Local
One underrepresented voice in the police reform movement that’s swept the country this summer is that of the Black police officer. In her new memoir, “Walking The Thin Black Line: Confronting Racism in the Columbus Division of Police,” Melissa McFadden tells the story of her 24-year career, currently as a Black lieutenant with the Columbus Division of Police.
Black officers walk a thin Black line every time they put on their uniforms. On one side is the Black community they strive to serve and protect from unjust treatment; on the other, a racist institution where they experience ongoing discrimination themselves.
McFadden shares her 24-year quest to defend her overpoliced community while coping with the personal trauma of surviving in a racist police department in this new book available now on Amazon.
Wednesday, September 23, 12noon-1:30pm, this on-line event requires advance registration
Due to COVID-19, many of us have concerns about voting in the November election. Bring your questions and join us to learn about: voter eligibility and registration, three ways to vote, absentee ballots, important dates, common problems to avoid to ensure that your vote is counted, and ways you can get involved in voter education and advocacy. You may even get answers to questions you did not know to ask such as how many stamps you need to mail in your ballot.
Presenters
• Rev. Joan VanBecelaere is the Executive Director of Unitarian Universalist Justice Ohio and Ohio UU the Vote. She serves as the Chair of the Registration Team of the Nonpartisan Ohio Voter Outreach Committee [NOVOQ]. She has also worked with the Ohio Poor People’s Campaign. Prior to moving to Ohio, she was Vice-President for Student Services at Iliff School of Theology in Denver, Colorado. She lives in Columbus, Ohio, with her spouse, Jerry, and four furry felines.
The Hilltop Historical Society was going forward with its annual Camp Chase cemetery memorial later this week – when scores of Confederate flags are placed on gravestones – but they canceled the September 27th ceremony due to COVID concerns. This historical society told the Free Press the ongoing social justice movement had nothing to do with the cancelation.
More disconcerting and surreal to some, is what Hilltop Historical Society President Dave Dobos – who is also Vice Chair of the Franklin County Republican Central Committee – told the Free Press in regard to the canceled event.
We asked Dobos: if the event had not been canceled, would the society still have brought out scores of Confederate flags during this summer of all social justice summers?
“If it hadn’t been for the coronavirus, yes,” said Dobos, who was scheduled to speak at the canceled event. “I think anytime you are accurately portraying history, it is appropriate. Folks can make their own opinion.”
As many are aware, Camp Chase on Sullivant Avenue is a VA-owned cemetery where over 2,000 Confederate soldiers and a handful of Union soldiers are laid to rest.
I have been a spiritual seeker over the last several decades. Along the way, I have studied a variety of teachings from different traditions, spiritual masters and accumulated wisdom. For many years I attended a psychic development class. I trust in things I can’t see or prove except in my own experience, in my gut.
In this program, I will share those influences on my understanding of the nature of reality and the many paths to the goal of “Conscious Creation.
In this inaugural program I am reading one of my favorite sources, channeled wisdom form a group of ascended masters transmitting as Emmanual.
“Whenever the feeling comes over you that you have no choices, I urge you to call a halt to everything. This is a trick you play on yourself to avoid the responsibility and therefore the joy of life.
Envision, instead, what it is you truly want. Test it. Be careful of this, my friends, because if you envision something quite casually, even though you may not be sure you want it, it will manifest.
This is neither magic or false hope. It is the REALITY OF THE POWER OF YOUR CREATIVE IMPULSE.
Toledo City Council last week made The Glass City the first in Ohio to take up a resolution supporting an Essential Workers Bill of Rights as part of a new national campaign to deliver better treatment and higher pay to all “essential workers.”
The resolution was introduced September 15th at a Toledo City Council meeting by Councilwoman Theresa Gadus. A vote is expected in October.
Toledo’s Essential Workers Bill of Rights largely reflects a national bill proposed earlier this year by Sen. Elizabeth Warren, which seeks to protect frontline workers by requiring employers to provide personal protective equipment, robust hazard pay, and provide 14 days of paid sick leave, among other proposals. The bill has stalled in the Senate, however.
There is no word from Columbus City Council whether it will consider a similar resolution. Several major cities have also introduced an Essential Workers Bill of Rights, as New York City Council did back in April.
Monday, September 21, 5:30-8:30pm, this on-line event requires advance registration
This panel discussion will feature activists from the 1960s and 1970s and will include community reflections on the lessons that have been learned.
A pre-screening of photos will begin at 5:30pm; a panel discussion, moderated by Pranav Jani (professor, OSU Department of English), will begin at 6pm.
Panelists include Jade Musa, President, OSU Students for Justice in Palestine; Chet Dilday, associate professor, Fayetteville [North Carolina] State University [a graduate of The Ohio State University]; and Linda Berdayes, organizer, VVAW [Vietnam Veterans Against the War]. Other activists and organizers will share reflections of the OSU campus “riots” that brought OSU Black Studies [now known as the OSU Department of African American and African Studies], OSU Women’s Studies [now known as the OSU Department of Women’s, Gender and Sexuality Studies], and many other changes to that institution as well as to the rest of the nation.
Please register for this event by using this link.
Sunday, September 20, 7-10pm
65 S. Front St., Columbus downtown
The power of Wikileaks in upholding whistle-blower rights is the reason millions of dollars has been spent by a global coalition of the rich, powerful, and corrupt to discredit the co-founder, Julian Assange.
The case is widely viewed as a global landmark event that violates press freedom, purportedly enshrined in the 1st Amendment to the US Constitution.
President Donald Trump seeks Assange's extradition from the UK this week to face 175 years in prison for publishing outside the United States about US war crimes, as a foreign journalist.
The extradition result will impact our so-called information-based economy and shape the power balance between the world's rich and poor masses for generations to come, broadly impacting tomorrow’s workforce.
