Occupy Boston’s General Assembly consented to endorse the following statement on April 10, 2012:
OB endorses the Tax Day demonstration coordinated by Right to the City described at
taxdayboston.org and on the attached flyers. OB understands that someone
from Occupy JP will fill out the RTTC on-line endorsement form.
The following proposal passed at the General Assembly of Occupy Boston on April 10, 2012:
The People of Color Working Group, Anti-Oppression Working Group and Decolonize
to Liberate Working Group request $1,000.00 to purchase a projector, video camera, and
screen to support educational and activism events.The People of Color Working Group needs to do further internal education on different
issues to build solidarity, and they also want to be able to document their activism with a
video camera for further education within and beyond the OB community.The Decolonize to Liberate Working Group is continuing to show films to deepen our
understanding of both the global impact of colonialism and its unique impact in the U.S.
context. We’re next planning to show “9500 Liberty”, a film which traces the impact of
anti-immigration legislation on a community in Virginia, as well as a film on the Indian
boarding school experience at a later date, etc.The Anti-Oppression Working Group has a series of films they would like to do examinig
points of intersectionality among oppressions, particularly the systemic oppressions
of racism, classism, and hetero-patriarchy. In particular we’d like to begin with the
3-part series “Race: The Power of An Illusion”, especially parts two and three which
demonstrate the historical underpinnings to the racialization of wealth in the U.S. context.
We’d also like to sponsor another showing of “Inside Job” at some point, the best film to
date explaining the economic crash of 2008.All three groups are finding that they have a shared analysis of the operation of white
supremacy and the legacies of colonialism in our Occupy movement, in the U.S. context,
and within the broader global context, hence we feel positioned to do this educational
work within OB but need equipment to share to do so.The WGs have been borrowing equipment (most often one person’s personal projector)
but have found it’s increasingly difficult to manage the logistics of this. We believe that
dedicating equipment to these WGs will allow us to hold more events and educate more
people more quickly if we don’t have to plan around borrowing equipment. We have
overlap in membership between our groups which will make transitioning and being
responsible for the equipment less challenging. If the equipment we purchase is less
expensive than the $1,000.00 requested, we will only seek reimbursement for the amount
purchased or return funds as appropriate.
Stories of the Day: Camp Charlie reoccupied! Supreme Court will re-examine Citizen’s United decision. The South Carolina House has given the go ahead to use gold and silver as real money. And chemicals used in frackinghave been linked to breast cancer and reproductive health problems and there have been reports of rises in crimes against women in some fracking “boom towns.” And in our town, state officials are pushing two separate bids today to take tighter control of the Rose Kennedy Greenway — one to tweak the state’s relationship with the Conservancy that now runs the 15-acre downtown park, the other to entirely cut off the embattled nonprofit.“What we have here is a partnership run amok,” said state Rep. Peter Durant (R-Spencer), a Greenway Conservancy critic who said he will file a bill today for a total state takeover. “It’s welfare for the 1 percent,” Durant said about the nonprofit, which has come under heavy scrutiny for its payroll, heavy with six-figure salaries and underwritten by taxpayer funds. Read more here.
Other Occupies/Protests: Occupy Tucson protester blog post: Tucson Police Department Protecting and Serving the 1%. There is no place in the City of Tucson that can be occupied twenty four hours a day, even for the purpose of peaceable assembly. For more, click here. Student radicals are suspected in an act of vandalism with Biblical overtones after swarms of locusts overran Montreal’s main business school on Thursday.
“When the people fear the government, there is tyranny. When the government fears the people, there is liberty.” Thomas Jefferson
Volunteer Opportunities/Announcements:
For a partial listing of Working Groups looking for volunteers, please click here!
Upcoming Events:
Justice for Farmworkers! Picket, Delegation and Theater at Stop & Shop Headquarters, Thursday, April 12 at 12pm, Stop & Shop Corporate Office Headquarters, 1385 Hancock St., Quincy.
Just days before the Ahold (parent company of Stop & Shop) Shareholder Meeting, please join farmworkers and Fair Food allies in calling on Stop and Shop to join the Fair Food Program!
For decades, Florida’s farmworkers faced poverty wages and daily violations of their basic rights — including physical abuse, sexual harassment, and in the most extreme cases, modern-day slavery — in order to harvest the food on our plates. Today, however, a new day is dawning in the fields. The Coalition of Immokalee Workers (CIW) — an internationally-recognized farmworker organization — has reached groundbreaking agreements with ten of the world’s leading food retailers, including McDonald’s, Subway and Trader Joe’s. Hailed by the New York Times as “possibly the most successful labor action in the US in twenty years,” the Fair Food Program establishes a worker-designed code of conduct in the fields and requires retailers to pay one more penny per pound for the tomatoes they buy to go directly to the workers who picked them—all of which is monitored and enforced by the independent Fair Food Standards Council. Supermarkets like Ahold leverage their high-volume purchasing power to demand the ever-lower prices that result in farmworker exploitation. By refusing to partner with the CIW, the steps the company has taken fall far short of the substantive, verifiable and enforceable standards that the situation requires, consumers expect, and others within the industry have embraced.
Join farmworkers and Fair Food advocates in demanding that Ahold uphold human rights and join the Fair Food Program! More information: www.ciw-online.org, Contact: elena@interfaithact.org; 650.678.9127
Continue reading “Occupy Boston Daily Digest for 4-11-12” »
Letter to the editor: Dig’s costs surface
Camp Charlie seems to be the only place to call out the Big Dig culture that will cost you and I another $54 million due to corrupt cronyism, no bid contracts and incompetence (“Occupiers take over State House,” April 5). Big Dig debt should get a separate line item that we all can track and be taken off the back of the MBTA, the disabled and the students. They did not sell out the taxpayer, Beacon Hill did. (Boston Herald)
http://tinyurl.com/6twyn9m
Winchester residents gather to discuss Occupy movement
More than six months after the Occupy movement began, one group of Winchester residents is still discussing its meaning and impact.
Seventeen individuals met at the Winchester Unitarian Society April 1 to screen film clips about the Occupy movement and discuss how they applied to Winchester residents and society at large.
The group, which counts about 40 members on its email list, has been meeting about once every two weeks since October 2011. It began after Darcy Roake, the intern minister at Winchester Unitarian Society, began noticing that more and more congregants were attending worship services with buttons saying they were “the 99 percent,” showing their support for the Occupy movement. (Winchester Star)
http://tinyurl.com/6s5qpbl
Occupy Boston protesters move ahead of Brazilian president’s State House visit
State police say about 40 Occupy Boston protesters who were camped outside the State House have moved to Boston Common so that security can be tightened for a visit by the president of Brazil. (Associated Press via WWLP)
http://tinyurl.com/7s5mmnf
Continue reading “The OB Media Rundown for 4/11/12” »
The Financial Accountability Working Group (FAWG) would like the Occupy Boston community to hear FAWG’s story, to consider its history, to feel its distress, to understand its observations and concerns, to think about Occupy Boston’s relationship to FAWG and to money, and to engage in a brainstorming session to decide what’s next.
During this evening’s General Assembly at Camp Charlie, FAWG will share background information, provide current updates, and lead a community discussion. Facilitators will take notes during small group sessions and capture key ideas, issues and concerns on easel pad paper. FAWG will ask for your feedback to determine possible next steps. All the information will be made available for review on FAWG’s wiki page and in an email sent to the Community Forum email list providing those unable to be present tonight with the ability to learn what was discussed.
FAWG anticipates a follow up discussion to this initial conversation approximately one week after the information has been posted to the wiki and the Community Forum email list.
FAWG asks all Occupy Boston members to attend this very important event and to participate in this discussion. Please spread the word!
Occupy Boston Media <Media@occupyboston.org> • <Info@occupyboston.org> • @Occupy_Boston