Protest Reports
“I’m here to stand up for people who don’t make a decent wage,” said Genelle Rhynehardt, who works as a janitor in the Huntington Center in downtown Columbus. “People have to earn more to better their communities and better themselves.”
A member of Service Employees International Union (SEIU) Local 1, Rhynehardt was speaking on November 10 at a #FightFor15 rally on the steps of Columbus City Hall. It was one of 230 solidarity protests held across the U.S. as part of a national day of action. Fast food workers went on strike in 270 cities, demanding a $15 an hour wage and the right to join a union.
The current minimum wage is not a living wage, Rhynehardt said. “For people to try to live on it and live on welfare at the same time is not fair. We want to be able to stand up for ourselves financially, to be able to go to the grocery store and not rely on food stamps.”
Okinawa--In late October 2015, I was with 3 Okinawa peace activists and a British solidarity activist on a tour of local resistance to U.S. military bases. After an hour of driving north from the city of Nago, crossing deep ravines and shimmering blue bays, we approached a dense forest, where the U.S. military’s only jungle warfare training center is situated, way up in the northernmost section of the island of Okinawa.
As we continued driving, the highway was suddenly blocked by some large, camouflage military vehicles, and we got out to investigate. One of the vehicles was an armored personnel carrier with what looked to be about 25 soldiers inside, some of them looking out at us quizzically. I waved and a few of them waved back. We watched two soldiers get out and direct traffic around their convoy, while they waited to enter the training center’s main gate. For a few minutes we chanted and banged our drums at the gate. Once the first vehicle cleared whatever impasse they had at the gate, all the vehicles soon vacated the highway and disappeared into the training center.
Strange how intellectual discussion concerning the so-called “Arab Spring” has almost entirely shifted in recent years - from one concerning freedom, justice, democracy and rights in general, into a political wrangle between various antagonist camps.
The people, who revolted across various Arab countries are now marginalized in this discussion, and are only used as fodders – killers and victims – in a war seemingly without end.
But how did it all go so wrong?
There was once a time when things were so simple, so easy to understand and explain: People, who were long oppressed, revolted against their oppressors (Arab regimes) and benefactors (western powers).
Unable to effect change using peaceful channels - for Arab civil societies either did not exist or were tightly controlled - Arab masses took to the streets, each nation with a unique struggle of its own yet united around a set of basic demands.
The Central Ohio Worker's Center planned and numerous other local organizations supported a march and rally to raise the minimum wage in Columbus on May Day, May 1st. See the photo slide show below. (Photos by Bob Studzinski)
This is big. A new civil rights era births itself in terrible pain.
Black men die, over and over. I can only hope that peace is the result, serious peace, bigger than new laws, bigger than better trained police — agape peace, you might say, peace that is, in the words of Martin Luther King, “an overflowing love which seeks nothing in return.”
“‘We’re out here, and this is peaceful,’ Bishop Walter S. Thomas, pastor of the New Psalmist Baptist Church, shouted to the crowd. After a pause, they continued, singing ‘This Little Light of Mine.’ Helicopters shined spotlights on the group, the thwack-thwack of their rotors competing with the music.”
Fair Food friends and allies gathered on Monday, April 20th at 11:30am to support the Ohio State Student/Farmworker Alliance and Coalition of Immokalee Workers' Boycott on Wendy's! The crowd wanted to show Wendy's that Ohio Fair Food will not stop till they sign the #Fair Food Program.
Supporters of the hunger strike in the supermax unit at Ohio State Penitentiary rallied in Columbus Tuesday, April 14, calling upon prisons director Gary Mohr to order the restoration of the inmates' constitutionally protected recreation and religious rights. Those rights had been taken away as collective punishment for the misdeeds of one prisoner.
The month-long hunger strike in the supermax unit at Ohio State Penitentiary largely ended the next day, after attorneys Alice Lynd and Staughton Lynd, and one of the strikers negotiated with the warden. The prison reportedly agreed to some of the demands of the strikers – changing policies for phone calls and restoring religious services. The demand for rescinding a new restrictive recreation policy, however, was not met. Officials denied a “negotiated settlement.” The hunger strike started with more than 30 prisoners; until Wednesday, five were still refusing meals, all of whom had lost 20 to 30 pounds in the course of the strike and some experienced medical problems. One of the five continues to strike, over concerns not yet made public.
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For News as it breaks in Ferguson and around the Country,
as the unrest over the Grand Jury decision not to indite Darren Wilson in the shooting death of Mike Brown spreads.
We will be be following protest events in Ferguson and around the county as they happen. As the unrest continues we will let you know what is happening up to the minute. This Feed will be mirrored at The Outsider News. All times are Pacific Standard Time
22:37 Bean Bag rounds used by CHP on protesters in Oakland https://pbs.twimg.com/media/B3WDProCYAE8Pkl.jpg
22:31 Police and National Guard pushing protesters and media down S Florrisant in Ferguson. RT reporter arrested, AP reporter reportedly thrown over a barricade by police.
22:30 Protesters now occupying the intersection of 55th and MLK in Oakland.
22:13 Police now clearing protesters from highway in San Diego