Calendar

9896
Oct
10
Fri
Hands Up United, Ferguson, MO. Days of Resistance.
Oct 10 – Oct 11 all-day

OCTOBER 10-13, 2014

THE INSPIRATION

We are in a movement moment. 

Droves of people, many of them young and black, took to the streets of Ferguson to demand justice for Mike Brown. Millions stood in solidarity as protestors were met by a brutal and militarized response by local police departments.

Our country can no longer deny the epidemic of police violence facing Black and Brown communities. Mike Brown is now part of a long list of people like John Crawford, Ezell Ford, Eric Garner, Oscar Grant and countless others who have been unjustly killed by police. And, their lives mattered.

JOIN HANDS UP UNITED AND OUR PARTNERS IN FERGUSON FROM OCTOBER 10-13TH FOR A SERIES OF EVENTS, MARCHES AND OPPORTUNITIES TO CONTINUE BUILDING OUR MOVEMENT FOR REAL CHANGE.

Website.

56661
Oct
18
Sat
CANCELLED: BLOCK CA Hwy 1 for YANIRA
Oct 18 @ 6:00 pm – 8:00 pm

 

THIS EVENT HAS BEEN CANCELLED OR POSTPONED. STAY TUNED.

On Behalf of the Serrano Family, we are asking our beloved Community, to join in solidarity, to demand justice for Yanira Serrano, who was mercilessly gunned down , June 3, 2014, in front her family, by San Mateo County Sheriff.

Please come and support our effort to STOP BUSINESS AS USUAL, during the Half Moon Bay Art & Pumpkin Festival. Let’s remind the city, county, state and the nation, that while this is a time when most families are enjoying the happy joy and harvest of the season; the Serrano family will not be celebrating this love & bounty because of senseless police brutality.

TRANSPORTATION:

FOR THOSE OF YOU, WHO HAVE ACCESS TO CARS AND VANS, OR HAVE THE RESOURCES TO RENT VEHICLES, LET’S ORGANIZE CARPOOLING OPPORTUNITIES FOR FOLKS IN SF BAY AREA, EAST BAY, NORTH BAY, SOUTH BAY, STOCKTON, SANTA ROSA, AUBURN, ETC. ♥

Please check out Yanira’s story on the Facebook page… And LIKE Justice 4 Yanira Serrano:

56617
Oct
22
Wed
National Day to Stop Police Brutality. Oakland Rally & March. @ Oscar Grant Plaza
Oct 22 @ 8:00 pm – 11:30 pm

19th Annual Nation Day to Stop Police Brutality, Repression and the Criminalization of a Generation.

Press Conference & Rally 1:00 PM.

March beginning 2:00 – 2:30 PM.

 

A video from the Alan Blueford Center for Justice regarding October 22nd.


Facebook event & RSVP.

– Consistently use our hashtags #Oct22 and #o22 in all tweets

-Trending hashtags, that are also important to add to our tweets as much as possible are: #Ferguson #FergusonOctober #BlackLivesMatter #AllLivesMatter

-Follow, tweet at, and retweet things from Carl Dix (@Carl_Dix), SMIN (@StopMassIncNet), and NYCRevClub (@NYCRevClub)

56438
Oct
26
Sun
Block The Boat! @ Meet at West Oakland BART
Oct 26 @ 10:00 pm – Oct 27 @ 3:00 am

UPDATE 10/25/14 10:00 PM. Press release:

 

All Out for Palestine on Sunday!
Our community power is disrupting Israeli business as usual. Our strength is challenging US-Israeli repression

The Israeli Zim ship is on the run, but we are closely tracking the ship. And based on our calculations, the Zim Beijing cannot make it this weekend,  but it could change course and arrive this week. Let’s show Zim what they can expect if they try to come back. Let’s show the world that the Bay Area says no to Zionism. 

SUNDAY, October 26th
3pm
Meet at West Oakland Bart and march to Port of Oakland

@blocktheboat | #blocktheboat |info@araborganizing.org

We are calling on all to join us on Sunday and take a stand to stop the US and Israeli relationship, their wars, militarization and repression by disrupting international commerce. Lets make sure Zim knows it will be met with the strength of our sustained movement should it attempt to come this week. As we mobilize at the Port, Block the Boat protests are being planned all over North America with solidarity actions taking place in New York, Long Beach, Tacoma and Vancouver. ALL OUT on Sunday to show our strength and to remind Zim that Israeli business is not welcome on the West coast! Please spread the word.

 

UPDATE 10/24/14 9:30 PM:
Zim is on the run, but we are tracking the ship closely!
Based on our calculations, the Zim Beijing cannot make it this weekend, but it could change course and arrive this week. Let’s show Zim what they can expect if they try to come back. Meet at West Oakland BART at 3pm SUNDAY to march and rally at the Port of Oakland. It is important we are ALL OUT on Sunday to show our strength and to remind Zim that Israeli cargo is not welcome on the West coast!

———————————-

The Block the Boat Coalition calls on the SF Bay Area to join us as we stop ZIM at the Port of Oakland once again.
Stay tuned for updates!

Subscribe to text-alerts by texting “join” to (510) 346-5951
Follow us on twitter @BlockTheBoat
To get involved, contact info@araborganizing.org
Facebook event & RSVP.

================
August 2014
Longest Blockade of Israeli Ship in History
ZIM ship turned away from SSA in Oakland!

For four days straight the San Francisco Bay Area community blocked the Israeli ZIM ship from unloading at the SSA. And today, we salute the rank and file workers of ILWU local 10 for standing with us against Israeli Apartheid by honoring our pickets and letting the ship go from the SSA terminal yesterday afternoon!

Saturday we mobilized thousands of our community to show the world that Oakland does not welcome racism, apartheid or Zionism, from Ferguson to Palestine. We flooded the streets and marched towards the Port only to discover that the ZIM ship decided to stay at Sea rather than dock and be confronted by the power of our numbers. The ship attempted to dock and unload on Sunday, but within a half hour’s time hundreds of us organized community pickets requesting that workers to stand with us on the side of justice and not unload the Apartheid ship. And as ILWU rank and file always have, and as they did during South African Apartheid, they demonstrated their solidarity with the global fight against oppression and honored our picket. The following Monday and Tuesday saw both an organized call to action as well as autonomous protests determined to keep the ship from being unloaded. These efforts coupled with worker solidarity continued the success of the weekend’s total blockade of the ZIM ship.

Tuesday we declared a historic victory for Palestine as Oakland held down the longest blockade of an Israeli ship. Not only did we block the boat, but we also showed the world that racist exclusionary state of Apartheid Israel has no place on our port, and will soon find that it has no place on any port on the West Coast. After being blocked from unloading at the SSA Terminal, the ZIM ship was forced to leave and unload at another Terminal where it was met with protests by autonomous activists. This even further delayed the unloading of the ship.

From the use of tear gas to the training of police by Israeli military, Oakland feels firsthand the brutality of Israeli war-making. And Palestine knows too well the role the US plays in facilitating the ongoing ethnic cleansing of the indigenous Palestinian people. From the policing and militarization of our local communities perfected with Israeli tactics of repression to the billions that the US provides Apartheid Israel, the connections are clear and are made for us. And over the last four days we showed the world that we stand shoulder to shoulder from Palestine to Oakland to Ferguson as we struggle bring down every wall, every Apartheid system and every racist state.

Palestine will be free.

Block the Boat was organized by a coalition of autonomous activists and the following organizations:

AF3IRM
Al-Awda New York
All African People’s Revolutionary Party (AAPRP)
American Friends Service Committee
American Muslims for Palestine
ANSWER Coalition
APEN: Asian Pacific Environmental Network
Arab Youth Organizing (AYO)
AROC: Arab Resource & Organizing Center
ASATA: Alliance of South Asians Taking Action
Bay Area Women in Black
BAYAN-USA
Bay Area CodePink
Bay Area Latin America Solidarity Coalition
Berkeley Fellowship of Unitarian Universalists Social Justice Committee
Black Organizing Project (BOP)
Black Organizing Leadership and Dignity (BOLD)
Black Workers For Justice
Catalyst Project
CodePink Washington
Committee for Open Discussion of Zionism (CODZ)
Communist Party of San Francisco
Critical Resistance – LA
Critical Resistance – Oakland
Critical Resistance – Portland
Descoloniza a Oakland/Decolonize Oakland
Free Palestine Movement
Freedom Archives
Friends of Deir Ibzi’a
Fuerza Mundial/Pueblos en Movimiento
General Union of Palestine Students – SFSU
Global Women’s Strike
Gray Panthers of San Francisco
Green Party of Alameda County
Haiti Action Committee
International Action Center
International Jewish Anti Zionist Network
International Solidarity Movement – West Bank/Gaza
International Socialist Organization
International Tribunal of Conscience for Camilo
ISM-Nor Cal
IWW Bay Area Branch
Jewish Against Genocide
Jews for Palestinian Right of Return
Justice for Palestinians
La Voz de l@s trabajadores/Worker’s Voice
Labor for Palestine
Lake Merritt Neighbors Organized for Peace
Malcolm X Grassroots Movement
Marcha Patriotica (Colombia) – California chapter
Middle East Children’s Alliance (MECA)
Movement Generation
National Lawyers Guild SFBA Chapter
Noam Chomsky
NorCal Friends of Sabeel
Occupy SF Action Council
ONYX Organizing Committee
The Palestine-Israel Action Committee
Palestine General Federation of Trade Unions
Palestinian Youth Movement
Queers Undermining Israeli Terror
Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network
San Francisco Green Party
School of the Americas Watch East Bay
Socialist Alternative – Bay Area Branch
Socialist Organizer
SOUL: School of Unity and Liberation
Southern Anti-Racism Network
Stanford Students for Justice
Stop the War Machine
Students for Justice in Palestine – Cal
Totally Radical Muslims
UAW Local 2865 (Academic Student Workers at the University of California)
US Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation
US Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott
US Palestinian Community Network
Veterans For Peace Chapter 69
World Can’t Wait Bay Area
Workers World Party
Xicana Moratorium

 

56823
Oct
29
Wed
STOP MILITARIZATION OF BERKELEY POLICE @ Old Berkeley City Hall
Oct 29 @ 2:00 am – 4:00 am

Speak out at Berkeley City Council  against renewal of Police Department Agreements with
Homeland Security/FBI programs!

The first Action Calendar item on the agenda is a Public Hearing on renewing
the Berkeley Police Department’s (BPD) agreement with Federal, local and State
law enforcement agencies.

To stop militarization of police departments we must demand that City
Councils not renew the agreement with the Homeland Security program, Urban
Areas Security Initiative (UASI), which gives grants to local police
departments for military equipment, such as tasers, drones, tanks and more.
Stopping UASI at our local City Councils would help to stop Police
Departments’ shopping spree at the annual URBAN SHIELD convention, stocked
with Homeland Security corporate merchandise.

Surveillance goes hand in hand with militarization. Ask the Council to also
vote to not renew the BPD agreement with the Northern California Regional
Intelligence Center (NCRIC), a data fusion center coordinated by the FBI’s Bay
Area Joint Terrorism Task Force, to which Suspicious Activity Reports (SARs)
are sent: e.g. taking a photo of a building or taking notes, especially if
you’re of a suspicious ethnic/color group.

SuperBOLD (Berkeleyans Organizing for Liberty Defense)

———————-
Berkeley Copwatch
2022 Blake St
Berkeley, CA 94704

57118
Nov
1
Sat
Jam the Sale of the Berkeley Post Office @ Downtown Berkeley Post Office
Nov 1 @ 8:00 pm – Nov 2 @ 5:00 am
Jam the Sale of the Berkeley Post Office

Nothing’s better for sustaining persistent resistance like persistent music

Why: To create a physical boundary of bodies and voices blocking the transfer of ownership of our public post office

The fate of the Downtown Berkeley Post Office has reached a crisis point.� The transfer of that building to private ownership may be only days away.  For this reason, the Berkeley Post Office Defenders call for mobilization of all those who appreciate the danger of privatization.  It is time to establish and support a physical presence at the Downtown Berkeley Post Office so that, with arms locked, we can block any poacher of our public property from taking possession.  By taking direct action to defend our public goods, we will affirm our reasons for living in community by sharing our energy and resources for the benefit of all.

The Board of Governors of the USPS has done a skillful job of narrowing the focus of the objections to the sale of the Downtown Berkeley Post Office to the issue of two New Deal works of art contained therein.  At this time, the position of the USPS is that they’ve done everything they can to satisfy the concerns of the Advisory Council on Historic Preservation (an agency formed by the National Historic Preservation Act of 1966) and concerns of the City of Berkeley for the preservation of these artworks, even to the point of promising that the USPS will provide that protection themselves in perpetuity after the building is sold.

The Berkeley Post Office Defenders re-emphasize two objections that have been largely ignored in the struggle to save our post office:

  1. The sale that the USPS intends to process is one manifestation of the neo-liberal strategy of privatization, deregulation, union-busting, and the cutting of government services, pursued via the World Bank and the WTO, which  in the last half-century  have proved to to be so detrimental to the welfare of people living in Chile, Argentina, Uruguay, South Africa, the nations of the former Soviet Union, Iraq, and many others.  Locally, the privately-owned Accrediting Commission for Community and Junior Colleges (ACCJC) is trying to bankrupt the publicly controlled City College of San Francisco.  The capital property of the USPS is a possession of the people of the United States as a public holding, meaning it is a component of national wealth and infrastructure, and the defense of that wealth is necessary for maintaining the viability of the national enterprise.  The Berkeley Post Office Defenders oppose the privatization of publicly owned property everywhere it is threatened, and we have mobilized our opposition locally to shield the erosion of the material foundation of community, of which the Downtown Berkeley Post Office is an element.
  2. With regard to the public ownership of the New Deal artworks, the promise of the USPS to preserve them  given its strategy of privatizatioon  is a deception.  By selling more than 300 of its properties since 2006, the Board of Governors of the USPS has undermined the capital foundation of the enterprise it is publicly charged with protecting.  This insidious strategy follows the steps to complete privatization of postal services pursued by other countries  the United Kingdom, New Zealand, Sweden, Germany and The Netherlands.  Given that the Board of Governors is selling the USPS out of business, it is their intention that, very soon, they will no longer be in a position to preserve the public ownership of anything.

The Downtown Berkeley Post Office is not only a monument to public organization, it is an organ of our common body; without it we grow weaker.  The agents of privatization are chiseling away at the investment our ancestors made to the survival of democracy.  Our post office was built by the sweat equity of our great-grandparents, and financed by their tax dollars.  As such, the Postal Service has NO RIGHT to sell it.  Berkeley Post Office Defenders DEMAND that this sale be halted and that the building continue to serve our – and our great-grandchildren’s – common good.

For more on the current status of the Downtown Berkeley Post Office: https://occupyoakland.org/2014/10/berkeley-post-office-contract-sold/

Berkeley Post Office Defenders: http://berkeleypostofficedefenders.wordpress.com/

First They Came for the Homeless: https://www.facebook.com/pages/First-they-came-for-the-homeless/253882908111999?ref=br_tf

BPOD is affiliated with Strike Debt Bay Area: http://strike-debt-bay-area.tumblr.com/

For more on the Staples boycott:

The Seeds of Protest Bloom. Staples Boycott Goes National.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2014/07/12/1313465/-The-Seeds-of-Protest-Bloom-Staples-Boycott-Goes-National#

For background on the fight to Save Berkeley’s Post Office:

Those Damned Hippies, They’re Saving the Post Office


USPS mission:

http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/39/101

For more on the privatization of the USPS:

Saving the United States Postal Service as a Public Enterprise: http://tinyurl.com/ltqq7ng

Privatization Is Social Cancer; Saving the US Postal Service: http://tinyurl.com/mbcbzrf

57119
March in Solidarity with Kobanê and the Rojava Revolution @ Oscar Grant Plaza
Nov 1 @ 10:00 pm – 11:30 pm

In respond to the Global Day of Action in solidarity with Kobanê

More Information about the global call out

kobanesolidemo.png
kobanesolidemo.png

57130
Nov
4
Tue
Strike Debt In Action with Student Debtors: OCCUPY THE DoE’s AGENDA! @ Department of Education Public Hearing, Grand Ballroom E
Nov 4 @ 8:00 pm – 11:00 pm

Strike Debt In Action with Student Debtors
We invite you to join us at the Department of Education Public Hearing to support current and former Corinthian (Everest, Heald, and Wyotech) students who will be speak directly to DOE officials to tell their stories and demand debt cancellation.

Join online at: Corinthian.debt.is The Debt Collective tech team created this page so that those of us who can’t be in Anaheim in person can be there virtually. This website will go live an hour before the hearing with a livestream, chat, social media links, DoE twitter bomb and other virtual actions. Everyone who wants to support Corinthian students as they demand debt cancellation, meet here on Nov 4th: http://corinthian.debt.is

What’s the Background?

On September 17th, Strike Debt launched The Debt Collective, where we are developing a new platform for organization, advocacy, and resistance. We aim to build power to bargain with creditors or even to threaten a debt strike. As we build membership, debtors can join together based on region, type of debt, or lender.

Alone our debts are a burden; together they make us powerful.

People already get it.  Denny in South Dakota emailed us to ask, “Is it possible there are others who have some of my issues in common? Is there an opportunity to collectivize this issue?”

Phil in California asked a similar question, “Do you have a collective group of Bank of America Mortgage debtors?” Denny and Phil’s questions show that people already understand what the debt collective can do.

People are ready to organize and begin demanding fair terms: fair interest rates, fair principal amounts, even the abolition of unjust debts.

Why Start With a For-Profit College?

The Debt Collective’s pilot project is with current and former students from for-profit Everest college. Everest, like other for-profit schools, targets students from low-income households, disproportionately from minority backgrounds. As Everest’s parent company, Corinthian, falls apart and its predatory activities are revealed, students are still expected to pay back their loans.

If Everest students join together, we believe they can win a full debt discharge. Their victory will help us demonstrate debtors’ collective power and other groups can be formed to follow their example.

What Will Happen at the Hearing?

On November 4th, we have a unique opportunity to demonstrate the power of debtors acting collectively at the Department of Education public hearing.

If you live in the Los Angeles area, we invite you to join us at the event.

If you don’t live in southern California but still want to support students, go here, starting at 12p PST, to help share students’ messages, see video clips, and watch the livestream of the hearing.

Please follow the Debt Collective on Facebook and Twitter.

Facebook event & RSVP

57163
Nov
7
Fri
Vigil/Protest in San Francisco for the open Internet @ Civic Center Plaza
Nov 7 @ 2:00 am – 3:00 am
Are you in the SF Bay Area this Thursday? On November 6th, in solidarity with the nationwide action, we’ll gather at the Civic Center in SF phones, candles, and flashlights up to shine light on the corruption that is unfolding in Washington, DC, and demand a free and uncensored Internet for all.

For more info go to https://www.battleforthenet.com/

Bring your cell phone, flashlight, or candle!

57190
Nov
10
Mon
Fight the CDCR’s Proposed Gang Association Rules, Etc @ Anywhere
Nov 10 @ 6:00 pm – Nov 11 @ 1:00 am

Please join Flying Over Walls, Prisoner Hunger Strike Solidarity, CURB and many others in fighting the latest round of CDCr’s attempts to censor communications across the walls! CDCr publicizes at its website that the purpose of these censorship rules is to forbid “publications that indicate an association with groups that are oppositional to authority and society.”

These proposed regulations seem to be a retaliation to try to prevent future hunger strikes or meaningful organizing of any kind. These new revisions do almost nothing to address the widespread concern and opposition voiced just a few months ago when the original version of the regulations were proposed. We need policies that open the lines of communication with our incarcerated family, friends, loved ones and political allies, not shut them down. Deadline is November 10 for public comments to the latest revisions put out. Please send in comments and make calls to let them know we are watching!

******************************BACKGROUND**********************************

Now that CDCr has passed new STG (Security Threat Group, aka gang) regulations, if any STG-associated incarcerated person’s name or letters are published in a newsletter (aka TGIJP’s Stiletto, Black & Pink’s monthly newsletter, Critical Resistance’s The Abolitionist, SF Bay View’s newspaper, etc.), then the whole newsletter can be banned, so as to ensure that “inmates shall also not possess or have under their control written material or photographs that indicate an association with a validated member or associate of a Security Threat Group. ”

And, if not banned, if they publish an article or picture of a “validated” member of a STG (whether or not it’s true, because the STG regulations are so absurd), another prisoner’s possession of it may be used to indicate that he or she is “associated” with the prisoners whose work is published in it, which could lead to them being “validated” as part of a STG and end up in SHU (solitary).

CDCr also continues to deem as contraband any number of items that a person in the SHU may innocently possess.

Please invite others, notify local media and help us raise awareness so that the CDCr does not try to slip this regulation through. Comments supposedly will only be “heard” to the extent that they address the revisions, rather than the originally proposed text, so please mention the revisions in your letters, even if it is just to say that these revisions do not address our original concerns.

*********************FAX-IN, EMAIL-IN, WRITE-IN!!!*************************

Please submit written comments to:

Timothy M. Lockwood, Chief,
Regulation and Policy Management Branch,
Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation,
P.O. Box 942883,
Sacramento, CA, 94283-0001;

by fax to (916) 324-6075;

or by e-mail at rpmb@cdcr.ca.gov (We additionally recommend that those responding by e-mail cc staff@oal.ca.gov)

Comments must be received or postmarked no later than 5:00 p.m. on November 10, 2014.

Sample letters and other resources will be posted in the comments section. Please post letters that you’ve sent and information that you want to share in order to support others in crafting their letters, emails, calls and faxes!!

*********************************AND CALL-IN!!!*******************************

In order to raise the pressure, once you have submitted your written comments, please also call Lockwood’s office to voice concern: (916) 445-2269. If you cannot get through, you can also call Christopher Abshire: (916) 327-5305.

Call-in script:

“Hi, my name is _________. I’d like to speak to Chief Timothy M. Lockwood or his staff person who handles public comments.

[You will almost definitely be told no one is available to speak with you. You can then tell the receptionist or whoever you are speaking with:]

“I am calling to express my concern / anger about the CDCR’s newly revised obscene materials regulations issued October 20. I’m upset that the Department has failed to meaningfully take into consideration concerns previously expressed by hundreds of community members regarding the originally proposed text, despite the Department’s promise that it would go back to the drawing board and its claim that the public had misunderstood its intent.

As a resident of [your city & state], I am very concerned that the description of what constitutes material from a Security Threat Group consists of materials that are highly subjective to individual interpretation on the part of prison staff and includes everyday items that may be innocently possessed. The CDCR needs to ensure that (1) no publication will be banned—permanently or temporarily— merely because because it has political or sexual content and correspondence typically protected by First Amendment constitutional rights, or because a person in custody with STG affiliation has chosen to publish his name and/or location in an editorial, news article or penpal request; and (2) no person in custody will be penalized simply for possessing publications that reference or include “affiliated” members of an STG.

[If you don’t get to have a real conversation with someone, make sure you leave your name and number and ask them to have a staff person call you back.]

57208
Nov
12
Wed
CONTINUE TO EXPRESS OUR SOLIDARITY WITH RASMEA. @ Oakland Federal Building
Nov 12 @ 3:30 pm – 5:00 pm

JOIN US TO CONTINUE TO EXPRESS OUR SOLIDARITY WITH RASMEA.

WHEN: Wednesday, November 12th @ 7:30, with the program starting at 8am.

WHAT: Rally, speak out, and flyering

Without a full and fair trial, Rasmea found guilty!

In a travesty of justice, Rasmea Odeh was found guilty of one count of Unlawful Procurement of Naturalization. For over a year, Rasmea, her supporters, and her legal team have been battling this unjust government prosecution, saying from the start that the immigration charge was nothing but a pretext to attack this icon of the Palestine liberation movement. And although there is real anger and disappointment in the jury’s verdict, it was known as early as October 27th that she would not get a full and fair trial.

Facebook page with detailed info & RSVP

57254
Nov
13
Thu
Fossil Fuel Divestment March at UC @ UC Berkeley
Nov 13 @ 5:00 am – 7:00 am

On Wednesday, November 12th, Fossil Free Cal is going to be leading a nighttime march around the South Side of the UC Berkeley campus. The March will start at 9:00 PM from the corner of Telegraph and Bancroft at the edge of campus.

The march aims to send a clear message to the UC Regents that a movement against their continued investment in fossil fuel companies is coming. Climate change is taking its toll on the planet and having a disproportionate impact on those least able to protect themselves. That being said, the Regents have shown no desire to stop investing in the big oil, coal, and natural gas producing and extracting companies.

Fossil Free Cal wants students and the community to bring their whistles, pots, drums, megaphones, and signs, so that the Regents can actually HEAR our complaints instead of continuing to ignore us.

Bring your friends, family members, and significant others. Join the movement and help us change the world!

Facebook event.

57201
Nov
14
Fri
A Food Initiative for the Gill Tract (Occupy The Farm) @ To be announced
Nov 14 @ 8:30 pm – 10:30 pm

On Friday Nov 14th, SEAL delegates will be meeting with Chancellor Dirks to present our proposal for a Food Initiative at the Gill Tract Farm.

We have years of visions and designs, years of petitions and public comments, years of community processes pointing towards a student and community desire for an alternative use of the land that does not exploit people and does not pollute the planet. We need the world-renown University of California to have a powerful Food Initiative amplifying the voices from the grassroots and producing community-driven research to find solutions to the pressing environmental problems we face today.

Nov 14th is the day. Let’s show our Chancellor the student and community power behind halting the development and engaging in a community-design process for all 20 acres of the Gill Tract Farm.

Facebook event & RSVP.  (Check for location details)

============

 

How can you help?? So glad you asked!

> Get inspired at the Occupy the Farm Film! It is having its theatrical premiere right here in Berkeley! Nov 7th-Nov 14th.
https://www.facebook.com/events/1698666823691759/

> If you have not done so already, please sign our petition:
bit.ly/FoodInitiative

> Like us on Facebook and share our posts!
https://www.facebook.com/studentsforengagedandactivelearning?ref=br_tf

> You can use this form letter to email and message your friends and family:
http://sealstudents.files.wordpress.com/2014/04/sample-email-outreach.pdf

> We love our campaign co-sponsors! Are you part of a food justice, urban garden, environmental justice, local economies, or other related organization and would be interested in signing on as a co-sponsor? email us!
http://sealstudents.wordpress.com/community-support/

57093
Nov
18
Tue
UC Davis Pepper Spray Commorative Action Against Tuition Hikes @ UC Davis Quad
Nov 18 @ 8:00 pm – Nov 19 @ 12:00 am

On November 18, the third anniversary of Pepper Spray, ASUCD and a coalition of student organizations and labor unions are staging a CAMPUS-WIDE action to fight the impending 5% tuition increases every year for the next 5 years. We believe these tuition increases are a callous threat to the promise of public higher education, and we, as students, are ready to fight back.

This action will also be a platform to recognize the intersectional dimensions of the privatization and decreasing affordability of higher education, as well as an opportunity for coalition allies to advance their causes such as stopping sexual violence, demanding fair and affordable housing, and converting contracted out employees to full-time career UC staff.

We will gather at the quad at noon, and then through participatory democracy and discussion we will decide the course of this action, including workshops, marches, sit-ins, teach-ins, and building occupations.

It doesn’t matter if you’re “non-political,” or not an “activist.” If you pay tuition, or if your friends pay tuition, this matters, and we need you here.

SHARE WIDELY. Talk to your friends, student organizations, workplaces, peers, professors, TAs, etc. Share articles about the tuition increases and discuss them. Engage in this conversation.

Student action stopped the Regents from increasing tuition 81% in 2011. There would be no greater celebration of that success than doing it again.

This is what democracy looks like.

57245
Nov
23
Sun
Change the Name! Change the Mascot! @ Levi Stadium
Nov 23 @ 6:00 pm – 11:00 pm

A Northern California grassroots campaign to end the use of the racial slur as the mascot and name of the NFL team in Washington, D.C. will be re-launched November 23rd at 10:00 AM. The campaign calls upon the NFL and Commissioner Roger Goodell to end the use of the racial epithet and its hurtful reminder of Indigenous peoples ongoing mistreatment. We also aim to develop institutionalized Indigenous oversight with the NFL to promote healing and restorative justice caused by our exploitation.

The American Indian Movement-West, Sacred Sites Protection & Rights of Indigenous Tribes, Eradicating Offensive Native Mascotry, and others are organizing its largest grassroots demonstration in the San Francisco Bay Area. Diversity is welcomed, so join our efforts and become a part of history! Endorsements, organizations, volunteers, carpools, & event attendees are needed.

800_change-the-name-rally-washington-racist-football-team-santa-clara.jpg original image ( 622x808)

57350
Nov
24
Mon
Rally & March at Cal: UC-Wide Walkout Against the Fee-Hikes and for Accessible Public Education. @ Sproul Plaza
Nov 24 @ 7:30 pm – 9:30 pm

UC-Wide Walkout Against the Fee-Hikes and for Accessible Public Education
The general assembly in Wheeler hall has called for a day of action on Monday to continue our struggle for accessible public education.

We will have:

Morning teach-outs ~ come join discussions on a variety of topics

  • 11:30: Academic Workers’ Rally for Public Education: https://www.facebook.com/events/501511563323950/?ref_newsfeed_story_type=regular
  • 12pm: Rally at Sather Gate in solidarity with statewide movements for public education

March through campus, then to downtown, passing big banks, BCC, and BHS. March returns to campus for a General Assembly to decide on a major action for Tuesday morning.

———–

Throughout the day, there will be Open University teach-outs on issues that cross student, worker, and community issues.

Check out the Open UC Website.

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Nov
25
Tue
Convergence at OGP After the Indictment Decision of Darren Wilson at 6:00 PM @ Oscar Grant Plaza
Nov 25 @ 2:00 am – 7:45 am

10421592_10205466962053002_7042848675072366031_nOfficials have announced that a decision on whether to indict Darren Wilson for the murder of Michael Brown has been reached, but what the decision is is not public yet.  The decision itself is to be announced later today,  now officially stated to be at 6:00 PM Pacific Time.

The call associated with the picture to the left.

IndyBay announcement.

 

The call from Stop Mass Incarceration Bay Area email:

If Wilson Walks, America Halts!
No Business As Usual in NYC!
Anything Less Than a Murder Charge Is Unacceptable
Charge Darren Wilson With Murder Now!
When Announced Immediately Go to 14th and Broadway and Into the Streets!
Justice for Michael Brown, Eric Garner,
and All Victims of Killer Cops!

 

 

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Nov
26
Wed
Oakland: Next Day After Ferguson Demonstratration! @ OPD HQ
Nov 26 @ 1:00 am – 2:00 am

WHAT: “The Next Day” Mobilization

The Oakland Uhuru Movement unites with the call put out by the Black is Back Coalition Social Justice, Peace and Reparations to engage in mass protest demanding justice for Mike Brown and the African with or without an indictment!

Bakari Olatunji, leader of the local Uhuru Movement says, “We stand up for Michael Brown, calling on police and military to withdraw from black neighborhoods across the county, including the Oakland police department. We also demand the release of all prisoners arrested during the Ferguson rebellions.”

Watch the dynamic call made by Chairman Lawrence Hamm of the People’s Organization for Progress at the Peace Through Revolution march: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=axL9UXZJl2A&list=UUIsoCw05eI4pWukrXLlOfoQ

Original IndyBay announcement.

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SF Protest: Another killer cop walks free! Justice for Mike Brown!
Nov 26 @ 1:00 am – 3:00 am

Protest the non-indictment of Darren Wilson in the killing of Michael Brown. We are outraged at the freeing of Ferguson police officer Darren Wilson. Just as in the murder of Alex Nieto, Andy Lopez, Eric Garner and so many more Black and Latino young men, officer Darren Wilson has been allowed to walk free. There is an epidemic of racist police killings across the country. Only the people organizing and fighting back can turn this around. Join with people across the country to say NO! to police killing and brutality.

Original notice on IndyBay.

800_ferguson.jpg original image ( 1200x799)

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Nov
28
Fri
Walmart vs. the World: Putting the planet’s largest climate criminal on trial! @ Walmart Store
Nov 28 – Nov 29 all-day

Join us on Black Friday as we condemn Walmart as the world’s largest climate criminal, destroying land and life from Richmond to Bangladesh.

This Black Friday (November 28th, 2014), we gather as peoples deeply committed to environmental and climate justice to condemn Walmart as a climate criminal and to stand side-by-side with Walmart’s workers organizing for $15/hr, full time work, and the respect they deserve.

Walmart’s war on workers is a war on planet Earth. Walmart has tried to salvage their tarnished reputation through greenwashing. But no amount of rooftop solar or  energy efficient refrigerators can conceal the fact that Walmart is the world’s largest climate criminal.

Walmart’s business model – worker exploitation, intensive resource extraction, globalized production and distribution, rampant consumerism, ruthless supplier competition, and subversion of our democracy – is at war with life on Earth.

In 2012, Walmart generated $16 billion in profit. The Walton family is worth $145 billion. These unprecedented profits have been extracted from the uncompensated labor of its workers at every stage of its global chain of production, as well as from the natural world. It is this extreme concentration of wealth wielded like a chainsaw against the natural world which is at the root of the ecological crisis:

Walmart exploits workers worldwide. Walmart’s chain of production is a chain of exploitation – Thousands of subcontracted workers in Bangladesh risk and lose their lives stitching “lowest price” garments, which are moved across the country by subcontracted port truck drivers, dubbed “sweatshops on wheels,” and sold by Walmart retail associates making poverty wages.

Walmart has a massive ecological footprint. Walmart’s endless rows of plastic products and electronics demand ever intensifying oil and mineral extraction. Their stores are a major source of greenhouse gas emissions. And Walmart’s globalized supply chain model makes it the largest importer of containerized ocean cargo in the U.S., one of the leading sources of pollution.

Walmart destroys local, living economies. Walmart actively drives out of business smaller, public transit-friendly, and environmentally-sustainable neighborhood retail districts, public markets, and “mom and pop” stores to make way for its -polluting, land-intensive, auto-oriented stores. Its
impoverishment of workers and communities then guarantees customers too poor to shop anywhere else.

Walmart undermines our democracy. Walmart’s PAC funnels millions of dollars to climate deniers and other lawmakers on the wrong side of climate policy – backing the Keystone XL pipeline, supporting subsidies for big oil, blocking the EPA’s ability to regulate CO2 emissions, and protecting the fracking industry from regulation.

Walmart’s funds to ALEC support mass incarceration when Walmart is committing the real crime of creating poverty and pollution.

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