In honor of Indigenous Peoples’ Day here is “Our Life Under the Oaks”, a Kumeyaay story curated by the American Indian Studies program at SDSU. [Read more…]
A Samantha Bee Primer on Puerto Rico, with an Assist from Javier Muñoz | Video Worth Watching
Samantha Bee, with an assist from Javier Muñoz (and Donald Trump) presents a quick overview of the hundred-year history of Puerto Rico getting screwed with its pantalones on by the United States. After watching this video you will know more about the Jones Act than the Full Frontal Graphics department. [Read more…]
Confederate Monuments – Grind the Stone Into Dust | Video Worth Watching
What is to be done with the monuments to Southern white supremacy? New Orleans has already begun the process of removing these symbols of white supremacy and New Orleans mayor, Mitch Landrieu, revealed to the Atlantic, some of the issues raised by this project.
Then there’s Daily Kos blogger, Hunter, who weighed in recently with a post titled “Tear Them Down”. Pointing out that nearly all of the monuments nationwide were erected long after the end of the Civil War, most were less an attempt to honor the exploits of those fighting to preserve slavery than a demonstration of the continued dominance of white power and privilege. Putting them in historical context he says: [Read more…]
Isaac Artenstein: Telling Frontier Jewish Stories
Filmmaker Isaac Artenstein likes to tell good stories, especially unknown ones, and if those stories inform and entertain others, even better.
He feels that the Jews of the Southwest have an untold story as the narrative has been mostly about the Anglo westward expansion; whereas, other immigrants are also part of the history. He wants to show one of the missing pieces of the puzzle.
To that end, he’s working on a four-part series of documentaries, “Frontier Jews,” which covers Jews of the Southwest, including New Mexico, San Diego, Arizona (specificially, Tucson), and El Paso, Texas. The documentary on New Mexico, “Challah Rising in the Desert” has just been completed and the one on San Diego, “To the Ends of the Earth,” is near completion.
Artenstein was born in San Diego and grew up as a child of the border. He went to school in Tijuana and high school in Chula Vista. Fluent in both English and Spanish, he moves comfortably between both worlds. In addition, with an Ashkenazi father and Sephardic mother, he was also exposed to the different aspects of Judaism, which has served him well while making the documentaries. [Read more…]
‘America First:’ The Value of Knowing Where We’ve Been
Tough subjects seem always to end up with Greek or Latin roots. Alienation, bulimia, catastrophe, depression … just go through the alphabet and you’ll find them.
In our fragile democracies, maybe we assign concepts like these, wrestled over by so many psychoanalysts, social and clinical psychologists, political scientists, sociologists, historians, writers for large daily newspapers — even some politicians — that they’ve become contorted and distorted to the point that they are merely suggestive, symbolic, abstracted from the particular.
Many of them become the product of people who differ mightily over the causes and effects of our barely civilized mistakes; for example, the election of Donald Trump to presidency.
Historians have generally proved to be more reliable than other more scientific specialists active in the battle to explain how we wound up electing a blowhard to the nation’s highest office. Here are two words they’ve used, righteously, to explain our mad indifference to failure: Xenophobia and isolationism. [Read more…]
A Genealogy Adventure with Slave and Supercentenarian Moses Williams
Donya Williams, the four-times great-granddaugter of a man named Moses Williams, asked me if I would help draw attention to some research she and a cousin are doing titled: Stronger Together: The Moses Williams Genetic Genealogy Project.
So I started reading a bio she sent me of their work and can’t help but think they already know what they’re doing.
I was barely into reading other information when the names Strom Thurmond, 50 Cent, Al Sharpton, and L.L. Cool J jumped out at me – names I wouldn’t ever expect to appear in the same sentence.
I mean what could a white Southern senator who loves the KKK and a man who raps, “There’s no business like ho business” and a melodramatic Baptist preacher “Keepin’ it Real” and the creator of “Mama Said Knock You Out” possibly have in common? [Read more…]
Veterans Call on U.S. to Sign Nuclear Ban Treaty
By Brian Trautman, Gerry Condon and Samantha Ferguson
On July 7, 2017, the United Nations (UN), in a historic decision, approved a legally binding instrument to ban nuclear weapons, the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons. Months of negotiations involving more than 130 countries began in March of this year, culminating in a final draft endorsed by 122 countries.
The treaty marks a significant milestone to help free the world of nuclear weapons.
Humanity has been at the brink of a nuclear exchange on multiple occasions since the end of World War II, including times when the decision to launch was seconds from happening. An urgent question, then, is why these close calls, as well as the brutal and unnecessary annihilation of the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki that preceded them, failed to convince all governments that nuclear weapons represent an existential threat to humanity, thus nuclear disarmament must be a top priority? [Read more…]
The Watergate Break-in, 45 Years Later
It was the night of June 17, 1972, that 5 so-called “burglars” were caught red-handed inside the National Democratic Party Headquarters in the Watergate complex in Washington, DC.
But as it turned out, not only did the burglars have CIA and anti-Castro Cuban connections – they also – and most importantly – were being paid out of a slush fund from the Committee to Re-Elect President Nixon, which was managed by the highest officials inside the White House.
The burglary of the Democratic Party’s HQ was just the tip of the iceberg – but it was that tip that eventually led to Nixon’s resignation on August 8th, 1974. [Read more…]
New Orleans Mayor Landrieu’s Address on Removal of Confederate Monuments
By New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu
History cannot be changed. It cannot be moved like a statue. What is done is done. The Civil War is over, and the Confederacy lost and we are better for it. Surely we are far enough removed from this dark time to acknowledge that the cause of the Confederacy was wrong.
And in the second decade of the 21st century, asking African Americans — or anyone else — to drive by property that they own; occupied by reverential statues of men who fought to destroy the country and deny that person’s humanity seems perverse and absurd.
Centuries-old wounds are still raw because they never healed right in the first place. [Read more…]
Why Is City of San Diego Delaying Sale of the Truax House Property?
By Charles Kaminski
San Diego architect and activist Charles Kaminski alerted SDFP to the current status of the Truax House property in his email below directed to Mayor Faulconer, the Planning Commission and various other elected officials and City staff.
I am writing to you because of the concerns I have over the delay in the sale of the City owned property known as the Truax House property at Union and Laurel streets in Uptown. I believe that this delay and possible sale are not in the best interests of the City and will explain why I believe that is the case.
[Read more…]
Secrets of the Fire: A Reflection On George Winne Jr.’s Self-Immolation And Other Nonviolent Gestures
By Niall Twohig / The Triton (UCSD)
Let’s begin with the bare facts: On May 10, 1970, George Winne Jr. stepped into Revelle Plaza. He held a sign that read “In God’s Name End the War.” Winne doused himself with gasoline, lit a match, and burst into flames. Students saw the burning man from a nearby building. They ran to him, beat out the flames. Winne was badly burnt. He died the next day.
Such facts can be deceiving. They only show the surface of reality. When we focus on the surface, we risk losing sight of the historical context surrounding Winne’s self-immolation. We also miss more profound secrets. I write now to whisper some of these secrets to you, so that you may whisper them to others. [Read more…]
From Remembrance to Resistance: The 48th Manzanar Pilgrimage
By Scott Oshima / Capital & Main
On April 29 an estimated 2,000 people from around the country convened for the 48th annual Manzanar Pilgrimage. This year, 2017, marks the 75th anniversary of Executive Order 9066, in which President Franklin Roosevelt authorized the forced removal of anyone who posed a “threat” to designated military zones during World War II. From 1942 to 1945, over 120,000 persons of Japanese descent were imprisoned in 10 concentration camps. Manzanar was the first camp, located in an inhospitable valley along California’s Eastern Sierras.
For many survivors, the camps were a source of trauma and rarely spoken of in the decades after World War II. Activist Pat Sakamoto recalled her mother saying, “There’s nothing to remember.” Longtime activist Warren Furutani described this silence as the impetus for the search for Manzanar: “It couldn’t help but stir the curiosity of the generation that was born after [the] camp.” On December 26, 1969, Furutani and over 150 other activists and survivors made the first pilgrimage to Manzanar—and galvanized a Japanese-American civil rights movement. [Read more…]
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