Protest Reports

A dozen or so activists braved the cold and marched from the Wexner Center at 15th and High Street to the opening of the OSU football stadium on Saturday, October 28 to “Take a knee to stand with Kaepernick.”

The reason for the rally was “On October 16, 2017 Shelley Meyer made it very clear that she does not support Colin Kaepernick and his fight against police brutality towards POC. For those who don't know, Shelley is OSU football coach Urban Meyer's wife. When 10TV news posted a tweet about Kaepernick filing grievances against the NFL, she responded "What-ever. He made his choices."It is absolutely unacceptable for the wife of a football coach to condemn the actions of the NFL and "take a knee." We must stand (better yet kneel) in solidarity with Kaepernick where it needs done the most. The Shoe. The Meyer's need to know that we do not accept Shelley and her negative reaction to Kaepernick, and we certainly do not accept her half hearted apology she posted later.”

The Coalition of Immokalee Workers started a boycott of an iconic central Ohio-based fast-food chain over a year ago. This was after the company stopped sourcing its tomatoes from Florida instead of joining the CIW’s Fair Food Program to protect Florida farmworkers from exploitation.

Wendy’s has responded to the boycott by quibbling over why they don’t want to pay a penny-per-pound premium for Florida tomatoes to support a living wage for the workers who harvest them. One thing that Wendy’s spokespersons don’t want to talk about is sexual violence in the agricultural industry.

On October 23, women of the CIW led a protest in the rain outside Wendy’s Dublin headquarters to raise awareness of widespread sexual harassment and rape in Mexican agribusinesses, where Wendy’s now sources tomatoes and other produce. They were joined by faith communities and members of the Student/Farmworker Alliance (SFA) at Ohio State University.

Women members of the Coalition of Immokalee Workers are in Columbus this week. Until 5 p.m. today the their new Harvest Without Violence mobile exhibit will be stationed in the South Oval on the Ohio State University campus. 

The OSU campus location is fitting. The university's administration has chosen to renew its contract with Wendy's to keep one of its stores on campus, despite the fast food chain's refusal to join the CIW's Fair Food Program. 

The mobile exhibit highlights gender-based violence, which the Fair Food Program has made great strides to eliminate in Florida's fields. Instead of joining the program, Wendy's decided to stop sourcing its tomatoes from Florida farms. Instead, they are buying tomatoes from growers in Mexico, where sexual harassment, rape, child labor, and slave labor are still rampant in the agricultural industry.

While 25% of women experience sexual harassment and sexual violence in the workplace overall, in the agricultural industry more 80% of women are subjected to these abuses.

Well, our President in Twitter Chief, Donald Trump, has once again trumped his own self.  This time he’s taking on the rights of athletes to protest the injustices inflicted on people of color in America during NFL games. Our Twitter Chief, President Trump, feels that it’s more important for him, as President of the United States, to tweet about the right for people to protest peacefully, than it is for him to tweet about the horrific plight of the people of Puerto Rico, who are in desperate need of drastic help to rebuild and survive after hurricane Maria.

As of September 27, our Twitter Chief had tweeted twenty-three plus times about his anger at the NFL players for not “standing and being respectful during the national anthem” and only six times about how he was going to help Puerto Rico, which by the way is a part of the United States since 1898, which makes the people of Puerto Rico AMERICAN citizens.  But wait a minute, hold up, seems like we have been down this road before with the President of the United States being slow to help its “Brown” American citizens after a natural disaster.

On August 13, the day after activist Heather Heyer was murdered and many others injured at the Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, about 500 leftists gathered at Goodale Park and marched to a solidarity vigil at the Ohio Statehouse.

Several who spoke from an open mic at the vigil addressed a fundamental question: What is the most effective way for the Left to combat racism and white supremacy? Can racism be eliminated in a capitalist system? Or is racism inextricably linked to and driven by capitalism?

 “We cannot rely on the police to protect us from violence,” said Rachel Reiser of the International Socialist Organization. “Right-wing vigilante violence, in many ways, is beneficial to the state. Right-wing violence against black people, Muslims, queer people, women, leftists, and activists is not prosecuted like it should be, because they are doing the state’s job for them, which is to keep oppressed people scared to death of fighting against the system.”

Columbus turned out by the hundreds to protest the rally by the KKK, neo-nazis and white supremacists in Charlottesville and the subsequent terror attack on the counterprotestors. On Sunday, August 13, a large group gathered at the gazebo in Goodale Park for speeches and a report from some activists who were on the scene in Charlottesville.

Eighty peope from Columbus and all over Ohio came together Saturday, July 29 at noon to protest the Congressional vote to send $705 million of taxpayer dollars for the US-Israel Missile Defense Partnership.

There is also an active international group advocating a BDS movement - boycott, divest and sanction -- against Israel for their treatment of people in Gaza and the West Bank. Ohio Senator Rob Portman is sponsoring a bill that would CRIMINALIZE the boycott, divestment, and sanctions movement in the US.

For the past decade, Israel has enforced a military blockade on over 2 million Palestinians in Gaza and now they only have 3 hours of electricity per day.

Mainstream media isn't covering these atrocities, so several local groups got together to speak out at the Statehouse last Saturday and demand an end to the brutal blockade.  

Concerned citizens met at the Ohio Statehouse at noon on Wednesday, July 5 for a Save Medicaid Save Lives Rally to protest the fact that Ohio’s legislature passed a budget bill that freezes enrollments in expanded Medicaid after July 1, 2018. The bill has been passed to Governor Kasich, and he is expected to veto the language that freezes enrollments. If that happens, the legislature may have the votes to override his veto and pass the enrollment freeze into law. Under this bill, 500,000 Ohioans will lose access to health care. Next week will be our last chance to protect the Medicaid expansion in Ohio, according to ProgressOhio.

Building on a successful strike against Verizon last year, on May 19 the Communications Workers of America hit the picket lines again to protect their livelihoods against corporate greed in the telecom industry. 21,000 AT&T Mobility workers in 36 states; 17,000 AT&T wireline employees in California, Connecticut and Nevada; and 2,000 DirectTV workers went on a three-day strike.

There was an outpouring of community support for the strikers in central Ohio. At 3 p.m. picket lines formed outside multiple AT&T stores in Columbus, Reynoldsburg, Hilliard, Upper Arlington and Westerville.

“Hey Randall, you can’t hide. We can see your greedy side!” 50 protesters chanted outside the AT&T store in the OSU Gateway district. AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson took home $28.4 million in 2016. AT&T Mobility made $13 billion in profits last year.

A year ago this month, Ohio finally did the right thing and passed a medical marijuana law. It was a caring and honorable move, especially when you consider there are hundreds if not thousands of children and adults in the state suffering from epilepsy.

Research has proven time and time again that cannabidiols or CBDs with extremely low levels of THC, such as Charlotte’s Web or Epidiolex, are miracle medicines for epilepsy. Unlike what Big Pharma has to offer, CBDs work and don’t have potential side-effects like vomiting and liver damage. These researchers say many of their patients report nearly half as many seizures when using a CBD. What’s more, their patients are also more cognizant, happier and, no surprise, a little more hungry.

That being said, a father from Ohio with a 9-year-old epileptic daughter told the Free Press he’s still unable to legally acquire a CBD because the Ohio Medical Marijuana Control Program is going through growing pains as it crawls toward full functionality.