All posts by nedhamson

Activist, writer, researcher, addicted to sharing information and facts.

PSA: Your Transphobia and Body Shaming Isn’t Radical

I don’t even know if a humiliation mode of politics, in a fractured America, serves any purpose other than self-satisfaction and smug liberalism, at the expense of meaningful dialogue and grassroots change. But even if you were to disagree on that, there are so many better ways to publicly deride Trump than to throw the people progressives claim to protect under the bus, in the name of a tasteless political joke.

Source: PSA: Your Transphobia and Body Shaming Isn’t Radical

France’s Burkini Bigotry – The New York Times

After bans on full-face veils, head scarves in schools and rules about students’ skirt lengths, France’s perennial problem with Muslim women’s attire has taken its most farcical turn yet with a new controversy over the “burkini,” body-covering swimwear whose name is an amalgam of burqa and bikini. As of Thursday, five French mayors had banned the burkini, calling it, variously, a threat to public order, hygiene, water safety and morality, tantamount to a new weapon of war against the French republic. Thierry Migoule, an official with the city of Cannes, the first to ban the burkini, declared the swimwear “clothing that conveys an allegiance to the terrorist movements that are waging war against us.”This hysteria threatens to further stigmatize and marginalize France’s Muslims at a time when the country is listing to the Islamophobic right in the wake of a series of horrific terrorist attacks. And with presidential elections scheduled for next spring and the right-wing National Front’s popularity on the rise, French officials and politicians have leapt to support the mayors.

Source: France’s Burkini Bigotry – The New York Times

Burkini ban: The garment’s Australian designer says the French are ‘digging a hole’ for themselves – ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)

Ms Zanetti said that was out-dated thinking, because women were the ones making the decision to buy the swimwear.”I think he is digging a hole for himself where women will be purchasing the garment no matter what,” she said.”If they are banning them in their beaches, [women] should be holidaying in Australia.”The Collective Against Islamophobia in France (CCIF) last week filed a complaint against the bans.The group’s spokesman Marwan Muhammad said they restricted fundamental liberties and discriminated against Muslim women. “This summer we are witnessing a hysterical political Islamophobia that pits citizens against one another,” he said.

Source: Burkini ban: The garment’s Australian designer says the French are ‘digging a hole’ for themselves – ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)

Justice Department says it will end use of private prisons – The Washington Post

Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates announced the decision on Thursday in a memo that instructs officials to either decline to renew the contracts for private prison operators when they expire or “substantially reduce” the contracts’ scope. The goal, Yates wrote, is “reducing — and ultimately ending — our use of privately operated prisons.”“They simply do not provide the same level of correctional services, programs, and resources; they do not save substantially on costs; and as noted in a recent report by the Department’s Office of Inspector General, they do not maintain the same level of safety and security,” Yates wrote.

Source: Justice Department says it will end use of private prisons – The Washington Post

Meet Palestine’s animal rights activists | +972 Magazine

Ahmad Safi, a PAL employee, gave us a presentation about their work. I was amazed by the amount of knowledge he had on animals in Palestine. He told us about their rescue operation to save animals from Gaza’s Khan Younis zoo who hadn’t eaten for 52 days during the 2014 Gaza War, and on treating working animals: the volunteers go to villages where donkeys and horses work the land, vaccinate them and instruct the owners about treating them respectfully.They also have a campaign to raise awareness among children about their pets.“We have to break the cycle of violence,” he said. “We have to tell these kids that what they see the occupation doing – killings, incursions and raids into their villages and schools – is not a natural reality. This violence eventually comes out on defenseless animals, and kids think it’s all right because violence is king. Everybody harms the weaker, and animals are an easy target.”“We try to convey to them that we are all living creatures, and we all have feelings – animals and human beings alike, “Sham, a volunteer, explains. “The same way we fear a tank or an armed soldier, they do too. We are under the occupation together, and therefore should help every living creature.”“It says so in the Qura,” Jiwa adds.Our ancestors didn’t eat meatI ask them whether they are vegan – khudaryat, in Arabic, meaning “herbivores.”“Sort of,” says Siham. “I barely eat meat. Since I became involved in this I noticed I don’t like the taste that much.”“I am vegetarian,” says Dana. “I gradually stopped eating murdered stuff, I can’t put in my mouth something that was once living.Sham says she does not proselytize or try to enforce anything on her family. “Palestinian cooking has so many vegetables. Even if they eat meat and I eat salad and rice, I’m happy.”“So many vegetables, yes,” adds Jiwa. “And how can you open a cafeteria without falafel? It has all the iron and protein that you need. Who needs shawarma?”“But meat is a requirement at any special meal,” I say. “Look at the iftar meal after Ramadan. Is there an Arab dinner party anywhere that doesn’t have meat?”“That’s right, Safi says. “We were taught meat was prestigious. But what did our ancestors eat? Plants and vegetables. They ate meat only once a week because they couldn’t afford it. Meat-eaters were considered the rich ones, that’s why it took over our diet. The meat industry here uses hormones profusely, we learned that from Israel. The owner of one of the biggest chicken farms in Palestine said that he learned from Israelis how to feed his chickens a mixture of chicken meat leftovers, intestines, hormones, antibiotics and some seeds, instead of the regular food, to make them fat quickly, and cash in on it. Since when did Palestinian farmers start growing chickens like that? It’s all about the money. Jews and Palestinians want to be as rich as they can.”

Source: Meet Palestine’s animal rights activists | +972 Magazine

American Xenophobic Racist Murders Lebanese Man Because He’s “Filthy Lebanese Ay-rab” | A Separate State of Mind | A Blog by Elie Fares

Vernon Majors did not kill Khalid Jabara because he had an “unusual fixation” with his Lebanese neighbors. He killed them because he was a xenophobic racist terrorist murderer.If the tables were turned and Khalid had been the person to whom all those criteria apply, you wouldn’t have hesitated to apply them. You’d have even decided what his entire background was judging by his name, the color of his skin, and the country where he came from.That’s not different from what Vernon Majors did. It’s not “unusual fixation,” it’s him making sure Khalid’s family knew they were: ‘dirty Arabs,’ ‘filthy Lebanese,’ ‘Aye-rabs,’ and ‘Mooslems,’ as he told them repeatedly to make sure they knew their place in his world. Not that it matters in the grand scheme of things, but the Jabara family is Christian.The story goes back to last year when Vernon Majors willingly ran over Khalid Jabara’s mother trying to kill her. Unfortunately for him, she did not die, and he ended up in jail, but like the good white American that he is, Vernon Majors saw himself out of jail a few weeks ago, back to the same streets, neighboring the Jabara family, and wanting to take out his revenge on them.Picture this: a man who willingly ran over a woman trying to kill her ends up in jail for one year, with no conditions on his bond — no ankle monitor, no drug/alcohol testing. It was as if he never entered.The Jabara family learned of his release. They also knew he had a gun. They also notified the police who informed them they couldn’t do anything, because second amendment and all. Minutes after the police left, Khalid went outside of his house to get the mail, and he was fatally shot by Vernon Majors, who has since been apprehended.

Source: American Xenophobic Racist Murders Lebanese Man Because He’s “Filthy Lebanese Ay-rab” | A Separate State of Mind | A Blog by Elie Fares

Feeling honored)

نادية حرحش

Honor List

Congressman Paul Findley published a book in the 1970s called “They Dare to Speak Out”.  He listed many examples of courageous individuals who speak truth to power with regard to US policy in the Middle East.  Speaking out against Israeli occupation, oppression, and apartheid is not cost free but the reward of being able to live with one’s conscience is priceless.  This list is just a sampling of names of people we consider with honor for heir honest and truthful stand for peace with justice:
Examples of Individuals with good work for peace with justice (please send names of/info on others you think should be listed to mazin at qumsiyeh dot org)

http://qumsiyeh.org/honorlist/

View original post

The Rise Of The Right Isn’t All Just About Class | Race Files

Consider the religious right. Are they a class movement? I argue no. They’re self-described cultural warriors, organized out of a born-again evangelical movement that rose as a response to sudden changes brought about by the baby-boom/free love/civil rights/anti-war/feminist uprising of the mid-last century by leaders who politicized what it meant to be “born-again,” exploiting the conservatism that dominated a cultural movement. During the height of religious right wing attacks against LGBTQ people and abortion, we were in a growing economy. The spoils of that growth may have been hoarded almost exclusively by the top ten percent, but the perception of good times was widespread throughout the middle class, and was demonstrated through the enthusiasm with which so many middle-classers responded to dot.com bubble investment opportunities that went bust. Never has the stock market been such a popular forum for the articulation of “hope” married to individualism than during the tech-bubble 90s.So let’s get this one straight so that class reductionists don’t steal the real opportunity presented by the fight against the right: class matters absolutely, but the rise of the right isn’t near as much about class as it is about culture, who gets to control it, and what that means about American cultural identity.I know opponents of “identitarianism” (the term for identity activists who they equate with neoliberals) will hate this, but those of us they’ve labeled “identitarians” include a not inconsiderable faction that understands that identity politics is, maybe, one of the most virulent expressions of anti-intellectualism out there. That’s right, we are able to hold a critique of identity politics while also having the sensitivity to recognize that you have to start with people where they’re at when you’re organizing a popular front for change. It’s an act of walking and chewing gum at the same time that I strongly recommend.Culture and identity are inseparable. We are cultural animals. This is what makes people distinct from other species. Identity is what holds cultures together. In order to win a more just world, we need to put political change in the context of cultural transformation and acknowledge this reality and not waste our effort trying to wish it away.

Source: The Rise Of The Right Isn’t All Just About Class | Race Files