Category Archives: human rights

Climate Refugees and a Collapsing City | Inter Press Service

“Over the next two to three decades millions of people will no longer be able to live and earn their livelihoods from farming and fishing as they are now,” said Saleemul Huq, a senior fellow with the Climate Change Group of the International Institute for Environment and Development.Conversely, prolonged droughts are affecting arable land by causing soil erosion and damaging crops that depend on predictable monsoon patterns.The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) estimates 20 million people will be displaced in Bangladesh in the coming five years. That is more than the cumulative populations of Los Angeles, Chicago and New York City. And this should be very worrying.Even now, many of the half-a-million-plus people who move their families – along with their hopes – to Dhaka, are driven there by the effects of climate change.

Source: Climate Refugees and a Collapsing City | Inter Press Service

Mimi Writes…….: The Man and The Pumpkin Pie ~ A Thanksgiving Story by Mimi Lenox

Wednesday, November 25, 2015

The Man and The Pumpkin Pie ~ A Thanksgiving Story by Mimi Lenox

It is tradition on this blog to re-post this story every Thanksgiving.

A lot changed in the years that followed, but it still stands as one of the clearer defining moments of my life. I am incredibly proud of my son and see in him a kindness I admire. I am also thankful for so many things this year, including the love of family and friends. I hope you and your family have a safe and wonderful holiday. ~ Mimi

When my son was fifteen he did something stupid. Not criminal, not earth-shattering, just knuckle-head-not-thinking stupid. His dad, my ex-husband, gave him the usual “Atta boy, don’t do that again” talk, the school got their three days without his smart mouth and I was left with the what-am-I-gonna-do-with-this-child? nightmare invading my dreams.What am I going to do with this child? The conversation went something like this: “You know I love you so I’m not even going to preface this punishment with I love you because you’ve already gotten a slap on the wrist but OK OK I love you.”“Yeah, I know Mom.”He started to walk away. “Well, I hope you’ll still love me when I tell you what your punishment is going to be.”Although I vowed never to give the think of all the starving children speech to my child (I broke that rule many times), this time I went for the jugular. Mine was bulging. “What were you THINKING?! Do you think you can just go through life handling things this way? Do you know how privileged you are? (yeah Mom) Do you understand that there are kids in this world who would love to have your life? (yeah Mom) Why are you choosing to mess things up for yourself? Do you know that you can’t play sports now? (yeah Mom) Are you listening to me?! If you don’t get your act together young man you’re going to end up somewhere you don’t want to be and I’m not bailing you out. Do you hear me? (yeah Mom) You have no idea how close you came to getting in serious trouble today, do you? Do you? Well, DO you?? (a surly yeah Mom….See, I told you, listen to the smart mouth.) What you do right now in school will determine your future. And now you have a bad mark on your academic record and a three-day suspension before high school. You are out of control!”“So ground me,” said the smart mouth.“No. I will not ground you.”He halted.“What are you going to do?” he asked.“Just think of it as Mama’s jail.” The smart aleck ceased for a moment and then I heard a surly, “Whatever, Mom.” I was furious with him and at my wit’s end. He needed to see how the real world works. I made arrangements. It took some doing but they finally saw it my way. “You want your son to do WHAT? But he’s not a criminal (not YET I thought) and we’re not a juvenile detention center.” (Well……) “Will you please allow us to do this?” I asked the nun-like administrator of this facility. “I’m not trying to teach him a lesson here- that is not the point- but he needs to see and understand with his own eyes how lucky he is and how his actions now can affect the rest of his life.” So, for the next two months that summer we got up at five am, drove to another town and worked in a homeless shelter’s soup kitchen. It was the worst of the worst neighborhoods.

I had cleanup detail (you didn’t think they’d let me near the food now, did you?) and he served the line. “What are we doing here?” he asked. I never told him why. He didn’t need another lecture.’Think of all the starving children’ just got real.

After one week of losing his summer sleep to ride an hour in my car at the crack of dawn – with my music blasting all the way – and mingle with very old people volunteers and stir canned creamed corn in a pot for an hour he said, “Why didn’t you just send me to REAL jail?! I hate this!” Uh huh, I thought. Just stir, buster.

In the middle of the second week he started to actually get up before I did. “Hurry up, Mom. We have to get going.” (Oh great, I thought. He’s met a pretty girl at the homeless shelter. That’s the only reason he would get up at five am. My plan has backfired. Drats!) And what was this grand revelation I expected him to learn? Heck if I knew. I was just a parent with an unruly fifteen- year -old with no respect for himself or his elders or his life. I didn’t even know if it would make a difference.

All I knew was that somehow the corn and pintos and no-extra-dessert-for-you rule would magically translate into a light-bulb moment for him. Osmosis maybe? I just knew this was the right thing to do but I didn’t know how or why. One early afternoon as I started to clean the lunch tables with a large wet rag and a bucket of soapy water, rearranging the napkins and utensils for the next meal, I looked up to see my sleepy-headed son talking with a man through the narrow serving window.

My boy had just served lunch. There was pie for dessert that day.

Pumpkin pie.

He was dirty. Shaky.
No teeth. Scraggly. Scary. Smelly. 
And hungry.

The rules were clear. One serving per person. No seconds. Period.
 No one was looking. And I’m thinking….We’re going to get thrown out of the soup kitchen for not following the rules. Oh great! Suspended again. And this time I’m going down with him. Oh the shame. Until…..

The man who wanted more pie.
 Up until this point he rarely made eye contact with anyone in the line, especially not the kids. He plopped the food on the plate and reached for the next empty Styrofoam sadness shuffling through. People with their entire families in tow. Hungry folks down on their luck and needing not even a hot meal. Just a meal. Families living in cars through no fault of their own. Unemployed. On the street. Raggedy clothes crossing elbows with his Tommy Hilfiger jeans and watch.
Pork ‘n beans, wax beans, any beans. Didn’t matter. Please feed my child. My little girl is hungry.
  I saw it in their eyes. The sadness. And the shame.

I was so moved that summer. Apparently, I needed a reality check too. But that was not the point. Was it?
 The man would not stop asking and my son was forced to look him squarely in the eyes. I could see the wheels turning in baby boy’s brown-eyed head….. “Will you shut up? I’m going to get in trouble if you don’t go away!”

Silence. 
 
 And a hungry stare full of embarrassment and shame that a life-giving gesture lay in the hands of this kid he did not know and would never know – someone young enough to be his grandchild – who held something he wanted.. something he had to beg for. And then I saw my son slip a plump piece of pumpkin delight (with whipped cream) onto the scraped clean empty plate. The man nodded appreciatively, lowered his head, and walked away.
 
 By this time my wet rag had dropped to the table and the cleaning had stopped. My hair in a net, pretending to fold silverware sets, I watched what happened. He saw me sit down. I waited for someone to say something. I waited for him to get in trouble. I waited for my own hands to stop shaking. 
 
 No one saw his discretion that day but I’ll tell you this – If I could have jumped through the tiny little window and wrapped my arms around that boy I would have done so.
 He was shuffling his hundred dollar Nike-shod feet standing with a spatula and an empty pan, trying not to look at me. When our eyes finally met, the blur of tears between us said what no lecture ever could. We never talked again about the man, the pie, or his punishment.
But I was proud.

We finished our tour of shelter duty as promised and school started again in the fall.
That was twenty-one years ago.

 
 Did that summer stop him from forever being a knuckle-head? No.
Did he straighten-up-and-fly-right from that moment on? No.
Were there more nightmare dreams for me through the teenage years? Yes.

But I have to believe that it shaped his understanding of the world a bit and through all his troubles and challenges in life that most certainly came later, I did see – and continue to see – a great compassion develop in him for people in need.

 
 And to this day, every time I’m offered a slice of pumpkin pie…. 
I see a homeless man, a prized piece of dessert and brown-eyed humility.

Mine.

Source: Mimi Writes…….: The Man and The Pumpkin Pie ~ A Thanksgiving Story by Mimi Lenox

Portugal′s new prime minister seeks alliance with far left, greens | News | DW.COM | 24.11.2015

Costa’s appointment as prime minister on Tuesday came after his unprecedented anti-austerity alliance with Communists, Greens and the radical Left Bloc toppled Portugal’s 11-day-old conservative minority government this month, after a dramatic parliamentary vote in October.Following the success of the pact, Costa is now trying to persuade the Portuguese President, Anibal Cavaco Silva, to allow him to form a government with the Communist Party and the Left bloc.Anti-austerity measuresThe key aim of the alliance is to ease austerity measures which were adopted after Portugal’s 78 billion-euro ($83 billion) bailout in 2011. The country only stopped receiving payments in May 2014.Austerity seemed to be reaping its first positive results in 2015, with the Portuguese economy growing 1.5 percent in the first half of this year compared to the same period last year. The unemployment rate also fell to around 12 percent, compared to 17.5 percent in early 2013.The opposition, however, claims that austerity has hit the middle class too hard and “destroyed millions of Portuguese lives,” according to the Communist Party official Jeronimo de Sousa.The leftist alliance intends to roll back tax cuts, as well as cuts in pay, pensions and public services. There has also been speculation about restoring several public holidays that were cut to boost productivity.

Source: Portugal′s new prime minister seeks alliance with far left, greens | News | DW.COM | 24.11.2015

Omar Robert Hamilton: Welcome to Lesvos – Guernica / A Magazine of Art & Politics

It’s the next morning, dawn, my tenth day on the island of Lesvos. I’m driving to the camp, cigarette in one hand, phone in the other, clothes unchanged. I unlock the phone and it goes straight to Facebook. I’m confused at first. There’s a message in Arabic to a woman in Sweden:My darlingI’ve crossed the seaI’m near AthensMy phone is deadThen I understand. I remember the young man from the night before. He’s gone on. I will never see him again. I swallow a little surge of exhausted emotion and drop the phone on the empty passenger seat. Clouds are gathering fast around the mountain peak. It will rain today. And when it rains people die.

Source: Omar Robert Hamilton: Welcome to Lesvos – Guernica / A Magazine of Art & Politics

What Does Belonging Look Like? – Global Gallery – TakingITGlobal

“Isolation is the feeling of sitting alone at the bottom of a well. Connectedness is the feeling of belonging.” Kim SamuelWhen you hear the word belonging, what images come to mind? What memories, feelings and life experiences have informed your personal sense of belonging? How are young people today fostering a culture of belonging and inclusion within your community?A sense of belonging is a human need, like the need for food and shelter and who we are is shaped by the people who we are connected to! Our communities thrive when people feel connected, welcomed, accepted for who they are and supported by those around us.We are interested in reflecting together on the theme of belonging in order to grow a global movement of fostering social connectedness.In the past, geographic boundaries often defined our identities and communities. In a digital age, people are either feeling hyper connected or excluded from opportunities for meaningful connection.We invite your imagination, voice and perspective on depicting visual representations on the theme of belonging so that we tackle the issue of isolation together.Our plan is to curate an online collection and exhibit to showcase at international conferences and events to inspire decision makers in policy making and action. With that in mind, please include a description with the image or video that you submit to provide additional context on the meaning of what you create.

Source: What Does Belonging Look Like? – Global Gallery – TakingITGlobal

Donald Trump on waterboarding: ‘Even if it doesn’t work they deserve it’ | US news | The Guardian

Donald Trump touted the benefits of waterboarding in a campaign rally on Monday night, telling a crowd that “you bet your ass” he would bring it back into use.Addressing thousands of people in Columbus, Ohio, the Republican frontrunner praised waterboarding, an interrogation method that has been called torture. “I would approve more than that,” he said.Trump told supporters: “Would I approve waterboarding? You bet your ass I would. In a heartbeat. I would approve more than that. It works.”The Republican frontrunner then added “… and if it doesn’t work, they deserve it anyway for what they do to us”.Trump is not the first Republican candidate to endorse the use of waterboarding, which involves simulating drowning, in an attempt to elicit information from terror suspects.

Source: Donald Trump on waterboarding: ‘Even if it doesn’t work they deserve it’ | US news | The Guardian

UNHCR: ′ We can′t cope with mass Burundian refugee influx in Tanzania′ | Africa | DW.COM | 23.11.2015

The United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) has warned that heavy rains, flooding and a spike in new arrivals could threaten the lives of over 110,000 Burundian refugees living in overcrowded camps in Tanzania.An upsurge of new arrivals in the camps in April saw the figures rise to almost 180,000 Burundian and Congolese refugees in Tanzania. The violence in Burundi sparked by President Pierre Nkurunziza’s bid for a third term has claimed at least 240 lives and sent more than 200,000 Burundian fleeing to neighboring countries.

Source: UNHCR: ′ We can′t cope with mass Burundian refugee influx in Tanzania′ | Africa | DW.COM | 23.11.2015

Massive Rolling Strikes Shut Down Quebec | Labor Notes

After provincial bargaining stalled, 400,000 public sector workers across Quebec walked out in October and November on rolling one-day strikes.The government is proposing pension cuts and only a 3 percent salary increase over five years. Since coming to power in April 2014 it has already begun cuts to services, including slashing health and education funding.The Common Front, a coalition of Quebec public sector unions, is coordinating the strikes, which include teachers, health care workers, and government employees. Members voted to authorize six days of strikes per union. These began with one-day strikes, staggered by region. The Common Front vowed that if no agreement was reached, all members would strike at the same time December 1-3.Labor Notes interviewed Benoit Renaud and Philippe de Grosbois, who have both been on strike. Renaud is an adult education teacher in the city of Gatineau and a member of the La Fédération Autonome de L’enseignement. de Grosbois teaches in a pre-college program in Laval and is an executive of his local, which is part of the Confédération des Syndicats Nationaux.At the time of the interview, a December general strike was still planned. However, the Common Front recently announced it’s postponing the strike while negotiations continue.

Source: Massive Rolling Strikes Shut Down Quebec | Labor Notes

Russell Brand: The Usefulness (or Not) of a Working-Class Celebrity Activist | Working-Class Perspectives

It is true that Brand does sometimes appear to take over and speak for the people he is supporting, and this could be frustrating for activists wanting to talk about their issues on their own terms. And some of his commentary has been arguably misguided or counter-productive. He famously stated in an interview prior to the most recent British general election that voting was not useful, and this may have influenced some working-class people (particularly young people) to not vote, which was against their interests.Brand also doesn’t always acknowledge his privilege – particularly his white privilege. In an episode of his YouTube web series The Trews, he suggested that anti-austerity protestors should show some love for the police in order to bring them into the fold. This might be fine for a white man with resources to fight police charges, but not so easy for people of colour who are subject to police harassment. This demonstrates a level of naivety and the cushioning effects of his fame and fortune.Despite this, the class-based criticisms of Brand point to the threat he poses as a working-class background celebrity activist. His fame allows him a platform and his popularity among his fans means many people listen to what he says and are potentially influenced by his views. At the Sydney show, fans cheered at his mention of causes which mainly affect working-class people.The mainstream media is very middle-class. Journalists and commentators tend to be privately educated. There has been a ‘gentrification of the left’, and few working-class voices are heard in politics and the media. Most Left-wing commentators are middle or upper class and despite their good intentions and commitment to social justice causes, their voices dominate. There’s much to admire in the work of Owen Jones, for example, but his social and educational capital means he is not likely to be ridiculed due to his accent or choice of words.When Emma Watson made her gender equality speech in the United Nations she was applauded for her restraint and simple eloquence. When Brand speaks he is accused of being verbose. The combination of working-class accent and intelligent speech is one that seems to particularly irk middle-class commentators across the political spectrum. Brand has the kind of visibility and fan adoration that most political commentators or journalists will never experience. Dismissing him as a narcissistic loud-mouth is arguably a way to silence him and to diminish the working-class causes he has championed.Brand is a comedian, and comedy is a powerful weapon. Comedy can educate, enlighten, and empower. Comedians often speak truth to power, and a celebrity comedian with a political message for working-class people has the potential to be quite powerful indeed. Brand deserves the same respect as middle-class commentators. His ideas should be discussed, debated, and even dismissed at times. But not because he doesn’t have the benefit of an expensive private education or a university degree or because he is loud (or ‘mouthy’ as English people say). He has as much right to occupy the public sphere as any Oxbridge or Ivy League graduate. Brand might not be responsible for starting a working-class revolution, but he might just inspire some of his working-class fans to get involved with politics, to join activist groups, to demand social justice.

Source: Russell Brand: The Usefulness (or Not) of a Working-Class Celebrity Activist | Working-Class Perspectives

Nationalistic or Culture War Breeds More War…

According to the political scientist Ulrike Guérot at the European Democracy Lab, the West’s double standards contribute ultimately even to the reinforcement of IS. “The talk of ‘defending our values'” in the “war on terror,” merely steadies “the stirrups, for, first, an exorbitant buildup of police and security measures throughout Europe,” and “second, for an exorbitant military buildup, for which more finances can be mobilized at the bat of an eyelash, than we would have been ready to spend on the refugees.” “The sorely felt discrepancy between our proclaimed values and reality is a breeding ground for IS,” explains Guérot. “We are certainly the rich, but, since quite some time, no longer the “good guys,” in the eyes of many. Some even see us as the barbarians.” “With each drone that fires a missile and bombards IS bases, IS will blow up our European cities and we will be even more terrified,” warns this former employee of the German Council on Foreign Relations (DGAP), the German Marshall Fund of the United States (GMF), and the European Council on Foreign Relations (ECFR). “As long as we do not understand that each person’s life is just as precious, we will have lost the fight against IS already, even before it has really begun.”[6]

Source: www.german-foreign-policy.com