If you want to receive this bulletin regularly (about every two weeks) email newengland (a) nefac [1].net. For more info about NEFAC go to www.nefac.net [2].
NEFAC New England e-Bulletin | Vol. 2, No. 3
Action Alerts
1) Bennington Healthcare Human Rights Hearing (Vermont)
2) Fletcher Allen Techs Need Your Supporters (Vermont)
3) Call for Submissions ~ Queer Voices Zine
4) Fax and Phone Campaign to Support Herman Bell and Jalil Muntaqim
5) Carlos Alberto Torres Parole Campaign
News & Views
6) Colibri Workers: We Won't Wait
7) Two Hundred Vermonters Rally To Stop the Budget Cuts
8) Rising Tide Boston Crashes Talk by Arch Coal CEO
9) Hundreds Attend Vigils to Protest State Budget Cuts
10) Video: Military Recruitment at Schools in Maine
11) Aren’t You People Over That ‘Rick Warren’ Thing Yet?
12) This Crisis is Fundamental Crisis of Capitalism, Immanuel Wallerstein
Events
13) Film: The Visitor (Metro Boston)
14) Film: Two Towns of Jasper (Connecticut)
15) Film: Fenced Out! (Connecticut)
16) Film: Neighbor by Neighbor: Mobilizing an Invisible Community in Lewiston, Maine (Maine)
17) Mexico Solidarity Network Speaking Tour (Metro Boston)
18) Readings from Rachel Corrie (Southern New Hampshire)
19) Women, Healthcare and the Economy (Metro Boston)
20) Boston Workers Alliance Open House (Metro Boston)
21) Organizing in the New Economy (Western Mass.)
Action Alerts
1) Bennington Healthcare Human Rights Hearing
Thursday, February 19th
7-9pm
Unitarian Universalist Meetinghouse
108 School St., Bennington, VT
For months, volunteers for the Vermont Workers' Center have been surveying Vermonters from all across the state about their experiences with the healthcare system. The results have been clear: Vermonters believe that healthcare should be a human right, and many are suffering because of lack of access to affordable, quality healthcare. The crisis continues to worsen as the state's budget problems have led to painful cuts to State health programs, exacerbating the crisis for thousands of Vermont families.
On Thursday, February 19, this conversation comes to Bennington as part of the "Healthcare is a Human Right" campaign, which is coordinated by the Workers' Center, to build a movement that can help reform the State's healthcare system so it will guarantee care to all Vermonters regardless of income. This event is also being sponsored by the Bennington Area Regional Council. The testimony about the impact the lack of access to healthcare has had on the lives of area families will be heard by a community listening panel comprised of faith leaders, health professionals and other community leaders. "It is really exciting that this event is happening," says Charlie Murphy, a Bennington resident who is helping organize the hearing. "People have to come out to build a movement to get the healthcare we need."
2) Fletcher Allen Techs Need Your Supporters
Almost 600 hospital technicians at Fletcher Allen Health Care (FAHC) are organizing to form a union, as the nurses did back in 2002. The techs and nurses are now calling on FAHC Administration to recognize their right to organize and not waste thousands of healthcare dollars on an expensive anti-union campaign. Since they formed a union in 2002 they have improved their working conditions to such a degree that what was a critical nursing shortage virtually disappeared. The union simply made the hospital a better place to work. When they formed a union there were about 1200 nurses, now there are over 1600, and the overall patient care at the hospital has improved dramatically. Now the hospital tech's are organizing for the same reasons, to ultimately create better care at our community hospital. Just like we supported the nurses back in 2002 and have continued over the years during their struggles to improve staffing at the hospital, we need to be support the hospital techs.
Petition at:http://www.unionvoice.org/campaign/techs
3) Call for Submissions ~ Queer Voices Zine from Queers Without Borders blog
Calling All Those with Queer Sensibilities–From CT to Beyond! Queers Without Borders is Going to Print Again and We Need Your Help! In Connecticut (as with most places throughout the world) there is a decided lack of queer voices in media. In Hartford, this often seems doubly the case.
Queers without Borders is a multi-issue group arguing for a radically different conception of politics—one that does not separate struggles for sexual dignity from struggles against racism, sexism, class exploitation, and the policing of gender conformity. We house a blog site at http://queerswithoutborders.com/wpmu/ [3] but want to add queer voices to print media (especially in the greater Hartford area) to provide an alternative to the politics-as-usual approach of existing publications geared toward the LGBT community (and beyond!).
With this in mind, we need YOUR help!!! This is a call for submissions to our second print publication, Queer Voices. Reformatting into a ‘zine format, we have focused this issue on personal experience. Send us your stories, poems, comics, etc. (the sky would be the limit, if we believed in such things as “limits”) for print in our second issue of Queer Voices! We are especially looking for pieces that outline personal experiences with queer identity, politics, theory, and practice. As well, we seek submissions that take note of the intersections between the politics of sexuality, race, class, gender, nation of origin, ability, age, and any host of subjectivities that have been formed into hierarchies in our often messy world.
After all, none of these identities exist independently of the others and to talk of one is to talk of them all (even when ignored, what goes unsaid is often as telling as what is actually articulated)! Submissions should be emailed to queerswithoutborders@gmail.com [4] by March 15th, 2009. Thank you for your time and submissions! Projects like this cannot exist without the active involvement of many! We need YOU! We need each other!
Yours in solidarity,
Queers without Borders!
4) Fax and Phone Campaign to Support Herman Bell and Jalil Muntaqim
To all celebrating Black History Month:
Black History Month is a time to not only celebrate, educate and embrace Afrikan contributions, but a time to continue upholding the legacy of our unsung Afrikan heroes, many of whom sacrificed a great deal in the times of the Civil Rights and Black Liberation Movements. 1,000's of Afrikan people have been held captive as Political Prisoners or Prisoners of War for holding America responsible for its injustices.
Martin Luther King Jr., Rosa Parks, Kwame Ture and Huey P. Newton were all incarcerated for political reasons.
Many of the men and women who stood beside the civil rights and black liberation heroes of yesterday are still incarcerated today.
Jalil Muntaqim and Herman Bell (of the San Francisco 8) are two of many who sacrificed so much during the Civil Rights and Black Liberation Movements.
Both have been held captive since the early 1970's. Jalil and Herman are being denied of their right of parole hearings because neither the California nor New York Governor will act on their request to be transferred to NY in order to work on their parole hearings.
"Phone for Parole!" every Monday during Black History Month
Let us commemorate Black History Month by simply calling or faxing for the immediate transporting of Jalil Muntaqim and Herman Bell for parole hearings.
"Phone for Parole!" every Monday during Black History Month
Please look at the attached letter for more details on this injustice. Feel free to use it as a basis for your fax or phone call.
Free the SF 8!!
Honorable David A. Paterson
Governor of the State of New York
State Capitol
Albany, NY 12224
FAX: 1-518-474-1513, 1-518-474-3767
david.paterson@chamber.state.ny.us [5]
This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it
phone: 518-474-8390
February, 2009
Dear Governor Paterson:
I call upon you to immediately approve the already agreed upon transfer of Herman Bell and Anthony Bottom (aka Jalil Muntaqim), back to New York State custody to attend their parole hearings.
Mr. Bell and Mr. Bottom have been languishing in the San Francisco County Jail for over two years. Their case is at least four months away from preliminary hearings, but red tape continues to block the implementation of their transfer.
The San Francisco County Jail does not have the proper facilities or capacity to hold people for an extended period of time, and two years in sub-standard living conditions, woefully limited visits and little to no access to proper medical care or activities has had devastating effects on Mr. Bell and Mr. Bottom and their families.
Both of these men have been incarcerated for over 35 years and are model prisoners. Their return to New York State is essential in order for them to be present for crucial parole hearings. It is unfair and cruel to deny them this right.
Additionally, Mr. Bottom has submitted a fully documented application to you for clemency/commutation of his New York sentence. Please do not allow Mr. Bottom's custody in California to lessen the urgency of acting on his compelling case.
Please act now to end this injustice.
Sincerely,
_____________________
(Print Name)
_____________________
(Signature)
________________________________________________________________
(Address)
________________________________________________________________
(Address)
5) Carlos Alberto Torres Parole Campaign
Link: http://prolibertadweb.tripod.com/id19.html [6]
News & Views
6) Colibri Workers: We Won't Wait by Fuerza Laboral
Link: http://www.fuerza-laboral.org/news.php [7]
7) Two Hundred Vermonters Rally To Stop the Budget Cuts from Vermont Workers Center blog
Link: http://www.workerscenter.org/node/30 [8]
8) Rising Tide Boston Crashes Talk by Arch Coal CEO by Rising Tide Boston
Link: http://boston.indymedia.org/feature/display/206859/index.php [9]
9) Hundreds Attend Vigils to Protest State Budget Cuts from Vermont Workers Center blog
Link: http://www.workerscenter.org/node/13 [10]
10) Military Recruitment at Schools in Maine from Maine Video Activist Network
Link: http://www.roundpointmovies.org/roundpointmovies/MVAN.html [11]
11) Aren’t You People Over That ‘Rick Warren’ Thing Yet? by elian maricon (Queers Without Borders blog)
Link:
http://queerswithoutborders.com/wpmu/blog/2009/02/15/arent-you-people-ov... [12]
12) This Crisis is Fundamental Crisis of Capitalism, Immanuel Wallerstein by Suh Jae-jeong
Link: http://english.hani.co.kr/arti/english_edition/e_national/332037.html [13]
Events
13) The Visitor
Wednesday, February 18th
7pm
Lucy Parsons Center
549 Columbus Ave., South End, Boston, MA
The Boston Interpreters Collective invites you to meet collective members, learn about becoming a member, eat some food and enjoy.
"The Visitor" (2007)
"Sixty-two-year-old Walter Vale (Jenkins) is sleepwalking through his life. When his college sends him to Manhattan to attend a conference, Walter is surprised to find a young couple has taken up residence in his apartment. Victims of a real estate scam, Tarek (Haaz Sleiman), a Syrian man, and Zainab (Danai Gurira), his Senegalese girlfriend, have nowhere else to go. As the friendship between the two men deepens, the differences in culture, age and temperament fall away.
After being stopped by police in the subway, Tarek is arrested as an undocumented citizen and held for deportation. As his situation turns desperate, Walter finds himself compelled to help his new friend with a passion he thought he had long ago lost. And it's through these new found connections with these virtual strangers that Walter is awakened to a new world and a new life and insight into deoportation's horrors.
14) Two Towns of Jasper
Friday, February 20th
7-9pm
Wrench in the Works
861 Main St., Willimantic, CT
Info: donnathecatwoman@juno.com [14] / georgekingiv@yahoo.com [15]
In 1998, a black man named James Byrd, Jr. was dragged to death from the back of a pickup truck by 3 white men outside of the town of Jasper, Texas. This award-winning film is about the effects of this crime on the people of the town. Using a black film crew to film the black community and a white film crew to film the white community, the film makers are able to depict the very different realities of each.
A discussion will follow the film.
15) Fenced Out!
Sunday, February 22nd
5pm
Metropolitan Community Church
155 Wyllys St., Hartford, CT
QWB Dinner and a Movie
COME OUT- COME OUT - FROM WHEREVER YOU ARE !
Join us to view Fenced Out a video from FIERCE NYC. Fenced OUT documents the struggle of LGBTSTQ youth of color to save the Christopher Street pier and the West Village from re-development and gentrification. While researching the history of the pier, FIERCE members discovered past generations of queer peoples’ fight for use of public spaces at Christopher Street and the piers. We have continued to use the documentary as a public education tool to raise awareness about the increasing displacement, violence, and criminalization experienced by LGBTSTQ youth of color.
A movie not to be missed by anyone who is interested in our Queer Youth of Color activism as told by those who experienced and lived the struggle.
Queers without Borders invites you to dinner before the movie and to join in a discussion after the movie, Facilitated by Regina Dyton and Kamora Herrington.
*Free will offering accepted
RSVP: queerswithoutborders@gmail.com [4], or call 680-7876
16) Neighbor by Neighbor: Mobilizing an Invisible Community in Lewiston,
Maine
Thursday, February 26th
6:30-8:30pm
Lewiston Public Library
200 Lisbon St., Lewiston, ME
Info: (207)782-3604
In Callahan Hall, the premiere of Neighbor by Neighbor: Mobilizing an Invisible Community in Lewiston, Maine, a feature-length documentary by local filmmaker Craig Saddlemire (http://www.roundpointmovies.org/roundpointmovies/neighbor.html [16]), in collaboration with the Visible Community, about five years of social justice organizing and urban redevelopment in downtown Lewiston.
Discussion will follow.
Free admission. Co-sponsored by the Visible Community
17) Mexico Solidarity Network Speaking Tour
Saturday, February 28th
2pm
Mexico Solidarity Network Spring Tour with Edith Lopez Ovalle: Human Rights and the Other Campaign: Political organizing and culture.
Edith is a 25-year-old artist and a member of Hijos por la Identidad y la Justicia contra el Olvido y el Silencio (HIJOS) where she Works with the Committee on Art and Politics. HIJOS is a member of the Otra Camp?nd works around questions of human rights, particularly the death and disappearance of social actors. The parents of most of the members of HIJOS were political prisoners, and many were killed or disappeared in the 60s, 70s and 80s. HIJOS is a multi-national organization founded in Argentina and with chapters in Guatemala, El Salvador, Colombia, Chile and Mexico. HIJOS works at the cultural level with innovative public events like “escraches” that draw attention to human rights violators. In “escraches,” protestors hold vigils or demonstrations in front of the homes or offices of human rights violators, calling public attention to their illegal acts in front of neighbors and fellow workers. HIJOS also renames streets, replacing the names of known human rights violators with dissident heroes. For more information on HIJOS, see www.hijosmexico.org [17]
Link: http://www.mexicosolidarity.org [18]
18) Readings from Rachel Corrie
Thursday, March 5th
6:30-9pm
Portsmouth Public Library
175 Parrott Ave., Portsmouth, NH
Info: (603)436-2424 / skyarne@yahoo.com [19]
The Palestine Education Network presents a Palestine teach-in, in the Levenson Room of the Portsmouth Public Library with Readings from Rachel Corrie, moving and informative journal excerpts of a young American woman killed in Gaza by an Israeli bulldozer while she was protesting Palestinians from a house demolition..
19) Women, Healthcare and the Economy
Saturday, March 7th
9am-1pm
Plumbers & Gasfitters Local 12
1240 Massachusetts Ave., Boston, MA
WILD in the Winter
Workshops:
-Working for Single Payer Health Care
-Investing in Health Care as an Economic Stimulus
-La Reforma de Seguro de Salud del Estado.
Lunch will be served. Childcare available upon request.
20) Boston Workers Alliance Open House
Saturday, March 7th
12-3pm
BWA Office
411 Blue Hill Ave., Dorchester, MA
The Boston Workers’ Alliance invites you to visit our new office in Grove Hall. Please join us in celebrating our growth, thanking our supporters and building our power for change.
Stop by our Open House to meet the leaders of the BWA. Hear about our efforts to win jobs and CORI reform, and find out how you can support the movement. The Open House will be a casual standing event. Families are welcome. Light lunch will be served.
21) Organizing in the New Economy
Saturday, March 14th
8:30am-1:30pm
Gordon Hall, UMass Amherst
418 N. Pleasant St., Amherst, MA
WILD in the Winter West