Wednesday, October 30

Tag: activist

Would An Outspoken Australian-Muslim Activist ‘Get Yassmined?’ 5 Years On, Abdel-Magied Herself Hopes Change Is Happening
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Journalism

Would An Outspoken Australian-Muslim Activist ‘Get Yassmined?’ 5 Years On, Abdel-Magied Herself Hopes Change Is Happening

Does Australia still have a racism problem? Or does it simply suffer from a diversity and inclusion problem at the level of governance and political representation? Answering these questions is rarely straightforward and always depends on the personal experiences and ethno-religious backgrounds of those asking. The new Albanese government has delivered the most diverse cabinet in Australian history: from the appointment of Linda Burney, the first First Nations woman to be Indigenous Affairs minister, to the elevation of Muslims Ed Husic and Anne Aly as ministers, to the election of Fatima Payman as Australia’s first hijab-wearing senator. Diversity and inclusion, at least in political representation, seem to be much improved. Yet while many national surveys show strong support for diver...
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What Irks And Inspires Climate Activist Vanessa Nakate
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Journalism

What Irks And Inspires Climate Activist Vanessa Nakate

By Breanna Draxler When I started reading Vanessa Nakate’s new book, A Bigger Picture (HarperCollins 2021), I didn’t immediately understand the connection between the title and the event that first introduced me to the Ugandan climate activist. It was January 2020 at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. She and four other youth activists were there to encourage attendees to take the climate crisis seriously. The five activists gave a press conference and posed for pictures. But when the Associated Press story came out, Nakate had been cropped from the photo. “As I looked at the image,” the 24-year-old Nakate writes in the introduction to her book, “it became impossible to ignore that of the five women who’d posed for that photo, I was the only one who wasn’t from Europe and th...
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Howard Fuller – How The Civil Rights Activist Became A Devout Champion Of School Choice
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Journalism

Howard Fuller – How The Civil Rights Activist Became A Devout Champion Of School Choice

Jon Hale, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign As a longtime civil rights activist and education reformer, Howard Fuller has seen his support for school choice spark both controversy and confusion. That’s because it aligns him with polarizing Republican figures that include Donald Trump and Trump’s former secretary of education, Betsy DeVos. But unlike those figures, Fuller’s support for school choice is not rooted in a conservative agenda to privatize public schools. Rather, it is grounded in his ongoing quest to provide Black students a quality education by any means necessary. I write about Fuller in my new book “The Choice We Face,” which traces the history of school choice as well as demands for radical education reform by Black activists. Unlike most other school choice advo...
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Journalism

Stop Calling Me an Activist

I’m only fighting for the right to live in this world free of constraints. Oral arguments before the U.S. Supreme Court in the case for Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals began as I stood outside the massive stone blocks that sustain one of the most powerful judicial bodies in the world. My emotions ran the gamut; this hearing would be a bookmark for what is yet to come: more anxiety, fear, and frustration surrounding my status as a DACA recipient. I had traveled from Albuquerque, New Mexico, where I volunteer as a legal assistant, providing legal aid to immigrants both detained and non-detained, to become a witness to this newest chapter in a mighty social movement that had begun long before Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano signed the DACA m...
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I’m a Young Black Activist in Georgia. I Don’t See Voting As the Only Answer
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Journalism

I’m a Young Black Activist in Georgia. I Don’t See Voting As the Only Answer

I never thought about politics purely in the context of elections. When I was growing up in Georgia, my first exposure to inequity came through my lived experience of living in a majority Black area. My first exposure to fighting inequity came through reading books. I learned about the icons of Black grassroots organizing: civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr., anti-rape activist Rosa Parks, workers rights champion Dorothy Bolden. What spoke to me was their commitment to door knocking, radical imagination, hard conversation, and deep care for people they had never met. To me, that looked like the most viable path to liberation. This history taught me that when discussing the role and impact of electoral politics for Black people, the context of community is paramount. It wasn’t unti...
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A Climate Action for Every Type of Activist
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CULTURE

A Climate Action for Every Type of Activist

No matter your age, gender, race, or political ideology, there are ways to fight climate change that fit your life and values. Most of us have heard about U.N. researchers warning that we need to make dramatic changes in the next 12 years to limit our risk of extreme heat, drought, floods, and poverty caused by climate change. Report after report about a bleak climate future can leave people in despair.   But another option is good for you and the planet. Susan Clayton, a professor of psychology and environmental studies at the College of Wooster, says getting involved with a group can help lift your climate-related anxiety and depression in three ways. Working with like-minded folks can validate your concerns, give you needed social support, and help you move...
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LGBTQ Activist Demands Reparations for All ‘Fat, Black’ Women
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SOCIAL JUSTICE

LGBTQ Activist Demands Reparations for All ‘Fat, Black’ Women

According to a piece on an “intersectional feminist media” website, “fat, black” women are owed reparations due to the “trauma” that comes with being one.“The case for reparations for fat Black b******  is: f*** you, pay us,” self-described “queer, agender Black fat femme writer, artist, and cultural producer” Ashleigh Shackelford writes in a piece for Wear Your Voice.#ad#Now, although Shackelford is discussing black women in particular, she also makes sure to clarify that this, unlike the case for slavery reparations, is an issue specifically tied to weight:  “I see thin femmes and women (of all races, actually) who are offered protection and care in ways fat black bitches are never granted,” she writes. “Our dehumanization is used to humanize everyone else in the entire world, but no one...
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