Occupy Boston Daily Digest for 5-4-12

Good Morning from Occupy Boston!

Stories of the Day: An American military document just uncovered appears to detail an U.S. Army plan that calls for detaining “political activists” at re-education camps staffed by military-hired “PSYOP officers” in both America and abroad. The document, entitled FM 3-39.40 Internment and Resettlement Operations can be read here:
http://info.publicintelligence.net/USArmy-InternmentResettlement.pdf.  
For more on the story, click here. While we’re on the topic: whatever you may think of former Governor Jesse Ventura, and I was never impressed with him myself, here is dramatic (some might say melodramatic) video footage of the FEMA camps – from his show appropriately entitled “Conspiracy Theory.” I certainly hope that’s all it is – you decide. And: this winter, the Air Force is set to deploy to Afghanistan what it says is a revolutionary airborne surveillance system called Gorgon Stare, which will be able to transmit live video images of physical movement across an entire town. Read more here. And more scary food news: Unless the rice you buy is certified organic, or comes specifically from a farm that tests its rice crops for genetically modified (GM) traits, you could be eating rice tainted with actual human genes. The only known GMO with inbred human traits in cultivation today, a GM rice product made by biotechnology companyVentria Bioscienceis currently being grown on 3,200 acres in Junction City, Kansas — and possibly elsewhere — and most people have no idea about it. For more, click here. And in a study, scientists with the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine tested chicken products sold by 15 grocery store chains in 10 U.S. cities for the presence of feces. A certified, independent analytical testing laboratory in Chicago, Ill., tested for the presence of E. coli as evidence of fecal contamination. Chicken products from every city and every grocery store chain tested positive for fecal contamination. Overall, 48 percent of chicken samples tested positive. For more, click here. And a new survey by the nonprofit Police Executive Research Forum (PERF) has found that police departments across the country are encountering more instances of domestic violence related to the poor economyUSA Today reports. Nearly three in every four domestic violence victims reported staying in an abusive relationship because they could not afford to leave, according the survey. For the story, click here. And apparently eugenics is still happening: Meet the Group That Gives Addicts Drug Money to Get Sterilized — and the Right-Wingers That Fund Them. For years, Project Prevention has been paying poor, addicted women not to procreate — now, with money from the far right, it’s going global. For more, click here.

Other Occupies/Protests: Massive May Day Turnout Highlights Media’s Disconnect from Reality. Tens of thousands of individuals taking to the street is a show of a “weak immigration movement,” according to Businessweek, or a “slow and soggy start,” if one were to consult the National Post on the matter. Most subtly, the New York Post published an article titled, “Goodbye, Occupy” that offered as much of an optimistic interpretation of the day’s actions as you’d expect. For more, click here. On May Day, Occupy London distributed thousands of roses and carnations. Attached tags read: “This flower is a May Day gift from Occupy London.  Please put it in water and enjoy it. There is something better out there.” Jane Bradley, who was giving out flowers at Liverpool Street, said: “People were matching the flowers to their outfits.  Others were coming up to us and asking for them.  Even the policemen ended up putting them in their lapels.  It’s crazy how something so simple can have such an enormous impact.  It was really moving.” For more, click here. And check out this fantastic photo essay of May Day signs from Occupy Love: click here.

“It is part of the general pattern of misguided policy that our country is now geared to an arms economy which was bred in an artificially induced psychosis of war hysteria and nurtured under an incessant propaganda of fear.” General Douglas MacArthur

Upcoming Events:

  • Occupy Boston’s General Assembly has agreed to hold the Saturday, May 5 General Assembly at the fabulous Wake Up the Earth Festival in Jamaica Plain. The Wake Up the Earth Festival is the best summer festival in Boston–it not only commemorates a major victory of the 99%–it brings together one of the most politicized and diverse neighborhoods in the city. Wake Up the Earth—WUTE–is a great opportunity to meet, greet and galvanize thousands of people while catching some rays and listening to live music. Staff the table! Help with children’s activities! 10:30: Parade set up. 11:30: Parade leaves the Peace Garden. Peace Garden, corner of School St. and Washington. Stony Brook T Stop, Orange line. Here’s a map from the T to the Peace Garden: http://g.co/maps/4pcp8. 5:00: General Assembly, Southwest Corridor Park–in front of the Stony Brook T in the Sacred Circle–look for the OB banner. 6:00: festival ends. 9:00–after party at Spontaneous Celebrations. The rain date for the festival is 5/6. If there is rain, then Strategic Action Assembly will meet at WUTE instead of GA. In the case of rain, GA will be cancelled on 5/5. For more information or to sign up for a table shift, contact/click: Aria: aria@littlhous.net. Joe: cc2manj@verizon.net. http://spontaneouscelebrations.org/

  • “Connect the Dots” Climate Impacts Day Event,  May 5, 2pm – 3pm, Boston Common at Parkman Bandstand across from 165 Tremont Street. Climate Action, Sustainability, and Environmental Justice working group is joining a global day of action to issue a wake-up call and connect the dots between climate change and extreme weather . Come join local climate activists to literally connect the dots in a fun and informative game of (climate) Twister.  
  • May 5 and 6: Forums on The Real Cost of Coal sponsored by the Rainforest Action Network. Speakers include: Bob Kincaid (WV) Board president, Coal River Mountain Watch; Lowell Chandler (MT) Student activist, University of Montana; Kristen Owenreay (WY) Organizer, High Country Rising Tide and The GoodMule Project. WHAT: The Real Cost Of Coal Forum-Sudbury, MAWHERE: Memorial Congregational Church; 26 Concord Rd. Sudbury,MA.WHEN: Saturday, May 5, 2pm. FACEBOOK RSVP: http://www.facebook.com/events/155182217944879/?notif_t=event_name_change. WHAT: The Real Cost of Coal Forum-Cambridge, MA. WHERE: First Parish in Cambridge,3 Church Street, Cambridge, MA 02138 (near the Harvard T-stop). WHEN: Sunday, May 6, 3PM. FACEBOOK RSVP: http://www.facebook.com/events/349900668391499/?notif_t=event_name_change CONTACT: Monique, moniqueditullio@gmail.com; 508-769-2599ADMINISSION: Free and open to the public. MORE INFO: http://dirtymoney.org
  • The Occupy Boston Finance Community Work Session, scheduled to address the issues and concerns raised at the FAWG hosted 4/10/12 Community Conversation, concerning Occupy Boston’s relationship to its finances, is now confirmed for Sunday, May 6, from 1:00 to 4:00, at Hope Church, in Jamaica Plain.  FAWG invites the entire OB community to help create the financial decisions necessary, for the next phase of the movement.  Hope Church is located one block from the Green Street T Station on the Orange Line.
  • Keep Immigrant Families Together! Stop the Raids and Deportations! Prayer Vigil for Immigrant Detainees, Sunday, May 6th, 2 p.m.Suffolk County House of Correction, 20 Bradston St., BostonFor more information about the vigil, contact our Facebook page, or email SocialAction@ascboston.orgwww.bostonnewsanctuary.org.

    1. Immigration through Faith: Faith through Immigration – Personal experiences of immigration as a moral and religious issue.
      A facilitated panel discussion exploring personal experiences of faith and immigration. This session is designed to help participants articulate and claim religious language and relevancy in a conversation dominated by secular and political messages. The panel discussion will be followed by an open period for questions and reflections.
    2. U.S. Immigration History and Your Faith:  We will look at who came and why?  What laws were enacted as barriers?  What role have people of faith played in this history?  We will also ask where we find ourselves in the story, and who belongs here?
    3. Immigrant Stories in the Struggle for Workers Rights

    To register, go to www.bostonnewsanctuary.org, or call Newell Hendricks at 617 876-5038$10 suggested donation  

  • AMEND! – a MassOccupy/Brookline public forum the national movement to amend, what the amendment should contain, and how to bring it about.  Wednesday, May 9, 7:00-9:00 p.m. Selectmen’s Hearing Room, 6th floor, Brookline Town Hall, 333 Washington Street, Brookline, MA. Take Green line D Train to Brookline Village, you have about 3 blocks to walk.Featured speakers will be two of the nation’s foremost spokespeople for the movement:• LAWRENCE LESSIG, Harvard Law School professor, author of “Republic, Lost: How Money Corrupts Congress – and a Plan to Stop It” and arguably the nation’s leading academic campaigner to end the corrupting influence of money in politics.• JOHN BONIFAZ, leader of the successful 1998 campaign for Clean Elections in Massachusetts and numerous other voting rights struggles in the US during the past two decades, co-founder and director of Free Speech for People, a lawyer highly experienced in conducting public campaigns, and a compelling speaker. Contact:Frank Farlow frank.farlow@verizon.net 617-232-9654

    David Klafter dbklafter@gmail.com 617-734-2593

    Bruce Wolff, balobo@verizon.net617-232-8215

  • Occupy New England – M12 Day of Action and Regional Gathering. 9am-5:30pm, May 12: Come join Occupy groups from all around New England as we converge in Worcester for a day of action and networking! The day will have four core key components to it: getting as many Occupy groups and participants in one centralized location at the same time for a day of networking and planning, direct actions and public visibility, continued actions against corporations backing ALEC, and finally the flared up “War on Women” – discussion on women’s issues (rights, health care, etc…) Preliminary timeline of events:
    (Please note the following is a rough draft discussed by Occupy Worcester and the M12 working group. More details will be released later on, and times/actions are subject to change.)
    9 am: Begin gathering at Worcester Common
    10 am: Second New England Solidarity March
    Late morning: Direct Action (w/ CD potential)
    Midday: Occupy New England gathering. Have lunch and talk a lot to each other.
    Mid afternoon: Occupy Worcester’s Women’s Caucus event, details TBA
  • Restoring the Dream of Democracy – Reversing Citizens United.  A forum with State Senator Jamie Eldridge and attorney Jeffrey Clements.  Arlington Center for the Arts, 41 Foster Street  Arlington.  May 14, 6:30 – 8:30pm. Sponsored by Progressive Democrats of America and co-sponsored by Occupy Arlington. This will be an education session talking about what people can do from a grassroots perspective.
  • May 17 – nationally recognized transgender activist and member of Occupy Boston Gunner Scott will be honored with The Theater Offensive’s Out on the Edge award. As Executive Director of the Massachusetts Transgender Political Coalition, Scott led the battle for passage of the Massachusetts Transgender Equal Rights Bill in November. The Transgender Equal Rights Bill, also known as An Act Relative to Gender Identity, makes it illegal to discriminate on the basis of gender identity in the areas of employment, housing, public education and credit & lending.Who: Transgender activist Gunner Scott. What: The Theater Offensive honors Scott with Out on the Edge award. When: Thursday, May 17 @ 6:30 pm. Where: Hibernian Hall (184 Dudley St, Roxbury). Open to the Public: Yes (with ticket purchase)
  • Sponsored by the Howard Zinn Memorial Lecture Series: Book launch for Truth and Revolution by Michael Staudenmaier. May 22 at 6 pm at Encuentro 5, 33 Harrison Ave, Boston. Michael Staudenmaier speaks on the Sojourner Truth Organization/STO. STO was Founded in Chicago in 1969 from the rubble of the recently crumbled SDS, the Sojourner Truth Organization (STO) brought working-class consciousness to the forefront of New Left discourse, sending radicals back into the factories and thinking through the integration of radical politics into everyday realities. Through the influence of founding members like Noel Ignatiev and Don Hamerquist, STO took a Marxist approach to the question of race and revolution, exploring the notion of “white skin privilege,” and helping to lay the groundwork for the discipline of critical race studies. Michael Staudenmaier is a doctoral candidate in history at the University of Illinois.

Friday, May 4, 2012

Event Highlights:

1) The Drug War Hurts Families: Cops and Moms Week of Action
City: Boston, Massachusetts
Location: State House Steps
Date/time: Friday, May 4, 2012, 10:00am
Speakers: Karen Hawkes, MA State Trooper (Ret.) and mom from Law Enforcement Against Prohibition, Andrea James, director of Families for Justice as Healing; Cara Crabb-Burnham from the NORML Women’s Alliance
Come out to show your support and to add a handwritten note of support to cards which will be sent to incarcerated women this Mother’s Day.
Contact: shaleen@leap.cc

Description:

Come join mothers and police officers in front of the State House in Boston this Friday, May 4 at 10am for a local demonstration against the war on drugs.

The event takes place as part of a national Cops’ and Moms’ Week of Action May 4-11. The week of action launches a new campaign comprised of national organizations representing mothers, police and students that seek to finally end the disastrous drug war. As part of the series of activities around the country, moms, cops and students will share powerful stories of incarceration, overdose and addiction and unveil the “Mom’s Bill of Rights.”

Join us on the state house front steps in Boston to show your support and to add a handwritten note of support to cards which will be sent to incarcerated women this Mother’s Day.

2) On Friday, May 4, in downtown Boston, the stories of five families on the front lines of the foreclosure crisis will be projected onto the seats of financial power – the corporate bank offices that have robo-signed away Americans’ homes, used illegal predatory lending practices to target people of color and immigrants, and pushed thousands of families below the poverty line. Each of the stories – public letters written by members of City Life/Vida Urbana who are being foreclosed by Bank of America – will cover the front wall of three Bank of America buildings downtown. This will be an opportunity for Boston residents, neighbors, and supporters to confront Bank of America with the human costs of its practices, and to recognize the efforts of families most affected by the financial crisis. The voices of the movement will be amplified and made publicly visible on a scale not yet seen in Boston. Following the projections, music producer and organizer M. Antonio Ennis will perform from his upcoming album, Bank Attack, which tells the story of the grassroots movement to fight displacement. Organized by City Life/Vida Urbana and artist John Hulsey, the event kicks off a week of actions that will culminate in Charlotte, NC, on May 9. City Life and other Right to the City National Alliance members and thousands of homeowners will gather at the Bank of America shareholders’ meeting in Charlotte to demand that Wall Street banks be held accountable to the public. They will make the demand for principal reduction on underwater loans, an end to no-fault evictions, the acceptance of rent from families post-foreclosure, and the sale of homes back to families at real market value. Join us for an evening of protest, celebration, and art to send our friends and neighbors off to Charlotte!

Schedule of events
8:30pm – Copley Square
Meet at corner of Boylston St. and Dartmouth St.
March, vigil, and projection of Letters onto Bank of America office
Performance by M. Antonio Ennis
 
9:30pm – South Station
Meet at entrance to T
Projection of Letters in the heart of Boston’s financial district
 
10:30pm – Dudley Square
Meet at corner of Washington St. and Dudley St.
Projection onto Bank of America branch office accompanied by impromptu street party to wrap up the evening!
 
*Transportation between sites will be available for those who need it*
Alerts and notifications:
 
To sign up for last-minute text message alerts, please contact Brandon (617) 584-1468 or Susie (205) 319-0231
Check out our Facebook event for up-to-date information: http://www.facebook.com/events/442085835805312/
Press contacts:
John Hulsey – john.hulsey@gmail.com
Brandon German — bgbran@gmail.com
Melonie Griffiths — mgriffiths@clvu.org

Calendar for Friday, May 4, 2012

5:30pm – 7:00pm, Women’s Caucus Working Group Meeting, 14 Beacon St, First Floor, Boston.

6pm – 8pm, Decolonize to Liberate WG Meeting, First Parish in Cambridge, Unitarian Universalist 3 Church Street Cambridge, MA 02138 (across from Harvard T stop). Decolonize our Minds, Decolonize our Movement.  All are welcome to our regular weekly meetings.  Half of the meeting is discussion/self-education to help us decolonize ourselves (see our resources section).  Half of each meeting is for planning events and actions to help decolonize the movement.
6pm – 8pm, Occupy MBTA WG Meeting, at SEIU 26 West St. Please join OccupyMBTA in defending our city’s transportation system and connecting with Boston’s 99% on this issue!
7pm – 9pm Radio WG Meeting,  Encuentro 5 (33 Harrison Ave, 5th floor) We need as much help as possible, have room for shows, need producers and people to follow up on the Music Department. We’d love your ideas, concerns and suggestion as we get up to the present updates and check-ins from various depts in the radio station.

8:30pm – 10:00pm Queer Trans DA Working Group Meeting, Boston Common Bandstand (if rain, City Place Food Court, in the Transportation Building)

 

 

Please note! Meetings and their locations are subject to change. We encourage you to check the Occupy Boston Calendar for the most up-to-date information. There are events scheduled all day for the May 1 General Strike and regularly scheduled events may not be held.

Volunteer Opportunities/Announcements: 

1) Issue 7 of the Boston Occupier is out now, and we need your help distributing!!

We rely exclusively on YOU, the broader Occupy community, to get our papers out there to the 99%. So…

** We would love for you to join one of our planned outreach/distribution efforts on the T.

** ANYTIME you’re going to a progressive or Occupy-related event, try to pass out papers. These are the most effective occasions to connect sympathetic readers to our paper. Copies of the issue are stored in the OB cubicle at E5, so PLEASE remember to grab a stack.

** Get them to readers in your community. We recommend small stacks in small stacks in cafes, libraries, bookshops, laundr0mats, community centers, waiting rooms, campuses, etc. Be creative!! But we’ve found that the BEST way to get papers to readers is to hand them out face to face, combining outreach and distribution.

** If you are a part of another local-area Occupy movement, a union, or a community organization that is willing to distribute papers — let’s make it happen! You can just come by E5 (between 9 am and 7 pm most days) and grab a stack, or coordinate with us if you’re not able to do so. Send questions or suggestions about distribution to Julie O (juliettejulianna@gmail.com).

** We’re also trying to raise funds so that we can continue printing the stories of the 99%! To that end, we’ve started a subscription service. Read about it online here. I hope you’ll encourage those you know to subscribe to the paper as well!!

As always, we welcome questions, suggestions, and distribution ideas — send to juliettejulianna@gmail.com.

2) Needed: Volunteers who might be available with to help with technical expertise and equipment in the next two weeks for Occupy participants without computer access or computer skills. Project: an upcoming exhibition of photos and short videos of Occupy Boston to be held in Freiburg, Germany. This will be the first Occupy documentation project to be shown in Europe. Please email Bonnie Woods, woods_bonnie@hotmail.com if you are available.

3)  GA locations: 

The following proposal passed the General Assembly of Occupy Boston on April 17, 2012:

Facilitation Working Group proposes the following changes to the current General Assembly schedule:

  • Tuesdays: We propose that, effective May 1st, all Tuesday GAs be held outside. We propose the Boston Common as a temporary location with the idea that location may change in the future. We will give Arlington Street Church notice that our last night using ASC space will be April 24, 2012.
  • Thursdays: We have ended our relationship with Emmanuel Church and therefore propose that all Thursday GAs be held outside effective April 19, 2012, at the Boston Common as a temporary location with the idea that location may change in the future.
  • Saturday: We propose to continue to hold GA at Community Church of Boston on Saturdays in order to ensure that at least one GA per week is held indoors. FWG is in the process of asking CCB whether it would have space available on Tuesdays. If so we would ask the GA to decide whether that one GA indoors should be on Tuesday or Saturday.
  • Community Gatherings will remain on Mondays and effective May 14, 2012, will be held at CCB.

This schedule is subject to review by the GA at any time.

Amendments:

  • FWG will seek access to the web banner and text service to ensure that any change in GA location or time will be widely communicated.

To join the Occupy Boston Community Forum email list, a general discussion list, click here! For a partial listing of Working Groups looking for volunteers, please click here! For a list of Working Groups with contact info, click here! For more information on Occupy Boston’s General Assembly, including passed resolutions, click here!  And if you’re interested in learning more about Occupy Boston and how you can participate, click here! For contact info for other Occupies in the area, click here! 

Contact Us: Want to subscribe to the Daily Digest? Click here to have it sent to your email inbox every morning! All Working Groups or Occupy Boston events that need placement in the Daily Digest, please email AnnaC@OccupyBoston.org. To view past issues of The Daily Digest, click here. And subscribe to the Occupy Boston Media Rundown, a daily listing of Occupy-related news, by contacting JohnM@OccupyBoston.org.