July 24th, 2020
We hope you were able to join us this afternoon at Niagara/Liberation Square for the National Day of Action to Support Portland! Get out in the streets to gather – wherever your latest town gathering place – to stand up for the people and against state violence! The state exists to serve the people, not to attack them!
On Sunday afternoon, please join us for our Nonviolent Direct Action Study, also at Niagara/Liberation Square. Come for shared learning, deepening commitment and trust, and strengthening our collective abilities to deliver nonviolent direct action and improve our nonviolence literacy. (Also see this great Ted Talk by Alia Braley.) More details – including agenda items – on our website.
Next week at MLK Park, Free the People WNY Coalition is hosting a Community Speak Out where stories will be shared on how policing in Buffalo and Erie County has affected each of us, our families, and our communities. If you can’t make it, you can submit your stories anonymously here. See more details in our events listing below.
As we continue to report, the fight for racial justice is ongoing – daily – at Niagara Square thanks to the WNY Liberation Collective. Our own Racial Justice Taskforce continues to work independently while also connecting with those at the Square and elsewhere.
We are also happy to report that the second (and final) week of our 13th annual youth summer camp, Camp Peaceprints, was another success! We are so grateful for and to all who joined us this summer and look forward to seeing you next year!
Lastly, we want to remind you that through August, contributions of $100 or more to WNYPC gets you one of Amanda Besl’s beautiful limited edition pieces (while supplies last), plus your choice of the #RESIST or #LoveIsLove lawn sign, AND will have your donation matched by the Fr. Bissonette Fund! For more information and to contribute, please visit the fundraiser page on our website. We cannot say it enough – this work can only be done with your support, for which we are so grateful!
Please see details and much more below, including other special events this week, regularly scheduled events, campaigns, fundraisers, and more at wnypeace.org, on our Facebook page, Twitter (@wnypeace), and Instagram (@wnypeace)!
Peace, thanks, solidarity and yes – love.
<3 <3 <3 <3 <3
We need you to make a call to your members of Congress today to urge them to support a critical amendments to cut Pentagon funding by 10%.
If you’ll recall, there are amendments to the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) to cut the Pentagon budget by 10% in both the House and the Senate. Sponsored by Reps Barbara Lee (D-CA) and Mark Pocan (D-WI) in the House and Senators Bernie Sanders (I-VT), Ed Markey (D-MA), and Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), the amendment would free up a much needed $74 billion for healthcare, affordable housing, and improvements to education programs, etc.
We’ve already had Sen. Schumer support the amendment! [1] This is HUGE. The Minority Leader’s support signals that the movement to make real cuts to the Pentagon is gaining traction beyond the usual suspects.And we do expect Sen. Gillibrand and Congressman Higgins will do so as well.
Great news – your efforts are making a difference!
Since we last contacted you to take action, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) has added his name in support of the amendment.
A vote is likely on these amendments next week! Even if you’ve already taken action, it’s still imperative that you make this call as well to keep the momentum and pressure up!
Here’s what we need you to do today:
1. Call the Congressional switchboard at 1-202-224-3121
2. Ask to be connected to one of your member’s offices
3. Once connected, say:
For your House Representative –
Hello, my name is (your name) and I am a voting constituent from (your city). I am calling to urge my representative to support an amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act by Reps Barbara Lee and Mark Pocan, which calls for cutting 10% off the Pentagon budget. This important step would free up $74 billion for healthcare, affordable housing, and improvements to education programs. The main threats to our true security, like the global health pandemic we find ourselves facing today, will not be solved militarily. By over-prioritizing the Pentagon and military solutions, our country is drastically underprepared for the crises that we are most likely to face. I look forward to hearing what the representative’s position is on this important issue.
For your Senators –
Hello, my name is (your name) and I am a voting constituent from (your city). I am calling to urge the senator to support an amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act by Senator Sanders, Markey, and Warren, which calls for cutting 10% off the Pentagon budget. This important step would free up $74 billion for healthcare, affordable housing, and improvements to education programs. The main threats to our true security, like the global health pandemic we find ourselves facing today, will not be solved militarily. By over-prioritizing the Pentagon and military solutions, our country is drastically underprepared for the crises that we are most likely to face. I look forward to hearing what the senator’s position is on this important issue.
The stakes today could hardly be higher. Over 40 million people are unemployed. More than 138,000 people have died from COVID-19, and thousands more are likely to perish. 5.4 million Americans have lost their health care during the pandemic. All the while, Congress is focusing on handing the Pentagon $740,000,000,000. Your time to act is now. Please call your members of Congress today and demand they do better.
Thank you for taking the time to act for a better tomorrow.
P.S. If your senators are Sanders, Markey, Warren, or Schumer, be sure to make the call and thank them for supporting this important amendment. To see if your representative is already a cosponor, click here.
Sources:
[1}https://www.sanders.senate.gov/newsroom/press-releases/sanders-welcomes-schumers-support-for-effort-to-cut-pentagon-and-invest-in-human-needs
(Picture is of Poet/Activist Jillian Hanesworth – “The Revolution will be led by black women who are just tired enough to do it themselves.”)
Kathy Kelly reflects on weapons and systems white people use to protect their white privilege, recalling that Dr. King likened U.S. wars to “some demonic destructive suction tube.”
In her poem, “The Revolution Will Rhyme,” Buffalo Black Lives Matter activist Jillian Hanesworth writes about the movement for change we now see sweeping across the world.
“It will not be developed just to be displaced
Its focus will not be extracted and refocused or repurposed
And the burden of education and comfort will not be placed on the oppressed
While understanding and tolerance is gifted to the oppressor
You will not be able to binge watch the revolution
Rewinding the comfortable triumphs and fast forwarding through the hurt”
In strong, confident language, fueled by recognition of hurts and atrocities, Hanesworth calls on white people to ask themselves uncomfortable questions. How does our white privilege contribute to racism and oppression? How can we use our privilege to bring about systemic change?
Mindful not to repurpose or refocus Jillian’s words, I think we must move forward, urgently, to tackle systemic change. We must use our white privilege to insist on and secure decent schools, health care, housing and human rights, especially for those who’ve been most harmed by racial disparities and economic inequalities in the United States.
Where are the resources, the funding, to do this? I think it’s important to examine the so-called security U.S. people purchase through funding the U.S. military and demand redirection of these resources. Money entrusted to the Pentagon and a vast array of military contractors must be spent to meet human needs.
Maybe this series of questions could help. Could I ever imagine myself paying for materials to assemble Molotov Cocktails for use as weapons amid a conflict? Could I ever imagine myself funding a group of people known for burning residential areas? At a magnitude incalculably greater than purchasing materials for Molotov Cocktails, or burning one urban residential area, U.S. taxpayers fund weapons used to wage gruesome wars of choice in far-away places where civilians struggle with every-day hunger, thirst, and displacement.
Condemn arson? Yes, but scale up and whisper: Dresden, Tokyo, Hiroshima, Nagasaki, Baghdad.
Imagine U.S. complicity with Saudi bludgeoning of Yemen’s cities, towns, and critical infrastructure and link that with construction, in Marinette, WI, of four Littoral Combat Ships which Lockheed Martin has arranged to build and sell to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. The Saudis use these ships to blockade Yemen’s ports, causing even more starvation in a country on the brink of famine. Yes, the construction of the ships provides greatly needed jobs. But, are there other, better construction projects that privileged people could demand be given immediate priority in our war-torn world? Could Marinette’s engineers, designers, welders and builders work on projects that would help rebuild communities devastated by declining infrastructure and racist neglect within the United States?
Jillian’s poem says the revolution will be a complete overhaul, not just a quick fix. We should join her in settling for nothing less. White people who are among the privileged “haves” in our unjust society must look long and hard into the mirror of our privileged history. Why should people who already have so much be entitled to get more? And if we’re to learn how to live together without killing one another, how can we dismantle and repurpose the vast killing machine that protects our unfair white privilege?
June 2020
Kathy Kelly (kathy@vcnv.org) co-coordinates Voices for Creative Nonviolence (www.vcnv.org)
