Even Ai Weiwei’s supporters have been targeted by Chinese authorities in the latest crackdown on the activist artist. Change.org (currently petitioning for Al Weiwei’s release) issued the following statement last week:

Change.org is experiencing intermittent downtime due to a cyber-attack originating in China, which the FBI is investigating and the State Department has condemned. The attack appears in response to a Change.org petition signed by more than 140,000 people worldwide, who are standing against the detention of Chinese artist and activist Ai Weiwei. Despite this attack, we will continue to stand with the supporters of Ai Weiwei to defend free speech and the freedom to organize for people everywhere.

Franklin Roosevelt proposed a second Bill of Rights in 1944 on the basis that the political rights enshrined in the US Constitution were inadequate to achieve happiness. Never enacted, he passed away 16 months later.

(via Adbusters)

Winner of the 2010 Sundance World Cinema Documentary Special Jury Prize, Enemies of the People follows the project of Thet Sambath, whose parents were among the approximately two million people who perished under the Khmer Rouge regime in the late 1970s. With unprecedented access and groundbreaking confessions from the notorious “Brother Number Two,” Nuon Chea, and from numerous grassroots killers, he uncovers terrifying personal explanations for the genocide by allowing the perpetrators to speak for themselves.

(via headphonesnotrequired via rightsandhumanity)

Film, as a medium, is unique in its power to change us, educate us, and most of all, open our minds and eyes to other worlds - to the layers of life that surround us, including that of our own. From End Human Trafficking on Change.org, one of the most quickly expanding sites out there for positive change in the world, comes a list of 10 human trafficking films to watch.

Several have been highlighted on this blog before - namely Holly and Slumdog Millionare - and of course it’s not an exhaustive list, but it is an excellent place to start. It includes everything from documentaries to short films to feature films. This is a way to learn about trafficking the easy way.

(via revolutionofourtime)

More at banksystreetart

(via hottentots via adailyriot)

Tony Abbott is perhaps second only to George Bush in terms of public brain explosions. Here are recent highlights, produced by GetUp in the lead up to the Australian election. 

Time’s cover of a mutilated Afghani woman drew widespread criticism. Wikileaks have just released a CIA document (available here) which spells out why: 

The proposed PR strategies focus on pressure points that have been identified within (a range of) countries. For France it is the sympathy of the public for Afghan refugees and women.

Supported by evidence like the Wikileaked document, Truth Out (amongst a host of others) argue that Time has simply fallen in line with the US Government’s public relations angle for continued presence in Afghanistan:

An internal Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) document released by WikiLeaks in March reveals a secret plan to use the plight of Afghan women and refugees in developing media strategies to “leverage French (and other European) guilt” during an especially bloody summer of military escalation. The confidential document was prepared by the Red Cell, a secretive group that consults the US intelligence community.

“Feminists have long argued that invoking the condition of women to justify occupation is a cynical ploy and the Time cover already stands accused of it,” wrote Priyamvada Gopal, an English professor at Cambridge University, in The Guardian UK. “Misogynist violence is unacceptable, but we must also be concerned by the continued insistence that the complexities of war, occupation and reality itself can be reduced to bedtime stories.”

(via suburbananarchist) 

As the BBC says: they wear pink saris and go after corrupt officials and boorish men with sticks and axes.

The several hundred vigilante women of India’s northern Uttar Pradesh state’s Banda area proudly call themselves the “gulabi gang” (pink gang), striking fear in the hearts of wrongdoers and earning the grudging respect of officials.

The pink women of Banda shun political parties and NGOs because, in the words of their feisty leader, Sampat Pal Devi, “they are always looking for kickbacks when they offer to fund us”.

Two years after they gave themselves a name and an attire, the women in pink have thrashed men who have abandoned or beaten their wives and unearthed corruption in the distribution of grain to the poor.

They have also stormed a police station and attacked a policeman after they took in an untouchable man and refused to register a case.

Great video here, watch 8:30 to 9:00 and get inspired. More here. 

Bash Back Attacks God!

The Mount Hope Church is a deplorable, anti-queer mega-church in Lansing, Michigan. The church works to institutionalize transphobia and homophobia through several repulsive projects including organized “ex-gay” conferences and so-called “hell houses”, which depict queers, trannies and womyn who seek abortions in hell. Mt. Hope is complicit in the repression of queers in Michigan and beyond.

Bash Back! ain’t down with that. And so on Sunday November 9th, about thirty radical queers from Lansing, Chicago, Memphis and Milwaukee disrupted the church’s most well-attended sermon.

At noon, a small group of folks dressed in pink and black, equipped with a megaphone, black flags, picket signs and an upside-down pink cross began demonstrating outside the church. The group was extremely loud and wildly offensive.

The demonstration drew a majority of Mount Hope’s security staff outside to watch them.

Meanwhile, with the guards pre-occupied by the distraction, over a dozen queers had put on their Sunday-best and infiltrated the church’s congregation. At the signal that the guards had been lured outside, the infiltrators sprung into action.

A group stood up, declared themselves fags, and began screaming loudly. Upon hearing the loud interruption, other affinity groups went into action. A team that had been hiding under the pews in the closed-off balcony dropped a banner and pulled back the curtains to reveal “IT’S OKAY TO BE GAY! BASH BACK!”. Another group threw over a thousand fliers to the entirety of the congregation. The fire alarm was pulled. Queers began making out in front of the pastor. And within a matter of minutes, everyone had evaded the guards and made their escapes.

Bash Back! operatives, still hidden among the congregation observed a person screaming that Satan had come to Mount Hope, that the end was here, that the queers were everywhere. She then began speaking tongues. The dumbfounded pastor, after regaining his composure, went on to speak of the of decadent, depraved wolves that menace his flock of sheep.

Let it be known: So long as bigots kill us in the streets, this pack of wolves will continue to BASH BACK!

We are everywhere.
bashbacknews.wordpress.com

(from Social Rupture)