5.5 Million Women Make Wall of Support for Rights

[Photo: Sabarimala Temple in Kerala, India (Anjana Menon).]

By Vijay Prashad
Source: ZNet

Editor's Note

When I saw this article, I was really surprised. Five and a half million people is a lot of people. It is and even more when that is 5.5 million women in one state – Kerala, India. There is under-reporting, and then there is outright silencing. I had actually heard a report on NPR several weeks ago about a woman who had slipped into the temple. ONE woman, and the uproar it had caused. Apparently, the issue is that no women of menstruating age are allowed into the temples of the celibate god Ayyappa. This woman’s entry into the temple was after the court’s decision that women could no longer be excluded. But what strikes me now is shame on NPR to offer a report on one woman entering the temple and say nothing about the 5.5 million women who formed up to support the court’s decision.

Those of you who read UncommonThought for any period of time have likely noticed that I work very hard to include graphics that integrates and supports the articles. Finding a photo (royalty free or from any media source) has proven impossible. What there is out there are dozens of pictures (copyrighted) of the protest against the court’s decision, and the after effects of the far-right riot against the ruling and the march. It is difficult to find anything about the remarkable action by the women of Kerala as they stand against the extremist right. The video from Global News (Canada) and twitter feed below among the few direct references to the march.

The #WomensWall in #Kerala is 5 million women strong and 640 kilometres long. It is amazing ✊🏽💕 https://t.co/M7rTOAeASd

— Women’s March London (@womensmarchlon) January 1, 2019

Narenda Modi, the Prime Minister of India, is a member of RSS and head of the BJP (Bharatiya Janata Party). I wtrongly recommend looking at this article under the “Who is Modi” heading. These are not just “conservative” organizations, but are far-right, and they are also the ones behind the counter-riots in Kerala in the wake of the women’s march. One can assume that Modi has little issue with dirty, even deadly, tactics as he was the Chief Administrator in Gujarat during the 2002 riots that left approximately 2,000 dead (including women and children). It is an open secret that the government (and Modi) was behind the riots.

I think that the events in Kerala, and in India, demand our attention. Here we have the communist party (of India) that won control of the Kerala government (official website of the party here). On one hand, this speaks volumes about the strength and richness of the largest democracy on the planet – India. On the other, we have this democracy being consumed at the national level by extreme right forces – just as has happened with the Republican party in the U.S., and as they won the Presidency and (for a while) the House and Senate, a similar coup occurred in the U.S. I think that it is important that it is the women of Kerala who are pushing back against the forces of extremism, exclusion, and fascism, and that the far right rioters are overwhelmingly male. It is significant that there is a mass movement of women stepping forward to embrace the Earth and standing for justice. This is not to exclude men, but women’s leadership and engagement is critical here. The events in Kerala and India are critical because of the lack of coverage of these women, the coverage given to the extremist right, and the fact that it was virtually invisible in U.S. media.

Category: Activists, Bear Witness, Good News, Guest, Neoliberalism, Rights, Social (In)Justice | Comments Off

6 December 2018

Life at Trump Speed

[Photo: “Trump Even Freaks Out Satan”, Christopher Weyant, The Boston Globe, MA.]

By Rebecca Gordon
Source: TomDispatch

Editor's Note

This essay offers a bit of a different perspective of life under the Trump Regime. I think it is important to realize that this is a man who has ALWAYS been the center of his universe, and being the center of the universe is a precarious place. We can watch a lifetime of strategies and convoluted thinking he has developed to maintain his own centrality. Some of this I have discussed before as his abuser personality. However, these mechanisms to keep things constantly unbalanced involve the almost constant creation of drama and chaos – large and small. It has been said that working for Trump (and his staff clearly work for him rather than for us) is a blood sport. He encourages infighting, backbiting, and ambushing among his “employees”, while at the same time they must copiously demonstrate fealty (something Pence has demonstrated in the extreme). To say he has a “mean streak”, or is a “bully” would be the height of understatement. I believe he is more in the realm of enthusiasts of cock fighting and the like.

I don’t believe that I am alone in feeling like we have spent over two years of non-stop, wall-to-wall, Trump insanity. The pace is incredible, but it is also frightening because whenever he feels threatened he throws an escalation into the mix that has real and dire implications. Nothing seems to matter except what serves Trump’s interests, and there has been no real attempt to curb his behavior – no matter how extreme. I think many are numbed and others are attempting to tune out the drone of ever changing Trump antics. Problematically, being President is not a “reality” show, and his actions and proclamations have devastating real world consequences.

I offer Gordon’s essay as a perspective shift that hopefully helps us keep the importance of current events front and center and helps us see through the barrage of psychological glossolalia that surrounds Trump like debris surrounds a tornado.

Category: Bear Witness, Climate Chaos, Guest, Immigrants and Refugees, Militarism, Social (In)Justice, Trump | Comments Off

13 November 2018

People Like Me

[Photo: Sharice Davids (lt) and Deb Haaland (rt) the first Native American women in Congress. (campaign photos)]

By Nellis Kennedy-Howard
Source: CommonDreams

Editor's Note

This was a special election in so many ways, but for women of color and the LGTBQ community there are firsts, and there is finally “someone like me”. I have friends who are conscientious non-voters, and family members who could give a damn about voting and don’t. Every last one of them are white males. I don’t think that is a coincidence. People paid, some with their lives, so that I have the vote, but even with the vote it has taken long years for some people to stand tall in the halls of government. I am moved at a deep level by the “firsts” of these mid-terms, and this article by Nellis Kennedy-Howard captures much of this for me. In fact it brought me to tears. Should our democracy survive, perhaps someday a government that actually reflects the people may be “ordinary”. Imagine that!

Category: Activists, Bear Witness, Guest, Indigenous Struggles and Rights, Social (In)Justice, The Vote | Comments Off

29 September 2018

The US Isn’t Just Backing the Yemen War—It’s Helping Trap Those Forced to Flee

[Photo: Water distribution in Sanaa, Yemen (Julien Harneis).]

By Khury Petersen-Smith
Source: Foreign Policy In Focus via CommonDreams

Editor's Note

With the level of domestic catastrophe and theater in the United States, it is easy to forget that the U.S. has many fingers in many pies, and that one of the biggest self-appointed jobs of President Trump is as an arms dealer. The U.S. is up to its neck in a variety of ways in the disaster of Yemen. I doubt that Trump cares about the level of pain, destruction and death that is happening there, but the rest of us damn well should care. Along with the terrible situation of Yemenis, we need to remember that Yemen has also been a “haven” for other refugee groups – Somali for example. We are so far past anything that is humane here. At the very least we need to be aware of what our government is doing and the impacts of those actions

Category: Bear Witness, Guest, Militarism, Policy, Silencing & Repression, Trump & Administration, War and Conflict, Weapon Systems | Comments Off

21 September 2018

Learning the Power of Lies

[Photo: “Liar” by Hekoto.]

By Arnold R. Isaacs
Source: TomDispatch

Editor's Note

I remember as a child learning the consequences of lying. Of course there are personal consequences like people won’t believe what you say and won’t trust you. Then there are consequences such as people not responding when you need them as in the consequences of ‘crying wolf.’ However, the consequences of lying often falls on others – sometimes disastrously. How many people’s lives have been seriously destroyed by creating false narratives – such as immigrants are rapists, murderers, and members of violent gangs? One of the problems with lies is that all too often they can not be undone, nor can the consequences. For example, the Tonkin Gulf Lie that brought the US into war against North Vietnam, or the non-existent “weapons of mass destruction” that was used to justify the invasion of Iraq.

So what do you do when the President of the United States is an inveterate liar? And even worse when those who venerate him have all kinds of justifications for why he NEEDS to lie, or believe that everyone else is lying – irrespective of evidence to the contrary. Frankly, I feel we are in a situation that will be causing the nation and the world problems long after Trump is a memory. The damage being done with the lies, and institutional destruction, may not be recoverable.

Category: Bear Witness, Culture, Guest, Lies Damn Lies - Propaganda, Mechanisms of Contrrol, Trump | Comments Off