Press Release: In solidarity with the Unist’ot’en March 30 Global Day of Action, supporters demonstrate and deliver message to Chevron Global Headquarters in San Ramon, CA

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE 

Contact: Annie Banks

Phone: 415-728-1134

Email: anniembanks@gmail.com

In solidarity with a global day of actions happening all over North America on March 30, a group called Anti-Colonial Queer Action (ACQA) traveled from San Francisco to San Ramon, CA (Ohlone Territories), where Chevron has its global headquarters, to demonstrate against fracking pipelines on Unist’ot’en and Wet’suwet’en territories and deliver a message from the Unist’ot’en to Chevron.

ACQA hoisted a banner that stated “No Fracking Pipelines on Indigenous Territories,” to the flagpoles outside of Chevron’s compound at 6001 Bollinger Canyon Rd. Afterwards, members of ACQA read out and delivered a letter, written by Unist’ot’en spokesperson Freda Huson.

The letter outlines the Unist’ot’en’s inalienable rights to their lands and to defend their lands. Chevron Corporation and all associated investors have acquired 50% ownership of the proposed Pacific Trail Pipeline project, a project which has already been evicted from Unist’ot’en lands. The letter is a warning of trespass to anyone who is infringing upon traditional Wet’suwet’en territory.

“The Unist’ot’en Camp is a resistance community created to ensure that no pipelines will ever cross Unist’ot’en traditional territory. They act to protect the land and the increasingly unstable climate, to do what is best for future generations.” – “Stop Fracking Chevron” flyer

Chevron’s impacts reach from up north in Unist’ot’en territory down to the Bay Area and around the world. In the Bay Area, Chevron’s emissions from their Richmond refinery are responsible for impacting the health of frontline communities, which are primarily communities of color. Impacted communities around the Bay Area have been organizing against the harms from Chevron’s toxic emissions.

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Read the Unist’ot’en’s letter here: http://calamites.resist.ca/wp-content/uploads/2012/12/Chevron-Letter.pdf

Stop Fracking Chevron Flyer here: http://calamites.resist.ca/wp-content/uploads/2012/12/Chevron-Flyer.pdf

Unist’ot’en Camp website: http://unistotencamp.com/

Session 8 readings: Deconstructing Class: Building Analysis and Power

This sessions readings, both required and recommended. All of the readings are from the Anne Braden Program, of which I am currently a part. Please email me or comment here if you would like further resources, want to discuss any of these or have any resources to suggest!

Paul Kivel, “Where Are You in the Class System?” from You Call This a Democracy?

Betsy Leondar-Wright, “Working Definitions” from Class Matters.

Molly Hein, “Diagram” from Karen Pittelman and Resource Generation, Classified: How to Stop Hiding Your Privilege and Use It for Social Change.

Donna Langston, “Tired of Playing Monopoly” from Margaret L. Andersen and Patricia Hill Collins, eds., Race, Class and Gender: An Anthology.

bell hooks, “Feminism and Class Power” from Where We Stand: Class Matters.

David Gilbert, Looking at the White Working Class Historically.

Gil Fagiani, “Community Organizing: White Working Class Communities – 1970s”.

James Tracy, “The (Original) Rainbow Coalition – An Interview with Bobby Lee”.

The Patriot People’s News Service, cover.

The Young Patriots, Program.

The Young Patriots, flyer for NYC benefit.

Barbara Joyce, “The Young Patriots”.

White Lightning (newspaper), cover and article.

“Organizing Poor Whites in Chicago: A Chronology”.

Michael James, “Getting Ready for the Firing Line: Organizing in Uptown in the 60s. Remembering JOIN Community Union.”

Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz, “Red Diaper Baby?” from Red Dirt: Growing Up Okie.

Linda Stout, “PPP: Creating Our Own Model for Social Change” from Bridging the Class Divide.

Sharing links re: Indigenous solidarity, “allyship”, local struggles and more

From a number of folks that I have had the privilege of meeting recently, here are some resources about Indigenous solidarity, “allyship” and local struggles, that have been mentioned, discussed and shared; I put the word “allyship” in quotations as it’s a term that I feel is important to not take on as a title or claim but rather to think about the meaning of being “allied” with someone and/or a struggle without claiming it or focusing on an identity related to this alliance rather than the work itself.

Also, a number of these resources I first came across in the Unsettling Minnesota Sourcebook, “Unsettling Ourselves: Reflections and Resources for Deconstructing Colonial Mentality,” available online as a .pdf here and also available to order as a hardcopy here.

Additional links/resources:

“Heteropatriarchy and the Three Pillars of White Supremacy” by Andrea Smith (article)

“White Supremacy Culture” by Tema Okun (article)

“Understanding Colonizer Status” by Waziyatiwin

“So You Want to be an Ally!” (zine)

“Harsha Walia on Anti-Oppression, Decolonization, and Responsible Allyship” (video)

“White Shamans and Medicine Men”, Pt. 1 – 3 (video)

“Decolonization is not a metaphor” by Eve Tuck, K. Wayne Yang (article)

And,  here is a film I was fortunate to see recently, about the land struggles happening here in the Bay Area:
“Buried Voices”, which chronicles some of the struggle to protect a local sacred place, led by Ohlone and Miwok people.

Any resources that you would suggest? Please add in the comments!

Session 7 readings: Imperialism and Global Peoples’ Movements for Justice

Check out these fantastic links for Session 7, on Imperialism and Global Peoples’ Movements for Justice:

Weather Underground Organization, Map from Prairie Fire: The Politics of Revolutionary Anti-Imperialism: Political Statement of the Weather Underground 

Elizabeth Martinez and Arnoldo Garcia, National Network for Immigrant and Refugee Rights, “What is Neoliberalism? A Brief Definition for Activists.” 

Stephen Howe, “Some Clarity…And Its Limits” from Empire: A Very Short Introduction.

Arundhati Roy, “Come September” from WarTalk.

Salim Vally, “From South Africa to Palestine, Lessons for the New Anti-Apartheid Movement,” Left Turn, April 2008.

Mazen Masri, “No Backing Down on Palestinian Right of Return,” Left Turn, April 2008.

Vijay Prashad, “Introduction” and “Conclusion” from The Darker Nations.

Notes from Nowhere Collective, “Emergence: An Irresistible Global Uprising” from We Are Everywhere: The Irresistible Rise of Global Anticapitalism. 

Peoples’ Global Action, “Hallmarks of Peoples’ Global Action (changed at the 3rd PGA Conference in Cochabamba)”.

South African Congress Alliance, The South African Freedom Charter.

Winnie Madikizela-Mandela speech on Freedom Archives (audio).

George Katsiaficas, “Eurocentrism’s Blind Eye” from Asia’s Unknown Uprisings Volume 1: South Korean Social Movements in the 20th Century. 

George Caffentzis and Silvia Federici, “A Brief History of Resistance to Structural Adjustment” from Democratizing the Global Economy. 

Program Demand Group of the Labor/Community Strategy Center, excerpt from “Towards a Program of Resistance”.

Letter from Subcomandante Marcos to Mumia Abu Jamal, April 24, 1999 from Our Word is Our Weapon: The Selected Writings of Subcomandante Insurgente Marcos.

June Jordan, “Moving Toward Home” from Living Room: New Poems. 

“Non-Aligned Movement” from Wikipedia.

“Global Resistance, Africa to Palestine”, audio of Amilcar Cabral, Winnie Madikizela-Mandela, Nelson Mandela, Chris Hani, the South African national anthem, and June Jordan, at Freedom Archives.

Youtube video of Gopal Dayaneni speaking at Catalyst Project’s Global Resistance Panel, March 27, 2011.

Arundhati Roy interview, “War Talk” on CNN.

Elizabeth ‘Betita’ Martinez, ed., “Manifest Destiny or Imperialism?” from 500 Años del Pueblo Chicano/500 Years of Chicano History. 

A Responsibility of Talking to Each Other (Part 2)

I followed up my first post in the “Talking to each other series” at the Becoming Collective (a collective blog about transformative relationships that I am part of where I get to write with Sarah Hunt and Morgan Clare) by writing about the question, “Why should white settler people oppose and work against racism and colonialism?”. You can read it here. 

Part 3 coming soon!

Week 6 readings: The Black Liberation Struggle

Here are the readings from our Week 6 session, which included an immensely powerful session from guest facilitators Alicia and Juana from POWER!

Vincent Harding, “American Bondage, American Freedom” from There Is A River: The Black Struggle for Freedom in America.

Angela Davis, “Reflections on the Black Woman’s Role in the Community of Slaves” from Beverly Guy-Sheftall, ed., Words of Fire: An Anthology of African American Feminist Thought.

Ewuare Osayande, “A Raging Flood of Tears” from South End Press Collective, ed., What Lies Beneath: Katrina, Race and the State of the Nation.

Lydia Potts, “Map of Translatlantic Slave Trade” and Illustration of Slave Ship” from The World Labour Market: A History of Migration.

Historical photographs from The Transatlantic Slave Trade and Lynching in the U.S.

Sweet Honey in the Rock, James Baldwin and Freedom Songs on Black Liberation Audio Part One at FreedomArchives.org (audio)

Malcolm X and Assata Shakur on Black Liberation Audio: Part Two at FreedomArchives.org (audio)

Marilyn Buck: A Tribute, video by Freedom Archives at vimeo.com (video)

S.E. Anderson, “The Slave Trade and Capitalism” from Black Holocaust for Beginners. 

Audre Lorde, “For Assata” from The Black Unicorn: Poems.

Additionally, there were a selection and additional suggestions of books available at Week 6’s session that I wanted to share here:

Black Reconstruction by W.E.B. Du Bois

Assata: An Autobiography by Assata Shakur, Angela Davis

The Color of Violence: The Incite! Anthology by INCITE! Women of Color Against Violence

Ella Baker and the Black Freedom Movement: A Radical Democratic Vision by Barbara Ransby

Review: Letters from Mississippi: Reports from Civil Rights Volunteers and Freedom School Poetry of the 1964 Freedom Summer edited by Elizabeth Martinez

Open Veins of Latin America: Five Centuries of the Pillage of a Continent by Eduardo Galeano

This Bridge Called My Back: Writings by Radical Women of Color edited by Cherríe Moraga and Gloria E. Anzaldúa

Transgender Warriors: Making History From Joan of Arc to Dennis Rodman by Leslie Feinberg

What Lies Beneath. Katrina, Race, and the State of the Nation edited by South End Press Collective

When the Prisoners Ran Walpole: A True Story in the Movement for Prison Abolition by Jamie Bissonette

Also, another Braden participant shared this interview with the incredible June Jordan from the From the Vault radio archives