Category Archives: Government Oppression

by Nabaa Muhammad and Michael Z. Muhammad

Political prisoners in American prisons have been the source of debate for many years. And while the United States has denied their existence, Blacks, Native Americans and others who questioned, organized and fought the evils, genocide and bloody, deadly repression meted out by the government have found themselves locked away.

Today many of the freedom fighters from the days of the Black Power, civil rights movement and American Indian rights movements remain imprisoned, sick, some dying and the U.S. government refuses to release them.

The existence of political prisoners in the United States goes to the very heart of the racist nature of this society. To not deal with the issue of political prisoners in the U.S. is to not deal with the true nature of America, Dhoruba Bin Wahad, a former Black Panther, Black Liberation Army co-founder, and political prisoner targeted in New York and jailed for 19 years, once observed.

An Aug. 19 online discussion focused on the experiences and realities of current and former political prisoners while discussing a tribunal planned for October to again highlight their plight and increase organizing efforts around their cases.

The tribunal planned for New York is part of continued grassroots work underway to free political prisoners and continue the struggle against American imperialism, colonialism, racism, and war, according to Black Voices For Peace, which hosted the online discussion.

Veteran freedom fighter and former political prisoner Jalil Muntaqim, now 69 years old, talked at length about the 2021 International Tribunal On Human Rights Violations & U.S. Held Political Prisoners planned for October and spearheaded by the Jericho Movement, an organization devoted to obtaining freedom for U.S. political prisoners and exposing their existence.

This initiative appeals to the international community, including the International Commission of Jurists, to call for special hearings within the United Nations to review the cases of political prisoners and genocide, Mr. Muntaqim said. He first thought of the need for such a tribunal while locked in solitary confinement. He served 49 years in prison after conviction in the killing of two New York police officers. He was released in 2020 during the coronavirus pandemic. He was a member of the Black Panther Party and the Black Liberation Army. He stayed politically active during his incarceration.

The enemy has an outpost in our minds. In many ways, we are duplicitous with Americas violent history because of our silence. This tribunal will celebrate the 70th anniversary of the call by William Patterson and Paul Robeson of genocide against the United States, Mr. Muntaqim added.

According to the Jericho Movement, among political prisoners on lockdown today is Ruchell Magee, who was denied parole again in June. He is the longest-held political prisoner in the United States and the world, serving time in California prison system for over 57 years. He is 81 years old.

He has served time related to the 1970 Soledad Brothers case and the attempt of 17-year-old Jonathan Jackson to free his brother George Jackson and others who were on trial and accused of killing a prison guard. Mr. Magee was also freed but San Quentin prison guards eventually shot three of the accused and critically wounded Mr. Magee survived. He was later convicted of simple kidnapping.

People have committed horrendous crimes and gotten much less time than Ruchell. Mention that Ruchell was very young when he was arrested and he should be able to enjoy the rest of his life outside of captivity. Add that we as taxpayers pay to keep this elderly man incarcerated instead of in his community, where he could make a positive contribution toward community development, said the Jericho Movement in an appeal for his release.

Others include Dr. Mutulu Shakur, who was sentenced to 60 years in prison and targeted by the FBIs now-infamous Counter-Intelligence Program as early as 1968. Dr. Shakur has served over 30 years in prison, and is currently suffering from multiple myeloma (advanced bone marrow cancer). He has been denied parole nine times and was recently denied a compassionate release, said the Jericho Movement. His family and friends are mounting a campaign to petition President Biden to grant clemency in the case.

Russell Maroon Shoatz, a 77-year-old political prisoner, is suffering from stage 4 cancer, said the Jericho Movement. His is another political activist jailed for his role in the Black liberation struggle say those who want him released.

Among political prisoners listed today by the Jericho Movement are Abdul Aziz, Haki Malik Abdullah (formerly Michael Green), Sundiata Acoli (formerly Clark Squire), Imam Jamil Al-Amin (formerly H. Rap Brown of the Black Panther Party and Student Non-violent Coordinating Committee), Joseph Bowen, Veronza Bowers, Kojo Grailing Brown, Muhammad Fred Burton, Byron Shane Chubbock, Bill Dunne, David Gilbert, Hanif Shabazz Bey, Alvaro Luna Hernandez, Kamau Sadiki, Larry Hoover, Abdullah Malik Kabah (formerly Jeff Fort), Maumin Khabir, Eric King, Malik Smith, Marius Mason, Leonard Peltier, Ed Poindexter, Rev. Joy Powell, Jessica Resnicek, and Mutulu Shakir. Not to be forgotten are those who fled America and remain in exile like Assata Shakur in Cuba.

There are hundreds of people who went to prison as a result of their work on the streets against oppressive conditions like indecent housing and inadequate or complete lack of medical care, lack of quality education, police brutality and the murder of people organizing for independence and liberation, the Jericho Movement noted. These people belonged to organizations like the Black Panther Party, La Raza Unida, FALN, Los Macheteros, North American Anti-Imperialist Movement, May 19th, AIM, the Black Liberation Army, etc., and were incarcerated because of their political beliefs and acts in support of and/or in defense of freedom.

A young vanguard of Black freedom fighters spoke during the From Black August to Black Liberation Commemorating the Struggle of Political Prisoners webinar convened by the Black Alliance for Peace.

The virtual event was hosted by Nnamdi Lumumba of the alliance.

Longtime activist Makungu Akinyela and a founding member of the New Afrikan Peoples Organization said over the years he realized everybody wasnt going to always be professional revolutionaries. So in 1990, we established the Malcolm X Grassroots Movement with the idea that the masses of our people needed a platform that they could organize under. That they could organize around principles of self-determination, human rights, fighting against genocide, fighting for the freedom of all of our people, regardless of gender, sexuality, or sexual identity fighting against sexist oppression.

And then, of course, we saw it as important to support our political prisoners, he said.

Black August is a month-long commemoration and prison-based holiday to remember Black freedom fighters and political prisoners and highlight Black resistance against racial oppression. It began to be popularized through hip hop concerts among young people.

A central element of Black August is to call attention to our freedom fighters still held captive as political prisoners and Prisoners of War. Some have moved into their fifth decade shackled as the longest serving political prisoners on the face of the Earth, observed the Black Alliance for Peace.

We believe Black August is about uniting the masses of our people with the idea that there are political prisoners. They are prisoners of war, brothers, and sisters who were willing to take up arms in self-defense of our peoples struggle, and they deserve to be supported and not run away from, said Mr. Akinyela.

A young voice on the scene is Philadelphia-based activist, scholar, and educator Krystal Strong, an assistant professor at the University of Pennsylvania. She detailed the plight of the MOVE organization and the lessons learned. She noted that August 8, 1978, was the date Philadelphia police besieged the Black radical groups compound resulting in the arrest of 12 people, including the Move 9, members sentenced to prison for 30 to 100 years.

What is lost in all of the noise is histories untold and underappreciated in our Black revolutionary struggles, Ms. Strong said. We define this radical revolutionary work by stories of state bias. What we dont understand is the revolutionary work of these organizations. MOVEs protest against the Philadelphia school board against educational injustice, their protests at the Philadelphia Zoo against animal cruelty, the revolutionary vision for respect towards all life, food justice, exercise, to being in proper relationship with the planet.

And so one thing that I think MOVEs history makes very clear to us, particularly the history of political imprisonment, is that political incarceration detracts from our revolutionary strivings, she said. The fact that we know more about state violence against MOVE than what MOVEs radical visions were is a testament to the intended impact of political incarceration.

Another thing this illuminates for us is that political imprisonment creates further harm. It spreads harms even beyond our beloved community members and revolutionaries who are incarcerated, Ms. Strong pointed out.

Another young presenter was Saudia Durrant, a Philadelphia-based racial justice organizer with the Abolitionist Law Center and the Jericho Movement. She brought fire and intensity in her presentation reminiscent of old-time church religion. She talked about her work with young people, demands for police-free schools, sanctuary schools free of agents from the federal governments Immigration, Customs and Enforcement agency, and empowering young people to be community leaders.

Our mission is exposing, challenging, and dismantling the American punishment system. And we do this in solidarity with our comrades, putting down this grassroots effort with other cities. We fundamentally believe in doing this work to build the capacity to abolish these institutions and the social constructs that attempt to legitimize the presence of state violence. And believe our communities can create new methods of dealing with these issues while politicizing our communities for self-defense, self-determination, and independence, she said.

We say, educate, organize, agitate, liberate. The idea is clear that whatever we are attempting to do, it begins with education and it ends with liberation.

Many of the activists paid homage to Min. Malcolm X as the inspiration for their work. His teacher, the Honorable Elijah Muhammad, taught Min. Malcolm and others sparking a revolutionary mindset, a desire for full and complete freedom, and a nation for Black people. The Hon. Elijah Muhammad was also a political prisoner, jailed for his teaching against the wickedness of the American government during WWII.

His top student, the Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan, has continued to teach about the wickedness of America, warned of her destruction, and exposed her warmongering, lies and wicked foreign and domestic policy. He has also defended and supported political prisoners in the United States.

Sacrifice is the unselfish giving of what one needs for oneself to accomplish an end that is greater than oneself. The scriptures of the Bible and Holy Quran are full of examples of sacrifice, said Min. Farrakhan in an address delivered during a benefit for then-political prisoner Geronimo Pratt, a Black Panther Party leader who was eventually released after over 20 years in prison for a murder he did not commit.

It is not enough to praise Malcolm X, Marcus Garvey, Nat Turner, Nobel Drew Ali or any of our brave freedom fighters. What we must do is take the principles that they lived and died on and be willing to sacrifice to see the end for which they lived and died. Then, and only then, will our living not be in vain and their sacrifice not have been in vain, the Minister said.

There never has been a teacher of valid principles for the liberation and survival of Black people in this country who has not been persecuted by the United States government, maligned, falsely accused, vilified by this system, he continued. Many criticized Elijah Muhammad, calling him counterrevolutionary, because they did not truly understand revolution, but romanticized about it. The root of revolution is light.

There is no motion without light. Light causes the motion of our planet. This planet makes its revolution around the sun by the power of light striking Earth at its equator, causing Earth to spin and producing the four seasons. The introduction of light and knowledge to a people who are asleep under the foot of oppression causes an idea of revolution to germinate in their minds. There is no revolutionary who is worth his salt or his sense that throws away his life. He wisely maneuvers in order that the revolution may live.

Malcolm X was not a revolutionary until he met the Honorable Elijah Muhammad. He was like most of us, wanting something better, but not knowing how to go after it. Many of our people said the Muslims just want to talk and sell papers. But Muhammad was wise; he said, Yes, Brother, for now.

How can we build a revolution without the idea of that revolution in the heads, hearts and minds of the people? How can we get Black people to make a sacrifice for an idea when we do not trust each other? We have to build a record of trust among our people, which means you have to adopt principles that encourage and promote trust.

So the revolutionary that he was, he said, Let me direct your anger to something within you that is counterrevolutionarybut he did not call it counterrevolutionary. He simply said let me direct your anger to something in you that is against the rise and liberation of our people.

And Min. Farrakhan added, We encourage this suppression by our unwillingness to sacrifice, discipline and organize ourselves properly against an oppressor and for our own liberation.

Ms. Durrant put forth four strategies being used to free political prisoners, including clemency, commutation, parole, and overturning wrongful convictions.

Communities must be organized to demonstrate solidarity, be it through marches, rallies, community meetups, and cleanups, art in cultural performances, organizing media content, and many other tactics to publicize the movement, she said.

Ending her presentation, Ms. Durrant discussed the dire medical conditions facing political prisoners like MOVE member and former Black Panther Mumia Abu Jamal, former Black Panther Russell Maroon Shoatz, and Native American activist Leonard Peltier. These are the mentors and the leaders of our movements of our communities who languished behind bars. We know that our folks are suffering inside, and we must honor them and commit to not leaving them behind, she said.

During the question and answer segment, threats confronting organizers were addressed.

We do not have reserves for when the state inevitably targets us. We need to out-organize our enemy. We have to learn from these histories. We have to be a part of collective networking, particularly around the threat of political imprisonment. We need to develop and share protocols that exist. You know, many of us are on signal. Still, signal is not enough of a strategy to out-organize the enemy that is in our bedrooms, our living rooms, Ms. Strong observed. We need to up the ante around things like protocols and safeguarding to the extent that we can.

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Free Black political prisoners and prisoners of war! Online forum focuses on the plight and need to support, organize for freedom fighters -...

The reaction of Germanys main parties to the fall of the imperialist puppet regime in Kabul underlines once again that voters have no real political choice in the federal election due to take place on September 26apart from the Socialist Equality Party (Sozialistische Gleichheitspartei).

The political and military debacle in Afghanistan has led to fierce recriminations in Germany. In particular, German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas (Social Democratic PartySPD), who just a few days before the fall of Kabul dismissed the notion of such an event, has been singled out as a scapegoat.

In fact, all of the political parties represented in the German parliament have reacted in the same manner. From the Left Party to the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD), they all emphasize the need to assist so-called local forcesAfghans who have worked for the Bundeswehr (German Armed Forces)to leave the country.

The two leading candidates of the Left Party, Janine Wissler and Dietmar Bartsch, devoted an entire press conference to this issue on August 16.

The Left Party had always opposed the German military mission in Afghanistan, Wissler said. But now the main thing is to get as many people to safety as possible. The German government had simply abandoned people, and was responsible for endangering human lives in Afghanistan.

Bartsch stressed that the Left Party had moved a motion in the Bundestag (parliament) on June 23 calling for local Afghan forces who worked for the Bundeswehr and the German police to be admitted to Germany quickly and without red tape. The party supported a similarly worded motion moved by the Greens, which was rejected by a government majority. Now it was absolutely crucial to get as many out as possible.

The Greens have adopted the same line. We have to get people out now! It doesn't matter which German authority someone worked for and when, the party declares in an appeal calling for demonstrations in dozens of cities. It is first of all a matter for the international community to maintain control of the airport and secure its operation. To this end, the EU and the German government must use their foreign policy influence.

Green Party MPs Omid Nouripour, Jamila Schfer and Agnieszka Brugger demand in a supplementary paper, The USA must not withdraw its military contingent until evacuations by all NATO partners have been completed The German government must offer the US support in securing the airport and quickly present the Bundestag with a mandate for a rescue operation that meets requirements on the ground.

The German government has long since complied with this demand. At the start of last week, it deployed 600 soldiers to supplement the US contingent of several thousand soldiers in Kabul. On Wednesday, the Bundestag will vote to ratify the deployment of armed forces for military evacuation from Afghanistan.

Approval on the part of the Greens is considered certain. It remains to be seen whether the Left Party parliamentary group, which has so far rejected combat missions by the Bundeswehr, will also agree. But even if it decides to abstain or vote no in order to save its pseudo-pacifist face, the stance taken by Wissler and Bartsch makes clear that the Left Party also supports this dangerous deployment, even though it threatens to reignite and escalate the war raging in the devastated country.

Even the far-right AfD, which usually conjures up the downfall of the West every time a single refugee is admitted to Germany, supports allowing local Afghan forces to enter the country. Germany is obliged to do so, AfD leader Alexander Gauland told Deutschlandfunk radio. We have to make it very clear that we have a responsibility for those who are genuinely at risk because they worked for us, he said.

The sudden concern for the lives of local forces is utterly hypocritical. The Bundestag parties have not shed a tear for the vast number of Afghan casualties of American bombing and drone attacks, or the anti-terror operations of the Bundeswehr and the Afghan army. Not a word is said about the victims of the brutal war lords and drug barons with whom the Western powers collaborated. Instead, the official parties used every means at their disposal to ensure that no Afghan refugee could set foot on German soil and apply for asylumand in the rare cases where refugees succeeded, sent many of them back as quickly as possible.

The Left and the Greens are now making a huge fuss about the fact that the German government only recently stopped deportations to Afghanistan. But on every plane that repatriated refugees to Afghanistan there were refugees from states where the Left Party and the Greens are in government, or, as in Thuringia and Baden-Wrttemberg, hold the post of state premier.

In reality, the Left and the Greens have no sympathy for local Afghan forces. They are worried only that Germany will not find local collaborators in future wars if it ditches them so ruthlessly in Afghanistan. This is what Bartsch meant at his press conference when he called the disaster in Afghanistan a devastating foreign policy defeat for the German government.

As we pointed out in an earlier article, the Afghan war was from the beginning a dirty colonial war with everything that goes with it: massacres, torture, criminality and corruption. It was never about human rights and democracy, but rather about gaining influence in an oil- and gas-rich region of extraordinary geo-strategic importance.

The Greens are among the main perpetrators of this criminal war. It was an SPD-Green coalition government, with Green Party leader Joschka Fischer as foreign minister, which decided to participate in the war in Afghanistan. Fischer and the Greens defend their decision to this day, and now attack the German and American governments from the right.

He still stands behind his decision, Fischer said recently at an election campaign appearance with the current Green Party leader, Annalena Baerbock. In a radio interview, Fischer declared that at stake at that time were Germanys imperialist interests. It was about demonstrating solidarity with the Germans most important transatlantic partner, the Americans, he said. In addition, Afghanistan plays a major geopolitical role in the region. China is a direct neighbor and Russia is not far away.

Fischer claimed that no strategic mistakes had been made. The big mistake, he said, was the sudden withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan: It was always clear to me that you cant just pull out like that.

The Left Party, for its part, has always voted against the Afghanistan mission in the Bundestag--when it was clear that its votes would make no difference and would help to suppress opposition to the war. The party did not lift a finger to mobilize opposition against it. After tens of millions protested against the Iraq war worldwide in 2003, it did everything it could to stifle the anti-war movement.

Today, it says nothing about the criminal nature of the war in Afghanistan, but rather speaks of a historical fiasco and regrets the wars failure. A greater failure following 20 years of major armed deployment by the Bundeswehr is hard to imagine, the Left Party writes in one statement on the war.

The Left Party, like the Greens 23 years ago, is now preparing its open transition into the camp of militarism. Already eight years ago, Left Party MP Stefan Liebich participated in a working group, which, under the title New Power, New Responsibility, drafted a great power strategy for German imperialism in the 21st century. Since then, the Left Party has repeatedly signaled its willingness to support future war missions of the Bundeswehr if it is accepted by the SPD and the Greens as a coalition partner in a federal government.

This is the background to the Left Partys current campaign on behalf of local Afghan forces. The Greens and the Left Party are demonstrating to the ruling class and the current governing parties their willingness to take responsibility for German militarism.

In leading foreign policy and military circles, lessons have long since been drawn from the Afghanistan debacle. The tenor of commentary is that Germany must pursue its imperialist interests more autonomously, more vigorously and more independently of the Americans, and accelerate the process of military build-up that has already assumed enormous proportions in recent years.

One thing is certain, Foreign Minister Heiko Maas told Der Spiegel magazine, The result of this process must not be that we no longer take responsibility internationally. The question is how we undertake it. At times, he said, NATOs decisions are made in Washington, and NATO in Brussels hardly has a say. Therefore, it was necessary to strengthen the European pillar in NATO.

In the Financial Times, Bastian Giegerich of the International Institute for Strategic Studies, who has worked as an adviser in the Ministry of Defence since 2012, called for Germany to develop a strategic mindset in security and defence policy. This is necessary and urgent, he wrote, because the rise of resurgent revisionist and repressive powersChina and Russiathreatens the international order on which Germanys post-war security and prosperity were founded.

He added that Germanys strategic goal should be to contribute to the defence of the Western international order against assertive, expansionist and authoritarian regimes, and in a way commensurate with its political and economic stature. Diplomacy and geo-economic statecraft would contribute to this defence, But German military power will be an indispensable component of Europes self-defence. Germany cannot afford for its political class to ignore this reality.

The Socialist Equality Party (Sozialistische GleichheitsparteiSGP) is the only party to uncompromisingly oppose German militarism and, as the German section of the Fourth International, fight for the international unity of the working class against social inequality, oppression, war and their root cause: capitalism. Those who support these goals should support the SGPs election campaign, vote for it on September 26 and join the party.

WSWS Review

What is the pseudo-left?

This review examines the response of pseudo-left political tendencies internationally to the major world political events of the past decade.

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What's behind the calls by the German Left Party and the Greens to support local Afghan forces? - WSWS

This article originally appeared in Workers World, Dec. 6, 2001.

Women village defense forces carry AK-47s during a ceremony in Kabul to mark the 10th anniversary of the communist revolution in Afghanistan, April 26, 1988.

As U.S. bombing and troop presence has intensified in Afghanistan, the mainstream media have issued a barrage of articles, photographs, opinion pieces and interviews claiming this war will liberate Afghan women. They present it as a collateral benefit that the war will reverse the Talibans cruel oppression of women and even give women a chance to get political rights under a new government.

Government officials, including Vice President Dick Cheney, Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld and Secretary of State Colin Powell have addressed the same subject in news conferences, briefings and interviews.

Most dramatically, First Lady Laura Bush was in front of the microphone on Nov. 17, instead of her husband, for the presidents usual Saturday radio address, so she could testify about the oppression of Afghan women under the Taliban.

This media blitz has been orchestrated through the governmental Coalition Information Center, set up to counter any criticism of the U.S. war. The

campaign is coordinated by spin-doctors like public relations industry legend Charlotte Beers, former chair of giant ad agency J. Walter Thompson. Four of the key gatekeepers of this campaign are women, including chief Pentagon spokesperson Victoria Clarke and Mary Matlin, chief political adviser to Vice President Cheney.

Matlin said of these womens commitment to advocating for the war: I think we probably bring and I dont mean this to sound sexist but we probably have more of a subconscious outrage at these issues . . . This is something that crosses my mind every day: A third of these women in pre-Taliban days were doctors, lawyers and teachers. You cant help but be outraged. (New York Times, Nov. 11, 2001)

The real outrage

Which pre-Taliban days is she talking about? The outrage is ours if we look at the real history of womens liberation in Afghanistan. Yes, terrible things have been done to women under the Taliban rule. But how did the Taliban come into existence? And what was the role of the United States?

In 1978 a revolution created a secular government in Afghanistan that tried to liberate the workers and peasants from the grip of feudal landlords. The secular government was based on a young socialist movement, the Progressive Democratic Party of Afghanistan. The revolutionaries cancelled mortgage debts of laborers and tenants; these debts had been inherited over generations so that feudal warlords held land workers as virtual serfs. And the new government promoted the welfare and liberation of women.

The revolutionary government immediately moved to improve the terrible conditions women had endured. It set up literacy programs especially for women, whose illiteracy rate was 96%. It trained more teachers and published textbooks in local languages. It organized brigades of women to go into the countryside to provide medical services and by 1985 had increased hospital beds by 80%.

Decrees were issued, both abolishing the bride-price, so women could be free to choose their marriages, and prohibiting the punishment of women for losing their virginity before marriage. Women were able to train and then work as doctors, teachers and lawyers.

Did the U.S. government know of these things? These facts about the Afghan revolution can be found in a book published by the U.S. Department of the Army entitled, Afghanistan a Country Study for 1986.

Yet it was this enlightened government that U.S. President Jimmy Carter set out to overthrow by organizing a massive counterrevolutionary army of religious fundamentalists in 1979. A CIA-orchestrated war forced the Afghan government to call for Soviet military assistance. What followed was a bitter conflict that lasted more than a decade and eventually overthrew the progressive regime. More years of war followed, as the Taliban, the Northern Alliance and other factions all of which drew their power from the feudal landlord class fought for supremacy. (Workers World, Oct. 10, 1996)

The CIA had facilitated the formation of Osama bin Ladens organization in the 1980s to attack the progressive government in Afghanistan. As U.S. vice president, George Bush Sr. oversaw the operation. Subsequently, bin Ladens troops murdered teachers, doctors and nurses, disfigured women who took off the veil, and they shot down civilian airliners with U.S.-supplied Stinger missiles. (Workers World, Oct. 4, 1996)

What the U.S. does care about

Now Bush and the generals claim to care about the rights of women living in the counterrevolution they financed and engineered. But the U.S. has consistently disregarded the plight and status of women in Afghanistan.

The White House and Pentagon knew the reactionary position of the U.S.-financed and trained fundamentalist groups toward women. But this was immaterial to the goal of the U.S. government to support the interests of oil corporations that have been trying to get a pipeline through Afghanistan for 10 years.

In a May 26, 1997, New York Times article, John F. Burns wrote: While deploring the Talibans policies on women and the adoption of a penal code that provides for the amputation of thieves hands and the stoning to death of adulterers, the United States has sometimes acted as though a Taliban government might serve its interests.

The Clinton administration has taken the view that a Taliban victory would end a war that has killed 1.5 million Afghans, would act as a counterweight to Iran, whose Shiite Muslim leadership is fiercely opposed to the Sunni Muslims of the Taliban, and would offer the possibility of new trade routes that could weaken Russian and Iranian influence in the region.

For example, a proposal by the Unocal Corporation of California for a $2.5 billion pipeline that would link the gas fields of Turkmenistan through Afghanistan to Pakistan has attracted strong support in Washington, though human rights groups are likely to object to the plan. . . . The Afghan project, strongly endorsed by the Taliban, is part of a broader concept under which the vast mineral resources of the former Soviet republics would be moved to markets along routes that would offer these countries a new autonomy from Moscow.

In May 1998, Time magazine reported the CIA had set up a secret task force to monitor the regions politics and gauge its wealth. Covert CIA officers, some of them well-trained petroleum engineers, had traveled through southern Russia and the Caspian region to sniff out potential oil reserves. When the policymakers heard the agencys report, [Secretary of State Madeleine] Albright concluded that working to mold the areas future was one of the most exciting things we can do.

Free to beg

As U.S. Marines dig in and direct air attacks near Kandahar, the U.S. continues to try to mold the future of Afghanistan, Central Asia and the Middle East but not out of concern for the future of women. On the first day of this war, U.S. bombs struck a Kabul hospital and killed 13 women in a gynecological hospital.

After weeks of bombing, U.S. newspapers enthuse that Afghan women are uncovering their faces, looking for jobs, walking happily with female friends on the street.

Yet, at the same time, Bush administration officials admit that they will not publicly insist women be included in talks about a post-Taliban coalition government. In fact, in the Bonn meeting scheduled by the U.S. and allies to arrange Afghanistans future, only three token women have been included: the widow of a mujahedeen commander killed fighting against the former secular socialist government and two backers of the long-deposed king. (New York Times, Nov. 26, 2001)

As the women of Afghanistan emerge into the horrifying destruction and chaos unleashed by U.S. bombing, what kind of freedom and what kind of rights will be theirs? A New York Times article, entitled Behind the Burka, focused on a 56-year-old woman with no schooling, eight children and a dead husband. (Nov. 19, 2001)

The last line of the article sums up her liberated future under imperialist subjugation: Now, at last, she is free to beg.

Stop the war!

That is a future this Afghan woman shares with many women in the United States women on welfare who soon will be free to beg under the so-called Welfare Reform Act.

Passed during the Clinton administration, it essentially eliminated Aid to Families with Dependent Children and set up a strict limit on the time length of benefits. The cut-off date of Dec. 1 is now fast approaching for thousands of already impoverished women. Some will be evicted in the middle of freezing winter. Others will be forced to place their children in foster care. Still others will be denied the most basic health care and reproductive services for themselves and their children.

And the astronomical economic cost of the U.S. war on Afghanistan will take an even greater toll on the poor in this country especially women and children.

The war against Afghanistan has never been about the liberation of women, not even as a collateral benefit. The war is about imperialist domination for capitalist profit. Opposition to this war, and this economic system, is the only thing that will help bring about the full liberation of women.

Minnie Bruce Pratt is an anti-racist activist, lesbian author and longtime leader in the struggle for womens liberation.

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Beware the siren song: Womens liberation and Afghanistan - Workers World

It was a 67-year-old woman in a simple white top, adorned in a sash and set behind a table of microphones, in Seoul on August 14th, 1991 who uncovered for the world a historical tragedy and set a movement in motion. Kim Hak-sun spoke of how, as a teenager during the Second World War, the Japanese military forced her into sexual slavery at a comfort station. This was the first time a woman, a member of a group now known as comfort women, publicly told her story. Further testimony from others followed, which set the stage for a movement of recognition and compensation that has since been marked by activism in a range of national contexts.

On August 14, 2021, groups in South Korea, Japan, and the United States commemorated the 30th anniversary of her testimony as International Memorial Day for Japanese Military Comfort Women. But this event comes at a time of historical revision and nationalist revival in Asia, as elsewhere. Denial of the comfort women, a questioning of the womens experiences, has become pervasive in Japan. And in recent months, J.Mark Ramseyer, a professor of contract law at Harvard Law School, incited controversy with the publication in the International Review of Law and Economics in March 2021 of Contracting for Sex in the Pacific War. The article, which focuses on the contractual dynamics of comfort stations, has been criticized by academics foramisuse of sources and ideological undertones, which, as one scholar put it, advocate a current Japanese political ideology.

In Japan today, the story of comfort women is contentious, a site of debate, a memory denied and questioned by a range of individuals and groups often with political and social influence; these actors, primarily on the far right, also dispute other acts of Japanese wartime aggression. But there is another side to the discourse: Japanese activists who fight and struggle for the voices of survivors. To understand the comfort women debates and activism in Japan, and the recent Ramseyer controversy, I spoke with Eika Tai, a professor at North Carolina State University who researches multiethnic Japan and colonial Taiwan. She is the author of Comfort Women Activism: Critical Voices from the Perpetrator State, published in August 2020, and one of the first to concentrate on what she has called comfort women activism in Japan.

It is hard to set words to paper when writing on the comfort women. I grew up with stories of the Holocaust, but I did not learn of the comfort women until I was older. There is, I believe, a degree of trivialization and desensitization at work with the Holocaust for me, as an American-born Jewish person, and a ready-made vocabulary to understand and write on survivor testimony. I learned of the stories little by little: I listened to the testimony of a Holocaust survivor at an assembly in high school, watched Schindlers List, and saw the Holocaust Exhibition at the Imperial War Museum in London. This is not true with the comfort women, a story that I only learned when I could realize the gravity of the trauma, which was as shocking as it was hard to comprehend.

SPENCER COHEN: Letsstart with a question on terminology, which is where you begin the book.When we use the term comfort women, to whom are we referring?

EIKA TAI: This is not a simple question, but opens up a question of the parameter of comfort women activism. The termianfu, the original Japanese expression, refers to those women who were taken from a dozen countries to comfort stations operated by the Japanese military and exploited as sexual slaves for soldiers.Ianfuis a euphemism and activists in Japan use quotation marks to indicate it. Some activists prefer to use sexual slaves, which has been used by the United Nations and the international community. The activists as a whole have decided to useianfufor the name of the nationwide association and for memorial days for victims because it was historically used. Some use the term in order to shed light on the cruel fact that while forcing women into slavery, the Japanese military labeled them as comfort women. I appreciate their stance on the term. I think this ironical effect of the use of the term is understood in the international community where people are aware that comfort women were sexual slaves. I use the term in this sense. In face-to-face communication with survivors, activists use the word grandma in each of their languages to express respect and affection. For example, they call Korean women halmoni and Chinese women from Shanxi Province daniang.

The comfort women movement is not just about victims who were called comfort women, but also about women victimized outside comfort stations. The official operation of comfort stations allowed soldiers to think it would be all right to build makeshift rape centers when finding no such station, and to rape women in streets and houses around the battlefield. That created the need to make more comfort stations. The rampant occurrences of sexual violence in warzones led to the creation of the comfort women system in the first place. There was a vicious circle of the forms of sexual violence. I would like to stress that the comfort women issue refers to all forms of sexual violence committed by the Japanese military, not just those that took place at comfort stations. This understanding of the termianfuis important because it captures the extensiveness of the Japanese empires sexual violence, and also because it makes clear that the issue is directly relevant to sexual violence in warzones in todays world. For these reasons, some activists insist on using the expression victims of Japanese military sexual violence. Yet, others say thatianfushould be kept to point to the particularity of the Japanese case.

Even with testimony by former comfort women and archival evidence, an array of far-right politicians, along with others, in Japan have advocated a view best recognized as historical denialism. They oppose the understanding of comfort women as sexual slaves, arguing that the women were volunteers, prostitutes who willfully chose such work; this view has become particularly fervent in the past two decades. Why do you believe there has been such pushback in Japan to the idea of these women as sexual slaves?

The question to ask is: what are they trying to protect or assert by denying the history of comfort women? It is their nationalism. Those politicians and others who deny the history must have diverse images of Japan, but they all seem to believe that, in the words of former prime minister Abe Shinz, Japan is or should be a beautiful country. Most of them support the emperor system, a system of hetero-patriarchy, and many believe the Asia-Pacific War (19311945) was a just war against the encroachment of Western powers. Japanese soldiers who fought for the emperor, for Japan should be respected.

They deny all kinds of historical facts about atrocities committed by the Japanese military in Asia and beyond, but the term sexual slaves has been particularly problematic to them. For them, it is an insult, defamation, disrespect to the Japan they love and admire. They know slavery is a crime against humanity. Their Japan would not have committed such a crime. The sexual act is an essential constituent of ethnicity. The idea of sexually abusing women of other Asian countries is a threat to the respectability of Japanese ethnicity. Their argument that comfort women were prostitutes and therefore not victims reveals their contempt and disregard not only for comfort women victims but also for prostitutes and sex workers. More fundamentally, it points to their assumption that women should provideian(comfort) for men, sexually or otherwise. This assumption is inherent in Japanese hetero-patriarchy.

So, then the comfort women issue is about the recognition of not only historical atrocities but also the rights of women. In Japan, how has this shaped activism and the movement in support of former comfort women?

I heard activists in Japan talking about two major perspectives for the comfort women issue: to see it as a redress issue for Japans past and as an issue about sexual violence and discrimination against women. At the beginning, activists and supporters often held one of the perspectives. As the movement evolved, they came to comprehend the issue from a multifaceted point of view, including the two perspectives. The transnational movement has revolved around two problems: the violation of womens human rights, especially in warzones, and Japans historical responsibility. In the international context, the gender perspective presented by activists in Japan is not only universal but particular, for thecrimes were committed by Japan.

That said, I want to note when encountering Kim Hak-sun and other survivors, many women in Japan heard the victims voices through their own experiences of gender-based discrimination permeated in their country. They saw the concatenation of what happened to the victims and what has been happening to themselves. For them, the encounter was deeply emotional. They hold themselves responsible for what Japan did to other Asian women as its citizens. This recognition is somewhat abstract. I think that their emotional attachments to the issue have been a driving force for them to continue fighting for three decades.

In the book, you write about how activists in Japan have a perpetrator consciousness (kagaisha ishiki) and identify as citizens of a perpetrator nation, which they see as responsible for wartime atrocities and aggression. Can you elaborate on how activists have reconciled with what appears a duality of self-identification: as both perpetrators of historical violence and victims of contemporary gender-based discrimination?

Such a duality materialized and troubled those who tried to tackle the Korean comfort women issueat the site of the womens liberation movement in the early 1970s. Because of their self-perception as victims of gendered discrimination within Japan, they could not fully develop a sense of perpetrators responsibility to take action on behalf of Korean victims. In the 1990s, women in Japan encountered victims face-to-face. I cannot stress enough how important that was. They were deeply moved by the victims courage to publicly tell the stories of sexual violence. They built interpersonal relationships with the victims, inviting them to Japan, visiting them in their home countries, and listening to their stories closely often in intimate contexts. Over time, the Japanese women witnessed many victim-turned-survivors becoming activists themselves. They learned from the survivors a spirit of fighting gendered discrimination. For them, there is little duality or contradiction between two positions: they fight as citizens of the perpetrator state for taking historical responsibility and as women discriminated against for eliminating sexual violence in contemporary Japan and beyond. They see themselves as fighters rather than as victims, like those survivors.

How do activists in Korea, for example, or elsewhere in Asia, view activists in Japan? Is there any animosity?

Over three decades, Japanese activists have built and maintained solidarity with activists in victimized countries such as South Korea. They have been able to gain trust from other activists because they have never forgotten that they are citizens of the perpetrator state Japan and because they have dedicated their lives to survivors.

That said, Japanese activists themselves do not think that they have worked hard enough because they have not succeeded in making the Japanese government apologize to victims sincerely with state compensation. Activists in other countries appreciate their dedication, as well as, I think, their humbleness. I remember the scene where a resident Korean praised Japanese activists efforts in front of other activists. As a resident Taiwanese, I shared her view. A Japanese woman standing next to me whispered she could never accept such a compliment.

That is an incredible and enlightening anecdote, which really reveals how activists in Japan understand and view their position within the movement.To conclude, lets bring the discussionto the US, particularly to the most recent controversy surrounding remembrance of comfort women. How should we understand the article written by Ramseyer and his views?

Activists in Japan first learned about Ramseyers article from the January 28, 2021 issue ofSankei Shimbun, a rightwing Japanese newspaper. They did not immediately take action, seeing it as yet another instance of the historical revisionist campaign. Witnessing concerted efforts in South Korea and the US to expose the problematic nature of the article and get it retracted, they became more involved. On March 10, historical associations issued a statement against the article. On March 14, Fight for Justice, an activist group, held in collaboration with other groups an online seminar,Sick and Tired of Hearing Comfort Women were not Sexual Slaves, inviting leading historians and reestablishing historical facts. The international movement against Ramseyer has also encouraged concerned citizens in Japan to publicly criticize him for having presented distorted views on Okinawa, resident Koreans, and Burakumin (people historically discriminated against). Ramseyers article has generated these criticalresponses. Yet, the left-leaning media in Japan has barely reported on it, limiting a social impact.

It has promoted the revisionist campaign.Sankei Shimbun, a newspaper which had been orchestrating history wars to spread revisionist views in the US, covered it several times. On April 24, Nadeshiko Action, a womens rightwing group, held a symposium, where Ramseyer, speaking in Japanese, called for freedom of speech in the academia and reiterated his arguments in the article. Revisionist politicians have grabbed the opportunity to reassert the need to revisethe 1993 KnoStatement, internationally recognized as Japans official position on the issue, rebuking it for admitting the use of coercion in treating women and thereby allowing for the criticisms of Ramseyer. Given that he is the Mitsubishi Professor of Japanese Legal Studies and was awarded in 2018 the Order of the Rising Sun by the Japanese government for his contributions to Japanese studies, one could argue that the revisionist campaign had paved the way for his publication of the article.

The reactions to the article in Japan shed light on how deeply Japan as a whole is isolated from the rest of the international community on the history of comfort women. Activists in Japan have been struggling with this situation for three decades. I must say that they are committed not only to spreading historical truths that have been documented but also to keeping alive survivors individual histories they heard in person. Ultimately, it is the memories of survivors that have given them energy to continue fighting.

Read the rest here:

Eika Tai on Denying the Oppression of Comfort Women - BLARB - lareviewofbooks

Despite a revived national focus on environmental injustice, one group remains largely ignored: disabled people, who make up more than 25% of the U.S population.

Even the definition of environmental justice provided by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) doesn't currently include disability.

Yet, a recent study suggests that disability statusespecially in combination with race, ethnicity, and incomecan determine how much environmental harm one could be exposed to.

Pollution in the U.S. has never been evenly distributed. Our long history of discriminatory housing and zoning laws have forced marginalized groups to live in areas that disproportionately expose them to environmental hazardsthe effects of which are still present today.

In response, environmental justice researchers have spent decades trying to document these inequalities. What started out with a focus on Black and Brown Americans, has since expanded to include other marginalized groups, such as low-income households, immigrants, and the LGBTQ+ community.

Few studies also consider disability. But in one of these rare studies, Jayajit Chakraborty, a professor of geography at the University of Texas at El Paso, observed that Houston neighborhoods located near pollution sourceslike Superfund sites and hazardous waste facilitieswere home to a significantly higher proportion of disabled people compared to the rest of the city. In addition, race, ethnicity, and age all further amplified these inequalitiesdisabled people of color and those aged 75 years or older both lived in even closer proximity to polluted areas, likely decreasing their quality of life.

These findings came as no surprise to Chakraborty. In his past work, he reached a similar conclusion when investigating how close disabled people lived next to toxic chemical spills, and again when looking at where disabled communities were placed relative to facilities that use hazardous materials.

"And that got me thinking, what about other kinds of environmental hazards?" he told EHN, adding that he wanted to look at more chronic pollution sources which "have traditionally received a lot of focus in previous [environmental justice] researchbut not so much with regards to disability."

He stresses, however, that these conclusions are specific to the Houston area and more work needs to be done to see how it translates across the country.

But expanding on this research will be difficult as work like Chakraborty's is uncommon.

"There are few studies of [environmental justice] and disability, let alone the intersection of race, class and disability," Arrianna Planey, an assistant professor of health and policy management at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, told EHN.

Yet, the disabled community has known about these types of issues "for forever," disabled youth organizer Daphne Frias told EHN. Researchers, she added, "have so much to do to catch up."

Dr. Jayajit Chakraborty (Credit: UTEP)

Part of the reason for this gap in environmental justice research is a lack of data on disability.

"I would prefer to do field work to get primary datasurveys or interviewsto understand the lived experiences [of this community]." Chakraborty said. However, due to time and funding constraints, this isn't always feasible. So, Chakraborty, like many other environmental justice scholars, relies on information obtained through other methods, such as through the American Community Survey (ACS).

Unfortunately, this can have several limitations. "The ACS has large margins of error and generally underestimates the prevalence of disability," said Planey, who was not involved with the Houston study.

That's because, for one, people in the disabled community face difficulty being counted by these surveys for reasons that range from inaccessible survey design to the distrust of government surveyors. Also, these surveys are self-reported. Stigma surrounding disability often leads people to forgo identifying as disabled, resulting in an underestimation of their numbers.

That said, despite its imperfections at least the ACS includes data about disability. Chakraborty has noticed that other research surveys often don't even inquire about disability status in the first place.

"There [are questions] for race, ethnicity, and housing status, and other kinds of stuff," he explained. "For a lot of these forms there's no identifier for people with disabilities."

Frias said the lack of available data is just a symptom of a larger problem: ableism.

"It's the idea that disabled lives are unimportant and disabled lives are invisible," she said. "It doesn't matter if where we live makes us even more unhealthy."

Disability is also rarely seen as a full-fledged identity, which is reflected on how it's often framed in environmental justice research. The "focus has generally been more on how environmental injustices cause disability," Catherine Jampel, fellow of the American Council Learned Societies (ACLS), told EHN, "but much less on the specific vulnerabilities of disabled people to environmental injustices."

It's likely this kind of framing that has led to terms like "disability-adjusted life year," which is a common metric used to determine "the years of healthy life lost due to disability" and has recently been used with regards to the health effects of environmental pollution.

But disability isn't just a negative state of being. It's a community who deserves access to a clean environment. Any opposing mindset can hinder developing solutions when it comes to protecting the disabled community from environmental issues, said Planey. "In the ableist cultural milieu, it's difficult to advocate to address both the social conditions that produce disablement and advocate for rights and protections for disabled people," explained Planey.

That's why Frias believes this framing needs to change. "Our community is beautiful and powerful, and I think that needs to be embodied instead of this doom and gloom narrative of how we're perceived."

Chakraborty's goal has always been to expand the scope of environmental justice research. He hopes that studies like his recent one in Houston will "lead to a better inclusion of people with disabilities in environmental justice research and environmental policy." He also believes that it's important that environmental justice uses an intersectional approach when looking at disability.

"We like to see disability as a monolithic system of oppression," said Frias, "But that is not necessarily true." Multiple marginalized identities can compound on each other to increase one's pollution exposure risk.

For example, "Disabled peopleespecially disabled people of colorare much more likely to be impoverished," said Planey, forcing them into low-income housing that is more likely to be built near pollution sites.

Still, there is hope. "With each study that's published, it creates more of a dialogue between [environmental justice and disabled] communities," said Frias, adding that moving forward, it's important that researchers begin reaching out directly to the community and listen to their lived experiences.

"It's the phrase that [disabled people] always say, 'Nothing about us without us.'"

Krystal Vasquez is a Ph.D candidate in the Division of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering at the California Institute of Technology. You can reach her at kvasquez@caltech.edu or on Twitter @CaffeinatedKrys

This article was produced through the Agents of Change in Environmental Justice fellowship. Agents of Change empowers emerging leaders from historically excluded backgrounds in science and academia to reimagine solutions for a just and healthy planet.

Banner photo: anjan58/flickr

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Environmental injustice and disability: Where is the research? - Environmental Health News

:Busta Rhymes at the official grand opening party for Mohegan Suns new ultra-lounge, novelle, on Saturday, June 22, 2019, in Uncasville, Connecticut.Photo: Dave Kotinsky for Mohegan Sun (Getty Images)

Good evening and welcome to yet another episode of Celebrities Say the Dumbest Things! Im your host, One Tired Writer.

Amid the ever-growing bucket of famous people adding their two cents to the Piggy Bank of Pandemic Ignorance, our latest contributor is none other than hip hop icon Busta Rhymes.

In a recently resurfaced video posted to Twitter, the Whats It Gonna Be rapper can be seen going on a mini-rant over masks, government-mandates and lockdowns.

This is my second show in front of human life in the last 15 fucking months, COVID can suck a d-ck. All these little weird ass policies and mandates can suck a d-ck. They tryna take our civil liberties away. Feels good to be back outside. WE OUTSIDE FORREAL, Busta began.

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Umm, Im sorry butwhen have niggas not been outside during this pandemic? Folks have been traveling, going to Tulum, Santorini, the moon, and their neighbors backyard barbecues since last year. I mean, theyre even out here using milk crates as stair masters now because they just wanna be outside SO BAD. Folks have BEEN outside, okay? But I digress.

Instead, Id like to move onto a segment called Woo Hah! WTF Did He Just Say? How its gonna work is, when you hear something that doesnt make sense, cant believe or can easily be disprovedyou just blurt out Woo Hah! Got it?

Lets try it out with more of what Busta said:

Its called the God-given right to freedom, right? No human being supposed to tell you you cant even breathe freely. Fuck your mask.

WOO HAH!

Im sayin, some of yall might feel differently. Fuck your mask. I cant rhyme to you with a mask on. You cant eat food with a fucking mask on. You cant even see each others smile with a mask on. Damn, yo.

WOO HAH!

I come from a time to where before I even used to wanna holla at a chick, I used to have to do shit with my face to let her know Im into her.

WOO HAH!

Alright! It looks like you got the hang of it! Lets move on to my favorite part of the show now, Hip Hop Hotep. This is where we like to find different members of the hip hop community and blast them for their hotepian-esque beliefs and downright ignorant ass comments. Luckily for us, Busta also gave us some fodder to work with on that front, too:

All of that energy gets blocked when your mask is on. Energy is important and we are all conductors of good fucking energy. We also gotta be clear when a mothafucka tryna give you BAD ENERGY. You can tell from only the expression on they face. I wanna see your face, fuck your mask. Im sorry I got a little political and shit, I miss my people. We gotta talk. We can party but we gotta talk. We gotta communicate, we gotta establish new understandings.

Fuck that, I aint going through that shit again. And make sure yall prepared too. Cuz if anything came outta this mothafucka was a lot of learning. I learned so much shit in this little time off. One thing that came good outta this fucking shutdown, I have become more empowered. And this energy right here is un-fuckwithable. They cant fuck with us when we together like this.

*inhales deeply*

Because I really feel like my explanation should be done in true Busta form, just imagine everything Im about to say said at like 5x the speed, okay?

I dont know when we as a society decided to look at celebrities as experts on everything but I really need us to stop it. Its already bad enough trying to convince the ones you actually know and love in real life to do whats right and whats best for everyone by wearing masks, socially distancing, GETTING THE VACCINE. And it doesnt help when someone with mega influence starts spewing more ignorance and discouraging people to do the very shit that can help us all get out of this hellhole.

I honestly dont get it. Busta and people like him are really out here trying to equate a piece of cloth to serious oppression or an infringement on rights. NO ONE is telling you you cant breathe freely. Literally, no one has said that. Were trying to minimize the spread of a fucking deadly virus that has killed over 630,000 people nationally in the last year. Thats it. How TF do you understand the importance of telling kids to cough in their elbow so they dont spread germs to others around them but not covering up your own mouth to keep from doing the same thing? Make. It. Make. Sense.

Because right now, no matter how you put it down, flip it and reverse it: it just doesnt. Continuing to be and spread this type of ignorance at a time when cases are steadily rising and children are dying is starting to become just as dangerous as the damn virus itself. And I dont know about you, but I, for one, would rather not fight two pandemics at the same time. This one is bad enough.

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Put Your Mask Where My Eyes Could See It: Busta Rhymes Goes Off on Masks and Government Lockdowns - The Root

Few observers of global discourse range as widely as Elnathan John, the novelist, satirist, and lawyer who frequently participates online and off in conversations about art, politics, and culture pertaining to at least three continents. His novel, Born on a Tuesday, is a coming-of-age story set in his native Nigeria. In Becoming Nigerian: A Guide, he tried his hand at satire.

Today, John lives in Berlin, where, in addition to writing, he works with academic institutions to foster collaboration between scholars and writers. I first encountered him on Clubhouse, the live-audio social-media platform, where Ive listened to him hold forth in conversations with members of the Nigerian diaspora, Americans across the political spectrum, and anyone else whos awake when he is.

Earlier this month, I invited him to lunch, hoping to better understand his perspective on the social-media era: We both use some of the same platforms, but I wondered whether we worry about the same threats to public discourse, and to what extent our experiences of the same spaces might differ.

This is a condensed, edited version of our conversation.

Conor Friedersdorf: Youre Nigerian. You live in Berlin. And you regularly talk on U.S.-based social-media platforms. We first encountered each other on Clubhouse during the 2020 COVID-19 lockdowns. What value did you find in the live group-audio conversations that app offered?

Elnathan John: I could find people from all across the world with whom to have conversations that I couldnt have elsewherefor example, to talk about Afrofuturism without having to plan some special event, or science fiction or history or philosophy with people from 10 different universities around the world that I would not otherwise meet, and who would not tweet. In the beginning, people treated Clubhouse like a safe space, and many people felt freer to talk about what ideas they actually had, unlike on Twitter, for example, where many were wary about sharing opinions.

Friedersdorf: Because they feared professional consequences?

John: Yes.

Friedersdorf: Do you think such fears about what many now call cancel culture are justified or overwrought?

Read: How capitalism drives cancel culture

John: There have always been codes of silence. At every time in history, to have access to people's true thoughts, one needed to learn a communitys codes and go deeper than superficial conversation. But today many people feel disoriented because the code is changing very fast and few understand where the changes come from. It used to be that if I didn't offend the chief of the village or the gods of the village, I could have freedom in other aspects. Now the source of power is less clear. It is globalized. You can say something about someone thousands of miles away and have instant repercussions.

And it is democratized: So many more people, especially young people, exercise power in controlling these public conversations. With their savvy and their numbers, they can demand consequences for certain kinds of speech. But their code is always changing, often very quickly and unpredictably, so many people feel that until they understand the new equilibrium, they must be circumspect observers and cannot talk freely.

Friedersdorf: Is this an American phenomenon, or do you see it in Germany and Nigeria too?

John: I would say that it is globalizingyou know, it is in the process of doing that, because the biggest site of these contestations is the United States, and the United States is the greatest exporter of culture. So its conversations quickly become the standard for conversations elsewhere.

Read: The blue check mark's evil cousin

Friedersdorf: Is that because most of the big social-media platforms are American companies?

John: It's not just the apps. Its everything America has done to spread its influence, because America dominates the media. We all consume it. In some way, shape, or form, things trickle down.

And its pervasive when you speak to Americans that they are unaware of their position in the world and this cultural hegemonythat their conversations very quickly dominate the public space because everybody is affected by these influences. You grew up watching American TV. You grew up listening to American music. And often you might have to remind people that maybe we want to step back from America being the center of this conversation.

For example, say I want to talk about slavery in northern Nigeria. One of the books I'm writing now is set in a time when the so-called caliphate in what is now northern Nigeria was at its peak. At that time, at least one in four persons was an enslaved person or in indentured servitude. At one point, we had probably the highest number of slaves in the world. Id like to talk about this without talking about slaves in the U.S. or white people. You know, why do I have to talk about white supremacy when writing about this period in Nigeria? But the conversation always goes there.

This U.S. hegemony is true regardless of race. Even if you are oppressed in America, you still have this outsize influence globally, and the rest of us are choking on it. And we would like to have conversations in our local spaces that do not always devolve to American tribal wars.

Friedersdorf: When members of the Nigerian diaspora connect online, what issues are of particular interest?

John: I think more Nigerians abroad are becoming politically active because they are increasingly affected by the ineptitude of our government at home. We find this in things such as very poor consular and embassy services. For example, during the pandemic, Nigerians in many countries have been unable to get passports. The embassy in Germany has not issued passports in many months. If your passport expires, you are stuck. You cant go anywhere. My passport expires in two days. So Im stuck here for a few months, and work travel is part of how I pay my rent.

Nigeria has many ways of extending its reach even to those of us who moved away, most dramatically with its increasing violence and spate of kidnappings, because if your brother is kidnapped, if they call you with a gun to his head, you have to send money no matter where in the world you are. We can no longer hide from Nigeria. Unless you have zero family, its tentacles reach wherever you are. You know that the hardship there is increasing, that inflation there is skyrocketing, so if you make remittances, you must increase those remittances. In these ways, Nigerians all over have an understanding of what happens in Nigeria. They support dozens of people back home. They hear the news reports, and they feel them in their pocket, too.

Friedersdorf: How has all of this affected the political views of the Nigerian diaspora?

John: I think that more people are questioning the idea of Nigeria. Especially abroad, I hear people questioning the reason why Nigeria is a single country. I dont think I have ever heard as many young Nigerians question that as I have just in the past few monthsthey have a desire to break up the country or to restructure it. And, of course, we have all of these separatist leaders who are emerging. We see Nigeria fracturing and hemorrhaging from a million cuts, and everyone is starting to think maybe we should go our separate ways, or talk about whether we want Nigeria to be a country, because we are such different people, and we are not getting along.

And now people are leaving without an end date. The idea is: When I leave, I will try to make it permanent. I don't know anyone who says, I just want to spend two years abroad. Everybody I know says, Im not going back. When I talk to my friends in Nigeria, they tell me, Dont think of coming back. Things are bad. They tell me, Whatever youre doing, make sure you can stay. With such uncertainty and violence, middle-class Nigerians are leaving in droves.

Friedersdorf: The United States is divided between people who believe our democracy is threatened and those who believe such fears are overwrought. There are concerns in Europe about the far right. How do Nigerians pondering whether and where to migrate view those questions?

John: I had a conversation with a bunch of Nigerians on Clubhouse, many of us abroad, where we discussed What is a safe place for a Black person in the world? We kept saying, you know, a white person can just up and go to Europethey mix in, and theyre fineand we kept asking, Where can a Black person go in the world and feel at home? And where can a Nigerian person go?

For a Nigerian, we cant go to South Africa and feel at home, because we experience xenophobia. Whenever theres a crisis, they attack us as Nigerians. We cant even go to Ghana, which is one of the most stable places that you can go in Africa. We increasingly have anti-Nigerian sentiment there, too, because theres a lot of us, and theres this tendency for people to feel overwhelmed by our presence. We upset the balance of things in many places by our sheer numbers alone, but also by our sheer hustle, the way we show up and we are like, Okay, were not having fun; were here for business. So often we dont feel at home elsewhere in Africa.

But we also understand the instability in some European countries. We know that this kind of far-right rhetoric is affecting local politics. In much of Europe, countries are moving to the right, you know, which means that people who are immigrants will be at the receiving end. And we certainly dont feel welcome in America, not just because of police violence or whatever, but because of the friction between Africans and African Americans, which is a very big problem.

Nigerians go to America, and they dont always support African American political movements, for, say, reparations, or progressive movements. While some queer Nigerians and women find escape by leaving Nigeria and joining progressive movements, many Nigerians are actually very conservative in their beliefs. And they are focused not on politics but on hustle. Nigerians go and say, What business is to be made? And many African Americans feel undermined when Black Nigerians get scholarships and achieve in universities and get benefits. That can grate on many African Americans, especially because some people on the right use Nigerian successes as a cudgel: You see those Black people doing well. Why wont you stop complaining about race? In turn, African Americans think, These guys dont understand our context. It annoys them that many Nigerians are oblivious to their long struggle against racism.

Of course, thats not going to stop Nigerians from coming to the U.S., because they know theres opportunity in America. They know that if they put their head down and participate in the grind, it is likely that they can make something of their lives, because America is the kind of place that, you know, if youre in the right place and you hustle right, you are likely to hit something.

So this is something Nigerians worry about: Where in the world can we feel at home too?

Read: The migration driven by developed countries

Friedersdorf: Youre always blunt, even when discussing sensitive issues. Why?

John: There is too much skirting around issues. Too many times, in academic writing and in communication in general, meaning hides in the folds of politeness, in the folds of doublespeak. Its a waste of time. How about you just say what you actually mean? And then its easier to confront whatever feelings exist. If you know, from the outset, this is exactly what I think, then we can have a conversation, then we can get angry and perhaps move past the anger. Or then you can decide, Actually, I dont want to engage with this. So it saves everybody time. I do try to not be unkind when Im direct. Im not fond of speaking without any understanding of the effect that ones words have on others. But there is elegance and utility in clarity.

And Im against attempts to stop people from speaking clearly, or stifling or criminalizing thoughts or dissent, because the only way that we can improve our thoughts and ideas is if we know exactly what other people are thinking. So I worry about this collateral damage that I see.

Friedersdorf: Do you mean that efforts to advance social justice are doing collateral damage to freedom of expression?

John: At times, yes.

I think that right now, centuries-old oppression and discrimination are being challenged, often by people who were not able to talk about themselves with human dignity before, because they werent present in the imagination of the people who shaped public discourse. Now they have the power to claim space for themselves and to say, I have been here; I demand to be acknowledged.

The demolition of injustices is good and necessary. I think of it like a house being constructed. Construction usually begins with demolition, right? Its not always elegant, and its not always painless. You know, there will be glass that will splinter, bricks that come down, that kind of thing. So sometimes we have this collateral damage that happens when things are being demolished.

But there are ways of having controlled demolitions, where you think, How can we bring down this 20-story building, this mammoth of oppression, without destroying the buildings around it?

Friedersdorf: What specifically would you recommend to people who want to demolish injustice, when they speak or converse, without destroying other important edifices in our society?

John: I want to protect free speech, for example. And a multiplicity of ideas and views. And inclusivityreal inclusivity, which is not excluding others because you want to include some. I also want to hear outliers, people who challenge even my deeply held beliefs. I need those people because outliers usually are the ones that push us to find new ways of thinking in the world. The right way to do the discourse is not to lump people who have genuine questions or disagreements with what you see as a perfectly just world with people who are antagonistic to your very existence.

Theres value in separating those groups.

I distinguish people who might mean well, but who nevertheless run afoul of what constitutes justice to me, from people who are committed to reducing the space in which I can exist as a free human with dignity. With the former, I want to reach points of compromise. And not just compromise. I want avenues of open discourse and debate. Thats more important than any type of compromise. If you have free, open conversation, you show an awareness that you alone do not have all the answers. And that youre working with other people who may have answers.

Of course, there is no substitute for having a healthy political space. One way of defining that is a space where the most privileged are open to challenge and the least privileged are sure of protectionthe most privileged are not above scrutiny, and the least privileged have, at least, safety. In between those points, the stakes are lowered in ways that open up space for conversation.

Friedersdorf: In todays political space, do you feel free, as a novelist and a satirist, to speak your own mind, or do you feel hemmed in by social pressure?

John: I have great privilege because Im able to say what I want to say, and I have a publisher that knows me, who will stand by me if I am simply expressing my thoughts. So I can talk about sex and the fact that people are so prudish, which many people are afraid to discuss, or about how people police language and dont want you to talk about your body or your politics or the things you really hate or that you really love. But right from the start, I guarded my ability to speak my mind, by showing people what to expect, so that they would not treat me like a role model.

Once youre treated as a role model, everybody wants you to say the perfect thing. But no human being is like this in real life. You know, we all want to be able to falter. We all want to be able to figure things out. Yet we elevate these people and we say, You cannot have inchoate thoughts. You cannot have thoughts in progress. You cannot have wrong thoughts. You have to always speak quickly and speak directly to every issue and also speak perfectly. You cannot say, Im thinking about this or stay silent. Then, you are supposedly siding with the oppressor.

Youre not allowed to be human anymore.

Friedersdorf: Why do you guard and value your independence so assiduously?

John: Theres a trade-off. Some people take love and adoration, and they sacrifice some part of themselves, some part of their humanity, and say, Okay, I sacrificed the ability to say what I want to sayI will say nothing that upsets anyonebut give me love, admiration, and money, and Ill take it.

Im not interested in that kind of trading. I cherish being able to say what I want to say, but not as an irresponsibly exercised freedom, like I just want to run my mouth. I try to think deeply about what I say. Thats why sometimes I dont answer questions: Im still thinking about this or that. And as a satirist, I have a responsibility to interrogate power, and there is power in what is popular.

Friedersdorf: Do you mean the power of the masses?

John: There are many kinds of power. It irritates me, simply saying a thing that many people want or expect to hear, and people say, Oh, he called out that injustice; hes so brave. I'm like, this is not bravery! Bravery is when, in spite of all of the things I have to lose, I still say exactly what I think.

Satire can become complicit with any kind of powerthe power of government, the power of a political faction, the power of what the masses likeand whenever it does, it is time to recalibrate. So we have these satirists who are super powerful, you know, they can call on Hillary Clinton, and shell show up and do an interview with them. They can call on whichever politician.

They should admit: Look, I am power now. They can't say, I'm calling out power. No, you are power. Satirists must interrogate their own positionality. I try to say, How am I implicated in this thing personally? Because satire never used to be popular. You know, it was always unpopular because it rubbed people the wrong way, and people are mostly agreeable. They want to be around agreeable people. And real satire has no intention to pander to anybodys desire for agreeability. So when my satire becomes popular, I must ask, What is the problem? Why are there so many people that are comfortable with my work? People mistakenly assume that there is just one group of powerful people, one level of power, government or old white men, blah, blah, blah. If you keep attacking them, everyone applauds, as if you are attacking power, but if everyone is applauding, then you have not properly interrogated all of the levels of power. To do so is not punching down. It is to recognize that there are many different levels of power.

Friedersdorf: So how should a satirist decide where to punch?

John: Satire is always more complicated than just punching in a certain direction, because you can possess and wield power even as others wield power over you. You can oppress even while being oppressed.

If I am being praised for my satire, I keep asking myself, Why is the applause so loud? Who are these applauding people? And I often find you guys are too comfortable. Then I zero in there, and some people always say, Oh, now you are attacking the wrong people. But they are also holders of power! What is popular has power and can be oppressive, even if it is determined by people who do not perceive themselves as powerful. If you can spur a crowd, if there are people whom you can hurt, if there are communities that can be harmed by your activity, if there are systems you can help demolish, then no, whoever you are, you are not just the good guy.

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Elnathan John on Satire and Cancel Culture - The Atlantic

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As a child in her San Antonio fourth grade classroom, Alejandra Lopez learned about the Battle of Alamo the way most Texas students do: The Anglo fighters were valiant heroes against the Mexican enemy, led by Gen. Antonio Lpez de Santa Anna.

I remember thinking, Oh no, I have the same last name as the bad guy, as the villain in this story, she said. That is really messed up, to carry that as a fourth grader.

When her father tried to tell her the story from the Mexican perspective that the white settlers were colonizers she said she didnt trust him.

I put the trust in my teachers, she said.

Years later, arriving as an undergraduate at Stanford University, she took an introductory course in Chicano/Chicana studies. She said she learned that white settlers wanted independence from Mexico largely to preserve slavery, which Mexico had outlawed, and she quickly realized that the history she had learned in K-12 had been severely lacking.

It was written from a perspective that is not the perspective of my people that is meant to indoctrinate me, a working class woman of color, into an American narrative of exceptionalism, she said. As a young brown child, I was being meant to experience history through the lens of the colonizer.

That absolutely atrocious feeling eventually helped lead her to become a teacher back in her hometown.

I wanted to teach differently than I had been taught, she said.

How Texas students learn about race and history has become an incendiary topic in recent months. In a state where more than half of public school students are Hispanic and 27% are white, many conservative state lawmakers have raised alarm about the idea of lessons that seek to reframe history lessons.

Those lawmakers have repeatedly claimed that critical race theory is being used to teach children that they are racist and that the U.S. is an irredeemably racist country. They have already passed one measure, House Bill 3979, purportedly to combat the theory, though the bill never mentions it by name nor does anything to ban directly teaching its concepts, such as racial formation and intersectionality.

Meanwhile, Gov. Greg Abbott has called for more legislation, declaring that he wants to abolish critical race theory in Texas classrooms and adding the issue to the agenda for two consecutive special sessions of the Texas Legislature. One such bill that calls for students to be taught a a commitment to the United States and its form of government has already passed the Senate and will be heard in a House committee hearing Tuesday.

But as those debates rage on, some teachers across disciplines are pressing on with approaches to teaching that are influenced by forms of critical theory such as critical race theory. These approaches look very different from how Republicans characterize it, they say.

Far from trying to incur guilt in white students or establish racial superiority, they say, anti-racist teaching efforts are about affirming and empowering all students, in light of their race, class and all aspects of identity, to be critical thinkers and agents of their own learning and to make sense of themselves, their communities and their society in complex ways.

In 2018, Lopez and other colleagues founded PODER, the social justice caucus of the San Antonio teachers union.

I was angry at the fact that a district that has over 96% students of color was not equipping teachers to meet their needs, to teach in a culturally relevant way, said Lopez, who is now president of the union.

The group runs trainings several times a semester that roughly 20 teachers from across the district join, discussing teaching methods based on Gloria Ladson-Billings work on the intersection of education and critical race theory.

At one recent training, Lopez told teachers about a monthlong project she carried out in her second grade classroom. The class first reads a book titled Milos Museum, in which a young Black child feels alienated at a museum and goes home to create her own community museum. Students then go through artifacts at home, choose something thats meaningful to them and set up a community museum in the classroom. Family members come and act as guides.

It shows, These are the things that are meaningful to me in my community and showcases them in a way where the children feel pride and their identities are being affirmed, she said.

Another PODER co-founder, Luke Amphlett, trains teachers about the concept of counternarratives and uses them in his U.S. history classroom at Burbank High School in San Antonio.

On the first day of class, he shows his students a double-layered painting where a portrait of Thomas Jefferson is pulled back, revealing the image of Sally Hemings one of the people he enslaved, and the mother of six children he fathered.

Every year, almost all of his students recognize Jefferson in the painting by Titus Kaphar, he said, but not a single student can name Hemings.

His class in a high school where 98% of students are Latino or Latina and more than 87% are economically disadvantaged then discusses why that is, the significance of that and through whose perspective American history is usually taught.

They realize in that moment, on day one, that theyve basically understood the story of this country through the eyes of powerful, rich, white men, he said.

He said that teaching a history grounded in counternarratives is not just about representing and including multiple groups, which is important but its also about thinking about why some groups have been left out or put in the limelight, as well as what that says about our current society.

There is a deep, rich, complex view of the world, and view of the past, that can emerge from the fact that we have people in different intersectional positions of power and oppression in society, he said. Some of those stories are amplified and some of them are erased.

Teachers are doing this work amid an ongoing backlash against efforts to discuss and address racism in America, as lawmakers and parents raise alarm around what they call critical race theory.

State Rep. Steve Toth, R-The Woodlands, said that much of the new critical race theory law, which he authored, was motivated by concerns he heard from parents who feel their kids are being indoctrinated.

Weve heard, You should feel guilty for what [white people have] done, he said. We have heard, Youre people of privilege, and you should feel guilty for that privilege.

During the regular legislative session, Toth cited Not My Idea, a childrens book examining how power and privilege affects white people, as the main example of critical race theory in Texas classrooms, claiming it was being recommended in Highland Park schools though the district said it was not being used.

Meanwhile, the issue has become a talking point in districts and school board elections across the state as some parents say the theory sows racial division and indoctrinates students into a far-left ideology.

The majority of teachers want to get back to teaching kids how to read and write at an early age, and as they progress through the process, how to be critical thinkers, to think for themselves not to indoctrinate these children, Toth said. Critical race theory does not teach a child how to think critically.

Teachers and experts say that no one is teaching critical race theory in classrooms, nor are they teaching Republicans characterizations of it. Angela Valenzuela, an education policy professor at the University of Texas at Austin, called the idea that teachers are blaming their white students for systemic racism a false, exaggerated claim.

Amphlett said that these teachers arent trying to force students to reject the dominant account of historical events, but instead are teaching them to critically weigh multiple perspectives and understand the complex, political, subjective ways that knowledge is created and understood. They teach them to be engaged in that process as critical thinkers in what he called the opposite of indoctrination, he said.

[We] will caution students not to accept the counternarrative on face value just because its different from the dominant narrative, but to develop complex syntheses of these different approaches to perspectives on history, he said.

Keffrelyn Brown, a teacher-educator and professor of cultural studies in education at UT-Austin, said this tenet of critical race theory is essential to anti-racist teaching that knowledge has never been neutral.

Because of the way that power has operated, there have been Eurocentric standards that have defined what counts as what we know, she said.

When Andrew Robinson, an eighth grade U.S. history teacher at Uplift Luna Preparatory in Dallas, teaches about Christopher Columbus, he gives them multiple perspectives including a cartoon video that shows the dominant narrative that in 1492, Columbus sailed the ocean blue, excerpts from Columbus journal that show his attitudes toward Indigenous people, historical documents describing his abuse of them and an article that defends Columbus actions. Afterward, he asks the students to write about what they think and why.

Giving them multiple perspectives gives kids a chance to consider, OK, what is propaganda, what am I being fed here and why am I being fed this? he said. It gets them asking questions and hopefully gets them interested to a point that they become self learnerswhere theyre going in and looking stuff up and reading stuff on their own.

Even before that, he teaches material about Indigenous communities and histories that arent in the state curriculum. This works to counter the dominant narrative that American history began when Columbus arrived.

Brown, the UT-Austin professor, said that kind of approach can be used in all subjects.

For example, in arts education, she helps teachers think about questions like, Who are the musicians and the visual artists that get identified as important for all students to learn about? What are the approaches that are left out, or that are not valued in the same way?

And Lopez, the San Antonio teacher, said the approach applies to all aspects of students identity and learning, not just race.

When you talk about culturally relevant pedagogy or anti-racist education, people think that its just about race they dont recognize that systems of oppression affect people in an intersectional way, Lopez said. Race is central and very important, but it is not the only way that dominant ideology perpetuates itself in our education system.

For example, she noted that class is also an important factor.

If Im only showing them books about people who have an upper middle class background, then my students who come from a working class background are still not going to see themselves reflected, she said.

Many teachers pursuing anti-racist work find solidarity in formal and informal networks of like-minded educators. One such group, Educators in Solidarity, was formed after the shooting of Mike Brown in 2014 and connects teachers in Austin committed to anti-racist teaching.

Eliza Gordon, one of the groups co-founders, said one of its arms is a cultural proficiency and inclusiveness team that plans a yearly conference, which last year had more than 800 attendees and focused on themes like reimagining discipline practices. A legislative and policy arm does political advocacy, including organizing against HB 3979 during the regular legislative session. The group has 28 active members, most of whom are full-time educators, and engages more than 1,500 people across social media and newsletters.

One member, AISD kindergarten teacher Elizabeth Wilson, heads a teacher mentorship program that connects about 15 newer teachers at a time with more established teachers to offer support and guidance for doing anti-racist work.

That relationship and that mentorship has been really powerful and empowering teachers to say no, this is important and even though Im a first or second year teacher, I understand that this critical work needs to be done, she said.

She said that EIS has given her a crucial community and support network.

Sometimes when youre doing this work, and you feel like youre in isolation, it can feel like, Wait, am I crazy? Is this right or wrong? she said. Having a network of teachers who you know you can lean on is really helpful.

These networks will be even more important as the school year begins and HB 3979 takes effect, Amphlett said. Hes spearheading a group called the TEACH Coalition, which currently has about 20 professors and K-12 educators across the state meeting weekly to prepare to support teachers.

Theyre preparing an academic defense of critical race theory, which is helpful to their practice despite not being something they directly teach students. But overall, they plan to focus more on the laws underlying attack on anti-racist education. In the works are events and teach-ins for teachers to learn more about anti-racist and culturally relevant teaching, as well as curriculum resources theyre developing and plan on disseminating to teachers. They created a statement against HB 3979 that has more than 300 signatures.

The purpose of our work as anti-racist educators is not to be Democrat or Republican its to do whats right for every kid, Gordon said. And to make sure that when we go into a school building, were honoring kids lived experiences and their stories.

Disclosure: University of Texas at Austin has been a financial supporter of The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization that is funded in part by donations from members, foundations and corporate sponsors. Financial supporters play no role in the Tribune's journalism. Find a complete list of them here.

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I wanted to teach differently than I had been taught: How some Texas educators practice anti-racist teaching - The Texas Tribune

What is happening in Haiti? What led to the assassination of President Jovenel Mose, a right-wing figure until recently aligned with the dominant foreign interests in the country?

Although the situation is still unclear, in detailing the circumstances, there is no doubt that transnational imperialism has once again put its foot in the stirrup in Haiti, through its main weapon of war and politics, the United States. Local authorities point the finger of responsibility at the United States and vice versa. It is likely that both are right and that there was a collusion of sectoral interests in the face of the tragic negligence of Jovenel Mose, who was a successful businessman exporting bananas and had no previous experience of political activity.

It is important to remember that Haitis territory was literally occupied by the United States through the marines for two decades, between 1914 and 1934, with the objective, not hidden by President Woodrow Wilson (President 1913-1921), of protecting US economic interests. These are structural problems of society.

What is the scale of the crisis in Haitian society?

In Haiti, there is a very serious multifaceted crisis. Political, social, and economic. The national state has lost its monopoly on the use of legitimate violence and the result is that violence has spread. The capital Port-au-Prince is dominated by rival gangs and the practice of kidnapping people and making ransom demands has become recurrent in the country. Gang rapes happen, out of any control.

Parliament was due to be re-elected in January 2020. But the elections were not held. Famine and rising commodity prices are terrible. And such a situation confirms the ineffectiveness of international organizations and international occupations such as MINUSTAH (United Nations Stabilization Mission in Haiti, which lasted from 2004 to October 2017), whose real objective is to maintain order and not to pacify.

MINUSTAH, by the way, has benefited from a significant participation of Bolsonarist military leaders from Brazil, who, in some cases, even try to shield their actions in that country from criticism.

Exactly. General Carlos Alberto dos Santos Cruz led the United Nations Mission in Haiti from January 2007 to April 2009. He held the secretariat of Bolsonaros government, after which he opposed the government. General Floriano Peixoto Vieira Neto, commander of the mission between April 2009 and April 2010, also became secretary general of the Brazilian presidency at the beginning of the current administration. General Edson Leal Pujol, who led MINUSTAH from 2013 to 2014, was commander of the Brazilian army from 2019 to February 2021. Tarcsio Gomes de Freitas, Minister of Infrastructure, served from 2005 to 2006 in Haiti as head of the technical section of the engineering company of the Brazilian Peacekeeping Force. General Otvio Rgo Barros, former spokesman for the Bolsonaro government, was commander of the 1st Infantry Battalion of the Peace Force. Fernando Azevedo e Silva, former Minister of Defence, held the position of Chief of Operations of the Brazilian contingent in Haiti from 2004 to 2005. And, General Lus Eduardo Ramos, current secretary of government to the president [since 21 July 2021], served from 2011 to 2012 in the Brazilian troops in Haiti.

Not to mention, of course, General Augusto Heleno, current head of the Internal Security Cabinet (GSI) and right-hand man (we might say!) of the president, who was the first commander of MINUSTAH in 2004. He is strongly suspected of being responsible for a massacre in the poor district of Cit Soleil, in Port-au-Prince, in 2005: operation Poing fort, with 300 soldiers, invaded this community and caused about 70 deaths, including women and children, after firing 22,000 shots. The fact is that Lulas government, after drawing accusations, withdrew General Heleno from Haiti.

We note that the military presence in Haiti has served as a kind of laboratory for the genocidal policy of the Bolsonaro government, including the federal intervention in Rio de Janeiro in 2018, commanded by General Braga Netto, current Minister of Defence. The latter was not in Haiti, but went directly to the seat of the operation, acting as military attach to the United States in 2013-14.

It should not be forgotten that the legitimately elected Haitian President Jean-Bertrand Aristide was deposed in 2004 by the US army with the support of the French and Brazilian governments, among others. It is a question of controlling the poor and black populations in a situation of increasing poverty, in Haiti and here in Brazil.

Haiti has a specific and little-known history, which stands out in the Americas. How do you relate the countrys past to the present?

Haiti was the first country to proclaim the abolition of slavery and the second to proclaim its independence in the Americas. At the beginning of the nineteenth century, the French thinker Abb Grgoire (1750-1831, who argued in the Constituent Assembly for the abolition of privileges and slavery as well as universal male suffrage) stressed that Haiti was like a beacon that shone in the West Indies, bringing hope to the oppressed and arousing the hatred of the oppressors. The Haitian revolution highlighted the capacity for struggle of enslaved workers and their ability to transform society, destroying slavery and colonialism.

Haiti has always been the scene of violent disputes between the powers, and, after its independence, it became a wasteland due to the action of France and other European countries. Little by little, the US has established itself as the new leader. The victorious Haitian independent state at first defeated all the European powers and the United States politically and militarily. But these countries have gradually regained control of the economy and have exercised a kind of terrible revenge.

There is a strong break with the historical past and memory in international perception. Haiti is usually presented today as the poorest country in the Americas. And thats it. The concealment of the Haitian revolution is symptomatic and is one of the ingredients of oppression. Although a large part of the Haitian population, the oppressed majorities, know who Jean-Jacques Dessalines, the slave who proclaimed independence in 1804 and who also became the most popular figure in voodoo, was. The historical past is in permanent reconstruction and in tension with the present.

In the end, isnt the level of interventionism in the country, given its anti-imperialist pioneer past, a cruel and real representation of a certain racism and white supremacism, bequeathed by colonialism and slavery that are at the root of these discriminatory ideologies? Are we not talking about a country punished by bourgeoisies inherited from this historic stage who are simply unable to deal with the self-determination of non-white peoples?

Yes, it is a good way of understanding what is happening in Haitian society today, beyond the stereotypes of poverty and violence. The Haitian revolution initially brought a dose of political, economic, and social liberation. But even these partial achievements were to be destroyed by colonialism and imperialism. And, it is worth saying, with alliances between the new local elites which emerged from independence and colonialism. The Revolution itself, with its clearly liberating dimension, already bore the germ of its self-destruction, which would be realized in an alliance between national and international dominators; now most of the population is oppressed by the exploitation of its labour power and the concentration of land, even if they are no longer slaves.

Although Cuba and Haiti have presented themselves as two rebellious Caribbean islands, there are differences in this process. What happened in Haiti after independence was an anti-blockade. The new nation-state struggled to structure itself in a sovereign manner, despite the determination of some of its leaders and the population, because the isolation then imposed on Haiti led to a frantic race by the European powers and the United States to a predatory and unregulated trade. Without customs tariffs, charging abusive prices, in a looting imposed by force. That is why the current situation is inherited from post- and counter-revolutionary violence, based on racism, on white supremacy on the notion of considering as unacceptable the sovereign and popular autonomy of the black and mulatto population as protagonists of their own history.

Haiti and Cuba have been (and are) the protagonists of a striking example of resistance to capitalist models and white supremacy, despite the many specificities and dissimilarities of their respective historical trajectories. This explains the treatment they are currently receiving, including from the mainstream media.

In this sense, we have seen this type of tension manifest itself here in the recent case of the burning of the statue of the bandeirante (adventurers who from the 17th century penetrated Brazil in search of mineral wealth and reducing Amerindian populations to slavery) Borba Gato in So Paulo (in the early 18th century, he was appointed General Superintendent of Mines and set up two huge fazendas, named Borba and Gato

First, my total and unrestricted solidarity with comrade Paulo Galo, one of those who are still in prison [following this attack on the statue of Borba Gato], and to all those who participated in or supported in any way the attack on the monument. They are political prisoners in this frightening and sick Bolsonarist Brazil in which we live.

The mainstream media were not outraged when the statues of the Soviet leaders were destroyed with much more violence. On the contrary, such acts were considered a gesture of freedom and civilization... It is therefore not the defence of the integrity of works of art that is at stake here.

What saddens me most in this episode is that the statue of Borba Gato remains intact with its structures firm. Businessmen in So Paulo have already offered to finance its restoration, which will not be complicated. It is a crude metaphor for Brazils history. Colony, independence, empire, republics, and domination metamorphoses, but its general features remain. It has emerged almost unscathed from the offensives to which it was subjected. Therefore, the hypocritical bourgeoisie is affected by attacks on monuments but supports or is indifferent to the daily attacks of the state against the poor population in Brazil. It mourns the memory of those who enslaved Indians and blacks, but not that of the Amerindian peoples and Afro-descendants who are massacred in our daily lives. How many thousands of black people and natives have been beheaded by characters like Borba Gato!

It is necessary not only to destroy all the symbolism of these monuments, but also to move forward and create new reference symbols. This applies to the past, present and future of society. Let us get to know and not forget the Haitian revolution.

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Haiti has always been the scene for violent conflicts between the powers - International Viewpoint

Anti-capitalism, progressive alliances, trans rights and more: here's how the debate is shaping up.

The Green Party of England and Wales leadership election is now in full swing. And on Monday, members were given their first proper opportunity to question the candidates at the first leadership hustings.

All five tickets were represented with Tamsin Omond representing team Womack/Omond, Martin Hemingway representing team Hemingway/Rothery and Carla Denyer representing team Denyer/Ramsay. [Former deputy leader Shahrar Ali and 2019 election candidate Ashley Gunstock are standing individually.]

Over the course of two hours, we learnt a lot about the candidates and their campaigns. Here six of the big takeaways.

Progressive alliances used to be all the rage. Caroline Lucas and Jonathan Bartley were big advocates for them when they stood successfully for the leadership in 2016. A number of Greens stood down for Labour or Lib Dem candidates in the 2017 general election. In 2019, the controversial Unite to Remain pact saw Greens enter an alliance with the Liberal Democrats and Plaid Cymru.

But this years crop of leadership contenders are much less enthusiastic.

While less strident in his opposition, Shahrar Ali a well known critic of the strategy implied at the hustings he remained opposed.

Martin Hemingway said that he didnt see how a progressive alliance could realistically get rid of the Tories and deliver PR.

Carla Denyer said she agreed with the idea of a one off progressive alliance to deliver proportional representation in principle. But she also made clear that Labour have to come on board, that shes not holding out hope and that the Greens should make clear that Labour are the stumbling block.

Tamsin Omond was noncommittal, instead choosing to talk about the need to grow the partys membership and strength so as to strengthen its hand in the event of any negotiations with other parties. Nevertheless, Omond described progressive alliances as an interesting preposition. Hardly the ringing endorsement.

Ashley Gunstock was the only contender to explicitly commit to progressive alliances, arguing they were key to getting rid of the Tories. He made this case even in his opening remarks. Later, on the specific question, he said I dont think we can avoid getting into positive progressive alliance.

One of the questions posed to candidates was whether the Green Party is an anti-capitalist party. In what will be music to the ears of the partys left, all candidates more or less agreed.

Tamsin Omond quoted Audre Lordes masters tools proposition before going on to argue that a system built on capitalism and colonialism that has extraction at its heart cant deliver climate justice. They continued by repeating the old Green adage that we cant have infinite growth on a finite planet.

Carla Denyer said yes I think I do agree that the party is anti-capitalist. She went on to say that the party is in the business of moving beyond capitalism but this needs to be better messaged for the public.

Martin Hemingway pitched the Green Party as a party opposed to growth and therefore an anti-capitalist party. He said the party was pursuing different economic ends to those that capitalism pursues.

Shahrar Ali was in agreement and branded capitalism a faulty economic system.

Ashley Gunstock was also in broad agreement that the party is anti-capitalist.

The format of Green Party hustings dont lend themselves well to conflict between panelists. And hustings over Zoom are are never going to bring such conflicts to life in the way they would in person. Even without the format enabling candidates to respond to each others points or to come back in and debate an issue the body language and human connection from a face to face event allows this to bleed through much more readily.

So by all measures the first hustings was incredibly cordial. Despite some pretty significant disagreements (well come to that), for the most part the hustings remained cordial. Candidates calmly responded to the questions in turn.

In 2020s leadership election, some of the hustings became a lot more heated. Given the stakes, and the nature of disagreements in this years contest, this may well happen again as the campaign goes on.

It will be of little surprise to people following the contest even with the most passing of interest that the issue of transphobia was the primary point of disagreement among contenders. Bundled together in a question on how to tackle both antisemitism and transphobia within the party, the responses from candidates on both these issues were illuminating.

Ashley Gunstock had little to give in terms of practical steps of tackling these issues. He did, however, give a flavour saying that tackling them is all about education to stop people being afraid of things they dont understand.

He spoke at greater length about antisemitism, recanting stories of his work with school children organising pro-Palestine protests, and his telling them that they shouldnt conflate the Israeli government with Jewish people.

Carla gave additional context for her response. She argued that the issues with transphobia in the party were part of a bitter so-called culture war over trans rights.

Although saying that neither transphobia or antisemitism in the party would be fixed overnight, she said that we need take a clear and consistent line in support of trans rights, against antisemitism. She went on to say that she and Adrian Ramsay wanted to make the party more welcoming and inclusive and to work with liberation groups to facilitate workshops on oppression where people can ask questions and learn about that oppression.

She also argued that the disciplinary committee needs to be better resourced to tackle complaints around transphobia and antisemitism. Denyer also reiterated her support for the motion to Green Party Conference which is calling for guidance on antisemitism to be embedded into the partys constitution. That guidance would include a range of definitions of antisemitism including that of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA).

Tamsin Omond came from a similar position on the issues as Denyer. They made the case that reaching out communities experiencing oppression, building trust with them and listening to their experience was crucial.

In addition, Omond said that they and Amelia were committing to build new accountability processes within the party to shut down hate speech. Omond also stated that if elected they would establish a panel made up of liberation groups that would be regularly consulted on issues effecting them.

Martin Hemingway took a notably different approach. He started by saying that he did not believe antisemitism or transphobia were major issues within the party. He clarified this by arguing that disagreement on antisemitism was mostly about whether the party should adopt the IHRA definition. Hemingway went onto say that he supports the Jerusalem Declaration as an alternative to the IHRA definition.

On transphobia, he acknowledged that there was a deep divide within the party, claiming that it was a case of two sides shouting at each other. He said that Tina Rothery and himself would not take one side or the other. His proposed solution on the issue was to create an assembly of members that could come to a balanced position on trans rights.

Shahrar Alis response will be unsurprising to many. His decision to make supporting those who disagree with the partys policies on LGBTIQA+ rights a central plank of his campaign mean his views on this are well known.

At the hustings, he did not give an answer on what he would like to see done to tackle transphobia and antisemitism in the party. However, he did say that he believed womens free speech as being oppressed in discussions around trans rights. He also described a vocal minority of supporters of trans rights as extremely nasty.

On antisemitism, he argued that allegations of antisemitism were in some instances being used to stop people from criticising the state of Israel.

Given the clearly polarised views on these issues it is more than likely well see similar exchanges in future hustings.

Many of the candidates responses to members questions were strong. Often they were thought through, evidenced and passionate.

However, there were moments where it became apparent that candidates werent hugely on top of the detail, and hadnt been well briefed by their teams. To some extent this is understandable. In a hustings, all manner of questions on all manner of questions can get thrown at you.

Nevertheless, at some points candidates lack of knowledge was apparent. This was most clear on a question on the governments Health and Care Bill. Most candidates branded it inadequate before pivoting to talk about their general position on the NHS.

In the context of a leadership hustings, it doesnt matter all that much. Theres no follow up question from a prying interviewer. But if elected, much mustard will remain uncut if they arent able to answer confidently on a wide range of issues.

Members were blessed in the hustings as former leader [and LFF Contributing Editor] Natalie Bennett was in the chair. From admissions of having too many tabs open to keep an eye all the functions of Zoom, to her attempt to explain how random.org works to determine candidates speaking order, Bennett brought a warm, entertaining approach to the whole affair. Candidates seemed at ease. Im sure the audience was for the most part too. If there was a winner from tonight, it was Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle.

Chris Jarvis is editor of Bright Green, and Head of Strategy and Development at Left Foot Forward. This piece was first published by Bright Green.

Image credit: Bristol Green Party Creative Commons

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6 things we learnt from the first Green Party leadership hustings - Left Foot Forward