Re-Writing The National and World Narrative on Climate, Race, Sustainability and Voting power

Written by Victoria Ross on October 4, 2018. Posted in Talking Peace News

716-332-3904 10/4/18

Friends,

We greet you in celebration of an awesome week working collectively towards justice!

Thank you to all who came out yesterday to our sunrise Witnessing Vigil in solidarity with survivors of sexual assault and abuse. It was a powerful moment to stand in solidarity, lift up our voices to dismantle oppression and show others that this behavior, whether in our homes or highest courts, is absolutely unacceptable.

We continue our community work towards peace through justice, dismantling oppression and uniting the struggles towards equity, equality and a world where everyone is safe and celebrated.

We also want to acknowledge last week’s events, including An Evening with Aviva Chomsky at Trinity Church – which was a very powerful talk disrupting the myths around immigration and labor. We must be informed to achieve true justice and equality.

The 14th Annual WNY Environmental Summit at Daemen College was also a very important event in order to gain knowledge on how we can continue to respect the earth and the living beings on the earth, including us as human beings!

Looking forward, there are some really promising ways to get involved this week! We hope to see you at one or all of these events.

EVENT LISTINGS

SCREENING | THE BLACKNESS PROJECT: HELP REWRITE THE RACIAL NARRATIVE

October 4 @ 6:00 pm – 8:30 pm

1300 Elmwood Avenue Buffalo, New York 14222 Film screening and community conversation. The Burchfield Penney’s second screening of The Blackness Project, created by award-winning film producer Korey Green who seeks to rewrite America’s racial narrative. The film is a featured length educational documentary about culture and race from the African American perspective.

Tim DeChristopher at Burning Books

October 4 @ 7:00 pm – 9:00 pm

Burning Books, 420 Connecticut Street, Buffalo, NY 14213. “Being serious about tackling the climate crisis means we have to be willing to confront corporate capitalism and the system that is driving that crisis.” – Tim DeChristopher, whose disruption of a 2008 Utah oil & gas lease auction cost him 21 months in prison.

15th Annual World On Your Plate Food and Sustainable Living Conference

October 6 @ 8:30 am – 4:30 pm

Wick Student Center, Daemen College, 4380 Main Street, Amherst, NY 14226 FOCUSING ON FOOD, NUTRITION, THE ENVIRONMENT, FARMING AND POLITICS. October 5-6, 2018. Friday, October 5, 5-9pm. Saturday, October 6, 8:30am-4:30pm. Free to students with pre-registration and ID. Otherwise, Pre-register at worldonyourplate.org.

Climbing Poetree; dual-voice spoken word with infectious beats and multimedia theater

October 6 @ 7:00 pm – 9:00 pm

Matt Urban Center, 1081 Broadway, Buffalo, NY 14212. Dual-voice spoken word, with infectious beats and multimedia theater. Alixa Garcia and Naima Penniman form the award-winning duo, exploring diverse themes such as healing from state and personal violence, human rights, and racial/social/economic justice.

Get In The Game Voter Registration Party!

October 7 @ 1:00 pm – 4:00 pm

Community Beer Works, 520 7th Street, Buffalo, NY 14201. Registering to vote is fast and easy and helps you participate in the decisions that shape this country. The WNY Peace Center, Coalition for Economic Justice, Push Buffalo, and VOICE-Buffalo will throw a voter registration party complete with music, beer, food, and soft drinks (for voters under 21).

We shall overcome #Unitethestruggles #Loveislove #PowerWITH-NOTPowerOver

The time is now, and we are the people we’ve been waiting for.

Remember to tune in: DEMOCRACY NOW! IS NOW BEING BROADCAST MONDAY-FRIDAY, 8AM-9AM (LIVE) ON WBNY 91.3FM. Hear it over the radio or streaming live at wbny.buffalostate.edu or http://tunein.com/radio/WBNY-913-s27549/.

Below are
– more event listings (see also calendar & facebook page);
– Taskforce items and campaigns; and
– regularly scheduled events – all in that order.

No hate, no fear as we are #StillResisting. Peace, Thanks, Solidarity, and yes Love.

——————————————————-

_____________________

* COMMUNITY INVOLVEMENT

ECONOMIC JUSTICE

Please continue to support the Poor People’s Campaign. Current focus: Voter Registration and empowerment. Voter Registration, most Mondays and Thursdays, 5:15pm – 7:30pm. Next Voter Registration canvass: Thursday, Oct 4, from 138 Grape Street, Buffalo, NY 14204, 5:15 pm.

Get In The Game Voter Registration Party!

October 7 @ 1:00 pm – 4:00 pm

EDUCATION & HUMAN RIGHTS

Climbing Poetree; dual-voice spoken word with infectious beats and multimedia theater

October 6 @ 7:00 pm – 9:00 pm

ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE

Tim DeChristopher at Burning Books

October 4 @ 7:00 pm – 9:00 pm

15th Annual World On Your Plate Food and Sustainable Living Conference

October 6 @ 8:30 am – 4:30 pm

No Nuclear Waste over the Peace Bridge

Join us every Friday from 2 PM to 3 PM at the corner of Busti Ave and Vermont St. in Buffalo NY. Vigil against the shipment of high level LIQUID radioactive spent fuel from Chalk River Ontario to Aiken South Carolina. If any of it spills out, it will be next to impossible to clean.

Action Alert re Stone Dam Road Pipeline: go to wnypeace.org/environmental-justice/

GENDER JUSTICE

If you believe that discrimination against all women should be eliminated, please support enacting the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) in the city of Buffalo. Follow this link for more information: https://cities4cedaw-buffalo.org/ and contact your district’s councilperson to urge them to support this ordinance too.

Darius G. Pridgen- Ellicott District- 716-851-4980

Christopher P. Scanlon- South District- 716-851-5169

David A. Rivera- Niagara District- 716-851-5125

Joel P. Feroleto- Delaware District- 716-851-5155

Richard A. Fontana- Lovejoy District- 716-851- 5151

David A. Franczyk- Fillmore District- 716-851-4138

Joseph Golombek, Jr.- North District- 716-851-5116

Ulysees O. Wingo, Sr.- Masten District- 716-851-5145

Rasheed Wyatt- University District- 716-851-5165

IMMIGRANT & REFUGEE JUSTICE

Vigil for Victims of ICE Terror

Thursdays, 5-6pm, ICE building on the corner of Delaware and Chippewa. Bring your signs and spirit of Solidarity. We will not stay silent! #EndICETerror #FamiliesBelongTogether #AbolishICE

Calls are still needed to your NYS Assembly Members to ask them to support NYS ASSEMBLY Bill #4050. IF SEAN RYAN IS YOUR ASSEMBLYPERSON, PLEASE CALL HIM! 716-885-9630! ALSO CO CLERK MICKEY KEARNS (716) 858-8785.

The GreenLight NY program restores access to drivers’ licenses to all community members, to avoid abusive immigration enforcement. For more info, please come out to above mentioned event, or go to
https://www.facebook.com/GreenLightNY/; Green Light Petition

Vive la Casa, shelter for people awaiting documents and/or sanctuary, still desperately needs personal hygiene products and of course, CASH.
jrchc.org/vive
(Checks to Jericho Road/VIVE) 50 Wyoming St., Buffalo, NY 14211, 892-4354.

LATIN AMERICAN SOLIDARITY

On the fourth Monday of each month during the school year, the Latin American Solidarity Committee and WNY Peace Center host a Peace Coffeehouse: hear first-hand accounts of peace actions locally and away, and connect with the community and with activists.Vigil for Victims of ICE Terror Thursdays, 5-6pm, ICE building on the corner of Delaware and Chippewa. Bring your signs and spirit of Solidarity. We will not stay silent! #EndICETerror #FamiliesBelongTogether #AbolishICE

Venezuela Sanctions Petition

After the attempted assassination of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, your help is requested. Please sign the petition to end US and Canadian sanctions:https://afgj.salsalabs.org/campaigntoendusandcanadasanctionsagainstvenezuela/index.html. The civilians and general populations are the ones to pay for this kind of foreign policy. The US government needs to stop penalizing the common people and destabilizing other countries. Please sign and share. Many thanks to Shontae Cannon-Buckley for her work on this issue!

As you know, people desperately need our help because of the continuing devastation caused by “natural” disasters (read fossil-fuel-burning-generated Climate Catastrophe) as well as other factors. You can contribute as follows:
Puerto Rico—Go to hispanicheritagewny.org for a full report on ways to help.
We also recommend:

Mutual Aid Community Soup Kitchens Paypal address: cdpecpr@gmail.com run by Giovanni Roberto, friend of MaryAnne Grady Flores (UpstateDroneAction.org and Puerto Rico activist].

The Mariafund.org is another fund governed by many grassroots community groups.
Cuba—Alliance for Global Justice/Irma Relief, 418 W. 145th St.. New York, NY 10031 (for tax deductible). Not tax deductible, IFCO/Irma Relief (same address) Phone: 212-926-5757 Please give generously – the situations continue to be terrible for many!!

Chenalhó, Chiapas—Humanitarian crisis
This article in the National Catholic reporter gives a brief overview of the situation.
https://www.ncronline.org/news/world/enough-deaths-mexican-clergy-reiterate-chiapas-crisis

If you would like to help, go to weaving-for-justice.org

*
PRISONER’S RIGHTS

Wednesdays 4-5:30pm protest/vigils at the Erie County Holding Center (Delaware & Church). All are welcome. Please bring signs.

Please join us in promoting the H.A.L.T. Solitary Confinement campaign. Please call your State Senators and ask them to cosponsor and vote for the bills S. 4784. (You can also thank the representatives who passed it in the Assembly!)
Other Ways you can help:

Sign the petition to support the HALT Solitary Confinement Act: https://goo.gl/HLwqbK

Encourage your organization to endorse the HALT Solitary Confinement Act: https://goo.gl/forms/FM2F6DZAcPZp1co32

RACIAL JUSTICE

SCREENING | THE BLACKNESS PROJECT: HELP REWRITE THE RACIAL NARRATIVE

October 4 @ 6:00 pm – 8:30 pm

Climbing Poetree; dual-voice spoken word with infectious beats and multimedia theater

October 6 @ 7:00 pm – 9:00 pm

THE CARIOL HORNE WHISTLEBLOWER FUND
The Western New York Peace Center has created a fund for the purpose of supporting police officers who face reprisals from their department from choosing to strictly uphold their oath to protect and serve the community. gofundme.com/cariol-horne-whistleblower-fund. The Peace Center has named this fund after Cariol Horne who saved the life of a citizen, but was fired just prior to earning her 20-year pension. Our goal is to encourage good police officers in following their moral conscience if and when it conflicts with the infamous blue wall of silence.

Join the #BuffaloLLEP movement. It’s easy.

Join the hundreds of Buffalonians who make up the #BuffaloLLEP movement, asking Mayor Byron Brown to make low-level marijuana arrests Buffalo’s lowest level enforcement priority (LLEP).

People across the U.S. recognize what a destructive failure the 40-year “war on drugs” has been. In Buffalo, the news hasn’t sunken in yet, though, as those living in communities of color & low-income areas are still disproportionately targeted by law enforcement for marijuana arrests. Join the #BuffaloLLEP movement to stop these unfair & harmful enforcement tactics!
Learn more.

Each Police District has a Chief and Community Police Meeting. We encourage people to go to them and communicate freely on issues of concern. See wnypeace.org calendar for listings, and/or call your District and ask when & where the next Chief and Community Police Meeting will be held.

RESIST MILITARISM!

Know about the King’s Bay Plowshares? 7 courageous and compassionate Catholic Workers who went to largest submarine base in the world Kings Bay Naval Submarine Base in St. Mary’s, Georgia on April 4th, 2018. They went to make real the prophet Isaiah’s command to “beat swords into plowshares”. Read their story at https://www.kingsbayplowshares7.org/ .

Donate, help us organize on their behalf, and agitate and pray for their acquittal. They face very serious charges of up to a decade of prison time, just for reminding our government of the illegal and foolhardy nature of our nuclear weaponry.

Please call your Senators and Congresspersons to urge them to
–vote in favor and cosponsor if possible Senator Markey’s Bill # 200 and House Bill, Rep Lieu # 669, to Restrict First Strike with Nuclear Weapons.
–support House Resolution 922 to define presidential wars not declared by Congress as impeachable offenses. These wars include wars of co-belligerency such as the US role in the atrocities in Yemen.

If you’d prefer to send an email to your senators, you can do so here.

Our tax dollars are funding massive civilian casualties and the world’s largest humanitarian crisis in Yemen. The U.S. military is providing midair refueling to warplanes, sharing intelligence for targeting assistance, and selling U.S. bombs to the aggressors. U.S.-supported airstrikes target schools, hospitals, and water and sanitation infrastructure. As a result, millions of Yemeni people are on the brink of starvation and are facing the fastest-growing cholera crisis ever documented.

Every day that the war on Yemen continues, America is complicit in aiding war crimes. Call your U.S. Senators today at 1-833-786-7927 and urge them to stop fueling war on Yemen!

********

REGULARLY SCHEDULED EVENTS in the One Movement, One Struggle

Riverside-Salem UCC/DC – Progressive program followed by potluck. Sundays, 4-7pm. Environmental Cottage, 3449 West River Road, Grand Island. Session on Bob Dylan.

Talking Peace with the WNY Peace Center Radio Show on 91.3FM, WBNY. Mondays, 1-4pm. Call-in show! Go to wbny.buffalostate.edu orhttp://tunein.com/radio/WBNY-913-s27549/. This week with Jim Anderson, Ahmad Nieves, and Vicki Ross; on Economic Justice and more.

Buffalo Supports Standing Rock Water Protectors/Nekanesakt. Indigenous support group/allies. 1st and 3rd Tuesdays of the month, 6:30-8pm. At Burning Books, 420 CT Ave. All are welcome!!

Prisoners’ Rights Taskforce – Wednesdays 4-5pm protest/vigils at the Erie County Holding Center (Delaware & Church). All are welcome. Please bring signs.

Interfaith Peace Network
Special meeting: moved to join with Jericho Road Community Health Center to celebrate their Ribbon Cutting Ceremony at their new location – at 1021 Broadway in Buffalo. (Oct 4 meeting will move back to regular time and place: 9:15am at 1272 Delaware Ave, Buffalo NY 14209 -entrance and parking round back.)

Vigil for Victims of ICE Terror –
Thursdays, 5-6pm, ICE building on the corner of Delaware and Chippewa. Bring your signs and spirit of Solidarity. We will not stay silent! #EndICETerror #FamiliesBelongTogether #AbolishICE

Environmental Justice Taskforce –
Vigil to Protest the Shipments of VERY Dangerous Radioactive Liquid from Canada coming over the Peace Bridge. Fridays 2-3pm, Front Park at Vermont & Busti, Buffalo. Sign welcome and also usually available.

Fridays – 1st and 3rd of the month; 6pm: Stop The Violence Coalition,
United Way Building, Delaware and Summer Sts.

Saturdays, Noon-1pm: Women In Black. Nonviolence vigil, Bidwell and Elmwood. Signs also available. (and you don’t need to be a woman or dress in black

***********
More listings on website (wnypeace.org) and in previous email posts.
To subscribe, write to weeklynews@wnypeace.org with “subscribe” in subject line.
To unsubscribe, write to weeklynews@wnypeace.org with “unsubscribe” in subject line.

(Sorry for occasional delays!)

Please submit possible listings for consideration to weeklynews@wnypeace.org.
Many thanks, peace, solidarity, and yes – Love. We shall overcome!!