More censorship with Speak Up For Women’s posters taken down

On February 11 the campaign group Speak Up for Women received notification from Phantom Billstickers that their poster campaign calling for public consultation on the controversial Births, Deaths, Marriages, and Relationships Registration Bill would be removed from over 60 sites from Auckland to Invercargill, in a move that is being described as reactionary and anti-free speech.

The media company allegedly received ‘four or five’ complaints from members of the public over the weekend, in response to the posters. Ani O’Brien, Speak Up For Women spokesperson, says: “Jamey’s email came out of the blue this morning, so I called him to discuss his concerns and clarify our position. Jamey Holloway, Managing Partner of Phantom Billstickers said “[your] campaign has been accepted in error and will be withdrawn as soon as logistically possible.” Mr Holloway decided to dump the women’s rights campaign to appease the 

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Speak Up for Women launches campaign

On January 14  the Speak Up for Women Campaign was launched.

This campaign is to oppose the current state of the Birth, Deaths, Marriages and Relationship Registrations bill and its proposals for sex self-identification.

“The BDMRR Bill will be read when Parliament returns in February 2019 and the campaign organisers are asking for help to ensure the parliamentarians understand this is concerning many people. Please spread the word! #SpeakUpNZ #NoSexSelfID

“We again ask that Our Three Reasonable Demands listed below are taken seriously.

“1. The Government must put the self-ID proposal on hold until there is reasonable public consultation. Respectful, evidence-based public consultation must take place, including with women who are affected by the proposals.

2. The Government must review how the proposed changes will affect data gathering, reporting and the integrity of records for things such as crime, health and monitoring sex-based discrimination such as the pay gap.

3. The Government must review how the proposed changes will impact the protected category of “sex,” intended to protect women from discrimination under the Human Rights Act

“If you haven’t done so already, please consider sending a message to your MP. We have made it very easy for you to do so, it only takes a minute – just fill out the form here.”

https://speakupforwomen.nz/email-your-mp/

50th anniversary of the 1968 Democratic Party convention

The last week of August marked the 50th anniversary of the (in)famous 1968 Democratic Party convention in Chicago.  Thousands of people turned up outside the convention to protest the war being waged by the United States, via a Democratic Party administration, on the people of Vietnam.  The Democratic Party mayor of Chicago, Richard Daley, turned his cops on the protesters, hundreds of whom were injured in police assaults.  The Illinois National Guard was also turned out, to supplement the armed cops.  This party convention was yet more proof, if any was needed, that the Democratic Party is no vehicle for progressive change in the United States, any more than the Labour Party is in New Zealand (or Britain or Australia).

by The Spark

In 1968, the Democratic Party met in Convention in Chicago to nominate its presidential candidate. This is the Convention that has gone down in history – in the words of Hodding Carter, one of its participants – as the work of “a party that had lost its mind.”

For most people who still remember, the 1968 Convention is associated with the 14-minute live telecast from the streets of Chicago, showing police clubbing and viciously kicking unarmed demonstrators, people who had come to protest the U.S. war on Viet Nam and the Democrats who were carrying it out. Some of those people, bloody on the ground, were shown yelling, “the whole world is watching.”

Or people remember from inside the Convention, Chicago’s mayor, Richard Daley, yelling “fuck you” to Senator Abraham Ribicoff from Connecticut, who had criticized “Boss Daley’s” cops.

In fact, the 1968 Democratic convention should go down in history as the symbol of the inability of the Democratic Party to respond to the deep problems of this country – even at the very moment when social forces were urgently pushing those problems forward.

A Country on Fire

Opposition inside this country to the U.S. war on Viet Nam had become so strong that

“We are not the dirt – we clean”: United Voices of the World, a different kind of union

Occupying the Ministry of Justice, London

by Floyd Codlin

“We are not the dirt, we clean”, is the slogan from United Voices of the World (UVW,) a relatively new union that is making a big industrial splash in Britain. UVW is a members-led, campaigning trade union, which supports and empowers the most vulnerable groups of precarious, low-paid and predominantly migrant workers in the country. The union was founded in 2014, rapidly gaining media attention and popular support with a series of high-profile victories for workers serving Sothebys, Harrods and the London School of Economics. Their members work overwhelmingly in London’s ubiquitous outsourced industries, which include cleaning, portering, security, and retail, waiters and bar staff.

UVW has campaigned for all members to receive at least the London Living Wage (£10.20 per hour as of November 2017), contractual sick pay and other rights, dignified and safe conditions, and general respect. They’ve also challenged outsourcing itself, which creates two-tier workforces in order to slash wage bills and deny important rights. Most recently, from 7th-8th of August 2018, UVW cleaners went on strike at the Ministry of Justice (MoJ) and Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea (RBKC) for the London Living wage of £10.20 per hour and sick pay.

There are two things that go to make UVW so unusual; one is the fact that

Aretha Franklin, 1942-2018

Aretha in 1973; pic by AP.

by The Spark

Tributes are pouring in for the late legendary singer Aretha Franklin. Many certainly came from those in official positions and celebrities, but most came from people she grew up with and from all of the neighborhoods around the country. The strength of people’s feelings stems from the fact Aretha expressed, not only through her music but also through what she stood for politically, their feelings at a time of engagement and determination to fight for social change in the social movements of the 1960s and 1970s.

Aretha’s first hit single, her remake of Otis Redding’s song, “Respect,” hit the charts almost simultaneously with the eruption of the urban rebellion that occurred in Detroit in 1967. Like several of her records, “Respect”became an anthem, for black people and for women. Aretha transformed the point of view of Redding’s lyrics about a man expecting respect from his wife to that of a woman demanding respect from her man. Aretha’s spelling out of “R-E-S-P-E-C-T” and insistent phrases like “Give me my propers!” reflected women’s growing militancy and, beyond it, the attitudes of the larger community demanding change.

Similarly, her hit “Think!,” was direct and to the point “You’d better think, about what you’re trying to do to me,” ending in a chorus of 

Abortion referendum: Historic victory for women’s rights and social progress in Ireland

Crowd welcomes the result, Dublin Castle, Saturday afternoon, May 26 (Irish time)

by Philip Ferguson

“I think for so many people in this country the weekend’s vote was just like an enormous weight being lifted – a ball and chain that dogged us all our adult life being finally gone. And I can’t believe that I’m 50 years of age and it’s taken this long. . .  I think for so many women it represented so much.  It’s almost like society atoning for everything it’s done to women in this country.  Atoning for how we stigmatised women faced with crisis pregnancies, the Magdalene Laundries, the Mother and Baby Homes, the shaming, the forced adoptions, the robbed identities. . .  For me, the biggest sentiment of the Yes vote, the thing that people said the most was, ‘Who am I to judge? It’s not my decision.'”

‘Kicking Bishop Brennan up the arse!’ The making and popularity of the ‘Father Ted’ TV comedy series, made in the mid-1990s, was an indication of changing attitudes towards the Catholic hierarchy.

With these words, spoken this week in the Dublin parliament, independent Marxist TD (MP) Clare Daly, welcomed the massive victory for women’s rights and human progress in the referendum vote last Friday, May 25.  The referendum was on whether or not to repeal the 8th Amendment to the Irish Constitution (the constitution of the southern or 26-County state).  The amendment, which had been passed in 1983 effectively banned abortion in Ireland.

Scale of victory

On May 25 66.4% voted Yes for repeal and just 33.6% voted No.  In numerical terms this was a vote of 1,429, 981 to repeal the anti-abortion amendment and 723,642 to maintain it.

Indicating the sea-change of attitudes among the people in the 26-Counties, this was a

Ramzy Baroud national speaking tour in New Zealand, May 18-24

Below we’re reprinting the official statement and itinerary for the speaking tour.

Dr. Ramzy Baroud’s NZ speaking tour itinerary – 18 to 24 May 2018.

Hosted by the NZ Palestine Solidarity Network

Ramzy Baroud brings the authentic voices of the Palestinian struggle for human rights to New Zealand, as part of a world-wide launch of his new book The Last Earth: a Palestinian Story.

Please note that signed copies of Ramzy’s book will be on sale for $35 at each venue – cash or EFTPOS (bookshop retail prices may vary). Other merchandise will be available also.

Each event is free entry and open to the public – bring your friends & workmates. There will be a collection for donations towards tour costs.

 

AUCKLAND: FRIDAY 18 MAY

10:30am: A special book signing event at UBIQ Auckland University Bookshop, 2 Alfred Street, Student Commons (off Princes or Symonds Street, City.)
12:00 midday: Listen to 95bFM radio for Kelly Enright’s studio interview with Ramzy Baroud on ‘The Wire’ current affairs programme.

AUCKLAND: SATURDAY 19 MAY

9:00am: Listen to Kim Hill’s face-to-face live interview with Ramzy on her popular ‘Saturday Morning’ programme, on RNZ National radio (FM 101.4)
2:00pm: Ramzy will speak at the Nakba Rally for Free Palestine, Aotea Square, Queen St, CBD.

AUCKLAND: SUNDAY 20 MAY

Free public talk: 7pm Freemans Bay Community Hall, 52 Hepburn St, Auckland.

 

HAMILTON: MONDAY 21 MAY
Free public talk: 7pm: Wintec, Room A2.05, City Campus, Hamilton.
Access via Gate 3 or Gate 2 on Tristram Street. Free parking.

 

WELLINGTON: TUESDAY 22 MAY

Book signing from 12pm to 1pm: Vic Books, Easterfield Building, 1 Kelburn Parade, Wellington 6012.
Evening event: 6pm Free Public talk: St Andrews on the Terrace, 30 The Terrace, Wellington City 6011. (Wellington event book sales by Vic Books).

 

CHRISTCHURCH: WEDS 23 MAY
Free public talk: 7pm Christchurch Cardboard Cathedral, 234 Hereford St, Christchurch 8011.

 

DUNEDIN: THURSDAY 24 MAY

Free public talk: 5:15pm Burns 2 Lecture theatre, Ground Floor Arts Building, Albany Street, University of Otago.

 

ABOUT THE BOOK AND ITS AUTHOR:

Gaza-born Palestinian author Ramzy Baroud is