Calendar
The first 100 people to arrive will get a free pocket Constitution!
You’re invited to the 2016 Bill of Rights Day when we celebrate the goals we’ve achieved together and look ahead to even greater challenges.
We know that you may be concerned about the presidential election results. Many of the proposed policies are unlawful and unconstitutional. The ACLU is swinging into high gear, ready for whatever awaits us.
Since our founding, we’ve worked together to defend the constitutional rights and freedoms of all Californians. Rest assured we’ll continue to do so. We’ve got your back!
Join us in Oakland on December 11 to celebrate the Bill of Rights and continue the fight together. With supporters like you, failure is not an option.
Tickets will NOT be sold at the door.
Abdi Soltani
Executive Director
ACLU of Northern California
ACLU. Because freedom can’t protect itself.
American Civil Liberties Union of Northern California
39 Drumm Street, San Francisco, CA 94111
On the 60th anniversary of the Hungarian Revolution:
Humanism vs. fascism, opposing capitalism then and now
Hailed by Martin Luther King, Jr., Hungarian revolutionaries in 1956 not only created a new form of direct democracy in Workers’ Councils but raised Marx’s humanism as freedom from Communism. “The goal of human development, the form of human society,” which Marx had warned is not communism, took center stage against the single-party-state.
Today various forms of humanism, from Black Lives Matter to Prisoners’ Human Rights Movement, also project humanism as an answer to global capitalism. Can Marx’s humanism help our age in is search for a way to unite the idea of freedom with a new post-capitalist reality? (see “Spontaneity of action and organization of thought. In memoriam: Hungarian Revolution”, Nov-Dec N&L at newsandletters.org)
Sponsored by Bay Area News and Letters Committees
We document current events, make films together, steward an editing suite and share a film equipment library. We also host film screenings, often with local directors, and put on an annual short film festival for independent Bay Area filmmakers. Our goal is to make the digital filmmaking accessible – no overpriced college degree or certificate program required!
We are also a good group to reach out to if you’d like to screen a film at the Omni. We can be reached at [ liberatedlens@lists.riseup.net ].
We usually meet in the basement, unless otherwise noted.
Information, discussion & community! Monday Night Forum!!
Occupy Forum is an opportunity for open and respectful dialogue
on all sides of these critically important issues!
Alan Haber, SDS:
The Port Huron Statement, Occupy, and a Blueprint for Action
In the 50 years since its initial publication, Tom Hayden has attracted the bulk of media attention surrounding the Port Huron Statement. He wrote much of the original text and served as its high-profile articulator and leader of its execution. But it’s the lesser-known Robert Alan (Al) Haber who is credited as the “big brain,” the “visionary,” and the “indispensable element” of the student movement.
As the founder of SDS, Haber was elected its first president in 1960. He spent the first few years building the organizational and intellectual foundation that would support Henry David Thoreau’s call of “voting with your whole body.” In the SDS, Haber had established an educational association that, in his words, was “concerned with building a responsible and articulate left in universities and to extending the influence of this community into the political life of society more generally.” After one of the organization’s first meetings he wrote, “Pessimism and cynicism have given way to direct action.”
Haber, Hayden, and a handful of SDS members organized a conference to discuss Hayden’s working treatise. In the course of five days, more than 60 student activists from New York to California hunkered down at Port Huron’s FDR Camp to hash out, then publish the consensus document that would change the course of American social and political history.
Join us at OccupyForum to hear from Al Haber, and discuss the implications and applications of the Port Huron Statement, and Occupy, for today’s precarious times.
Q&A and Announcements will follow. Donations to OccupyForum to cover our costs are encouraged; no one turned away!
http://www.sds-1960s.org/PortHuronStatement-draft.htm
http://michigantoday.umich.edu/a8402/
https://www.jacobinmag.com/2016/10/tom-hayden-sds-port-huron-counterculture-protest-vietnam/
This workshop for APTP comrades supports the resilience and wellbeing of front line change-makers, justice seekers, organizers, and activists.
Together we will explore:
• How to keep alive and vital that place within us where the motivation to work for social change arises
• How to not only “keep on keeping on,” but to keep on in a way that is transformative for us as individuals, for the organization, the movement, and the community
• How to stay connected to the larger vision and purpose that inspires, uplifts, and sustains each of us to be our best and most whole selves in every area of our lives
• How to process and clear trauma
The workshop will be held in Shelton Hall of the Oakland Peace Center (OPC).
This is the building of the First Christian Church of Oakland (the big white church at the corner of Fairmount Ave and 29th St.) You will need to enter through the glass office door via the parking lot (enter parking lot from Fairmount Ave). Please arrive early if possible. After 7pm the door will be locked and you can text the number posted to be let in.
OTU’s Mission
The Oakland Tenants Union is an organization of housing activists dedicated to protecting tenant rights and interests. OTU does this by working directly with tenants in their struggle with landlords, impacting legislation and public policy about housing, community education, and working with other organizations committed to furthering renters’ rights. The Oakland Tenants Union is open to anyone who shares our core values and who believes that tenants themselves have the primary responsibility to work on their own behalf.
Monthly Meetings
The Oakland Tenants Union meets regularly at 7:00 pm on the second Monday evening of each month. Our monthly meetings are held in the Community Room of the Madison Park Apartments, 100 – 9th Street (at Oak Street, across from the Lake Merritt BART Station). To enter, gently knock on the window of the room to the right of the main entrance to the building. At the meetings, first we focus on general issues affecting renters city-wide and then second we offer advice to renters regarding their individual concerns.
If you have an issue, a question, or need advice about a tenant/landlord issue, please call us at (510) 704-5276. Leave a message with your name and phone number and someone will get back to you.
This month we had a conflict so the meeting will be held on the second Monday, December 12th at 7 PM at the Niebyl-Proctor Library.
The Oscar Grant Committee Against Police Brutality & State Repression (OGC) is a grassroots democratic organization that was formed as a conscious united front for justice against police brutality. The OGC is involved in the struggle for police accountability and is committed to stopping police brutality.
Note: At our November meeting we changed our meeting date from the first Tuesday of the month to the first Monday, starting January 2nd.
“Faulty Towers: Where do we go from here in contingent academic labor organizing?”
By Jessica Lawless, who is a former adjunct professor and current organizer for SEIU 1021’s Northern California Faculty Forward Campaign.
This is part of the Oakland Livable Wage Assembly meeting. The talk will be preceded by introductions and a short business meeting. This will be OLWA’s last meeting for 2016.
This year, Oakland’s Anti Police-Terror Project is calling on our Bay Area community to up the resistance level, as we reclaim the radical legacy of Martin Luther King and resist the fascist Trump agenda. This year the Reclaiming King’s Radical Legacy March on Monday (1/16) will launch 120 hours of direct action, culminating on #HellNawGuration Day (1/20). This year we are focused on immigrant rights, protection of our Muslim brothers and sisters, womens reproductive rights, loving our LGBTQ sisters, brothers and siblings, and the defense of Black life.
As is our custom, we will host a Spokescouncil meeting to plan and coordinate actions in the SF Bay Area. PLEASE SAVE THE FOLLOWING DATES in your calendar.
> Tuesday Dec 6th, 6:30pm orientation and kickoff meeting, GPW 955 7th Street.
> Tuesday Dec 13th, 6:30pm orientation, 7pm meeting, OMNI Commons
> Tuesday Dec 20th, 6:30pm orientation, 7pm meeting, OMNI Commons
> Tuesday Dec 27th, 6:30pm orientation, 7pm meeting, OMNI Commons
> More dates TBA
* If it”s your first meeting, please make sure to show up early to attend the orientation!
What is a spokescouncil?
A spokescouncil is a collective framework for direct action mobilizations, where large masses of people organize themselves into smaller teams called “affinity groups”. Affinity groups plan their actions independently with the intention of advancing the larger goal of the spokescouncil. Affinity groups are represented by at least one person (“a spoke”) at the meetings, where they are able to share resources and coordinate their actions with other groups.
Why a spokescouncil?
We propose the spokescouncil as a solution to many of the shortcomings of unstructured mass assemblies. We intend to provide a highly structured organizing space with clear tactical and messaging guidelines, that empowers participants to organize independently and in parallel. We intend to inspire a multitude of diverse actions and awaken the massive potential we have as a community engaging in direct action.
** for questions or more information about the spokescouncil please contact aptpspokescouncil@gmail.co
Casino San Pablo makes millions. Its workers are struggling to get out of poverty. This holiday season, stand with them!
Casino San Pablo made $263 million* in FY 2014-15. But its workers make as little as $11 per hour – less than the minimum wage in nearby towns like Richmond, El Cerrito and Oakland. And the Casino’s proposed raise for its lowest-paid workers in 2017 is just 22 cents per hour!
State labor laws don’t apply at the Casino, so workers are denied many of the basic rights that other California workers take for granted – from California workers’ compensation benefits to a smoke-free workplace. And the Casino’s contract only provides for 3 months of medical leave – so workers can be fired if they need more time to recover from surgery or childbirth.
Workers are standing up to demand the Casino do better. Join them!
In Solidarity, UNITE HERE Local 2850
*gross gaming revenue 2014-15
UNITE HERE Local 2850, 1440 Broadway, Suite 208, Oakland, CA 94612 | www.unitehere2850.org
Due to an overwhelming level of interest, we had to move this month’s meeting to a larger venue. Despite our best efforts to accommodate all who showed interest, the largest site we could secure is the Oakland Peace Center.
We are sorry to have to limit attendance, but we have to adhere to the building’s fire safety rules. Note that we will be holding our next intro meeting on January 11 and would love to see you then, as well!
At this meeting gathering, we will create an altar in honor of Will Sims, the beloved young, Black man and gifted musician who was a killed in El Sobrante on November 12. Please bring items to offer on the altar we will build for him and his community. In so doing, we strengthen our commitment to fighting white supremacy right here in the Bay Area.
Please note: There is very limited parking near the venue. Please allow time to find parking or plan to take the bus, bike, walk, or carpool. 19th Street BART is the closest station and is a 20 minute, .8 mile walk. Bus lines 51A and 11 stop within a block.
Thank you so much for your interest in SURJ Bay and look forward to working for racial justice with each and everyone of you. Additionally, you’ll hear about upcoming workshops and trainings as well as reports from SURJ’s committees – Basebuilding, Communications, Fundraising, Mobilization, Youth & Families, and the Queen & Trans Working Group. We’ll answer your questions, and share how you can get involved in local racial justice efforts.
PLEASE RSVP HERE: http://
Space is limited so we are asking folks to please let us know they’re coming.
Showing up for Racial Justice (SURJ) Bay Area is a local chapter of a national network of groups and individuals organizing white people for racial justice. There are over 150 chapters and affiliates nationwide. Through community organizing, mobilizing, and education, SURJ moves white people to act as part of a multi-racial majority for justice with passion and accountability.
Accessibility:
The space is wheelchair accessible through the glass door off of the parking lot on Farimount Avenue, and there are several accessible parking spaces in the lot next to the door. The bathrooms have a flat entryway but are not wheelchair accessible. There is one gender-neutral restroom, and the other two restrooms will also be gender neutral during the event. The space uses some scented cleaning products. We ask that you do your best to arrive at the event scent/fragrance free to keep the space as low-scent as possible to support people with chemical and scent sensitivities – please see https://
We’ll be continuing the coordination of immediate responses toward making Oakland DIY spaces safer, in the short and long-term.
The goal of this meeting will be to tighten coordination efforts and check-in on developments from various working groups since the last meeting, as well as getting new volunteers up to speed and involved.
Everyone is welcome to attend the meeting; as volunteers, as members of DIY spaces, or simply as people wanting to know what is going on and how to help.
* We do ask that all press remain outside the event, and respect the privacy of this process.
Please collaborate on the agenda here: https://pad.riseup.net/p/
Add comments or questions to the agenda in the chat window in the the right-hand corner.
The notes from the previous meeting can be found here:
https://omnicommons.org/
Hear from a delegation from the Marin County Task Force that traveled from the San Francisco Bay Area to to participate at the US-Mexican Border to raise issues of immigration justice:
(1) participate in a national convergence at the border to highlight the militarization of the southern border and the U.S.-sponsored militarization of Central American borders, and the human rights crisis of an unjust immigration system
(2) support maquiladora workers, highlight the failures of the North America Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) in protecting workers rights and demonstrate the dangers of the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) in further depressing wages in Mexico and the United States
This is part of the Alliance for Social and Economic Justice participating organizations: Bay Area Committee in Solidarity with the People of El Salvador (CISPES), Global Exchange, Marin Task Force on the Americas, San Francisco Living Wage Coalition, Trabajo Cultural Caminante, School of the Americas Watch West.
Eyewitness Aleppo: Journalist Eva Bartlett Reports from Her Experience on the Ground:
Independent Canadian journalist Eva Bartlett, newly arrived from Syria, will report on her experiences in Aleppo and elsewhere in Syria, as will Gerry Condon, US Veterans for Peace VP and member of the US Peace Council Delegation to Syria. You will definitely hear much that you have not heard elsewhere, and perhaps question what you think you know about Syria. Eva lived in Gaza for three years and was one of the few western reporters present during the Israeli attacks that killed thousands of Palestinians.
Organizers, sponsors and co-sponsors: International Action Center (IAC), United National Antiwar Coalition (UNAC), US Peace Council, Syria Solidarity Movement, Socialist Action, Workers World Party, Resource Center for Non Violence Palestine/Israel Action Committee, ANSWER – SF Bay Area, Cindy Sheehan Soapbox, Mt. Diablo Peace and Justice Center, Peace and Freedom Party (Marin), Peace and Freedom Party (San Francisco), Project Censored, Media Freedom Foundation, Veterans for Peace East Bay Chapter 162
We have received word from Manny’s attorney that this court appearance is important and that support in the audience is very likely to influence the judge!
Manny was arrested in Burlingame at the Anti Trump demonstrations outside the Hyatt Hotel. (Remember in the Spring when Trump was so scared by demonstrators he had to sneak in through the back??) He has been fighting his charges ever since!
We realize the peninsula is out of the normal area that we usually call for folks to give support, however, it would really mean a lot to Manny and his defense team to supporters in the audience!
Standing Rock water protectors still urgently need our help. Efforts continue in our own backyard to encourage divestment from Citibank, that perpetual bad actor and financial ringleader of the global investors bankrolling the Dakota Access Pipeline. Because Energy Transfer Partners plans to go ahead with pipeline construction under the Missouri River despite the Army Corps of Engineers permit denial, it is more important than ever to stop the financing for this pipeline. Without investors, this project simply cannot move forward.
Join us on Saturday, December 17th at Citibank branches across the Bay Area to urge customers to close their bank accounts and demand that Citibank divest from DAPL.
We just need two to three people at each branch any time on Saturday. Which of these branches can you target? Please RSVP to both Carolyn (carolynclara [at] gmail.com) and Lora Jo (ljfoo60 [at] gmail.com). Here are four documents that you can print and use: talking points, a flyer to distribute, a petition for signature-gathering, and a letter that customers can send to Citibank:
samplescript-forbanksdivestingfromdapl-12-7-16
Citibank, Piedmont Branch
4101 Piedmont Ave.
Oakland, CA 94611
Citibank, 4017 Macarthur Blvd Branch
4017 Macarthur Blvd.
Oakland, CA 94619
Citibank, Fruitvale Village
3301 East 12th Street
Oakland, CA 94601
Citibank, Alameda-Downtown Branch
2420 Santa Clara Ave.
Alameda, CA 94501
Citibank, Oakland-Chinatown
801-A Franklin St.
Oakland, CA 94607
Citibank, Berkeley Square Branch
2000 Shattuck Ave.
Berkeley, CA 94704
Citibank, San Leandro-Downtown
1300 E 14th Street
San Leandro, CA 94577
Citibank, San Lorenzo Branch
429 Paseo Grande
San Lorenzo, CA 94580
Citibank, Albany Branch
1377 Solano Ave.
Albany, CA 94706
Citibank, 280 El Cerrito Plaza Branch
280 El Cerrito Plaza
El Cerrito, CA 95630
Remember to check their Saturday hours—best way to do that is enter the branch in Yelp. If you don’t live near any of the banks listed on the spreadsheet, go here to to find one nearest you.
This year’s theme is Community: for good or ill.
For anarchists the idea of community represents both an ideal and a practice. The ideal community is either explicitly anarchist, one that concerns itself with an anti-authoritarian rigor, challenging culturally normative standards like beauty, heterosexuality, diet, and bigotry or it is a broader group that allows anarchists to live within it, and listens to their concerns. The practice for anarchists, by and large, is identical to that of our neighbors— isolation, slavery to job and routine, and association only with a small subset of who is possible, even just within a geographical area.
March in the streets with homies & comrades: America was never great. It has always been a country where indigenous, black, brown, migrant, queer and trans folks y muchos más have been systematically exploited and attacked by the police, the state and fascists. This has been the colonial tradition of America. With the rise of yet another fascist as president on stolen land, the threat to our lives and communities deepens and we need to defend ourselves and each other, together, with all the love & rage that we feel. This action is to show our resistance and make our presence visible. Community collectiveness is necessary and healing, aqui estamos and we have each other’s back. Let’s make the Mission and all of our neighborhoods places where racists and bigots are afraid to go – para siempre, always.
(Backup location if Paris Baguette has no seating: Oscar Grant Plaza amphitheater, 14th & Broadway, outside of City Hall.)
Strike Debt is building a debt resistance movement. We believe that most individual debt is illegitimate and unjust. Most of us fall into debt because we are increasingly deprived of the means to acquire the basic necessities of life: health care, education, and housing. Because we are forced to go into debt simply in order to live, we think it is right and moral to resist it.
- organizing for public banking in Oakland! We made the first step happen… now we have to keep the momentum going!
- Tiny Homes for the homeless.
- Working on debarring US Banks that have been convicted of felonies from municipal contract
- money bail reform and fighting modern day debtors’ prisons and exploitive ticketing and fining schemes
- helping out America’s only non-profit check-cashing organization and fighting against usurious for-profit pay-day lenders and their ilk
- student debt resistance
- Promoting the concept of Basic Income
- advocating for Postal banking
- Presenting debt-related topics at forums and workshops
- Bring your own debt-related project!
If you are new to Strike Debt and want to come early , meet one or two of us and get a briefing on our projects before we dive into our agenda, email us at strike.debt.bay.area@gmail.com .
Strike Debt – Principles of Solidarity
Strike Debt is building a debt resistance movement. We believe that most individual debt is illegitimate and unjust. Most of us fall into debt because we are increasingly deprived of the means to acquire the basic necessities of life: health care, education, and housing. Because we are forced to go into debt simply in order to live, we think it is right and moral to resist it.
We also oppose debt because it is an instrument of exploitation and political domination. Debt is used to discipline us, deepen existing inequalities, and reinforce racial, gendered, and other social hierarchies. Every Strike Debt action is designed to weaken the institutions that seek to divide us and benefit from our division. As an alternative to this predatory system, Strike Debt advocates a just and sustainable economy, based on mutual aid, common goods, and public affluence.
Strike Debt is committed to the principles and tactics of political autonomy, direct democracy, direct action, creative openness, a culture of solidarity, and commitment to anti-oppressive language and conduct. We struggle for a world without racism, sexism, homophobia, transphobia, and all forms of oppression.
Strike Debt holds that we are all debtors, whether or not we have personal loan agreements. Through the manipulation of sovereign and municipal debt, the costs of speculator-driven crises are passed on to all of us. Though different kinds of debt can affect the same household, they are all interconnected, and so all household debtors have a common interest in resisting.
Strike Debt engages in public education about the debt-system to counteract the self-serving myth that finance is too complicated for laypersons to understand. In particular, it urges direct action as a way of stopping the damage caused by the creditor class and their enablers among elected government officials. Direct action empowers those who participate in challenging the debt-system.
Strike Debt holds that we owe the financial institutions nothing, whereas, to our friends, families and communities, we owe everything. In pursuing a long-term strategy for national organizing around this principle, we pledge international solidarity with the growing global movement against debt and austerity.