Calendar
Y.O.G.A. = You Occupy, Get Access!
As part of Veterans Day, veterans will be leading a march against police brutality on November 11th, 2011 in Oakland. We will start with a press conference and rally with an update and statement from Scott Olsen at Oscar Grant Plaza starting at 4pm.
We welcome all veterans of the 99% to lead the way and all supporters to join us as we march the streets. We march not only for injured veterans Scott Olsen, Kayvan Sabeghi and Doug Connor, but for all those who have been killed or injured as a result of police brutality.
Kayvan Sabeghi and Doug Connor were injured on November 3, 2011 while being detained near Oscar Grant Plaza. Kayvan was severely beaten and suffered a lacerated spleen and internal bleeding. He was abused and denied medical treatment. For hours, Kayvan waited in a holding cell in severe pain before receiving medical attention. Doug is an ex-army flight nurse who was attempting to help injured protesters in jail when he was then put in additional handcuffs that were so tight on his wrists that his hands turned blue and were numb. He was left in those handcuffs for several hours until he was released.
Numerous injuries have been incurred at the hands of the police in our communities. This is unacceptable.
We strongly believe that the 99% should be free to exercise our constitutionally guaranteed right of free speech and peaceful assembly without fear of harm.
Oakland citizens have long been on the receiving end of police violence. The most recent victims have been military veterans who served their country in foreign wars, only to be seriously injured at home as they exercised the freedoms they served to protect.
While it has been the recent injurious of three of our military brothers that has catalyzed us, we stand against violence and brutality toward ANY of our people- veteran, civilian or otherwise.
As military members, we put our lives on the line in the name of protecting our country and its citizens (including the police). We take our oath to protect and defend the Constitution very seriously and while we may have departed the military, we never disavowed our commitment.
We will return to the streets this Veterans Day to remember our brothers and sisters who have served to protect the freedoms that the Oakland Police Department and the Alameda County Sheriffs have decided do not exist. We join the people of Oakland in affirmation of our Constitution, our right to peacefully assemble and to do so without fear of violence from those sworn to protect and serve.
Meets Monday Wednesday, Friday and Sundays at 6.
Training covering teargas, pepper spray, handcuffs and some blunt trauma. All are welcome. This will be a completely sober space.
“Deep Green Resistance: Strategy to Save the Planet” authors Derrick Jensen and Aric McBay, as well as Dakota writer, teacher, and activist Waziyatawin speak at OccupyOakland and OccupySF.
Our planet is under serious threat from industrial civilization. Yet activists are not considering strategies that might actually prevent the looming biotic collapse the Earth is facing. We need to deprive the rich of their ability to steal from the poor and the powerful of their ability to destroy the planet. We need a serious resistance movement that includes all levels of direct action–action that can match the scale of the problem.
Deep Green Resistance organizers will be at both locations with literature and available to chat and answer questions.
Y.O.G.A. = You Occupy, Get Access!
Egypt held a solidarity march for us and now we are doing the same for them.
Oakland and Cairo are one hand.
Rally at the plaza at 4pm
March at 5pm: First to the federal building where people can speak about the U.S. government’s complicity in the repression of Egyptian people, and then to the Glenn Dyer detention facility to connect the imprisonment of political prisoners in Egypt to prisoners in the U.S. and everywhere.
The following was passed at the Nov. 9 General Assembly with 97% approval:
Preamble:
Egyptian activists from the Tahrir Square movement have put out an international call for solidarity actions with their revolution on Saturday, November 12th. While Egypt has faded from the spotlight over the past few months, activists have never been in more danger from their on-going military government and police state. Several Egyptian activists have been imprisoned using open-ended sentences: including Alaa Abd El Fattah by the military of Egypt, which is trying to stifle the revolution and has been using repressive tactics to do so.
Given that our Egyptian counterparts marched on the U.S. embassy in solidarity with Occupy Oakland, published a solidarity letter, continuously strive to keep vital connections between Cairo and our Occupy Movement after the tragic day of police violence on the streets of downtown Oakland, it is imperative that we respond in kind, with solidarity, love and support during their difficult and dangerous struggle. This solidarity is best shown, not only by expressing support for their similar goals and movements, but by acknowledging that our very government stands in the way of their goals, just as it often does with ours.
This proposal is in no way meant to discourage any other actions or statements that may be planned for this day in solidarity with Egypt’s Revolution, but rather, was organized so that there would be at least one GA endorsed Occupy Oakland solidarity letter and action.
To the Revolutionaries in Egypt,
The January 25th revolution shook the globe. After over 30 years of living under a brutal dictatorship, the Egyptian people erupted in fury. We watched as you occupied Tahrir Square and resisted the government’s ruthless attacks; at the end of those 18 long days, we witnessed the power of a united people as you celebrated the revolution’s success in ousting Mubarak.
But we realize that your struggle is long from over. We watched in tears as the military council took power, protecting the remnants of the old government, and defending the system of economic oppression which continues to exploit and drive your people into poverty. It seems that they did not understand the now infamous chant: The people want the downfall of the regime. As the SCAF (Supreme Council of Armed Forces) promised to facilitate the transition to democracy, it has continued to kill protestors, viciously remove occupiers from Tahrir, conduct “virginity tests,” and persecute thousands through unjust military trials. Ridding yourselves of Mubarak was the first step, but now it is more evident than ever that the people will only be truly free when the whole system is abolished.
Do not stop in your efforts for freedom. You have already inspired thousands all over the world to occupy public spaces, to bring Tahrir Square everywhere. These liberated spaces have provided food, shelter, protection and education in a way that capitalism never can, and never will. But just as government thugs, the military, and the police repeatedly cracked down on Tahrir, police forces everywhere are raiding our occupations with the goal of destroying everything that we create. It has become clear that if we build shelters, develop safe spaces for people of color, women, the poor, trans and queers, if we set up open kitchens, create free schools– if we attempt to imagine a world without capitalism, we will be quashed by the capitalists and their army of police.
And so we stand with you. We are you. This entire generation has come to understand that we have no future in the current state of things. From Oakland to Egypt, there is only one chant: The people want the downfall of the regime.
Oakland has fallen in love with the Egyptian revolutionaries, and from Oscar Grant Plaza, we are standing with you. We are standing with you against all military trials, the repression from the government, and this system, which plagues all of our lives. Continue your resistance, strengthen your revolution, and do not be discouraged. You are the ones, after all, who have shown us all that another world is possible.
This Saturday, Nov 12th, as the Egyptian people call for solidarity from across the globe, rest assured that your comrades in Oscar Grant Plaza will be standing with you. Oakland and Egypt are one hand!
With Love and Solidarity from Occupied Oakland
November 9, 2011
This is the same training as Saturday’s covering teargas, pepper spray, handcuffs and some blunt trauma. All are welcome. This will be a completely sober space.
Discussing ways to protect the plaza, to connect with other rank and file workers, and possible ways and places where workers can defend workers in Oakland.
Specific meeting for all camped at Oscar Grant Plaza. Meetings everyday at 12pm.
Bring readings of poetry you want others to hear, or share your own poetry.
Events Committee is responsible for the actions, workshops, shows, teach-ins, etc. Meetings every day at 1:00 pm at the Rising Loafer, right across from the Interfaith Tent and a few doors down from Tully’s.
Y.O.G.A. = You Occupy, Get Access!
Chris Hedges, whose column is published Mondays on Truthdig, spent nearly two decades as a foreign correspondent in Central America, the Middle East, Africa and the Balkans. He has reported from more than 50 countries and has worked for The Christian Science Monitor, National Public Radio, The Dallas Morning News and The New York Times, for which he was a foreign correspondent for 15 years.
These workshops are being ran by individuals from native communities who brought forward the Memorandum of Solidarity with Indigenous Peoples that Occupy Oakland agreed to adopt. In order to move forward with this solidarity work this workshop is being held.
What does it mean to acknowledge the United States as a colonial and imperial nation? What is colonialism and imperialism?
What does it mean to acknowledge that Oakland is already occupied land? Who are the Chochenyo Ohlone people?
What does decolonization and deoccupation of the United States and Oakland mean? What can it mean?
Come discuss and learn with each other.
We are a group of theatre activists and drama therapists comitted to racial justice. We use Theatre of the Oppressed, Playback Theatre, and many drama therapy methods. We are offering a weekly interactive theatre workshop for community members who would like to partake in a space for anti-racist community building, working through dynamics with “isms” within the movement, letting off steam, and practicing embodying our racial justice ideals together.We encourage community members who do or who would like to embody anti-racist/ racial justice oriented ideals. We acknowledge that for white activists, this means practicing having the humility and compassion to continually challenge our assumptions, and distortions, and listen deeply to people of color. This space is for people of color and white people and acknowledges that we live in a world that is racially oppressive. For People of Color, this space can be a place to acknowledge the oppressive systems we are impacted by and how those systems manifest in our interactions with our communities, families, partnerships, and ourselves in the narratives and interactions we have about ourselves, our partners, families, friends, and community.The movement, at its best, can be about embodying racial justice ideals in order to make the change we need. We are inspired by histories of resistance to racial injustice and honor these legacies. Interactive theatre, like drama therapy, Theatre of the Oppressed, and Playback Theatre, are powerful tools to help with this process.