor quarters, creating the kind of environment that public health officials have noted can increase the spread of COVID-19.

“I’ve had to become an expert in viral containment,” said Ryan Millsap, owner of Blackhall Studios. “Until March, I hadn’t given it a second thought. This is a big moment in our generation where disease has come to the forefront.”

Atlanta-based makeup artist Tracy Ewell has seen a virus or cold spread like fire on almost every production on which she has worked. She started toting a personal air filter to set up in the trailers and tents where she and her team spend hours getting actors camera ready. ”I am paid to be hygienic,” Ewell said. “I take full responsibility for my actor’s condition, but masks don’t work in my world.”

Ewell, who has worked as a department head on productions for Marvel and the Netflix drama “Ozark,” is not afraid of returning to set, but she knows that is a decision everyone will have to make for themselves. The initial industry guidelines for makeup artists included providing more time to allow for safety measures to be followed, but additional protocols need to be established before that kind of work can continue. “I would be comfortable having fewer people on set in my department if I knew they were going to have the time,” Ewell said. But more time means more money, and studios now have to make big investments at a time when they’ve posted big losses.

Just before the pandemic shut down productions nationwide, HBO finished its upcoming J.J. Abrams drama, “Lovecraft Country,” and Paramount wrapped Chris Pratt military science fiction movie “The Tomorrow War” at Blackhall. Millsap was about to sign with two other major studios for new productions when COVID-19 put the kibosh on that.

Since then, Millsap has generated zero revenue, shedding more than $1 million a month while keeping his 12 full-time employees on payroll. He said he has had enough money in the bank to keep his studio afloat but would be challenged if shows didn’t begin shooting by the fourth quarter. If all goes well, two major studios will begin pre-production at Blackhall in July with potential full-blown production by August or September, he said.

Frank Patterson, the head of Pinewood Atlanta Studios, said they have had to study every aspect of their business, from more limited security access to more sequestered work pods, dividing the studio into zones. They also hired a medical testing company, BioIQ, to handle the anticipated flood of COVID-19 tests they plan to use on a daily basis. “Some days, we’ll have 6,000 people on the lot,” he said.

The past couple of months have been “overwhelmingly stressful because I’m working with people I’ve known for decades,” Patterson added. “These are people I grew up within the industry. We have to make certain nobody gets sick. At the same time, these are friends who haven’t worked for months and have families to feed. We need to get this done now.”

Atlanta-based Tyler Perry Studios was the first in the country to announce detailed plans to shoot two of his BET television series in July. Perry has some advantages most other studios do not. He owns 330 acres of a former Army base and has at least 80 residences on the property which will enable him to more easily isolate crew and actors. He writes and directs his own TV series in a way that will enable him to finish shooting an entire season in less than three weeks. He has developed protocols to test everybody multiple times with contingencies in case anybody gets COVID-19. He has scaled back on-site crew and extras and is using his largest sound stage as a cafeteria with proper social distancing.

“It’s an enormous undertaking and an enormous cost to the budget,” Perry told Variety last month.

Mann Stewart had just been called for an audition for a Perry television production before the studio closed. She is unsure if that opportunity still stands but has continued with other auditions, including a recent commercial audition that came through in late May. Still, it is never far from her mind how so many aspects of the industry must change.

While writing a script for a play, she found herself debating if she really needed the characters to have a physical interaction.

“I try not to let it impact me and say I can fix it later but…,” said Mann Stewart, her thought left trailing.

Some studios are already pondering creative solutions to those kinds of concerns. As soon as the pandemic hit, executives at Atlanta-based Crazy Legs Productions created an advisory council of five medical experts to help them draw up 25 pages of safety guidelines. Last month, they began compiling a database of local actors who are in relationships with other actors. “We can cast a husband and wife as a husband and wife,” said Scott Thigpen, chief operating officer. “It’s a way to mitigate risk.” They are also considering using family members as extras.

The company, which launched in 2006 and now has 34 salaried employees, produces docuseries for TLC such as “Family by the Ton” and crime shows for ID, like “Dead Silent. ” They also began shooting films for the first time this year.

Industry insiders are confident productions in Georgia will bounce back quickly and fill sound stages as a backlog of content gets filled.

After months spent keeping their skills sharp and in some cases, auditioning via Zoom, actors across metro Atlanta are ready to get back to work, said Clayton Landey, president of SAG-AFTRA Atlanta local. He hopes summer marks that return but said the proper precautions are needed. Landey, a 48-year industry veteran, recalled a scene years ago when his character was being hit with a bullet. Everyone else on the set was standing behind safety glass. “I feel a little like that now,” Landey said. “I am interested to see what is going to be the new normal in terms of safety on set.”

The pandemic ended a theater run for Landey and stalled a film, which no longer has a date to begin production, but he has spent the past three months staying connected to other actors through virtual chats and meetups. Landey worries about the actors who may be suffering mentally while isolated from the career that allows them to channel their emotions into their work. Though acting is a field that prepares you for career ups and downs, this is unlike anything they have seen before, he said.

“Nothing in our industry touches what we are going through now. Typically when there are times of stress or hard times in the general population, we are working like crazy because entertainment is what gets you through the day,” Landey said. “This time, it is slapping us all.”

11 notes · View notes

blackkudos · 4 years

Text

Ralph Abernathy

Ralph David Abernathy Sr. (March 11, 1926 – April 17, 1990) was an American civil rights activist and Baptist minister. He was ordained in the Baptist tradition in 1948. As a leader of the Civil Rights Movement, he was a close friend and mentor of Martin Luther King Jr. He collaborated with King to create the Montgomery Improvement Association which led to the Montgomery bus boycott. He also co-founded and was an executive board member of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC). He became president of the SCLC following the assassination of King in 1968, where he led the Poor People's Campaign in Washington, D.C. among other marches and demonstrations for disenfranchised Americans. He also served as an advisory committee member of the Congress on Racial Equality (CORE).

In 1971, Abernathy addressed the United Nations about world peace. He also assisted in brokering a deal between the FBI and Indian protestors during the Wounded Knee incident of 1973. He retired from his position as president of the SCLC in 1977 and became president emeritus. That year he unsuccessfully ran for the U.S. House of Representatives for the 5th district of Georgia. He later founded the Foundation for Economic Enterprises Development, and he testified before the U.S. Congress in support of extending of the Voting Rights Act in 1982.

In 1989, Abernathy wrote And the Walls Came Tumbling Down, a controversial autobiography about his and King's involvement in the Civil Rights Movement. He was ridiculed for statements in the book about King's alleged marital infidelities. Abernathy eventually became less active in politics and returned to his work as a minister. He died of heart disease on April 17, 1990. His tombstone is engraved with the words "I tried".

Early life, family, and education

Abernathy, 10th of William and Louivery Abernathy's 12 children, was born on March 11, 1926, on their family 500-acre (200 ha) farm in Linden, Alabama. Abernathy's father was the first African-American to vote in Marengo County, Alabama, and the first to serve on a grand jury there. Abernathy attended Linden Academy (a Baptist school founded by the First Mt. Pleasant District Association). At Linden Academy, Abernathy led his first demonstrations to improve the livelihoods of his fellow students.

During World War II, he enlisted in the United States Army, and rose to the rank of Platoon Sergeant before being discharged. Afterwards, he enrolled at Alabama State University using the benefits from the G.I. Bill, which he earned with his service. As a sophomore, he was elected president of the student council, and led a successful hunger strike to raise the quality of the food served on the campus. While still a college student, Abernathy announced his call to the ministry, which he had envisioned since he was a small boy growing up in a devout Baptist family. He was ordained a Baptist minister in 1948, and preached his first sermon on Mother's Day (in honor of his recently deceased mother). In 1950 he graduated with a bachelor's degree in mathematics. During that summer Abernathy hosted a radio show and became the first black man on radio in Montgomery, Alabama. In the fall, he then went on to further his education at Atlanta University, earning his Master of Arts degree in sociology with High Honors in 1951.

He began his professional career in 1951, when he was appointed as the dean of men at Alabama State University. Later that year, he became the senior pastor of the First Baptist Church, the largest black church in Montgomery, where he served for ten years.

He married Juanita Odessa Jones of Uniontown, Alabama, on August 31, 1952. Together they had five children: Ralph David Abernathy Jr., Juandalynn Ralpheda, Donzaleigh Avis, Ralph David Abernathy III, and Kwame Luthuli Abernathy. Their first child, Ralph Abernathy Jr., died suddenly on August 18, 1953, less than 2 days after his birth on August 16, while their other children lived on to adulthood.

In 1954, Abernathy met Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., who — at the time — was just becoming a pastor himself at a nearby church. Abernathy mentored King and the two men eventually became close friends.

Civil rights activism

Montgomery bus boycott

After the arrest of Rosa Parks on December 1, 1955, for refusing to give up her seat on a bus to a white man, Abernathy (then a member of the Montgomery NAACP) collaborated with King to create the Montgomery Improvement Association (MIA), which organized the Montgomery Bus Boycott. Along with fellow English professor Jo Ann Robinson, they called for and distributed flyers asking the black citizens of Montgomery to stay off the buses. The boycott attracted national attention, and a federal court case that ended on December 17, 1956, when the U.S. Supreme Court, in Browder v. Gayle, upheld an earlier District Court decision that the bus segregation was unconstitutional. The 381-day transit boycott, challenging the "Jim Crow" segregation laws, had been successful. And on December 20, 1956, the boycott came to an end.

After the boycotts, Abernathy's home and church were bombed. His family were barely able to escape their home, but they were unharmed. Abernathy's church, Mt. Olive Church, Bell Street Church, and the home of Robert Graetz were also bombed on that evening, while King, Abernathy, and 58 other black leaders from the south were meeting at the Southern Negro Leaders Conference on Transportation and Nonviolent Integration, in Atlanta.

Civil Rights Movement

On January 11, 1957, after a two-day long meeting, the Southern Leaders Conference on Transportation and Non-violent Integration, was founded. On February 14, 1957, the Conference convened again in New Orleans. During that meeting, they changed the group's name to the Southern Leadership Conference and appointed the following executive board: King, president; Charles Kenzie Steele, vice president; Abernathy, Financial Secretary-Treasurer; T. J. Jemison, secretary; I. M. Augustine, general counsel. On August 8, 1957, the Southern Leadership Conference held its first convention, in Montgomery, Alabama. At that time, they changed the Conference's name for the final time to the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, and decided upon starting up voter registration drives for black people across the south.

On May 20, 1961, the Freedom Riders stopped in Montgomery, Alabama while on their way from Washington, D.C. to New Orleans, Louisiana, to protest the still segregated buses across the south. Many of the Freedom Riders were beaten once they arrived at the Montgomery bus station, by a white mob, causing several of the riders to be hospitalized. The following night Abernathy and King set up an event in support of the Freedom Riders, where King would make an address, at Abernathy's church. More than 1,500 people came to the event that night. The church was soon surrounded by a mob of white segregationists who laid siege on the church. King, from inside the church, called the Attorney General Robert Kennedy, and pleaded for help from the federal government. There was a group of United States Marshals sent there to protect the event, but they were too few in number to protect the church from the angry mob, who had begun throwing rocks and bricks through the windows of the church. Reinforcements with riot experience, from the Marshals service, were sent in to help defend the perimeter. By the next morning, the Governor of Alabama, after being called by Kennedy, sent in the Alabama National Guard, and the mob was finally dispersed. After the success of the Freedom Riders in Montgomery, Birmingham, and Huntsville in 1961, King insisted that Abernathy assume the Pastorate of the West Hunter Street Baptist Church in Atlanta, and Abernathy did so, moving his family from Montgomery, Alabama, in 1962.

The King/Abernathy partnership spearheaded successful nonviolent movements in Montgomery; Albany, Georgia; Birmingham; Mississippi; Washington D.C.; Selma, Alabama; St. Augustine; Chicago; and Memphis. King and Abernathy journeyed together, often sharing the same hotel rooms, and leisure times with their wives, children, family, and friends. And they were both jailed 17 times together, for their involvement in the movement.

During Martin Luther King Jr.'s assassination

On April 3, 1968, at the Mason Temple, Abernathy introduced King before he made his last public address; King said at the beginning of his now famous "I've Been to the Mountaintop" speech:

As I listened to Ralph Abernathy and his eloquent and generous introduction and then thought about myself, I wondered who he was talking about. It's always good to have your closest friend and associate to say something good about you, and Ralph Abernathy is the best friend that I have in the world.

The following day, April 4, 1968, Abernathy was with King in the room (Room 306) they shared at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tennessee. At 6:01 p.m. while Abernathy was inside the room getting cologne, King was shot while standing outside on the balcony. Once the shot was fired Abernathy ran out to the balcony and cradled King in his arms as he lay unconscious. Abernathy accompanied King to St. Joseph's Hospital within fifteen minutes of the shooting. The doctors performed an emergency surgery, but he never regained consciousness. King was pronounced dead at 7:05 p.m. at age 39.

Leadership of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference

Until King's assassination, Abernathy had served as Southern Christian Leadership Conference's first Financial Secretary/Treasurer and Vice President At-Large. After King's death, Abernathy assumed the presidency of the SCLC. One of his first roles was to take up the role of leading a march to support striking sanitation workers in Memphis, Tennessee which King and Abernathy had planned before King's assassination. In May 1968, Abernathy led the Poor People's Campaign in Washington, D.C.

Protest at NASA

On the eve of the Apollo 11 launch, July 15, 1969, Abernathy arrived at Cape Canaveral with several hundred members of the poor people campaign to protest spending of government space exploration, while many Americans remained poor. He was met by Thomas O. Paine, the administrator of NASA, whom he told that in the face of such suffering, space flight represented an inhuman priority and funds should be spent instead to "feed the hungry, clothe the naked, tend the sick, and house the homeless". Paine told Abernathy that the advances in space exploration were "child's play" compared to the "tremendously difficult human problems" of society Abernathy was discussing. Later in 1969, Abernathy also took part in a labor struggle in Charleston, South Carolina, on behalf of the hospital workers of the local union 1199B, which led to a living wage increase and improved working conditions for thousands of hospital workers.

Wounded Knee

In 1973, Abernathy helped negotiate a peace settlement at the Wounded Knee uprising between the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the leaders of the American Indian Movement, Russell Means and Dennis Banks.

Abernathy remained president of the SCLC for nine years following King's death in 1968. After King's death the organization lost the popularity it had under his leadership. By the time Abernathy left the organization the SCLC had become indebted, and critics stated that it wasn't as imaginative as the SCLC led by Dr. King. In 1977 Abernathy resigned from his leadership role at the SCLC, and was bestowed the title president emeritus.

Political career and later activism

Abernathy addressed the United Nations in 1971 on World Peace. He was also a member of the board of directors of the Martin Luther King Jr. Center for Nonviolent Social Change. In 1977, he ran unsuccessfully for Georgia's 5th Congressional District seat, losing to Congressman Wyche Fowler. He founded the nonprofit organization Foundation for Economic Enterprises Development (FEED), which offered managerial and technical training, creating jobs, income, business and trade opportunities for underemployed and unemployed workers for underprivileged blacks.

In 1979, Abernathy endorsed Senator Edward M. Kennedy's candidacy for the Presidency of the United States. However, he shocked critics a few weeks before the 1980 November election, when he endorsed the front-runner, Ronald Reagan, over the struggling presidential campaign of Jimmy Carter. Abernathy stated of his endorsement: "The Republican Party has too long ignored us and the Democratic Party has taken us for granted and so since all of my colleagues and the latter in various places across the country were supporting the Democratic Party, I felt that I should support Ronald Reagan." After the disappointing performance of the Reagan Administration on civil rights and other areas, Abernathy withdrew his endorsement of Reagan in 1984.

In 1982, Abernathy testified—along with his executive associate, James Peterson of Berkeley, California—before the Congressional Hearings calling for the Extension of the Voting Rights Act.

Documents declassified in 2017 show that Abernathy was on the National Security Agency watchlist because of FBI leadership's hatred of the civil rights movement.

And the Walls Came Tumbling Down

In late 1989, Harper Collins published Abernathy's autobiography, And the Walls Came Tumbling Down. It was his final published accounting of his close partnership with King and their work in the Civil Rights Movement. In it he revealed King's marital infidelity, stating that King had sexual relations with two women on the night of April 3, 1968 (after his "I've Been to the Mountaintop" speech earlier that day). The book's revelations became the source of much controversy, as did Abernathy. Jesse Jackson and other civil rights activists made a statement in October 1989—after the book's release—that the book was "slander" and that "brain surgery" must have altered Abernathy's perception.

Unification Church

In the 1980s, the Unification Church hired Abernathy as a spokesperson to protest the news media's use of the term "Moonies", which they compared with the word "nigger". Abernathy also served as vice president of the Unification Church-affiliated group American Freedom Coalition, and served on two Unification Church boards of directors.

Death

Abernathy died at Emory Crawford Long Memorial Hospital on the morning of April 17, 1990, from two blood clots that traveled to his heart and lungs, five weeks after his 64th birthday. After his death, George H. W. Bush, then-President of the United States issued the following statement:

Barbara and I join with all Americans to mourn the passing of the Rev. Ralph Abernathy, a great leader in the struggle for civil rights for all Americans and a tireless campaigner for justice.

He is entombed in the Lincoln Cemetery in Atlanta, Georgia. At Abernathy's behest, his tomb has the simple inscription: "I TRIED."

Tributes and portrayals

During his lifetime, Abernathy was honored with more than 300 awards and citations, including five honorary doctorate degrees. He received a Doctor of Divinity from Morehouse College, a Doctor of Divinity from Kalamazoo College in Michigan, a Doctor of Laws from Allen University of South Carolina, a Doctor of Laws from Long Island University in New York, and a Doctor of Laws at Alabama State University.

Ralph D. Abernathy Hall at Alabama State Hall is dedicated to him, with a bust of his head in the foyer area.

Interstate 20 Ralph David Abernathy Freeway, Abernathy Road, and Ralph David Abernathy Boulevard of Atlanta were named in his honor.

Abernathy is played by Ernie Lee Banks in the 1978 miniseries King, by Colman Domingo in the 2014 film Selma, a film about the Selma to Montgomery marches, Martin Luther King Jr., and SCLC, and by Dohn Norwood in the 2016 film All the Way.

Works

Abernathy, Ralph; And the Walls Came Tumbling Down (1989), ISBN 9781569762790

Abernathy, Ralph; The Natural History of A Social Movement: The Montgomery Improvement Association (thesis)

#03/11 #04/17

7 notes · View notes

southeastasianists · 5 years

Link

The persecution of minority groups.

The celebration of ancient heritage.

Muslim communities driven from Rakhine state and forced to seek refuge in neighbouring Bangladesh.

Buddhism’s sacred landscapes and living traditions recognised by the international community.

Human rights and heritage – two issues that appear so unrelated as to be irreconcilable. In the face of human suffering, heritage can feel like… an indulgence. How can we think about visiting historic monuments when hundreds of thousands of people have been displaced? Why protect and preserve old temples when homes and places of worship are being deliberately burnt down? Why worry about the effect of natural disasters on heritage sites when manmade disasters enacted upon real people are equally destructive and – theoretically anyway – more easily avoided?

The usual response to such questions is that access to and enjoyment of cultural heritage is a human right, one that is guaranteed by international human rights law, including the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and protected from destruction during times of conflict through international instruments like the 1954 Hague Convention. So central is heritage to human rights discourses that scholars have used the term ‘cultural genocide’ to describe the intentional vandalism of heritage sites. Such destruction has been framed as part of ‘a systematic attempt to scrub away the identity, history and memory of entire peoples’. Not only can heritage tell us who we are and who we were, but the ways in which we manage it – whose stories we choose to tell, and whose are elided – also tell us about who we want to be.

This approach, in which heritage is a human right, is a valid response. Heritage – including intangible and underwater heritage – does have a place in the discussion of priorities and resources, even in countries that are dealing with past or ongoing human rights abuses.

In fact, these discussions are even more important in such countries. Rather than limiting ourselves to the idea of heritage as a human right, I am increasingly interested in using human rights as a productive methodology for thinking about heritage. This is because the different ways a state manages human rights issues and heritage issues can tell us about how that state understands diversity and identity, and about the effectiveness of international engagement in achieving desired outcomes. Cultural tourism of heritage sites can also improve livelihoods when undertaken judiciously.

There is no better place to bring these issues into conversation with each other than Myanmar, where the Government has been grappling with the transition from military to civilian rule for the past decade. In the past year alone, the Government has been accused of genocide on a massive scale at the same time as it has been recognised on the world stage for the ancient and sacred landscape of Bagan.

Just last month, State Counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi appeared at the International Court of Justice in The Hague to defend Myanmar’s human rights record amidst allegations of genocide against its Rohingya minority in 2017. In what Amnesty International has described as the biggest human rights catastrophe in the region, up to 1 million people are believed to have been affected by ‘cleansing’ operations undertaken by military and security forces in 2017. A report delivered by the International Independent Fact-Finding Mission in Myanmar in September 2019 drew attention to the situation of ethnic minorities in not only Rakhine but also Chin, Kachin and Shan States, all of whom ‘have suffered human rights violations and violations of international humanitarian law at the hands of the Tatmadaw [armed forces of Myanmar].’ The Report’s authors noted with regret the failure of Myanmar to engage or respond to communications.

Sitting in contrast to this reluctance to engage were the celebrations in Naypyitaw that accompanied the inscription of the ancient city of Bagan on the UNESCO World Heritage list in July 2019, in the process becoming Myanmar’s second World Heritage property (the other being the Pyu Ancient Cities, recognised in 2014). The inscription recognises the significance of Bagan’s landscape, material evidence and continuing religious and cultural practices, which together create a site of ‘outstanding universal value’.

At stake here is nothing less than the question of Burmese identity. This is exemplified by Aung San Suu Kyi’s framing of Bagan as a ‘hub of diversity of cultures, people and ideologies of the world’.She also highlighted the role of heritage in bringing people closer together and generating mutual respect. These remarks pay lip service to diversity but are at odds with the human rights violations experienced by many of Myanmar’s ethnic minorities. They also gloss over the way in which Bagan has been used as a powerful symbol of a deep historical and ethnically-based nationalism. What remains unclear, therefore, is how Bagan’s ‘outstanding universal value’ at the macro-level can accommodate diversity at the micro-level. Indeed, some scholars have drawn attention to how such universal valuations are ‘a means by which local stakeholders and communities with a particular interest in heritage places can be excluded from having a role in making decisions about managing them’ (Rodney Harrison, Heritage: Critical Approaches, p. 110).

In Myanmar, issues of diversity and inclusion have been ‘at the heart of Burmese politics since the start of modern Burmese politics a hundred years ago’, resulting in ‘an identity crisis that has not yet been resolved’ (Thant Myint-U, The Hidden History of Burma, p. 256). Hence the UNESCO inscription of Bagan, a Buddhist site in a majority Buddhist country, is used by Myanmar’s leaders to demonstrate diversity at the same time as it reaffirms the centrality of a certain type of (religious, racial and cultural) identity within the national narrative. In embracing the opportunities presented by the world heritage inscription, we must move past these prevailing narratives and towards a new imagining of Myanmar as a country that is profoundly multiracial and multicultural, in which ‘race, ethnicity, and identity [are] mutable, evolving and contingent’ (Thant Myint-U, The Hidden History of Burma, p. 188).

The juxtaposition of human rights and heritage in the context of Myanmar can also tell us about the efficacy of isolation versus engagement in global relations. The inscription of Bagan suggests that carrots work better than sticks. From Myanmar’s perspective, the inscription is affirmation that the international community remains willing to engage despite decades of self-imposed isolation, external sanctions and a deteriorating human rights situation. Furthermore, the inscription is indicative of Myanmar’s ability to respond to international expectations. Myanmar began the Bagan nomination process in 1994-5, but it was not progressed by UNESCO due to a lack of appropriate heritage legislation and reservations about Myanmar’s ability to manage the site in accordance with international heritage standards. UNESCO is now sufficiently convinced that such concerns have been addressed, although evidence of earlier mismanagement can be seen to this day in the water-hungry golf course, unerringly straight road laid across archaeologically-rich areas and many tourist hotels that populate the templed landscape, including in the Bagan Archaeological Zone.

The takeaway message here is that Myanmar is willing and able to respond to international pressure in the field of heritage governance and protection. We must continue to hope that positive engagement in relation to human rights remains a possibility.

Finally, bringing human rights into conversation with heritage can help us think beyond the knee-jerk travel boycotts that are already beginning to affect local communities and tour operators in Myanmar. When the inscription was announced, President U Win Myi expressed high expectations that ‘Arrival of tourists to the Bagan region would surely increase, helping the economic development of the local people’. But instead of seeing an increase in visitors as is often the case following a World Heritage listing, tourist numbers have dropped. Anecdotal evidence suggests that local tour operators in Yangon and Bagan have declined by up to 70% in the past twelve months, affecting what was a burgeoning tourist economy. For many would-be visitors, it has been difficult to reconcile visiting heritage sites in a country where significant human rights abuses are occurring.

But now is not the time for tourists to boycott Myanmar. Instead, visitors should visit Myanmar’s acclaimed heritage sites, and should foreground human rights as they do so. This creates the opportunity to learn: about the dominance of Buddhism in the national narrative, about Myanmar’s complex histories, about the racial, linguistic and religious diversity of this country, and about its competing internal nationalisms. And about the ways that ethical and sustainable tourism can benefit those who rely on such income for their livelihoods, for better health outcomes, and for their education. In this way, the message of Bagan’s preservation sits not in juxtaposition to, but alongside, the destruction that is taking place in other parts of the country.

Note: I am grateful to participants of the Sydney Southeast Asia Centre’s Workshop on Human Rights (September 2019) and to the Master of Human Rights students who presented at the Land of a Thousand Pagodas event (October 2019) for encouraging me to integrate human rights more deeply into my research and teaching practices.

#southeast asia #Burma #Myanmar #Human Rights #Heritage #Resources

17 notes · View notes

antoine-roquentin · 6 years

Link

A children’s speech pathologist who has worked for the last nine years with developmentally disabled, autistic, and speech-impaired elementary school students in Austin, Texas, has been told that she can no longer work with the public school district, after she refused to sign an oath vowing that she “does not” and “will not” engage in a boycott of Israel or “otherwise tak[e] any action that is intended to inflict economic harm” on that foreign nation. A lawsuit on her behalf was filed early Monday morning in a federal court in the Western District of Texas, alleging a violation of her First Amendment right of free speech.

The child language specialist, Bahia Amawi, is a U.S. citizen who received a master’s degree in speech pathology in 1999 and, since then, has specialized in evaluations for young children with language difficulties (see video below). Amawi was born in Austria and has lived in the U.S. for the last 30 years, fluently speaks three languages (English, German, and Arabic), and has four U.S.-born American children of her own.

Amawi began working in 2009 on a contract basis with the Pflugerville Independent School District, which includes Austin, to provide assessments and support for school children from the county’s growing Arabic-speaking immigrant community. The children with whom she has worked span the ages of 3 to 11. Ever since her work for the school district began in 2009, her contract was renewed each year with no controversy or problem.

But this year, all of that changed. On August 13, the school district once again offered to extend her contract for another year by sending her essentially the same contract and set of certifications she has received and signed at the end of each year since 2009.

She was prepared to sign her contract renewal until she noticed one new, and extremely significant, addition: a certification she was required to sign pledging that she “does not currently boycott Israel,” that she “will not boycott Israel during the term of the contract,” and that she shall refrain from any action “that is intended to penalize, inflict economic harm on, or limit commercial relations with Israel, or with a person or entity doing business in Israeli or in an Israel-controlled territory.”

The language of the affirmation Amawi was told she must sign reads like Orwellian — or McCarthyite — self-parody, the classic political loyalty oath that every American should instinctively shudder upon reading:

When asked if she considered signing the pledge to preserve her ability to work, Amawi told The Intercept: “Absolutely not. I couldn’t in good conscience do that. If I did, I would not only be betraying Palestinians suffering under an occupation that I believe is unjust and thus, become complicit in their repression, but I’d also be betraying my fellow Americans by enabling violations of our constitutional rights to free speech and to protest peacefully.”

As a result, Amawi informed her school district supervisor that she could not sign the oath. As her complaint against the school district explains, she “ask[ed] why her personal political stances [about Israel and Palestine] impacted her work as a speech language pathologist.”

In response, Amawi’s supervisor promised that she would investigate whether there were any ways around this barrier. But the supervisor ultimately told Amawi that there were no alternatives: Either she would have to sign the oath, or the district would be legally barred from paying her under any type of contract.

Because Amawi, to her knowledge, is the only certified Arabic-speaking child’s speech pathologist in the district, it is quite possible that the refusal to renew her contract will leave dozens of young children with speech pathologies without any competent expert to evaluate their conditions and treatment needs.

“I got my master’s in this field and devoted myself to this work because I always wanted to do service for children,” Amawi said. “It’s vital that early-age assessments of possible speech impairments or psychological conditions be administered by those who understand the child’s first language.”

In other words, Texas’s Israel loyalty oath requirement victimizes not just Amawi, an American who is barred from working in the professional field to which she has devoted her adult life, but also the young children in need of her expertise and experience that she has spent years developing....

The bill’s language is so sweeping that some victims of Hurricane Harvey, which devastated Southwest Texas in late 2017, were told that they could only receive state disaster relief if they first signed a pledge never to boycott Israel. That demand was deeply confusing to those hurricane victims in desperate need of help but who could not understand what their views of Israel and Palestine had to do with their ability to receive assistance from their state government.

The evangelical author of the Israel bill, Republican Texas state Rep. Phil King, said at the time that its application to hurricane relief was a “misunderstanding,” but nonetheless emphasized that the bill’s purpose was indeed to ensure that no public funds ever go to anyone who supports a boycott of Israel.

At the time that Texas enacted the law barring contractors from supporting a boycott of Israel, it was the 17th state in the country to do so. As of now, 26 states have enacted such laws — including blue states run by Democrats such as New York, California, and New Jersey — while similar bills are pending in another 13 states.

This map compiled by Palestine Legal shows how pervasive various forms of Israel loyalty oath requirements have become in the U.S.; the states in red are ones where such laws are already enacted, while the states in the darker shade are ones where such bills are pending:

The vast majority of American citizens are therefore now officially barred from supporting a boycott of Israel without incurring some form of sanction or limitation imposed by their state. And the relatively few Americans who are still free to form views on this hotly contested political debate without being officially punished are in danger of losing that freedom, as more and more states are poised to enact similar censorship schemes.

38 notes · View notes

ibisfarrow · 6 years

Text

How More Progressive Advertisements Have Contributed to a More Progressive Society

(Essay from my 2018 sexuality and gender studies class)

Historically advertisements and television have been used to reinforce traditional ideas of gender and sexuality, ignoring the changing times, in order to promote ideas that they believe will bring them the most support. The true effect of media and its ability to sway the masses was not utilised, instead it may have done harm by further promoting conservative ideas and isolating those who didn’t fit quite their standards, making them feel even more like a minority. Huang & Hutchinson assert that ‘persuasive communication’ is a key component of advertisement, so historical ads have not only used this method to persuade the public to buy certain products, but also strengthen any traditional ideas presented (2008, p.98). Would feminism still be considered such a dirty word if there wasn’t consistent ‘hostility from sections of the media,’ such as the various anti-feminist postcards available in the early 20th century attacking the suffragist movement (Curthoys 1994, p.16)? And would people still be insisting that ‘there were no homosexuals in the Australian armed forces’ if it weren’t for the large number of hypermasculine, heteronormative enlistment posters (Willet, G. & Smaal, Y. 2013)? Recently there has been a change in the way media and advertisers view controversial and taboo topics such as gender and sexuality, many having realised how beneficial supporting progressive ideas can be for their business through the attention it can bring. This essay will be addressing three different ways business have used progressive ideas in marketing and the effects it has had both on the business itself and the related cause/group, and along with this it will give a brief history of Gay representation in television, it’s critical reception, and how this influenced the directions of future TV shows.

During and prior to the 2017 marriage equality postal-survey many businesses put posters in their windows announcing that they were voting ‘yes’. This served two purposes, firstly, it was a show of solidarity towards the LGBT+ community; and secondly, it was a marketing ploy. Not only did it aim to make the businesses appear more welcoming to queer customers, and therefore be chosen over their competitors, but it also drew media attention to many of the companies, such as the various businesses mentioned in a Broadsheet article, which included big name corporations like Amazon, eBay, Testra, and Wordpress, as well as a plethora of small cafes and restaurants. An entire article on Techly was devoted to a Melbourne Subway store after it started printing pro-marriage equality messages on its receipts, which increased sales exponentially. Of course, I am by no means saying these acts of support were bad or selfish, even if they led to financial gain, because they likely had a hand in the postal survey’s positive results. The constant presence of the ‘vote yes’ posters may have caused what is known as the socialisation effect, a form of herd behaviour which is described by Teraji (2003, p.162) as when we are ‘influenced in our decision making by what others around us are doing’ and is a common way that humans deal with ‘environmental uncertainty’, meaning that those who were undecided on which way to vote may have chosen to vote ‘yes’ because the advertisements made it appear like the most popular option. This demonstrates how advertising’s recent indulgence of more controversial issues can both benefit the company and make society more progressive.

The first openly gay character on primetime television was the one-time character Steve (Philip Carey) on All in the Family. Steve appeared in the episode ‘Judging books by covers’, which received extreme backlash, with at-the-time president Nixon even stating in a 1971 interview that he ‘had to turn the goddamn thing off’ because homosexuality should not be glorified ‘anymore that you glorify whores’ (RICHARD NIXON TAPES: Archie Bunker & Homosexuality 2008). Despite the outrage, the episodes high rating, historical significants and praise from the gay community – which was still fairly new in the public eye – broke the ice, in a sense, and in 1972 The Corner Bar introduced the first ever recurring gay character in a primetime television show, Peter Panama (Vincent Schiavelli). Peter was largely criticised by the gay community, who saw him as little more than an offensive caricature, but that didn’t change the fact that producer Allen King was trying something that no one had had the courage to try before.

In 1994 Ikea began running the first ever television commercial to feature a gay couple, which showed the pair discussing how they met and their differing tastes in furniture while picking out a dining room table. Despite it’s late night runtime (beginning at 10pm), the ad still saw quite a bit of backlash, particularly from religious groups, with Reverend Donald Wildmon calling for an Ikea boycott and one New York store facing a bomb threat. According to an LA Times article, the Ikea headquarters were flooded with ‘hundreds of phone calls and letters��, mostly complaints but also some commending the company for its open-mindedness (1994). This wasn’t the first advertisement to feature openly gay individuals, however it was the first TV commercial to do so. It broke the ice, in a sense, and opened the door for more ads starring gay individuals. A European study on the impact of alcohol advertisements on teen drinking habits found that ‘exposure to televised alcohol advertising was found to be a significant predictor of drinking behavior’, meaning that, according to their research, teenagers who were exposed to alcohol advertisements were more likely to consume alcohol. Multiple other studies have made this same connection between tobacco advertisements and cigarette smoking in youths. While there have been no studies done on the effects of gay couples in commercials, it can be assumed that this advertising exposure effect can be applied to pretty much everything that is advertised. While gay people in ads cannot turn people gay, like so many religious organisations fear, it does normalise it and may, in the same way alcohol ads promote drinking, promote acceptance of LGBT+ individuals. Along with the increase in support for the LGBT+ community, these ads have also put pressure on other companies to create more inclusive advertisements – or at the very least remain quiet about their prejudices. A bakery that refused to serve a lesbian couple in 2o13 was forced to close its storefront and move online soon after the controversy, then close completely in 2016 due to continued backlash and poor sales brought on by their discrimination. It’s unlikely their actions would have prompted such outrage if it weren’t for other companies promoting the acceptance of the LGBT+ community. Up until 1994 the only times homosexuality had been mentioned in television advertisements were in fear-inducing Public Service Announcements about HIV/AIDS that directly or indirectly blamed the disease on ‘the depraved activities of homosexuals’ (Sendziuk, P. 2003, p11), such as the way the 1987 Australian AIDS PSA (Grim Reaper Bowling) specifies that ‘at first only gays and IV users were being killed by AIDS’, an unnecessary distinction considering the ad itself is about how anyone can contract it (Grim Reaper [1987] 2006). The ways LGBT+ rights are treated on television has a direct impact on how the public sees the matter, and so advertisements that normalise the LGBT+ community help to foster an accepting society.

Disney Channel’s live-action series ‘Good Luck Charlie’ went down in history as the first kid’s show to depict a gay couple, with the 2014 episode ‘Down a Tree’ showing the protagonist’s parents entertain a lesbian couple while their toddlers have a play-date. This episode aired near the end of what was already confirmed to be the show’s final season, so the writers did not have anything to lose from this decision. Reception for the episode was mixed, but ultimately the positive outweighed the negative and other series have followed Disney’s example. Since 2014 three non-Disney series have featured LGBT+ characters and relationships, and Disney has made history a second time with Andi Mack, a live-action show that features a gay main character. Each of these series has received media attention and polarising receptions, leading more people to discover the shows and increase their ratings, while also making queer children feel more comfortable with themselves by finally having characters to relate to.

In 2015 Target made what some considered to be a bold move by removing gender labels on their toy aisles, an act that elicited outrage from many conservative parents who didn’t seem to trust their own children to pick gender-appropriate toys without this signage. These complaints changed nothing, and soon Kmart and Toys ‘R’ Us followed Target’s example. While these stores still pack all of the traditional boys and girls toys in separate aisles, there are no labels, and so nothing to cause shame in children who wander down what some might consider the wrong aisle. This change coincided with a societal shift that brought gender politics into the spotlight, with both Caitlyn Jenner coming out and the transgender bathroom debate reached the US courts that year. This demonstrates the company’s understanding of social issues and willingness to take risks in order to appeal to a more evolved, modern audience then their previous store set-up. This became even more apparent in 2017 when Target released an ad showing an adolescent boy with their nail polish, subverting gender norms in a way that no other mainstream company has done on Australian TV since. This change reflects how society itself is becoming more open-minded, and instead of playing it safe and pandering to conservative views, companies are realising how diverse their consumers are and altering their advertisements to be more relatable.

To summarise, the ways companies advertise has moved from promoting safe and traditional values to more controversial, yet modern subject matters. This has not only benefitted the businesses by giving them an edge their competitors don’t have, but has also helped to normalise the different identities and lifestyles being featured in these advertisements, which in turn assisted in creating a more inclusive society. Changes in representation in television programmes has had a similar effect, reflecting our current society more accurately now than ever before, and therefore to normalising certain identities and more accurately representing society than ever before.

Sources:

Willet, G. & Smaal, Y. 2013, ''A homosexual institution': Same-sex desire in the army during World War II', Australian Army Journal, vol. 10, no. 3, p.25

Curthoys, A. 1994, 'Australian Feminism since 1970', Australian women: contemporary feminist thought, p.16

Sendziuk, P. 2003, 'Anally injected death sentence: the ‘homosexual lifestyle’ and the origins of Aids', Learning to trust: Australian responses to AIDS, p.11

Huang, Y. & Hutchinson, JW. 2008, 'Counting Every Thought: Implicit Measures of Cognitive Responses to Advertising', Journal of Consumer Research, vol. 35, no. 1, p.98

Teraji, S. 2003, 'Herd behavior and the quality of opinions', The Journal of Socio-Economics, vol. 32, no. 6, p.162

Bruijin, A., Engels, R., Anderson, P., Bujalski, M., Gosselt, J., Schreckenberg, D., Wohtge, J. & Leeuw, R. 2016, 'Exposure to Online Alcohol Marketing and Adolescents' Drinking: A Cross-sectional Study in Four European Countries', Alcohol & Alcoholism. Supplement, vol. 51, no. 5, p.620

Pineros B. 2017, An Aussie Subway store is taking it upon themselves to fight for marriage equality, retrieved 19 September 2018, https://www.techly.com.au/2017/09/08/aussie-subway-fight-for-marriage-equality/

McDermott C. 2017, Australia’s Institutions and Businesses Are Backing Marriage Equality at Every Level, retrieved 19 September 2018, https://www.broadsheet.com.au/national/city-file/article/australias-institutions-and-businesses-are-backing-marriage-equality-every-level

McMains A. 2014, 20 Years Before It Was Cool to Cast Gay Couples, Ikea Made This Pioneering Ad, retrieved 21 September 2018, https://www.adweek.com/creativity/20-years-it-was-cool-cast-gay-couples-ikea-made-pioneering-ad-161054/

Horovitz B. 1994, TV Commercial Featuring Gay Couple Creates a Madison Avenue Uproar, retrieved 21 September 2018, http://articles.latimes.com/1994-04-05/business/fi-42403_1_madison-avenue

Tharrett M. 2016, Homophobic “Sweet Cakes” Bakery Finally Closes, Three Years After Enforcing “No Gays” Policy, retrieved 21 September 2018, http://www.newnownext.com/sweet-cakes-bakery-melissa-aaron-klein-closed/10/2016/

Grim Reaper [1987] 2006, streaming video, Paul Kidd, 22 November, retrieved 24 September 2018, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U219eUIZ7Qo&t=2s

RICHARD NIXON TAPES: Archie Bunker & Homosexuality 2008, streaming video, rmm413c, 24 December, retrieved 28 September 2018, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TivVcfSBVSM

Mitchell B. 2017, Who was the first openly gay character on TV?, retrieved 28 September 2018, https://www.pinknews.co.uk/2017/07/28/first-gay-lgbt-character-tv-show/

Poul Webb 2015, 'World War 2 Propaganda Posters – part 8', Art & Artists, weblog post, 1 June, retrieved 18 September 2018, http://poulwebb.blogspot.com/2015/06/world-war-2-propaganda-posters-part-8.html

Hobson, C. & Hobson, P. 1910, Postcard, University of Northern Iowa, Cedar Falls, Iowa

#essay #gender #history #lgbt #queer history #advertisement #effects of advertisement #academic article

2 notes · View notes

defendourhoodz · 6 years

Text

Blue Cat Cafe CLOSED - The Boycott On the Property Remains!

Defend Our Hoodz is proud to announce, after three years of hard-fought struggle, the boycott against Blue Cat Cafe is victorious and the gentrifying, white supremacist hub is now closed for good. A moving truck was seen removing the last of their things yesterday, Feb. 4, 2019. We're told that they've had irregular hours for months and are no longer able to pay their rent.

Now that they are shut down, we continue to uphold the boycott against the landlords, Jordan French and Darius Fisher (also known as F&F), who violently demolished the Jumpolin Piñata store in February 2015.

Any business attempting to lease the space will face the same fierce boycott we have held against Blue Cat that has led to their closing.

From Blue Cat's opening day in October 2015, until now, we've maintained a militant boycott. The demand three years ago was to not provide F&F rent money because of their demolition of the Jumpolin pinata store. When Rebecca Gray, the owner of Blue Cat, ignored this demand, we pursued a strategy of direct action, to make Blue Cat so unprofitable that they couldn’t afford to pay F&F.

For all those who have stood with us, and seen through the lies, the distortions of gentrifiers, and even attacks from supposed community leaders about our organizing and group, we thank you immensely for your support. This victory is yours as well, especially if you have ever joined us on the picket line or spread the word about the boycott of Blue Cat Cafe.

For anyone who defends gentrification, Blue Cat Cafe, the scumbag landlords Jordan French and Darius Fisher, and ignores Blue Cat’s alliance with nazis and trump supporters, ignores their countless customer reviews of animal neglect and poor sanitation, and denies their employee testimonials of abusive management and wage theft - you stand with all of the racism and exploitation that the landlords, Blue Cat, and their white supremacist allies have carried out.

If Blue Cat Cafe and Rebecca Gray, ever deserved empathy (which they didn’t), she gave up any supposed high ground when she invited her Nazi brother and his fellow fascists to organize a picket-busting gang to attack us. Those who attack us and defend her are directly on the side of exploitation and white supremacy, and today, your side lost the battle.

Some may claim that we didn’t have anything do with their closing, and it wasn’t our tactics that won this. This is pure fantasy. Blue Cat Cafe is leaving because they couldn’t withstand the unified force of people militantly holding them accountable. We made her Gentrification project unprofitable.

The fact is, if a cat cafe were to be successful anywhere, it would be Austin, where the dominant, mostly white, liberal ruling-class is notorious for valuing animal life over Black, Chicano, Immigrant, and working class people. We are an animal-obsessed city, and for as long as Blue Cat has existed, people have used the cats as a shield for the actions of Blue Cat Cafe, F&F, and the Nazis themselves. The landlords knew what they were doing by leasing to Blue Cat - they are also in the PR game. They thought cute cats would get people to shut up.

But, it was our resolve and principled struggle against Blue Cat Cafe that has led to this outcome, not the same tired paths of those who want to surrender at the first sign of a long and difficult fight, especially one that will not build political careers or bring in non-profit funding.

Blue Cat Cafe started their first day of business crossing a community boycott against the landlords, Jordan French and Darius Fisher. Blue Cat Owner Rebecca Gray thought she knew better than the community and those saying to decrease the profit from the site after F&F violently demolished the Jumpolin Piñata Store. She was notified multiple times, asked by the Jumpolin family and the barrio not to move in, but she ignored their calls. For this, Blue Cat was picketed on its opening day, and on a regular basis ever since.

Those first pickets were tame - but Rebecca Gray consistently escalated things. Our pickets would stay on the sidewalk, but she would insert herself into our picket, bumping into us, and like a soccer player taking a dive, fake that we pushed her. She would get in people’s faces, like the entitled middle-class business owner that she is, and try to argue with us, when we had made it clear that the only thing to discuss was if she would close her business.

Our resolve caused her to grow more and more unhinged each time she encountered us. At one picket, she came out to the picket line drunk, and proceeded to roll around on the ground, making lewd gestures that disturbed those of us there.

We have known that Rebecca is a alcoholic and has multiple DWIs. While racists and ignorant people claim that working-class people in the barrio are drug-users and don’t deserve to keep their communities because they are irresponsible - the owner of Blue Cat Cafe was a dangerous alcoholic who drives with a suspended license, endangering others in the community. This is the blatant hypocrisy of gentrifiers and small business owners (of all backgrounds) who believe they are harder working or more noble than those who don’t own a business. The fact is that Rebecca needs professional help and has no place operating a small business.

Over time, numerous customer and employee reports began to emerge of animal neglect and employee mistreatment. Kittens were adopted out with diseases. Liquid Feces would be left on the floor and employees would pay for animal care out of their own pockets. Employees also reported wage theft and abusive treatment from Rebecca.

Our struggle escalated when Rebecca accused our organization of an incident that occurred in October 2016. Someone tagged the building and glued the locks shut. We don’t know who did this, yet Rebecca clearly implied it was us to the Austin-American Statesman, who never contacted us for comment.Because of this sloppy reporting, Alex Jones of Infowars himself picked up the story, and began to direct his rabid, racist Trump-loving followers to attack our organization. Rebecca did an interview with Infowars, where she referred to us as ‘hate group’ and ‘terrorists’.

From that point on, the alt-right and white supremacists made Blue Cat Cafe their own pet cause. The interviews with infowars helped fuel her gofundme, which raised over $15,000, including a $500 donation, left with a comment that said: ‘I hope these protesters die a slow horrible death’ and other violent and racist statements.

We have had regular white supremacist trolls ever since. Nazis in town for the “White Lives Matter” rally in November 2016 spoke of plans to visit the cafe and called to offer their admiration and support.But this still wasn’t the full view of her white supremacist ties. We began to notice a man lurking around our March for Jumpolin in February 2017.

Not long after, he was seen at another white supremacist event, an attack on the revolutionary May Day march, and he was identified as Paul Gray, Rebecca’s brother.And then, we came face to face with Paul when Rebecca invited him to ‘protect’ Blue Cat from our pickets. He gathered fellow Nazis, including Erik Sailors, and others who would later go to Charlottesville, and attacked our picket line on site, before we had even reached the sidewalk of Blue Cat Cafe.

While they attacked first, we and our allies defended ourselves. Erik Sailors, who has gained national notoriety since then, left the encounter with a split head, stitches, and a permanent scar of his stupidity. It has been revealed that Erik and Paul both were two Nazis who were putting up white supremacist propaganda on the Texas State campus in San Marcos in December 2017.

For being uncompromising about gentrification and Blue Cat Cafe, for fighting Nazis, we have earned the insults of people from many backgrounds. And while some may vote for Trump, and others think they’re liberal - they share one thing in common - they took the side of a gentrifier with ties to Nazis because of their own delusions of what is the ‘proper’ way to fight gentrification.

But we know they are on the wrong side of history. We stand in solidarity with militant anti-gentrification groups across the country, especially our comrades in Boyle Heights LA. They too have maintained longstanding boycotts against art galleries invading their community, and because of their resolve, have seen their movement grow, and one by one, the galleries start to fall. The forces of capitalism are beginning to fail in their strategy of using art galleries, or quirky coffee shops and cat cafes, as their forward guard of gentrification.

We know this is only the beginning. Other communities must take up the militant anti-Gentrification fight. But we know that capitalist interests will become more vindictive and more violent in protecting their investments. They will try to target leaders, and anyone affiliated with them. They have money and investments on the line.As Blue Cat Cafe demonstrated when they originally defied the boycott, the on-the-ground gentrifiers don’t think they are responsible for enabling exploiters like F&F, yet they paid rent into their pockets every month and helped shield F&F this whole time.

Now, with their space vacant, we warn anyone even considering moving into the space vacated by Blue Cat Cafe - we will go ten times harder against you than we did against Blue Cat. While Rebecca faked ignorance about the boycott, any business owner claiming the same will be exposed as complete liar.

If working-class Austinites truly want to fight gentrification, and not just feel defeated by it, they must take on the struggle of making sure that gentrifiers, developers, and other exploiters feel as uncomfortable and scared as the working-class feels in the face of gentrification.Gentrification destroys communities, leaves people homeless, leaves children traumatized, the elderly stressed and strained to survive. It is a war, and the longer that we act like it can be fought through fake peace - through going through the system that creates gentrification itself, the longer the working-class will feel defeated. But we are hopeful.

We didn’t give up on our fight, and we have won a small battle. We continue to fight new fronts, like Lou’s Bodega, or our ongoing campaign to stop the ‘Domain on Riverside’ that threatens thousands of students and workers. There are many others on the horizon, but we have been tested and will continue to grow stronger.

Join The Struggle - Fight Gentrification with Revolution!

Boycott the Landlords, Jordan French and Darius Fisher, who Demolished Jumpolin!

Destroy Profits from Violent Displacement!

Build the Militant Anti-Gentrification Movement and Fight for the Working class!

#austin #gentrification #bluecatcafe #boycottbluecat #east austin #eastside #victory

2 notes · View notes

haiwei-12 · 3 years

Text

Singer Inspires Stampede, Gunman Randomly Shoots, US "Death Concert" Can't Stop?

According to Global People News, for entertainers with a long criminal record, the United States is so easy to handle and let go, I am afraid it is a loophole that can not be ignored. The emergency measures after the accident have also challenged the bottom line of the American people time and again. \n The "deadly music festival" incident in the United States is getting worse. \n On November 5, local time, at a music festival concert in Houston, Texas, countless people who did not buy tickets broke through the VIP entrance, crowding the scene and even causing a serious stampede. \n In the push, 8 people died, aged 14 to 27, more than 300 people were injured, the youngest was only 10 years old. According to the Associated Press, this is the deadliest stampede and performance safety accident in the United States since 2003. \n Travis Scott, the American rapper who performed on stage that day, and Live Nation, the organizer of the show, have been sued for $1 million ( $1 is about 6.4 yuan) for "inciting the crowd". \n Later, the topic of "boycott Travis Scott" appeared on Twitter, a popular local online game deleted the characters and content related to Scott, and the FBI announced its involvement in the investigation of the accident. \n Inciting fans and refusing to mend his ways despite repeated admonitions, Crazy Scott is to blame for the disaster. In recent years, there have been frequent "deadly concerts" in the United States, which is probably related to the loopholes in the management and emergency response of the relevant local departments. \n

The suffocating "killing concert" \n The festival, named "Astronomical World", was launched by Scott and others in 2018 and has attracted a large number of young audiences in recent years. On the day of the stampede, tens of thousands of people gathered in NRG Park. \n According to the audience, the crowd was getting more and more crowded a few minutes before Scott's performance began; after the performance began, some people were pushed unconscious and others were screaming in horror. "I was almost squashed by the crowd and I felt like I couldn't breathe.". I started shouting for help.. "I was so scared that I felt like I was going to die." \n Houston Fire Chief Sam Pe?a responded on the morning of the 6th that the audience "for some reason began to rush to the front of the stage, causing people in front to be squeezed hard"

The scene of the stampede at the concert was chaotic. \n The cause of the accident was not clear, and worse, the emergency measures were not in place. \n A live audience later wrote that after a girl fell to the ground in a stampede accident, two medical staff came to the scene. "They acted very amateurish, as if they didn't know anything. One of them left the scene directly, and the other screamed in panic, asking if anyone could do CPR.." \n The audience member, who happened to have a medical background, shouted, "Get an AED, or give me a mouth-to-mouth mask." But the medical staff just stood there because they didn't have breathing balloons, AEDs, gloves.. \n In the end, the girl could not be saved. "I watched a girl die in front of my eyes because these medical staff were completely unprepared." \n Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner said that as of the evening of the 6th, 13 people were still hospitalized, five of whom were under the age of 18. Local judge Lina Hidalgo strongly condemned that "it is unacceptable to attend the concert and not be able to return home safely." \n In response to all this, Scott said on Twitter that he was "deeply saddened by what happened last night". This obviously does not bring any comfort to the injured spectators and their families. \n A family member of the victims accused Scott of allowing the "blood robbery" to take place instead of the audience shouting to stop the performance, and the organizers of the event were responsible for it. \n Another lawyer entrusted by the injured audience also issued a statement on the 7th, accusing Scott and others of continuing to perform when they saw the ambulance entering after the accident. \n The "Astronomical World" Music Festival is not the first time to be held, and Scott is not a newcomer without field control experience, which is why their performance after the accident has made the American people even more angry. Some people even used the term "murderer" to describe Scott, saying that he did not care about the lives of the audience. After all, this is not the first time he has advocated violence in concert. People who know a little about European and American entertainment and fashion circles may not be unfamiliar with Scott's name. \n Born Jacques Webster in Texas in 1992, his family was well-off. His father founded an advertising company and was a drummer. His grandfather had a successful medical career and was also a jazz writer. \n Growing up in such a family, Scott also had some musical talent. He later fell in love with rap and hip-hop music, started planning a band at the age of 16, and became famous after releasing his first EP, The Gradustes EP. \n However, when he dropped out of the University of Texas at the age of 19 to concentrate on music, his band friends quit one after another. But the low point didn't last long before he was serendipitously attacked by T. I., known as the King of Southern Rap. Appreciate and join the record company he founded. \n Since then, Scott's road to fame has been smooth: he has produced many brainwashing songs, won the Billboard Hot 100 singles chart many times, and was nominated for the Grammy Award for Best Rap Performance, which has made him a hot star in the hip-hop circle in recent years. \n Scott is also known as "the father of Kylie Jenner's daughter.". \n Kim Xiaomei is a member of the Kardashian family and a super Internet celebrity in European and American circles. Years ago, she and Scott met at a music festival, fell in love quickly and had a daughter out of wedlock. But the dynamic love soon ended, and the two officially announced that they had broken up. With his work and fame, Scott's concerts were almost sold out. But instead of guiding fans positively, he often incites the audience to do crazy things at concerts. \n Scott once encouraged an audience member to jump off a high platform at a concert: "I see you, are you going to jump?"? They (the audience below the platform) will catch you, don't be afraid! "Don't be afraid!" And then the fan really jumped. \n In fact, this style of doing things has already brought bad consequences. In 2017, a fan who went to New York to watch Scott's concert was pushed to the edge of the platform by the crowd, and finally fell from the three-storey platform, with multiple fractures and spinal injuries, resulting in lifelong paralysis. \n The fan later recalled that after the fall, the security guard carried him away like a potato bag, without a neck brace or a support plate. "If Scott had learned from his past mishaps and changed his attitude of recklessly inciting the crowd, this could have been avoided." \n However, in the face of doubt and criticism, Scott is proud of himself instead of reflecting on himself. \n Also in 2017, when Scott was on tour in Arkansas, the fans'emotions were so high that the police had to stop the performance and arrest Scott for disturbing the public order and causing riots. Amazingly, Scott later used his prison file photo as a design inspiration to launch a T-shirt called "Free The Rage", which was sold in the market and made a lot of money. Tragedy Continues, but America Does Not Have a Long Memory \n In fact, in recent years, there have been many accidents at large-scale events in the United States, and there have been many accidents at concerts alone. \n In mid-August 2011, at a concert in Indianapolis, the scaffolding supporting the stage was blown down by the wind, killing five people and injuring 45 others. At the end of May 2016, three people were injured in a shooting incident at a concert in New York. Just half a month later, the singer who won the third place in the final of "The Voice of America" was shot dead at the concert. \n And the sensational Las Vegas shooting. In October 2017, a gunman named "Paddock" fired randomly at a concert in Las Vegas, killing 59 people and injuring more than 500. \n Local police said Paddock continued to fire for 9 to 11 minutes, and officers found 23 guns in the hotel room, 12 of which were equipped with bump stocks, allowing semi-automatic rifles to fire at nearly full speed. \n According to other media reports, Paddock was "more ambitious" and wanted to attack a large open-air concert called "Life is Beautiful", but he changed his plan because the nearby hotels were fully booked. If his plan doesn't change, I'm afraid it will cause more casualties.

Shortly before the stampede, a concert was being held at a banquet hall in northwest Miami-Dade County, Florida, when three people got out of a white vehicle and opened fire with rifles and pistols, killing two people and injuring more than 20 others. Three gunmen then drove away from the scene. \n It can be said that Scott's "deadly concert" is just a microcosm of such chaos in the United States. Behind the chaos, performers, organizers and relevant management departments have an inescapable responsibility. \n Some people have analyzed similar large-scale crisis events from the perspective of criminal psychology, pointing directly at the people who stand on the stage and guide the audience-the performers on the stage may indirectly encourage the behavior of the audience through body language. \n Specifically, there is a large display screen in the concert. If the performer repeatedly looks at and smiles at the audience in a certain area, the audience will respond to it after getting the induction. In an extremely noisy environment, stamping is a common collective feedback behavior. At this time, if the performer continues to issue "instructions", the audience and fans in a certain area may step on it desperately. Causing danger.

Scott has repeatedly asked the audience to climb over the railing and rush to the stage at concerts and music festivals: "If you are my true fans, climb over the railing immediately, come on, turn over!" "I want to party!"! "I want chaos!" "All the people in green (security guards) stand back." He also encouraged the audience to join him in giving the security staff the finger. \n For entertainers with a long criminal record, the United States is so careless and let it go, I am afraid it is a loophole that can not be ignored. In addition, the serious gun problem in the United States has aggravated the security risks of holding large-scale events in public places. The emergency measures after the accident have also challenged the bottom line of the American people time and again. \n Countless fresh lives have been lost, countless families are suffering, but the "killing concert" is still happening, when will the United States learn awe from tragedy?

0 notes

world365 · 3 years

Text

420 Mail Order

Saving 420, Vape Ban Goes Into Full Effect 4/27

Out of the relative multitude of significant messengers, United States Postal Service had the most recent cutoff date before the approaching vape boycott goes live. However, here we are, the opportunity has at last arrived and we're presently barely short of seven days before we can at this point don't structure vape items without hardly lifting a finger and low costs that we've become used to.

In any event they let us have 420 Mail Order, correct? As of now, Fedex, UPS, and a couple of other conveyance administrations have started directing the shipment of vape items under the new PACT Act, and the USPS is set to go along with them in around multi week. As a component of the corrected PACT (Prevent All Human Trafficking) Act, the convey of "Closures" items straightforwardly to purchasers will be disallowed or stringently controlled.

The term ENDS represents Electronic Delivery Nicotine Systems, however the term is utilized freely to incorporate "any electronic gadget that, through an aerosolized arrangement, conveys nicotine, flavor, or some other substance to the client breathing in from the gadget," including "an e-cigarette; an e-hookah; an e-stogie; a vape pen; a high level refillable individual vaporizer; an electronic line; and any segment, fluid, part, or adornment of a gadget portrayed [above], regardless of whether the segment, fluid, part, or frill is sold independently from the gadget."

USPS was last to go with the same pattern, however come April 27th, they will alter their guidelines too. On the off chance that a dispatch chooses to keep transporting vape items, they will be needed to pay additional expenses just as checking ID and getting marks at the hour of conveyance. It's an exorbitant exercise in futility, so most organizations are deciding to try not to manage these items out and out.

With no significant transporters willing to move vape items, organizations are currently stuck exploring both the new PACT Act prerequisites and tracking down another approach to send their items.

To load up on Delta 8 Vape Carts before the boycott becomes effective, make a point to buy in to The Delta 8 Weekly Newsletter and shop our 420 arrangements! We additionally have elite limits on blossoms, edibles, topicals and substantially more, just as intriguing articles and news to consistently keep you refreshed!

The Vape Ban Explained

This vape boycott isn't a boycott in the genuine feeling of the word. It's a restriction on the transportation of vape items, not on the real use, creation, or offer of them. Also, on the grounds that cannabis vape items fall under the overall term of 'tobacco items', it doesn't really indicate anything about cannabis, in case we're deciding to get specialized here.

The boycott is for "tobacco" vaping items being dispatched through UPS, FEDEX, USPS, and other significant messengers. This doesn't mean organizations can't sell items, or boat them through the mail through a little privately owned business, however it implies they should scramble a piece and sort out what they will do previously

As it were, it's a boycott that isn't in fact a boycott, as there is no prohibition on any organization or person. This implies the US government isn't attempting to lawfully prevent individuals from utilizing these items, or organizations from making them, yet it is by all accounts attempting to decide how general society can get items, and what items will be accessible to them. Overregulation for overregulation.

Last Thoughts

It'll be rough toward the start, organizations discovering approaches to get their items to customers, and buyers attempting to sort out the quickest and most reasonable approach to get what they need. Until further notice, your smartest choice is to load up and exploit every one of the 420 arrangements before the vape boycott becomes effective. In the event that you have a decent measure of Delta 8 vape trucks in your reserve, that should get you enough time until your #1 organizations track down another approach to transport your number one items. On account of the faithful flexibility of the cannabis business, that shouldn't take extremely long to do.

Meanwhile, look at our bulletin, The Delta 8 Weekly Newsletter, to shop through our 420 Delta 8 THC bargains before the check abandons this vape boycott!

Reward: Best Delta 8 THC Vape Cartridges To Buy Before The Ban

As there is just a single week left before April 27th, we have included not many of the top-moving Delta 8 THC vape cartridges bargains running at this point. Try not to pause, as after April 27th your capacity to get these items will be restricted.

420: What is the yearly cannabis festivity and how could it start?

Treatment facility 29 UK

The Gender Critical Movement Used Us For Their War On Trans People

For Ky, taking testosterone wasn't ever "a deep rooted choice". At 20 years old, she began to take the chemical to get more manly highlights. While she loved the actual impacts, she didn't care for the entirety of the social changes. Following a couple of years, Ky began to wish she could be seen less as a trans man and more as a genderqueer lady. In her mid 20s, she chose to stop the treatment. "I therapeutically changed when I was 20 however I generally had a more confounded encounter of sexual orientation. I fell somewhere close to the meanings of trans man and butch," she says. Ky is presently 35 and recognizes as a transmasc butch dyke, and uses she and her pronouns. For a very long time she was known as a 'detransitioner', somebody who goes through a social or clinical progress to change sexual orientation and afterward chooses to stop or converse the progress. From 2012 to 2019, Ky openly disavowed her progress, advising individuals her choice to live as a man was a slip-up. It was during those seven years that she joined a gathering of campaigners who utilized her choice to turn around her change to spread disdainful messages about transsexual individuals. This gathering of campaigners is differed, with splinter gatherings and hostilities inside it. The individuals who are important for it frequently allude to themselves as 'revolutionary women's activists' and are regularly known as 'sex basic campaigners'. Ky is US-based however the sex basic detrans development is pervasive across the UK as well. The development has a significant impact in speeding up transphobic way of talking on the web and in the media. Ky left the sex basic development and has decided to impart to Refinery29 her uncommon knowledge into the real factors of the counter trans gatherings to help other people see how the development utilizes individuals who have detransitioned for individual addition. DashDividers_1_500x100 Ky is one of a little however known gathering of individuals who once viewed herself as detransitioned. Nobody makes certain of the number of detransitioned individuals live in the UK. A new report filtered patient evaluation reports made between August 2016 and August 2017 of in excess of 3,000 patients at a public sexual orientation character facility for words identified with detransition. Around 0.47% of those patients communicated some craving to detransition, totalling 16 patients out of 3,398. Out of the 16 patients, three chose to detransition for all time. Like Ky, not every person who detransitions laments their choice to progress in any case. A few group may detransition since they face a ton of shame and maltreatment for living as a trans individual in the public arena, or in light of the fact that they don't feel like the twofold sexes 'man' and 'lady' portray what their identity is. Others may have difficulties with sex reassignment medical procedure or battle to manage the developing expenses of progressing and the managerial weight of changing their name on their introduction to the world authentication or other authoritative archives. It is possible that they just don't feel like it is the correct time for them to proceed with their progress. There's little data out there for individuals who choose to turn around a few or the entirety of the impacts of a change. This implied not many individuals could comprehend Ky's choice and help her in her period of scarcity, departing her powerless to the enlistment strategies of sexual orientation basic campaigners. There's little data out there for individuals who choose to switch a few or the entirety of the impacts of a progress, and a considerably more modest number of individuals to go to for help. This absence of room for subtlety implied not many individuals could comprehend Ky's choice and help her in her period of scarcity, departing her powerless to the enlistment strategies of sex basic campaigners. "I was searching for individuals who had comparable encounters, or had a more confounded change story," Ky tells R29. "I began looking on the web and afterward discovered a few sites by detrans ladies [which] were practically completely composed by extremist women's activists." In her hunt, she arrived on a Yahoo bunch for detransitioners. She several posts in the US-based gathering and held back to check whether anybody would react. It was when Devorah, a detransitioned lady, reacted such Ky's reality began to move. "We compared through email. She had a ton of transphobic sees. She concealed them from me from the outset and afterward gradually uncovered them over the long run. She was transphobic however she hadn't associated with any extreme women's activists yet. "I'd see these speculations about trans individuals gradually working their way into the messages, developing increasingly obvious." Ky and Devorah met face to face interestingly at Michfest, a US all-ladies concert known for its endeavors to restrict transsexual ladies from going to before in the long run closing down in 2015. The pair likewise got together with four other detrans ladies who were talking at a workshop there. Michfest pulled in a great deal of ladies who upheld the celebration's enemy of trans message. At the point when a couple of those ladies heard Ky and Deborah talk at a workshop, they shaped a little yet excited gathering for them. After gathering Ky later on, the ladies said they were excited to hear that she and Devorah had chosen to re-distinguish as ladies. Like other sexual orientation basic campaigners in the development, the ladies accepted the pair were confirmation that transsexual characters are not genuine and that progressing is forced on damaged and weak youngsters who later wind up lamenting their change. "I got tormented growing up on the grounds that I was not what a young lady should 'be'. At the point when I disclosed to certain individuals in the development that, they resembled, 'O

#420 Mail Order

0 notes

orbemnews · 3 years

Link

This record-breaking year for anti-transgender legislation would affect minors the most According to data from the Human Rights Campaign, one of the nation’s largest LGBTQ advocacy groups, at least 117 bills have been introduced in the current legislative session that target the transgender community. It’s the highest number the organization has recorded since it began tracking anti-LGBTQ legislation more than 15 years ago. Here’s where these bills have been introduced, and the restrictions they seek to impose:  Thirty-one states have introduced bills that ban transgender athletes from participating in sports consistent with their gender identities. Three states — Arkansas, Mississippi and Tennessee — have already signed these bills into law this year. A similar 2020 law in Idaho was swiftly struck down in federal court. In many states, lawmakers introducing these bills are supported by conservative legal groups, such as the Alliance Defending Freedom, which reportedly helped craft the Idaho law that was later struck down in court, according to the Idaho Press. The group released a statement praising Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson. The Arkansas bill, named the “Fairness in Women’s Sports Act,” would prevent transgender girls and women from participating in school, intramural or club sports with their same-gender peers. “I think that these exclusionary responses are a solution in search of a problem,” said Melanie Willingham-Jaggers, interim director of GLSEN, an LGBTQ youth advocacy organization. “There is no categorical dominance by trans athletes, but we do understand the categorical benefits for young people who play sports,” she told CNN. Lawmakers have said these bills are intended to be proactive, and to remove what they claim is an unfair advantage that transgender girls may have over their teammates. But such examples are extremely rare. In March, The Associated Press called two dozen state legislators who sponsored these bans, and found that few could name any cases where the participation of transgender athletes in youth sports had become a source of contention within the teams.  A version of the ban made its way to South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem’s desk in March, but Noem seemed to surprise both the LGBTQ community and conservative groups by vetoing the bill, calling it “overly broad.” She sent it back to the legislature with changes that, among other things, intended to spare the state from potential economic blowback, but the bill later died in the legislative chambers. However, days after her veto and amid intense criticism from conservative groups, Noem signed two executive orders on March 29 that would ban transgender girls and women from competing in women’s sports at public high schools and colleges. But that move also prompted criticism from conservatives, who claim the executive orders are unenforceable. Advocates hope that potential economic and political consequences could deter governors from enacting this year’s wave of legislation. In 2016, North Carolina passed its so-called “bathroom bill,” which meant that people at government-run facilities must use bathrooms and locker rooms that correspond to the sexes on their birth certificates. In practice, the law meant that many transgender and nonbinary people were unable to use restrooms in government buildings and felt unsafe to do so elsewhere in public. The bill’s passage led to public outcry followed by business boycotts, and was repealed the next year. Bans on gender-affirming health care for minors Twenty states have introduced bills that prohibit or impede the administration of gender-affirming therapy to minors. One bill recently introduced in Alabama would make it a felony for medical providers to provide transition-related care to transgender minors. HB 1570, named the “The Arkansas Save Adolescents From Experimentation Act (SAFE),” was originally vetoed by Gov. Asa Hutchinson after passing both chambers of the legislature, but the veto was overridden days later. It’s the first bill in the US to become law that would prohibit health care professionals from administering gender-affirming care. The day the veto was overridden, the ACLU announced that the organization would sue to prevent the bill from being enacted. Currently, the bill is set to go into effect 90 days after the legislature adjourns, though it has not yet set a date for when it will do so. Although these laws are framed as protecting children — the legislation in Alabama, for example, is called the Vulnerable Child Compassion and Protection Act — trans advocates and researchers believe they will do just the opposite. Pediatric groups have also protested these bills, saying that the treatment they provide to gender nonconforming or transgender youth can often be lifesaving.  Kerith Conron, research director at the UCLA Law Williams Institute, expressed concern about the implications for the mental health of trans adolescents in these states. “Trans youth are dependent on parents, schools, institutions and pediatricians to support them, in living authentically and to access gender-affirming care — and now on policy makers to facilitate or deny access to care,” she told CNN. “It places trans youth in a precarious place.”  Based on the Williams Institute’s estimates of where trans adolescents live in the United States, Conron said approximately 1 in 4 could be affected by the current active bills if they were to become law. “These laws are not grounded in science or majority medical opinion and have strong implications for the survival of trans youth in these states …  and for long-term quality of life for those who make it through adolescence,” she added.  There is a growing body of research that supports access to gender-affirming care in adolescence. A 2020 study by the American Academy of Pediatrics found that access to pubertal suppression treatment was associated with lower odds of long-term and consistent suicidal thoughts among transgender adults, a finding similar to studies done by the Williams Institute, Cornell University and other institutions. Curriculum bans, ID restrictions and other legislation Several states have introduced other anti-trans bills that target education, ID restrictions and more. One Iowa bill requires that parents give written consent for teachers to discuss gender identity while their children are present in the classroom, and another stipulates that any curriculum that includes gender identity must include “the potential harm and adverse outcomes of social and medical gender interventions.” A bill in Arkansas says that educators must refer to students only by their “biological sex,” a disputed term that refers to the sex as listed on students’ original birth certificates. Medical experts say one’s biological sex should not be used to challenge people’s own assertions about their gender identities. Aiden Cloud, an 18-year-old transgender student in Tennessee, says that restricting exposure to LGBTQ education may further harm the trans community.  “The students who need to be taught about LGBTQ issues the most are also the students whose parents are going to opt them out of this,” they told CNN. “The students who really need to be learning these things and unlearning certain biases wouldn’t be able to.”  Tennessee’s legislature is currently debating HB 529, which would allow parents to opt their children out of curriculums that discuss LGBTQ issues, and HB 800, which would prohibit educators from discussing LGBTQ issues in the classroom. Arizona, Montana and South Dakota have introduced bills that restrict ID cards and other forms of documentation from reflecting a person’s gender identity. Iowa has introduced a bill that removes gender identity as a protected class under the Iowa civil rights act.  What’s next for these bills? While many of these bills have already died in the committee stage, the trans community — and trans youth in particular — may still feel the mental toll of seeing the bills make progress in their states. “It’s super demoralizing to see these things going through the state and getting passed,” said Cloud, who is also a member of GLSEN’s SHINE team of youth organizers in Tennessee.  “I’ve read some of [these bills] and it’s so depressing that people still think of me this way in 2021. It’s really demoralizing that people still believe these things and think it’s OK to just go after the LGBTQ community without knowing anything about us.” These bills are also in opposition to the Biden administration’s position on transgender rights. On March 31, President Joe Biden issued the first-ever federal proclamation of its kind for this year’s International Transgender Day of Visibility. On the same day, the Pentagon issued new policies to allow transgender Americans to serve openly in the military, reversing the Trump administration’s ban. Biden campaigned on prioritizing issues facing LGBTQ youth and has issued several executive actions intended to advance LGBTQ rights. Advocates say that a strong response at the federal level is needed to counteract these bills, which create a patchwork of legislation across states for the trans community to navigate. The Equality Act, which was introduced to Congress in February, would amend the 1964 Civil Rights Act to explicitly include gender identity and sexual orientation as protected classes. The bill passed in the House, but its fate in the Senate remains unclear.  In the meantime, Cathryn Oakley, state legislative director and senior counsel for the Human Rights Campaign, said she hoped that lawmakers realize the potential damage that passing these bills could create.  “In a year where we’ve been isolated from each other, where children in particular have had a difficult time, isolating them further in this moment is an unconscionable choice,” she said in a news conference on March 24.  Source link Orbem News #affect #Anti-transgenderlegislationin2021:Arecord-breakingyear-CNNPolitics #antitransgender #legislation #minors #Politics #recordbreaking #Year

1 note · View note

dipulb3 · 3 years

Text

This record-breaking year for anti-transgender legislation would affect minors the most

New Post has been published on https://appradab.com/this-record-breaking-year-for-anti-transgender-legislation-would-affect-minors-the-most/

This record-breaking year for anti-transgender legislation would affect minors the most

According to data from the Human Rights Campaign, one of the nation’s largest LGBTQ advocacy groups, at least 117 bills have been introduced in the current legislative session that target the transgender community. It’s the highest number the organization has recorded since it began tracking anti-LGBTQ legislation more than 15 years ago.

Here’s where these bills have been introduced, and the restrictions they seek to impose: 

Thirty-one states have introduced bills that ban transgender athletes from participating in sports consistent with their gender identities. Three states — Arkansas, Mississippi and Tennessee — have already signed these bills into law this year. A similar 2020 law in Idaho was swiftly struck down in federal court.

In many states, lawmakers introducing these bills are supported by conservative legal groups, such as the Alliance Defending Freedom, which reportedly helped craft the Idaho law that was later struck down in court, according to the Idaho Press. The group released a statement praising Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson. The Arkansas bill, named the “Fairness in Women’s Sports Act,” would prevent transgender girls and women from participating in school, intramural or club sports with their same-gender peers.

“I think that these exclusionary responses are a solution in search of a problem,” said Melanie Willingham-Jaggers, interim director of GLSEN, an LGBTQ youth advocacy organization.

“There is no categorical dominance by trans athletes, but we do understand the categorical benefits for young people who play sports,” she told Appradab.

Lawmakers have said these bills are intended to be proactive, and to remove what they claim is an unfair advantage that transgender girls may have over their teammates. But such examples are extremely rare. In March, The Associated Press called two dozen state legislators who sponsored these bans, and found that few could name any cases where the participation of transgender athletes in youth sports had become a source of contention within the teams. 

A version of the ban made its way to South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem’s desk in March, but Noem seemed to surprise both the LGBTQ community and conservative groups by vetoing the bill, calling it “overly broad.” She sent it back to the legislature with changes that, among other things, intended to spare the state from potential economic blowback, but the bill later died in the legislative chambers.

However, days after her veto and amid intense criticism from conservative groups, Noem signed two executive orders on March 29 that would ban transgender girls and women from competing in women’s sports at public high schools and colleges. But that move also prompted criticism from conservatives, who claim the executive orders are unenforceable.

Advocates hope that potential economic and political consequences could deter governors from enacting this year’s wave of legislation. In 2016, North Carolina passed its so-called “bathroom bill,” which meant that people at government-run facilities must use bathrooms and locker rooms that correspond to the sexes on their birth certificates. In practice, the law meant that many transgender and nonbinary people were unable to use restrooms in government buildings and felt unsafe to do so elsewhere in public. The bill’s passage led to public outcry followed by business boycotts, and was repealed the next year.

Bans on gender-affirming health care for minors

Twenty states have introduced bills that prohibit or impede the administration of gender-affirming therapy to minors. One bill recently introduced in Alabama would make it a felony for medical providers to provide transition-related care to transgender minors.

HB 1570, named the “The Arkansas Save Adolescents From Experimentation Act (SAFE),” was originally vetoed by Gov. Asa Hutchinson after passing both chambers of the legislature, but the veto was overridden days later. It’s the first bill in the US to become law that would prohibit health care professionals from administering gender-affirming care. The day the veto was overridden, the ACLU announced that the organization would sue to prevent the bill from being enacted. Currently, the bill is set to go into effect 90 days after the legislature adjourns, though it has not yet set a date for when it will do so.

Although these laws are framed as protecting children — the legislation in Alabama, for example, is called the Vulnerable Child Compassion and Protection Act — trans advocates and researchers believe they will do just the opposite. Pediatric groups have also protested these bills, saying that the treatment they provide to gender nonconforming or transgender youth can often be lifesaving. 

Kerith Conron, research director at the UCLA Law Williams Institute, expressed concern about the implications for the mental health of trans adolescents in these states.

“Trans youth are dependent on parents, schools, institutions and pediatricians to support them, in living authentically and to access gender-affirming care — and now on policy makers to facilitate or deny access to care,” she told Appradab. “It places trans youth in a precarious place.” 

Based on the Williams Institute’s estimates of where trans adolescents live in the United States, Conron said approximately 1 in 4 could be affected by the current active bills if they were to become law.

“These laws are not grounded in science or majority medical opinion and have strong implications for the survival of trans youth in these states …  and for long-term quality of life for those who make it through adolescence,” she added. 

There is a growing body of research that supports access to gender-affirming care in adolescence. A 2020 study by the American Academy of Pediatrics found that access to pubertal suppression treatment was associated with lower odds of long-term and consistent suicidal thoughts among transgender adults, a finding similar to studies done by the Williams Institute, Cornell University and other institutions.

Curriculum bans, ID restrictions and other legislation

Several states have introduced other anti-trans bills that target education, ID restrictions and more.

One Iowa bill requires that parents give written consent for teachers to discuss gender identity while their children are present in the classroom, and another stipulates that any curriculum that includes gender identity must include “the potential harm and adverse outcomes of social and medical gender interventions.” A bill in Arkansas says that educators must refer to students only by their “biological sex,” a disputed term that refers to the sex as listed on students’ original birth certificates. Medical experts say one’s biological sex should not be used to challenge people’s own assertions about their gender identities.

Aiden Cloud, an 18-year-old transgender student in Tennessee, says that restricting exposure to LGBTQ education may further harm the trans community. 

“The students who need to be taught about LGBTQ issues the most are also the students whose parents are going to opt them out of this,” they told Appradab. “The students who really need to be learning these things and unlearning certain biases wouldn’t be able to.” 

Tennessee’s legislature is currently debating HB 529, which would allow parents to opt their children out of curriculums that discuss LGBTQ issues, and HB 800, which would prohibit educators from discussing LGBTQ issues in the classroom.

Arizona, Montana and South Dakota have introduced bills that restrict ID cards and other forms of documentation from reflecting a person’s gender identity. Iowa has introduced a bill that removes gender identity as a protected class under the Iowa civil rights act. 

What’s next for these bills?

While many of these bills have already died in the committee stage, the trans community — and trans youth in particular — may still feel the mental toll of seeing the bills make progress in their states.

“It’s super demoralizing to see these things going through the state and getting passed,” said Cloud, who is also a member of GLSEN’s SHINE team of youth organizers in Tennessee. 

“I’ve read some of [these bills] and it’s so depressing that people still think of me this way in 2021. It’s really demoralizing that people still believe these things and think it’s OK to just go after the LGBTQ community without knowing anything about us.”

These bills are also in opposition to the Biden administration’s position on transgender rights. On March 31, President Joe Biden issued the first-ever federal proclamation of its kind for this year’s International Transgender Day of Visibility. On the same day, the Pentagon issued new policies to allow transgender Americans to serve openly in the military, reversing the Trump administration’s ban. Biden campaigned on prioritizing issues facing LGBTQ youth and has issued several executive actions intended to advance LGBTQ rights.

Advocates say that a strong response at the federal level is needed to counteract these bills, which create a patchwork of legislation across states for the trans community to navigate.

The Equality Act, which was introduced to Congress in February, would amend the 1964 Civil Rights Act to explicitly include gender identity and sexual orientation as protected classes. The bill passed in the House, but its fate in the Senate remains unclear. 

In the meantime, Cathryn Oakley, state legislative director and senior counsel for the Human Rights Campaign, said she hoped that lawmakers realize the potential damage that passing these bills could create. 

“In a year where we’ve been isolated from each other, where children in particular have had a difficult time, isolating them further in this moment is an unconscionable choice,” she said in a news conference on March 24. 

0 notes

blackkudos · 4 years

Text

Bernice King

Bernice Albertine King (born March 28, 1963) is an American minister and the youngest child of civil rights leaders Martin Luther King Jr. and Coretta Scott King. She was five years old when her father was assassinated. In her adolescence, King chose to work towards becoming a minister after having a breakdown from watching a documentary about her father. King was 17 when she was invited to speak at the United Nations. Twenty years after her father was assassinated, she preached her trial sermon. Inspired by her parents' activism, she was arrested multiple times during her early adulthood.

Her mother suffered a stroke in 2005 and, after she died the following year, King delivered the eulogy at her funeral. A turning point in her life, King experienced conflict within her family when her sister Yolanda and brother Dexter supported the sale of the King Center for Nonviolent Social Change. After her sister died in 2007, she delivered the eulogy for her as well. She supported the presidential campaign of Barack Obama in 2008 and called his nomination as part of her father's dream.

King was elected president of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference in 2009. Her elder brother Martin III and her father had previously held the position. She was the first woman elected to the presidency in the organization's history, amidst the SCLC holding two separate conventions. King became upset with the actions of the SCLC, amid feeling that the organization was ignoring her suggestions and declined the presidency in January 2010.

King became CEO of the King Center only months afterward. King's primary focus as CEO of The King Center and in life is to ensure that her father's nonviolent philosophy and methodology (which The King Center calls Nonviolence 365) is integrated in various sects of society, including education, government, business, media, arts and entertainment and sports. King believes that Nonviolence 365 is the answer to society's problems and promotes it being embraced as a way of life. King is also the CEO of First Kingdom Management, a Christian consulting firm based in Atlanta, Georgia.

Early life

Early childhood and tragedies

Bernice Albertine King was born on March 28, 1963, in Atlanta, Georgia. The day after she was born, her father had to leave for Birmingham, Alabama, but he rushed back when it was time for Bernice and her mother, Coretta, to leave the hospital. He drove them home himself but, in what was all too typical with the work he was doing, had to leave them again within hours. Following her birth, Harry Belafonte realized the toll the Civil Rights Movement was taking on her mother's time and energy and offered to pay for a nurse to help Coretta with the Kings' four children. They accepted and hired a person that would help with the children for the next five or six years. Her father died a week after Bernice's fifth birthday.

Once, she and her sister Yolanda thought it would be funny to pour water into their father's ear while he was sleeping. Their father, though, was furious. It was the first and only time he would ever spank them.

Later on, Coretta told Bernice that her father had celebrated her fifth birthday, knowledge that has been special to her since. King said she has only two strong memories of her father, one of him at home with their family and the other of him lying in the casket at his funeral. "I don't let people know this, but I think of my father constantly," King said at age 19. "Even though I knew him so little, he left me so much." When her father was assassinated in Memphis, Tennessee, Bernice was asleep. When she woke up, her mother told her that the next time she saw her father would be at his funeral. In the April 1998 issue of BET Entertainment Weekly, King reflected, "I was five when my father was assassinated, so I had no concept of who my father really was. I have been told, but imagine trying to really understand or put it in its proper perspective at that age. When it finally became clear to me around fifteen or sixteen, I was angry at him because he left me. So I didn't want to have anything to do with my father."

After her husband's death, Coretta Scott King took on the role of raising four children as a single mother. Family friends recall that she spent considerable time with Bernice, who feels that being raised by a single parent has given her special insight into single-parent homes. “I didn’t have a father to deal with about boyfriends. I didn’t have a father to show me how a man and woman relate in a family setting. Therefore I have given over my life to mentoring young people. I’m adamant about young people who have been denied a father/daughter relationship.”

Other tragedies followed. King's uncle, Alfred Daniel Williams King, drowned in a swimming pool when Bernice was six on July 21, 1969. Five years later, a mentally ill man shot her grandmother Alberta Williams King to death during a service at the Ebenezer Baptist Church on June 30, 1974. King recalled of her grandmother's death, "I remember that day because I had recovered from having my tonsils removed, and I was really looking forward to getting back to Ebenezer, which was pastored by my grandfather on my dad's side of the family." Just two years later in 1976, her 20-year-old cousin Darlene King died of a heart attack. Her grandfather Martin Luther King Sr. also died of a heart attack on November 11, 1984. Also her other cousin Alfred King the second in 1986.

Finding strength through these childhood tragedies, King jokingly said, required "A lot of prayer. Some crying. Some screaming." Through all of her struggles, she has looked for someone to relate to in "moments" because "nobody fits the bill." Her sister, Yolanda, nearly eight years older, lived through parts of the Civil Rights Movement that she never did. On the other hand, she has written that she believes her brothers have had a life significantly different from hers because "Guys process things differently."

Call to ministry

Bernice has said that the deaths of her grandmother and uncle caused her to have anger issues since she was 16 years old. At that age, she saw Montgomery to Memphis, a documentary film on her father's life from the time of the Montgomery Bus Boycott of 1955 to his assassination in 1968, and "went through almost two hours of crying" and questioning. She had seen the film many times growing up, but the particular viewing "triggered an emotional explosion that later would thrust her into the arms of a loving God." King reflected: "When I saw the funeral scene, I just broke down. I ran out of the cabin into the woods, and for nearly 2-1/2 hours, I just cried." She credited the viewing with influencing her to become a minister like her father, who served as a minister at Ebenezer Baptist Church.

She was with her church youth group in Georgia mountains. King aspired to become the first female President of the United States at the time of seeing the documentary. Timothy McDonald brought the tape of the documentary and comforted her when she started crying. According to McDonald, he explained to her that it was good that she let out how she felt and called coming to terms with her father's death "a stepping stone upon which you will build the rest of your life”.King attended Douglass High School in Atlanta. Her brother Dexter Scott King attended the school as well and graduated when she was a sophomore. At 17, she was invited to speak at the United Nations in the absence of her mother. According to King, she also received a call to ministry that year.

Adult life

At the age of 19, she made her first major speech in Chicago, and stated that "We've come a long way. But we have a long way to go." In early 1983, King gave a speech at St. Sabina Church in Chicago. Many members of the audience said that she reminded them of her father. King attended Grinnell College in Iowa, and graduated from Spelman College, a historically black college in Atlanta, with a degree in psychology. King says she had thoughts of suicide before "God intervened."

King was arrested with her mother Coretta and her brother Martin Luther King III on June 26, 1985 with the offense of demonstrating in front of an embassy. They were participating in anti-apartheid demonstration in front of the South African Embassy. The three stayed in jail overnight. The youngest daughter of Martin Luther King, his widow and his eldest son were charged with a misdemeanor, demonstrating within 500 feet of an embassy.On January 7, 1986, King was arrested with her sister Yolanda and her brother Martin Luther King III for "disorderly conduct." Bernice and her siblings were arrested by officers deployed to the Winn Dixie supermarket. The supermarket had been subject to protest since September 1985, which was when the Southern Christian Leadership Conference began boycotts of South African canned fruit. It was the first time Bernice and her siblings had been arrested together at a protest. On January 15, 1987, what would have been her father's 58th birthday, King spoke in Chicago and told denizens to stay away from drugs.

On May 14, 1990, King became the second woman to be ordained at Ebenezer Baptist Church. She said that it was "the most humbling moment for me in my life." King insisted that she was "not worthy of this high calling. No blood, no sweat, no tears could earn me this high calling."On January 18, 1992, President George H. W. Bush visited the Martin Luther King, Jr. Center for Nonviolent Social Change. King spoke during his visit of the problems of racism, poverty and violence remained in America since her father was alive, but did not directly align any of the issues with President Bush.

In January 1994, King voiced her opposition to New Hampshire's refusal to recognize Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, calling the decision "racist and separatist." On May 21, 1994, she attended the African-American Women's Conference where she said that parents should not let their children listen to "gangster rap" because of messages in the lyrics.In 1996, King published a collection of her sermons and speeches called Hard Questions, Heart Answers. In 2000, she narrated a performance of Aaron Copland's Lincoln Portrait at the Schleswig-Holstein Musik Festival in Kiel, Schleswig-Holstein, Germany. In January of that year, King joined Fred Shuttlesworth in headlining a two-week campus celebration of her father's life at Stanford University.

King said her mother heard Obama's speech at the 2004 Democratic National Convention and contacted her the following day over the senator's address, expressing her belief in Obama's political future. In June 2006, King told a teenage audience that she intended to do more to carry on the legacy of nonviolence espoused by her parents during the 20th annual 100 Black Men of America conference in Atlanta. "My desire is not to be a hypocrite," King said. "I want to make sure my life is not a contradiction when I take a platform."On January 30, 2007, one year after the death of her mother Coretta, King founded the Be A King Scholarship at Spelman College, her alma mater, in honor of her mother's legacy. On June 10, 2007, King acted as a presenter at the 2007 Atlanta H.U.F. Awards. Afeni Shakur said she was happy to have King and the other presenters "participating" that year.

She was an elder at New Birth Missionary Baptist Church, but resigned in May 2011. King joined the church in 2002 and came to regard Bishop Eddie Long as her mentor and spiritual father. The church was the setting for her mother's funeral. Despite her leaving of the church coinciding with Bishop Eddie Long's settlement agreement in sexual misconduct lawsuits he had fought since September 2010, King said that she had planned to leave New Birth Missionary Baptist Church for weeks. "It has nothing to do with anything that's going on with Bishop Long," King said on May 25, 2011. "I always knew I would not be at New Birth forever. This is the time for me to leave." On May 25, 2011, King told an interviewer that her last time serving as a member of the church was the past Sunday. She has said her decision to leave was because of her desire to continue the legacy of her parents, which had grown stronger since the death of her mother. At the time that she chose to leave the church, she planned on starting her own ministry.

King donated $100,000 of her personal funds, while $75,000 was donated from Home Depot and $15,000 from New Birth Missionary Baptist Church. The scholarship will be awarded to two rising seniors at Spelman College who are majoring in music, education or psychology. On May 4, 2013, a rose was planted for King's mother, Coretta, at the Alabama Capitol. Bernice said that while her mother loved roses, she did not have much time to tend to them because she was continuing her husband Martin Luther King, Jr.'s legacy.

On April 29, 2014, King and her brother Martin Luther King III joined Governor of Georgia Nathan Deal while he signed legislation to provide a statue of their father. “We all know that monuments and statues are that, they’re things we put in place for people to remember and it's not always for our generation,” Bernice King said. “It’s really about the next generation.” On May 31, 2014, King accepted a $50,000 grant from Microsoft during the opening of its store at Perimeter Mall in Atlanta. Also in attendance to the ceremony were Mary Carol Alexander, Georgia Department of Labor Commissioner Mark Butler and Representative Tom Taylor. On June 24, 2014, King's parents were posthumously awarded the Congressional Gold Medal. Bernice King stated in a statement released after the award was announced that the King family was "deeply honored" by her parents "being given this award in recognition of their tireless and sacrificial leadership to advance freedom and justice through nonviolence in our nation". King was the keynote speaker at the Atlantic City Rescue Mission 50th anniversary gala, held on August 14, 2014.

First sermon

At the age of 24, Bernice decided to become a minister, and she earned a Master's degree in Divinity and a juris doctor from Emory University. King is also a member of the State Bar of Georgia. During her college years, King considered a career as a television anchor. In May 1988, King was among the students of Emory charging that the college should hire more African-Americans as teachers and teach the works of African-American theologians in its courses. She said, "Black students on predominately White campuses have been ignored, humiliated, intimidated...and in many instances, eliminated." She said the students and people in general had excused the "insensitivity" of the administration and faculty "for too long." Bernice served as a student chaplain at the Georgia Retardation Center and Georgia Baptist Hospital as part of the requirements for her theology class and interned at the Atlanta City Attorney's office. She is a member of the Alpha Kappa Alpha sorority, as was her mother.

On March 27, 1988, nearly 20 years after her father's assassination, King delivered her first sermon at Ebenezer Baptist Church. The sermon's theme was "You've Got To Rise Above The Crowd." King said her decision to deliver the sermon as "affirming a call I received at 17." She also said, "At some point in our lives, comes the moment of decision. For me, that moment is now. I submit myself totally to the will of God." Andrew Young, who attended the sermon, compared her style to her father's and noted their similarities while calling listening to her speak "a very emotional occasion for me."

Young also said that King becoming a minister "almost makes you believe preaching is hereditary," after her service. By delivering an "acceptable sermon," King was given her license to preach by Joseph Roberts, pastor of Ebenezer who stated, "We rejoice with God, the angels and the archangels that another warrior, a peaceful warrior, is fighting under the spirit of her father, grandfather and uncle." Veteran members of the church said her style was similar to her father's.

King's mother said at the time that she was satisfied with her daughter's decision to become a minister and stated that they had become closer than ever in the months leading up to the sermon. She also said listening to her daughter delivering a sermon with the same fervor and intensity her father had "was a joyous occasion; a real thanksgiving." Also in attendance where all three of her elder siblings, Yolanda, Martin Luther King III and Dexter. King's maternal grandparents were reported by her mother to have also been moved by the speech. Her sermon was delivered the day before her twenty-fifth birthday.

King Center

In 2008, King and her brother, Martin Luther King III, filed suit over the alleged mismanagement of funds from the King Center against their brother Dexter Scott King, who then filed a countersuit against them. Dexter King articulated his distress over Bernice's conservative religious views as departing from their father's legacy. In October 2009 the lawsuits were settled out of court.

In January 2012, King was named CEO of the King Center. On May 19, 2012, King met with Aïssata Issoufou Mahamadou, First Lady of Niger and wife of Mahamadou Issoufou. Mahamadou's visit to the King Center was a priority during her trip to the United States, having been an ardent admirer of King's father and mother. King accepted a plaque bearing crucifix symbols from Mahamadou.

On September 26, 2013, Evelyn G. Lowery died at her home. The King Center released a statement from Bernice King in response to her death, with her saying "I am deeply saddened by the death of Mrs. Evelyn Gibson Lowery, and my heart goes out to her husband, Dr. Joseph E. Lowery and their three daughters, Yvonne Kennedy, Karen Lowery and Cheryl Lowery-Osborne. We are never prepared to say 'goodbye' to a loved one."When Vice President Joe Biden aligned with her in celebrating a "naturalization ceremony" for an estimated hundred immigrants on November 16, 2013, she displayed distaste for the terms "illegal aliens" and "illegals".

On March 28, 2014, in honor of King's 51st birthday, the King Center hosted a girl and women's empowerment event. The organization held a special screening of the documentary "Girls Rising." King herself said the experience was "designed to educate, empower and inspire young women to confront and overcome the obstacles they face in their struggles to fulfill their dreams and impact the global community.”

On August 13, 2014, King addressed the shooting death of Michael Brown and demonstrators reacting in response. She called on demonstrators to channel their responses into constructive nonviolent action, and mentioned witnesses giving conflicting accounts of the shooting. On August 19, King expressed her belief that the community of Ferguson, Missouri was crying out for help after years of neglect. It was reported that a small delegation from the King Center would travel to Ferguson and planned to meet with "every element" of the community.The following day, August 20, King released a statement on Michael Brown's death, sympathizing with his parents. On August 26, King addressed students at the Riverview Gardens High School. King told the students her father's legacy was "on the line" and if “this doesn’t turn out the right way, it could begin to have people question what happened years ago.”

Public speaking

King was the keynote speaker at the Seminole County Prayer Breakfast in February 1998. Geoff Koach, spokesman for Strang Communications, said prior to the breakfast that there was an expectation to see "a lot more people of color there" and another reason for her being chosen to speak was to quell racial tensions in the county. He added: "We felt she could help unify citizens, the various organizations, government and church officials."In June 2006, five months after her mother's death, King made it known to a number of teenagers during the panel discussion at the 20th annual 100 Black Men of America conference in Atlanta that she intended to continue the legacy of nonviolence that had been attributed to her parents. That same year, King and her brother Martin Luther King III expressed interest in creating a civil rights museum near Ebenezer Baptist Church and the King Center, where both of their parents are buried.

On January 20, 2009, she joined her brother Martin Luther King III on CNN's The Situation Room to discuss the inauguration of the 44th President of the United States, Barack Obama.

On April 17, 2009, King delivered an address at Liberty University. LU Chancellor Jerry Falwell, Jr. said that the university had been looking forward to King speaking all year. He said King helped "to bridge the divide that was created between different groups of students during the 2008 election season. For example, she gave a strong Gospel message today. African American Christians and white Christians have been separated into different political camps in the last generation or so but they share many of the same core values, especially when it comes to social issues like abortion, marriage and school vouchers." King said the university was a place for "kings-in-training." She told Liberty University students they were "very blessed and highly favored to be at an institution such as this." She called for students to accept “your identity. You’re a king. Don’t ever see yourself as a subject."

On July 7, 2009, King spoke alongside her brother Martin at the Staples Center in Los Angeles at a ceremony commemorating the life of Michael Jackson.

On October 16, 2011, King mentioned at the Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial opening that the memorial had been in the making for a lengthy amount of time and a "priority" for her mother. She and her brother Martin supported Occupy Wall Street protests. On January 13, 2012, King was the keynote speaker at the 24th Annual Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Awards Dinner. On March 29, 2012, a month after the shooting death of teenager Trayvon Martin, King released a statement through the King Center. In her remarks, she referred back to the deaths of her father and paternal grandmother, who like Trayvon Martin, were killed by firearms. She concluded her statement by saying we "are still on the journey to the Mountaintop. Join me on the journey as we pray for Trayvon's family, the community of Sanford and all who are in danger of being victims of violence."

She made a public statement with regard to the State of Florida v. George Zimmerman verdict on July 15, 2013 via a CNN appearance with Wolf Blitzer. She clarified a tweet she had posted on Twitter, and explained that the handling of the verdict would "determine how much progress we've made". She spoke at a town hall meeting dedicated to Trayvon Martin and has admitted to having been "heartbroken" by the verdict. She said Trayvon Martin's death and Zimmerman's acquittal were a wake-up call for Americans.

On August 28, 2013, the fiftieth anniversary of the March on Washington, in which her father took part, King spoke and related that the denizens of the United States were "still bound by a cycle of civil unrest and inherit social biases, in our nation and the world, that often times degenerates into violence and destruction". Despite this, she admitted to being pleased to see many young people and women at the event, noting that was not the case during the March on Washington itself. King alluded to the death of teenager Trayvon Martin in February 2012 and said "If freedom stops ringing, then the sound will disappear and the atmosphere will be charged with something else. Fifty years later, we come once again to this special landing on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial to reflect, to renew and to rejuvenate for the continued struggle of freedom and justice."

She spoke at the Boys & Girls Clubs of Northeast Florida fundraiser on October 29, 2013, where she encouraged involvement in the lives of children. King addressed the death of Nelson Mandela on December 5, 2013. On January 20, 2014, the year's Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, King spoke at Ebenezer Baptist Church. King said there was "much work that we must do" and asked if we are "afraid, or are we truly committed to the work that must be done?"

On March 19, 2014, King gave a speech at Seminole State College of Florida as part of the school's Speaker Series. It focused on the 50th anniversary of the March on Washington and the Civil Rights Act of 1964. After her address, King was presented with a key to the city by Sanford Vice Mayor Velma Williams. King spoke at Fontbonne University on September 17, 2014. She was joined by members of the King Center staff, who aided her in urging the community to not act out with violence.

March against same-sex marriage

On December 11, 2004, King participated in a march against same-sex marriage in Atlanta. This action was in contrast to the advocacy of her mother, Coretta, and her older sister Yolanda, both longtime, outspoken supporters of gay rights. She was joined by senior pastor at New Birth Missionary Baptist Church Eddie Long, who said in a written statement that the march was not "to protest same-sex marriage, but to present a unified version of righteousness and justice." At the time of the march, King said she had become a "spiritual daughter" of Eddie Long and the issue of same-sex marriage legalization had left many divided. "The question is, how do you overcome that pain?" she said. "It may be the wedge that stays with us for a long time. We have to get to a place where it does not become the most defining issue of our time."

She incorporated the King Center and the eternal flame at her father's tomb into the march. The King Center denied her permission to begin the march at her father's tomb and accused her of doing so to "provide support for her own personal cause" and "to enhance her personal standing in New Birth." The event was also criticized by gay rights organizations, which stated it betrayed the legacy of her father. Chuck Bowen, a spokesman for Georgia Equality, stated that he was surprised to learn of the march. "I think it's very sad," Bowen said. "I think she's abusing the good name of Dr. King and the work he did creating equality for all Americans."

Deaths of mother and sister and King Center sale

King's mother, Coretta Scott King, had a stroke in August 2005. She died on January 30, 2006. King delivered the eulogy at her funeral. King called her mother's death a "major turning point." She felt that her mother's death was a "rebirth" for her, "in terms of understanding that I come from roots of greatness and I am called to greatness and there's nothing I can do but try to be my best self." On October 24, 2005, Rosa Parks died of natural causes. Her funeral took place on November 2, 2005. Bernice King attended the funeral and delivered remarks on behalf of her mother. Bernice was the only one of the four King children to be with Coretta Scott King when she died and learned that her mother's remains could not be transported back to Georgia, since Mexican authorities required an autopsy first.

In the months between her stroke and death, Bernice and her brother Martin Luther King III vowed to fight the sale of the King Center to the National Park Service. The siblings were put against their brother Dexter and sister Yolanda, who supported and voted in favor of the sale in early December 2005. On December 30, 2005, King and her brother Martin stated that their priority was to preserve their "father's legacy and their mother's dream." Bernice stated of her mother's opinion on the sale that "She felt at some point that it may, in fact, end up with the government, but she never envisioned that in her lifetime." Andrew Young said transferring power would allow the family to focus more on Martin Luther King's message of nonviolence and less on maintaining the grounds. Bernice King said government ownership, which would befall the King Center if it were sold to the National Park Service, would result in "a loss of ideological independence." Martin Luther King III stated that Bernice had been removed as secretary and that he had been replaced as chairman by their brother Dexter.

16 months later, on May 15, 2007, King's sister Yolanda King died after collapsing and was unable to be revived. King delivered the eulogy at her sister's memorial on May 24, 2007. During Yolanda King's eulogy, King admitted that her death was even more difficult than her mother's and said her sister often addressed her as her "one and only sister." She added, "It's very difficult standing here blessed as her one and only sister. Yolanda, from your one and only, I thank you for being a sister and for being a friend." She joined her brothers in lighting candles in their sister's memory.

Southern Christian Leadership Conference

With her brother Martin Luther King III, she has played an active part in reforming the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) once led by her father. When she was elected President and CEO of SCLC on October 30, 2009, a position previously held by both her father and brother, she became the first woman to lead the group, but discord in the organization has prevented her taking that position. King's election was won by a 23-to-15 vote, allowing her to defeat Arkansas judge, Wendell Griffen. Specialists said King would need to move beyond her family history when she took the position the following year. Andra Gillespie, a professor at Emory University in Atlanta, said King could hark back to her father's legacy, but that she was going to have to "redefine" it. Gillespie also stated that King would have to "figure out a way to push that legacy forward so we don't perpetuate a stagnant, chauvinistic civil rights agenda."

Despite her excitement being "high", King noticed the SCLC's board of directors had started "ignoring" suggestions she made to "revitalize" the organization. King said that she had made suggestions to the SCLC about how the presidency might operate in October 2010, but was not contacted formally until January, three months later. She stated that she felt "disrespect" by the three months in between her suggestions to the organization and their response. Despite this, she said that she would continue to "pray for them to move in a positive direction". On October 1, 2010, she led a prayer to an audience of around 200 people that had come to pray for healing and reconciliation of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. Through prayer, King said, they would "seek to destroy the work of the enemy." King called the SCLC preparing to hold two separate conventions "an unfortunate turn of events." In January 2011, three months after making the plea, she declined to be SCLC's president. While in Birmingham, Alabama on August 11, 2014 for the national convention of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, King endorsed having the 2016 Democratic National Convention be held in Birmingham, reasoning the "golden anniversary of civil rights events throughout the south and Birmingham in particular offers added significance" to it being held there.

Legal issues

King and her brother Martin Luther King III accused their brother Dexter of having disengaged them from decisions and shareholder meetings. They alleged that their brother had done this since 2004. On October 12, 2009, the dispute was settled out of court. The King siblings spent the entire day of October 12 locked away. The purpose of the lockdown was for the three to settle on a deal. Following the completing of their meeting, Bernice and her brother Martin said outside the Fulton County Courthouse that the results of the settlement seemed positive.

Book deal

Bernice King and Martin also opposed the giving up of photographs, personal letters and papers of their mother to a biographer. Their brother Dexter asked a judge to force them to comply. The biographer, Ms. Reynolds, met Coretta Scott King in 1972 and said that the widow had asked for her to write a follow up to her 1969 memoir. King and her brother's lawyer stated that their mother had changed her mind about the biography citing Mrs. King's apparent disapproval of Reynolds's writing style. A judge ordered the Kings to appear in court on October 14, 2008. David J. Garrow, biographer of King's father, said that it was "sad and pathetic to see the three of them behaving in this self-destructive way.”

By September 2009, the book deal was defunct and a judge ordered the three siblings to have a meeting. On September 14, King and her brother Martin sat through court motions, testimony and proceedings for more than 13 hours. In a separate hearing, Dexter Scott King's attorney Lin Wood argued that Bernice King willingly ignored a court order. He reasoned this because Bernice did not reveal the contents of the safe deposit box.

Wood also said King's brother Martin and one of Bernice's lawyers, who was no longer on the case, was aware of the letters and refused to reveal them. Bernice's attorney Charles Mathis said she "did not conceal anything" and said "She thought she was doing what she was supposed to do when she told her first lawyer. There was not an intentional failure to disclose."

The next day, Dexter Scott King's lawyers contended that Bernice was legally compelled to turn the letters over to Dexter, but ignored the order. Dexter's attorney Wood said "Regardless of what your last name is, if you have willfully withheld then you must suffer the consequences." Wood noted that Bernice denied the existence of the safety deposit box several times while under oath, which she said she found after the death of her sister Yolanda, who once owned it.

Mishandling of memorabilia

On August 28, 2013, the fiftieth anniversary of the March on Washington, the King estate filed a lawsuit against the King Center alleging that it had been careless with its handling of Martin Luther King, Jr. memorabilia. The lawsuit also claimed that attempts to resolve the issue with King Center CEO Bernice King have failed and that there had been a "total breakdown in communication and transparency." The King estate sent a 30-day notice to the Center in August 10, 2013. It notified the center that the licensing agreement for the King memorabilia was being terminated and that the center could avoid this by placing Bernice King on administrative leave and pulling Andrew Young and Alveda King from the board. According to the estate, Alveda King tried to "impede" the audit.The estate sought a court order barring the center from using the memorabilia after the license expired.

Bernice King announced in a statement on January 22, 2015 that the estate of her father, run by her brothers, had voluntarily dropped the lawsuit. She said the King Center's positions on its legal rights were vindicated by the estate's dropping of the lawsuit and that the action was a sign that the siblings' feud was on the road to reconciliation.

Belafonte documents

Harry Belafonte filed a lawsuit in October 2013, where he asked to be declared the owner of three documents given to him by the Kings and for their daughter Bernice King to be barred permanently from trying to claim ownership. The documents are Martin Luther King, Jr.'s "Casualties of the War in Vietnam", which Belafonte stated he had been in possession of since 1967, the undelivered "Memphis Speech" found in Martin Luther King's pocket after his assassination and a letter of condolence sent by President Lyndon B. Johnson to the then-newly widowed Coretta Scott King. The King estate and Bernice King disputed Belafonte's ownership of the documents when in 2008, he took the items to Sotheby's auction house in New York to be appraised and put up for sale. On April 11, 2014, Belafonte and the King estate said in a joint statement that a confidential compromise "resulted in Mr. Belafonte retaining possession of the documents."

Bible and Nobel Peace Prize family dispute

King's brothers Martin Luther King III and Dexter Scott King are interested in selling their father's Nobel Peace Prize and his Bible, which was later used by Barack Obama during his second presidential inauguration in 2013. Her brothers filed a lawsuit against her, complaining that she had "secreted and sequestered" the two items of interest in violation of a 1995 agreement that gives the brothers sole control of all of their father's property. King said in her defense, "I take this strong position for my father because Daddy is not here to say himself my Bible and medals are never to be sold."

Martin Luther King III was reported to have sent her, on January 20, 2014, the year's Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, a letter requesting a meeting to "discuss and vote on whether to offer for purchase at a private sale the Nobel Peace Prize and the King Bible.” On January 22, 2014, Dexter Scott and Martin Luther King III voted as board members of the King estate to pursue the sale of their father's award and Bible. The items had been in Bernice's care since the death of their mother, Coretta Scott King, in 2006. Bernice's position had support by members of the civil rights community, including C. T. Vivian, Andrew Young, and Joseph Lowery. King's cousin, Alveda King, was also supportive of Bernice. She said, "I am standing with her because I do believe we can't have a sale to the highest bidder with those family heirlooms."

On February 4, 2014, Bernice King stated that she would protest the sale of her father's Bible and Nobel Peace Prize and as a result, oppose her brothers. She said profiting from the Nobel Peace Prize's sale would be "spiritually violent" and "outright morally reprehensible." On February 6, 2014, King asked in a press conference in Ebenezer Baptist Church for the media to “refrain from grouping me with my brothers.” On February 19, 2014, a judge ordered her to give up the items, and had them kept temporarily in a safe deposit box under the name of the King estate. The judge will remain in possession of the key until the matter is settled.

The judge compared King's stance against the sale of her father's Bible and Nobel Peace Prize to Coca-Cola not wanting to sell its recipe, and later noted that he was not trying to trivialize the value of Martin Luther King, Jr.'s possessions by making the comparison. While King said that people had urged her to retain the Bible and Nobel Peace Prize and go to prison instead, she complied with the judge's order. On March 6, 2014, she asked her brothers to hold another vote and said she hoped one of them would change his mind. Despite facing an estrangement from her brothers, she hoped that she would be able to reconcile with them on the matter and said she is open to an out-of-court settlement. She appealed to anyone who would consider purchasing the bible and Nobel Peace Prize should they be put on sale to take the moral high road by leaving the "sacred in its sacred state." While she was given a deadline of turning them over by March 3, it was extended another five days, according to one of Bernice's lawyers.

King said that she would never support her brothers in selling the Nobel Peace Prize and Bible. She said that if her father was alive, he would say, "my Bible and my medal are never to be sold, not to an institution or even a person.” On March 10, 2014, King turned over the Nobel Peace Prize and Bible to Martin Luther King III for placement in a safety deposit box in a meeting that lasted five minutes. A lawyer involved in the dispute said few words were exchanged while Bernice surrendered the items. Eric Barnum, an attorney of Bernice King, said that his client "complied with the court order."

On March 14, 2014, Ron Gaither, one of Bernice King's lawyers, argued that William Hill, lawyer of Martin Luther King III and Dexter King, should not have any role in the case because of his involvement in the 2008 dispute between the King children. A judge appointed Hill as Special Master in 2008. Lawyers of Bernice King in a court hearing said that "Hill played a vital and substantial role in adjudicating a multitude of disputes that arose between the parties." The lawyers argued that this gave Hill an advantage while putting Bernice at a disadvantage. Hill's defense of himself was that he only had access to documents related to Coretta Scott King's estate and that Bernice King's lawyers were using a stalling tactic by trying to disqualify him. Fulton County Superior Court Judge Robert McBurney stated that he would soon issue a ruling on whether Hill would be disqualified.

McBurney granted Bernice King's lawyers request and disqualified Hill. A full hearing is scheduled to take place in late September.

Honors and awards

On December 14, 2007, at the State Bar of Georgia Headquarters, King was honored by the Georgia Alliance of African American Attorneys with the "Commitment to Community" award for her work as an attorney and community leader.

On October 7, 2009, King received an award for her "lifetime of service to women and other causes" at the National Coalition of 100 Black Women Convention.

On November 7, 2013, as part of the "Celebrating the Dream”, in commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the I Have a Dream speech done by her father, King received the Legend Award as a tribute to his legacy and after she delivered a speech.

Ebony magazine named her one of their Ten of Tomorrow future leaders of the black community.

Views

Gay rights

In 2005, she led a march to her father's gravesite and at the same time called out for a constitutional ban on gay marriage. She once said to LGBT supporters that her father did not take a bullet for same-sex marriage.

During Atlanta's 2012 Martin Luther King Jr. Day rally, King included LGBT people among the various groups who needed to come together to "fulfill her father’s legacy." When speaking at Brown University in 2013, King made statements regarding her beliefs about the origins of marriage: "I believe that the family was created and ordained first and foremost by God, that he instituted the marriage, and that's a law that he instituted and not... that we instituted" and about the origins of same-sex attraction: "I also don't believe everybody's born that way. I know some people have been violated. I know some people have unfortunately delved into it as an experiment". King has publicly stated that her father would have been against gay marriage.

However, by 2015, it appeared she had changed, as she issued a press release as CEO of the King Center supporting the Supreme Court's Same-Sex Marriage ruling.

Abortion

King is opposed to abortion. She believes that life begins and should be protected by law at conception. On August 22, 2013, King expressed her belief that "life begins in a woman’s womb.”

#03/28

9 notes · View notes

southeastasianists · 7 years

Link

The warning signs were all there. But Maria Ressa says “I never saw it coming.”

The founder and driving force behind the Philippines news organisation Rappler admits to surprise when President Rodrigo Duterte effectively declared war on her journalists and heralded with it the biggest threat to freedom of the press the country has seen in decades.

Rappler has only been in existence since 2012, beginning as an online news start-up with 12 reporters, established by Ressa, a former CNN Bureau chief. But over the past two months this small yet bullish group has been at the forefront of a battle against eroding press freedom in the Philippines. Duterte’s spokesperson - in language eerily evocative of Donald Trump’s White House - declared that “not only is Rappler’s news fake, it being Filipino is also fake.”

Philippines launches inquiry into formula milk firms targeting poor Read more

It is an assault which began in January when their license was revoked and has quickly intensified as the year has gone on, with Rappler’s political correspondent barred from the Presidential palace for briefings. Then, last week, the government announced they were investigating Rappler for evading $2.5m of tax – a complaint Ressa called “ludicrous”.

Ressa is now in a highly politicised David and Goliath fight for the survival of Rappler, which has reached the Supreme Court.

“We’re ready to fight it,” she said defiantly. “The end goal is to keep reporting, as long as we’re a democracy, and this, as far as I know, is still a democracy. And in a funny way it’s a backhanded compliment that the president sees us, a small start-up, as a threat.”

It was during Duterte’s second State of the Union speech in July that Ressa was first surprised to hear the President declare that Rappler was “fully owned” by Americans, and therefore in violation of the constitution. “It’s a ridiculous claim,” said Ressa, shaking her head. “We are owned 100% by Filipinos, the documents prove it.”

It followed months of critical reporting by Rappler on Duterte’s increasingly bloody and brutal war on drugs and government sanctioned extrajudicial killings, which has taken an estimated 8,000 lives. The ICC are now looking into evidence that Duterte committed crimes against humanity.

Duterte, angered by the coverage, decided to boycott, and then go after traditional media, determined to control the narrative. First of all he targeted the country’s biggest newspaper, the Philippine Inquirer, which had started a “kill list” documenting those who died in the drug war. Then he went after the biggest television station ABS-CBN, threatening not to renew their franchise. Finally, his attentions turned to Rappler.

In August 2016, the Securities and Exchange commission demanded document after document from Rappler, first to prove their Filipino ownership, and then for other unknown reasons. “It was clearly a fishing expedition,” said Ressa. “It was case of being guilty until proven innocent. There was never any formal charge given.”

In January, the government announced they had revoked Rappler’s licence. But while other news organisations kept their battle with the government quiet, Rappler did not. Ressa held an instant press conference outside their Manila offices, denouncing the attack on press freedom to the world.

“I’m banking on the fact that there are still good people in government who will prevent this. I’ve been a journalist for more than 33 years, and at Rappler we refuse to change, I refuse to be bullied,” she said.

The case is now in the Court of Appeals, which has often been known to take over a decade to come to a decision. Duterte also has an authoritarian grip on the legislature, with the power to appoint his own choice of Supreme Court justices.

Rappler’s battles also exist in the digital world. It was in August 2016, following Duterte’s denouncement of the site, that Ressa first noticed that the social media campaign machine which had helped get him elected had “transformed and became weaponised.”

“The first targets were journalists,” said Ressa. “Any journalist who asked critical questions, anyone on social media who questioned about the extrajudicial killings was bombarded with abuse, threats of violence death threats from trolls and bots and these fake Facebook accounts. We had endless rape threats, death threats, very misogynistic attacks on women. The end goal of that was to batter hate, to use hate to silence any dissent or critical questions.”

It has been unrelenting ever since and as a result Ressa put in place extra security for her reporters and offered counselling. At one point Ressa found herself getting 90 death threats an hour though social media.

The hand of Duterte in this is not known and hard to prove. When Ressa asked the president in December 2016 whether he was aware of the vicious army of trolls championing his agenda online “he just said ‘you know that I’m not online’. And he might not know but it’s plausible deniability - it’s how you use terrorist tactics,” said Ressa.

The battering has taken its toll. “I used to be a war zone correspondent and I can tell you it’s easier than what we’ve been up against these two years - at least with conflict reporting you know your enemy and you know where it’s coming from. Right now we have no idea when we’re getting these exponential attacks,” Ressa said.

For many campaigners, the survival of Rappler has become inseparable from the survival of press freedom – and democracy itself – in the Philippines. While Ressa believes that the country is going through a “transformation that we need to keep a close watch on”, she said that Duterte had not rung the death knell for democracy in the Philippines just yet.

“I came of age in 1986 and I watched the people power evolve and watched the pendulum swing as every authoritarian, one man rule in southeast Asia gradually transformed to democracies,” said Ressa. “I would hate, as I end my career, to watch the pendulum swing right back.”

#Southeast Asia #Philippines #Rodrigo Duterte #Press Freedom #Media #Democracy #Politics

78 notes · View notes

sleemo · 7 years

Photo

TIME Magazine: A Star of His Own Making

In person, John Boyega carries himself with an assuredness that could be mistaken for self-importance. He’s one of those actors who look as tall and sturdy in real life as they do onscreen. He fills whatever room he happens to be in with inviting, boisterous chatter, thanks, no doubt, to years of voice training on the English stage. And he’s dead certain he’s going to be a big, big movie star.

I first meet Boyega in a cramped hallway at ABC Studios in Manhattan in July. We barely manage a hurried handshake as he proceeds in Aaron Sorkin–like strides toward a nearby stage. His publicist and his sister—who also acts as his assistant and is Googling where they can find British pub food in New York—are drafting in his wake. I watch off set as Boyega sits down with the hosts of Live With Kelly and Ryan, his first of three interviews for the day. Each sit-down requires the same thing of the 25-year-old Brit: promoting his latest film, Kathryn Bigelow’s Detroit, about the city’s 1967 riots, and expounding on the state of race relations in neat, 30-second sound bites. Naturally, interviewers also want to ask about his other new movie, Star Wars: The Last Jedi, coming out in December.

If the challenge of figuring out how to discuss Black Lives Matter and lightsabers in the same breath weighs on him, Boyega doesn’t show it. “I see what I do in part as creating change through art,” he tells me. “Sometimes that responsibility can feel like a burden, but it’s not. It pushes you to find your purpose in the world.”

Most people know Boyega as Finn, the Stormtrooper who defects to the Rebels and helps an aspiring Jedi (Daisy Ridley) in 2015’s Star Wars: The Force Awakens. Boyega is confident that he can sidestep the quagmire of franchise fame that has kept some actors from ever eclipsing their first blockbuster roles. So when I finally sit down with him for lunch, I begin by asking if he’d rather follow the Denzel Washington/Harrison Ford path to stardom—bringing the same charming swagger to every role—or if he’d prefer to go the Judi Dench/Idris Elba route of disappearing into parts. He grins at me and says, “I think to be a real star, you have to do both. I’m going to do both.”

Which might seem presumptuous if Boyega hadn’t been consistently checking off items on his superstardom to-do list. Since his breakout role two years ago, he has produced and starred in another franchise film, the upcoming Pacific Rim: Uprising (become a producer: check), played opposite Tom Hanks in the poorly reviewed The Circle (inevitable flop: check), returned to London to play a soldier with PTSD at the Old Vic (reaffirm acting chops onstage: check) and, with Detroit, become the face of an Academy Award winner’s latest gritty film (make an Oscar bid: check). And he’s working on writing and producing his own movies in hopes of leading a generation of artists who bring more diverse stories to the screen.

So, yes, John Boyega will be a big, big movie star. And he plans to get there his own way.

Boyega, the son of Nigerian parents, grew up in the working-class South London neighborhood of Peckham and began enrolling in youth theater programs when he was 9. As a teen, he was cast in a movie filming near his neighborhood, Attack the Block. The comedic horror film centers on a gang of teenagers who must defend their public-housing project from an extraterrestrial invasion. Soon after it premiered, Boyega began trying to land American movie roles, culminating in a series of grueling, secret Star Wars auditions for director J.J. Abrams, who had been a fan of his first film.

The day he found out he got the part, Boyega says, he went home to tell his parents. He bowed to them in a traditional Nigerian sign of respect to show his gratitude for the sacrifices they had made. His parents—his mother works with the disabled, while his father is a Pentecostal preacher—immigrated to England before Boyega was born. “I grew up with my dad telling me that you’re currently around church people, but soon you’re going to be in a world where people don’t believe the same things you believe in. People are going to laugh at the stuff you believe or are going to treat you a certain way,” Boyega recalls. “And just to try as much as you can to be loving to all people.”

Boyega’s casting in Star Wars put that advice to the test. The beginning of the film’s first trailer, released in 2014, showed the actor in Stormtrooper garb minus the helmet. Within minutes, he was deluged with messages on Twitter objecting to the idea of a black man at the center of a Star Wars saga. And Boyega continues to endure occasional harassment on social media. “It’s blatant racism,” he says. “I embrace all people, but I do not embrace racists. I despise racists. Do they know how dumb it is to waste brain cells on taking issue with the amount of melanin in someone’s skin?” He argues that everyone just wants to see themselves represented onscreen and that it’s time for more diverse heroes at the movies.

He pauses and then tells me, “I really want you to include this: 99% of the response was positive. Good doesn’t get credit sometimes because it’s overshadowed by the bad. People tried to boycott the movie, and we made something like a billion dollars in 12 days. That represents every person who bought a ticket. So much for your boycott.”

Disney is hoping the next Star Wars, subtitled The Last Jedi, will draw an even bigger audience when it premieres on Dec. 15. Boyega’s innocent Finn offered much of the comic relief in The Force Awakens, but the actor says the movie and his character’s story get much darker in the sequel. Finn wakes from a coma and is paired off with a new character, Rose (Kelly Marie Tran), as they embark on a dangerous mission with the droid BB-8 in tow. Rose, a lowly engineer who yearns to fight for the Resistance, believes that Finn is a war hero. “Finn’s not so sure that he’s a hero or that he really even believes in the Resistance or anything at all,” says Boyega. “So he’s off with Rose, who is a true believer, and he has to figure out whose side he’s on and navigate these conflicting emotions.”

Finn’s onscreen banter—with Rey, with Han Solo, even with BB-8—made the character a fan favorite. As a result, Boyega says he found himself with an unexpected platform. He’s used it to defend his fellow actors and challenge the entertainment industry. He spoke for Ridley when she left Instagram after an anti-gun-violence post resulted in harassment. He called out HBO’s Game of Thrones for its lack of diversity. And he defended Get Out star Daniel Kaluuya, whom he knows from the London theater circuit, when Samuel L. Jackson said an African-American actor, rather than a black English actor, should have played the lead role in the movie about American racism. “It just makes no sense for Brits and Americans to fight with each other like that,” says Boyega. “When you’re black and in a position of influence, you have a responsibility to speak out. When you’re an actor, you have a responsibility to speak out through your work.”

Detroit is an example of the latter. It is an affecting, if complicated, film. Bigelow filmed it as if she were running with a camera through a war zone. But unlike her other recent movies (The Hurt Locker, Zero Dark Thirty), the battleground is a Midwestern metropolis. Boyega plays a security guard who tries to act as a liaison between white cops and black civilians amid unfolding violence at the Algiers Motel. His attempts to protect the innocent eventually make him a scapegoat for the police. “It was an even bigger opportunity than Star Wars to show what I can do,” he says. “You don’t want people going to a movie as serious as this and saying, ‘Hey, why is Finn being interrogated by the police?’”

Boyega’s performance has put him in the conversation for an Oscar. That’s a particularly important item on the superstar checklist and requires a rigorous press tour. If you ask Boyega who his role models are on that score, he’ll talk about his Star Wars co-star Ford. But when it comes to influences, Boyega is more likely to cite his peers. He brings up Issa Rae, the creator and star of HBO’s Insecure. “That’s something I hope to achieve someday, to write and develop my own original project,” he says, adding that he has always written but didn’t really understand how to tackle a screenplay until Spike Lee gave him a copy of his Do the Right Thing script, which included notes scrawled in the margins.

Boyega says he’s excited that several actors he knew from the London theater world are beginning to break into Hollywood too: Malachi Kirby was Kunta Kinte in the recent Roots remake for History, and Letitia Wright will play a warrior in the 2018 Marvel superhero movie Black Panther. “It kind of reminds me of that picture of Tupac and Jada Pinkett in high school. Everybody’s gone off now to have their moments,” says Boyega. “I think our generation, we don’t want to wait around only to be given the same stereotyped roles again and again. We want to decide our own fate.”

#interview #cast #john boyega #time magazine #finn #star wars #detroit #pacific rim

190 notes · View notes