Why are you telling people to vote for the guy committing genocide :/

because voting is not an endorsement it's harm reduction.

Trump is going to be at best doing the same as Biden and likely much worse for Palestinians and all the countries suffering from American Imperialism than Biden is.

Republicans want to bring back child labor and get rid of social security, medicare, Medicaid. As someone who is surviving on Medicaid and social security I don't want those taken away. The Republican majority house already put a lot of limits on food stamps in this past term and I don't think we'll still have food stamps if we get a republican Congress and a Republican president.

They've made it pretty clear that if they get a republican Congress and a Republican president they're going to enact project 2025 and call a conference of states and try and take our rights back to the days when only wealthy white men had any rights when women and racial minorities had no rights, they want to make it illegal for LGBT+ folks to safely exist in public and get lifesaving healthcare.

In short

Do I support every single thing Biden has done as president?

No.

Do I like him?

Not particularly. But I'm still voting for him because apathy is not a choice.

Do I think that Joe Biden having another term means that we can actually make more progress for labor rights, trans healthcare, abortion access, advancement of the rights and protections for disabled people and so much more?

Yes absolutely.

Do I think that the genocide in Gaza needs to end and the United States needs to stop sending weapons to israel?

Yes, I think that un restricted flow of humanitarian aid into Palestine needs to happen, the siege needs to stop, and the country of Israel and the United States need to be held accountable at an international level. I think that the soldiers of the IDF/IOF need to be held accountable for their war crimes and pillaging that they continuously post evidence of on social medias. I'm trying to put a read more here so ce I've put a few linked articles and quotes from them.

A quote from the article below:

"While our map focuses solely on high school aged youth (age 13-17), some states, such as Oklahoma, Texas, and South Carolina, have considered banning care for transgender people up to 26 years of age. "

I've seen lawmakers in some states try to make it felony punishable by life in prison to get your trans child healthcare to keep them alive because they want to make it illegal for us to exist and a legal for anyone who helps us exist.

some quotes from the article above:

"Led by the long-established Heritage Foundation think tank and fueled by former Trump administration officials, the far-reaching effort is essentially a government-in-waiting for the former president’s second term — or any candidate who aligns with their ideals and can defeat President Joe Biden in 2024. With a nearly 1,000-page “Project 2025” handbook and an “army” of Americans, the idea is to have the civic infrastructure in place on Day One to commandeer, reshape and do away with what Republicans deride as the “deep state” bureaucracy, in part by firing as many as 50,000 federal workers. “We need to flood the zone with conservatives,” said Paul Dans, director of the 2025 Presidential Transition Project and a former Trump administration official who speaks with historical flourish about the undertaking. “This is a clarion call to come to Washington,” he said. “People need to lay down their tools, and step aside from their professional life and say, ‘This is my lifetime moment to serve.’” The unprecedented effort is being orchestrated with dozens of right-flank organizations, many new to Washington, and represents a changed approach from conservatives, who traditionally have sought to limit the federal government by cutting federal taxes and slashing federal spending. Instead, Trump-era conservatives want to gut the “administrative state” from within, by ousting federal employees they believe are standing in the way of the president’s agenda and replacing them with like-minded officials more eager to fulfill a new executive’s approach to governing. The goal is to avoid the pitfalls of Trump’s first years in office, when the Republican president’s team was ill-prepared, his Cabinet nominees had trouble winning Senate confirmation and policies were met with resistance — by lawmakers, government workers and even Trump’s own appointees who refused to bend or break protocol, or in some cases violate laws, to achieve his goals. While many of the Project 2025 proposals are inspired by Trump, they are being echoed by GOP rivals Ron DeSantis and Vivek Ramaswamy and are gaining prominence among other Republicans. And if Trump wins a second term, the work from the Heritage coalition ensures the president will have the personnel to carry forward his unfinished White House business. “The president Day One will be a wrecking ball for the administrative state,” said Russ Vought, a former Trump administration official involved in the effort who is now president at the conservative Center for Renewing America. Much of the new president’s agenda would be accomplished by reinstating what’s called Schedule F — a Trump-era executive order that would reclassify tens of thousands of the 2 million federal employees as essentially at-will workers who could more easily be fired. Biden had rescinded the executive order upon taking office in 2021, but Trump — and other presidential hopefuls — now vow to reinstate it."

"There’s a “top to bottom overhaul” of the Department of Justice, particularly curbing its independence and ending FBI efforts to combat the spread of misinformation. It calls for stepped-up prosecution of anyone providing or distributing abortion pills by mail."

Personally I think that voting for Joe Biden is better than someone who wants to enact this stuff on day one. It's like they read handmaid's tale and want to make that the reality of this country.

"Chapter by chapter, the pages offer a how-to manual for the next president, similar to one Heritage produced 50 years ago, ahead of the Ronald Reagan administration. Authored by some of today’s most prominent thinkers in the conservative movement, it’s often sprinkled with apocalyptic language." Ronald Reagan is a big reason we have a lot of problems we have today with our economy and with a lot more things. The people that supported Ronald Reagan do not need another term in office.

A quote from the article linked below:

"Trump has given no indication that he would be more sympathetic to Palestinian claims, nor that he would place more pressure on Israel to agree to a ceasefire. “The approach of the United States would be that Israel needs to win this war, it was attacked brutally,” Trump’s ambassador to Israel, David Friedman, told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, describing how Trump would act. Friedman is now a campaign surrogate for Trump."

Personally I think Trump telling Israel to finish the job is indicators that another Trump presidency doesn't mean that weapons would stop being sent to Israel from United States

I fail to see how another term of Donald trump will be any better for the victims of the ongoing genocide in Palestine than President Joe Biden.

i think our system is absolutely messed up and broken but I don't think abstaining from voting is going to actually help.

"We The People" Are Supposed To Have The Power, But Do We Really?

As Americans, we are taught from a young age that we live in a democracy where "we the people" have the power to elect our leaders and shape the policies that govern our lives. But recent events have raised questions about whether that power truly resides with the people or if it has been usurped by wealthy interests and political elites.

The rise of Super PACs and dark money in politics has allowed corporations and wealthy donors to wield enormous influence over our elected officials and the policy decisions they make. The Citizens United decision by the Supreme Court in 2010 opened the floodgates for unlimited corporate spending in our elections, effectively giving corporations the same rights as individual citizens when it comes to political speech.

As a result, we have seen the rise of a political class that is more responsive to the interests of big donors than to the needs of ordinary citizens. This has fueled widespread cynicism and distrust in our political system, as many people feel like their voices are not being heard and their votes do not matter.

But there are signs of hope. Grassroots movements like Occupy Wall Street, Black Lives Matter, and the Women's March have mobilized millions of people to demand change and hold our leaders accountable. These movements have demonstrated the power of ordinary citizens to effect change and challenge the status quo.

The upcoming elections will be a test of whether the power truly resides with the people or if it has been completely captured by special interests. We must continue to demand transparency, accountability, and a level playing field for all citizens in our democracy. Only then can we truly say that we the people have the power to shape our collective future.

The Good Party Declaration of Independence

I am working to secure the endorsement of the Good Party– a non-partisan organization (not a political party) endorsing non-partisan local, grassroots campaigns nationwide. In an email I received from Good Party, they report their mission is to “bring attention to and increase the viability of people-powered campaigns… that are running without the backing of a major party and funding from…

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"On our latest podcast, we spoke to members of Safe Redlands Schools, a group of antifascist moms in the #SoCal area, who are pushing back against gender fascists and groups like the Proud Boys through grassroots organizing."

Listen and download here:

If I must die, let it bring hope Let it be a tale 🪁🍉🇵🇸

resources below!🕊️

DONATE:

Buy an eSim for someone in Gaza

The Palestine Children's Relief Fund IG: @thepcrf

Sulala Animal Rescue IG: @sulalaanimalrescue

Care for Gaza, a grassroots organisiation in Gaza that gives care packages to Gazan families

United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees

Operation Olive Branch

GET INVOLVED:

Join your local rallies!

Australia Palestine Advocacy Network (APAN) Twitter: @APAN4Palestine IG: @apan4palestine

Justice for Palestine Magan-djin (Brisbane) FB: justiceforpalestinebrisbane IG: justiceforpalestine.magandjin

Justice for Palestine Melbourne FB: FreePalestineMelbourne IG: freepalestinemelb

Friends of Palestine (Western Australia)

Wage Peace, Disrupt War (Australia) IG: disruptwars

BOYCOTTS:

Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions

Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions Australia

LEARN:

Decolonise Palestine

If you have any additional resources or funds that aren't listed, let me know and I will endeavor to add them on.

170 hours later and this behemoth project is completed. After being moved to tears three times by Dr. Alareer's poem, I needed to create something. Hopefully this honours his memory.

Hoping to get some funding from local orgs to get this printed into a physical booklet for distribution.

From the river, to the sea!

"For the first time in almost 60 years, a state has formally overturned a so-called “right to work” law, clearing the way for workers to organize new union locals, collectively bargain, and make their voices heard at election time.

This week, Michigan finalized the process of eliminating a decade-old “right to work” law, which began with the shift in control of the state legislature from anti-union Republicans to pro-union Democrats following the 2022 election. “This moment has been decades in the making,” declared Michigan AFL-CIO President Ron Bieber. “By standing up and taking their power back, at the ballot box and in the workplace, workers have made it clear Michigan is and always will be the beating heart of the modern American labor movement.”

[Note: The article doesn't actually explain it, so anyway, "right to work" laws are powerful and deceptively named pieces of anti-union legislation. What right to work laws do is ban "union shops," or companies where every worker that benefits from a union is required to pay dues to the union. Right-to-work laws really undermine the leverage and especially the funding of unions, by letting non-union members receive most of the benefits of a union without helping sustain them. Sources: x, x, x, x]

In addition to formally scrapping the anti-labor law on Tuesday [February 13, 2024], Michigan also restored prevailing-wage protections for construction workers, expanded collective bargaining rights for public school employees, and restored organizing rights for graduate student research assistants at the state’s public colleges and universities. But even amid all of these wins for labor, it was the overturning of the “right to work” law that caught the attention of unions nationwide...

Now, the tide has begun to turn—beginning in a state with a rich labor history. And that’s got the attention of union activists and working-class people nationwide...

At a time when the labor movement is showing renewed vigor—and notching a string of high-profile victories, including last year’s successful strike by the United Auto Workers union against the Big Three carmakers, the historic UPS contract victory by the Teamsters, the SAG-AFTRA strike win in a struggle over abuses of AI technology in particular and the future of work in general, and the explosion of grassroots union organizing at workplaces across the country—the overturning of Michigan’s “right to work” law and the implementation of a sweeping pro-union agenda provides tangible evidence of how much has changed in recent years for workers and their unions...

By the mid-2010s, 27 states had “right to work” laws on the books.

But then, as a new generation of workers embraced “Fight for 15” organizing to raise wages, and campaigns to sign up workers at Starbucks and Amazon began to take off, the corporate-sponsored crusade to enact ���right to work” measures stalled. New Hampshire’s legislature blocked a proposed “right to work” law in 2017 (and again in 2021), despite the fact that the measure was promoted by Republican Governor Chris Sununu. And in 2018, Missouri voters rejected a “right to work” referendum by a 67-33 margin.

Preventing anti-union legislation from being enacted and implemented is one thing, however. Actually overturning an existing law is something else altogether.

But that’s what happened in Michigan after 2022 voting saw the reelection of Governor Gretchen Whitmer, a labor ally, and—thanks to the overturning of gerrymandered legislative district maps that had favored the GOP—the election of Democratic majorities in the state House and state Senate. For the first time in four decades, the Democrats controlled all the major levers of power in Michigan, and they used them to implement a sweeping pro-labor agenda. That was a significant shift for Michigan, to be sure. But it was also an indication of what could be done in other states across the Great Lakes region, and nationwide.

“Michigan Democrats took full control of the state government for the first time in 40 years. They used that power to repeal the state’s ‘right to work’ law,” explained a delighted former US secretary of labor Robert Reich, who added, “This is why we have to show up for our state and local elections.”"

-via The Nation, February 16, 2024

Yemeni, Iranian, and Palestinian authorities have spoken out in support of US university students and faculty members who have been targeted by brutal police repression for the past two weeks during mobilizations calling for an end to the genocide in Gaza. The leader of Yemen's ruling Ansarallah movement, Abdul Malik al-Houthi, said during a speech on 25 April that the US government “does not respect their laws, their constitution, or any headlines they raise and brag about,” stressing that there is a “concerted effort” from Washington to silence a movement that “has begun to wake up to the horror of what is happening in occupied Palestine.” “With the demonstrations and sit-ins at prominent US universities, the US support for the Israeli enemy became clear, as authorities dealt with the demonstrations and protests … in a bad manner that goes beyond all considerations,” the Yemeni resistance leader added.

Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian also condemned the crackdown witnessed across several universities. “The suppression and violent treatment of the American police and security forces against professors and students protesting the genocide and war crimes of the Israeli regime in various universities of the United States is deeply worrying,” Iran's top diplomat said via social media, adding that this repression is an extension of “Washington's full-fledged support for the Israeli regime and clearly shows the double standard policy and contradictory attitude of the American government towards freedom of expression.”

In Palestine, officials from Hamas and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), as well as student organizations in the Gaza Strip, issued statements supporting the grassroots movement that has taken over about two dozen university campuses in the US. “We, the students of Gaza, salute the students of Columbia University, Yale University, New York University, Rutgers University, the University of Michigan, and dozens of universities across the United States who are rising in solidarity with Gaza and to put an end to the Zionist–US genocide against our people in Gaza,” a statement from students organizations in Gaza reads. “From here in Gaza, we see you and salute you. Your actions and activism matter, especially in the heart of the empire, in the United States … It is clear that a new generation is rising that will no longer accept Zionism, racism, and genocide and that stands with Palestine and our liberation from the river to the sea,” the statement adds. For their part, the PFLP called on Palestinian and Arab students to “rise for Gaza following the example of American universities.” “Palestinian and Arab universities must take the initiative and break the barrier of silence, following the example of American universities which have ignited an intifada within the campus for the victory of the blood of our Palestinian people, and in rejection of the continuing American support for the zionist entity,” the PFLP statement reads. In a similar vein, Hamas politburo member Izzat al-Rishq said that the government of US President Joe Biden “violates individual rights and the right to expression, and arrests university students and faculty members because they reject the genocide that our Palestinian people are subjected to in the Gaza Strip at the hands of the neo-Nazi Zionists, without the slightest feeling of shame about the legal value represented by the students and university professors.” “The Biden administration, which is a partner in the brutal war on our Palestinian people, does not want to acknowledge that [the US public has] discovered the truth about the Nazi entity and is siding with human values and standing on the right side of history. Today’s students are the leaders of the future, and their suppression today means an expensive electoral bill that the Biden administration will pay sooner or later.”

THIS WEEK, WASHINGTON’S top Israel lobby is rallying its supporters to go to Capitol Hill and falsely claim to lawmakers that people aren’t starving in Gaza and Israel isn’t blocking aid shipments, according to talking points obtained by the American Prospect.

Israel has led a brutal siege on Gaza since Oct. 7, when Hamas killed 1,139 Israelis and kidnapped more than 200. More than 31,000 Palestinians have been killed, 2 million have been internally displaced, and hundreds of thousands are at imminent risk of famine, according to the United Nations.

The powerful lobbying group American Israel Public Affairs Committee, or AIPAC, is working to maintain support for Israel’s war, amid increased protests and public outcry. This week, AIPAC convened in Maryland for its annual policy conference, which it uses to marshal its donors and supporters to serve as a grassroots lobbying army in the halls of Congress.

The Prospect obtained a copy of AIPAC’s talking points for supporters heading to the Hill — and they are extreme, to say the least. The documents instruct supporters to claim that “reports that people are starving in Gaza are false,” and say that “Israel is not blocking the delivery of aid to Gaza.”

The AIPAC talking points additionally claim that Hamas wants people to believe Gazans are starving in order to “exert pressure” on Israel, and argues the “United States must not fall into Hamas’ trap.”

These claims from AIPAC are false. Gazans are starving on a massive, unprecedented scale. According to the United Nations, 2.2 million Palestinians in Gaza — almost the entire population of the region — are facing “crisis or worse levels of food insecurity.” Half a million of those included in that figure face “catastrophic” levels of food insecurity.

The Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) — a leading food security analysis and advocacy group — classifies the Gaza Strip as being in Phase 4 “Emergency” status food insecurity, with a high risk of imminent famine conditions.

(continue reading)

Since the founding of the state of Israel, the Zionist movement has positioned the domination and oppression of Palestinians and the colonization of Palestinian land as the answer to the very real question of Jewish safety. They have taken the very real pain and trauma that we as Jews carry and sharpened it into a deadly weapon. We desperately must understand that what is happening is not a cycle of violence. It is a system of violence. Everyone is caught in its teeth. It is the system of settler colonial apartheid that the Israeli government has built and maintained over the past seventy-five years—with billions upon billions of dollars from the United States. Settler colonialism is a structure, a language, a culture, an ideology—an interlocking, totalizing, system of violence. It is a machine of war and dehumanization against Palestinians. It is this system that imperils the lives and safety of everyone. While the vast majority of the violence of the apartheid regime lands on Palestinians, there is no safety for Israelis in a system rooted in such dehumanization and oppression. In the words of Holocaust survivor Hajo Meyer, “My great lesson from Auschwitz is: whoever wants to dehumanize any other must first be dehumanized himself. The oppressors are no longer really human, whatever uniform they wear.” The Israeli government has lost any semblance of humanity as they wage a genocide against the people living in Gaza. It is not Palestinians who have chosen the language of violence for this land. It is the Israeli government and the United States government that have created a state of violence. Palestinians have remained steadfast in seeking freedom against immeasurable violence. Tens of thousands of Palestinians protested in weekly grassroots nonviolent protests at Israel’s militarized border wall around Gaza during the Great March of Return in 2019, and the Israeli government sent military snipers to murder and maim hundreds of children, women, medics, and journalists. Palestinians launch boycott campaigns to win their rights, and the Israeli government opens an entire new ministry to combat the nonviolent movement. Palestinians work at human rights organizations to document the crimes against them, and they are called and treated as terrorists. Palestinians speak the language of freedom, and the Israeli government responds—every single time—with the language of violence. The United States government has united to fully support the Israeli war machine. Already the United States sends more than $3 billion in aid to Israel every year. Now Senator Lindsey Graham said, “I am with Israel. Do whatever the hell you have to do to defend yourself. Level the place.” Make no mistake: Israel isn’t defending itself, it is committing mass murder. Biden says, “We’ll make sure Israel has what it needs to take care of itself.” Make no mistake: Israel is waging genocide. My dear ones in Palestine are saying that they have never experienced such destruction in seventy-five years of occupation. My dear ones are saying there is not a moment to wait. Do not sit back while Israel carries out a genocide fully enabled by the United States. Bring your full body, your spirit, your communities, your humanity, to meet this moment, to call your representatives, to the streets. “Never again” means standing up for Palestinian people. “Never again” means this very moment.

— Stefanie Fox, A Jewish Plea: Stand Up to Israel’s Act of Genocide, as featured in Boston Review

i thought there was a call to boycott the entirety of black friday and cyber monday?

i think there are people on tumblr & twitter that are advocating for a full boycott (which is good), but specifically with BDS & according to their website they're just calling for a targeted boycott against puma, HP, and marvel for black friday and cyber monday (along with the other targeted companies)

personally, i'm also boycotting starbucks (for their treatment of unionized workers) as well as a few of the other companies not listed in the immediate full boycott list.

as of 11/22 on their twitter, this is what they shared:

1. Consumer boycott targets - The BDS movement calls for a complete boycott of these brands carefully selected due to the company's proven record of complicity in Israeli apartheid.

2. Divestment targets - The BDS movement is pressuring governments, institutions and investment funds to exclude and divest from as many complicit companies as practical, especially weapons manufacturers, banks, and companies listed in the UN database of business involved in Israel’s illegal settlement enterprise, as well as the WhoProfits and AFSC Investigate databases of companies enabling the occupation. Below we give some of the targets we are campaigning against.

3. Pressure (non-boycott) targets - The BDS movement actively calls for pressure campaigns against these brands and services due to their complicity in Israeli apartheid. We have not, on strategic grounds, called for a boycott of these brands and services, instead we strategically call on supporters and institutions to mount other forms of pressure on them until they end their complicity in Israeli apartheid.

4. Organic boycott targets - The BDS movement did not initiate these grassroots boycott campaigns but is in support of them due to these brands openly supporting Israel’s genocide against Palestinians.

ultimately the companies listed under the first category you absolutely should be boycotting 100%.

and i'm not going to tell you to not also boycott black friday, especially since it coincides with the temporary 4-day "truce." like i said, i know there are groups that have been advocating for a full boycott this weekend along with protests; there were hundreds today, from Washington, DC, to Massachusetts, to California, to Florida... i shared the creator's day because they do that every other month or so on itch.io anyways & i wanted to link the BDS information alongside it. they may update in the future as well and call for more targeted boycotts as the holidays ramp up so i suggest bookmarking the website or following them on twitter, and look for a campaign near you to get involved directly.

BDS has also called for a global day of action on November 29th, which includes intensifying all targeted boycotting campaigns.

Euro-Med Monitor reports of countless civilians killed in the streets and in homes by Israeli army snipers, or targeted by Israeli artillery shells, with their bodies being left on the ground for days or weeks on end. There is also ample evidence and video of boys and men being rounded up, stripped down to their underwear and abused. Every man is guilty until proven innocent and have no way to prove their innocence through the human rights abuses and abuse- including children.

Field executions are part of the horrifying crimes committed by Israeli forces in various incursion zones in the Gaza Strip, along with looting, intimidation, arbitrary detention, torture, threats of rape, and widespread destruction, Euro-Med Monitor reports.

The United States is complicit in these crimes against humanity and war crimes. The White House continues to bypass Congress to arm Israel as it breaks and violates international law.

This Art Activism is part of a daily grassroots movement in Washington DC, organized by activist and humanitarian @hazami. The goal is to bring awareness and action to end the atrocities in Gaza and to inspire Americans to realize their role and power in creating change to Free Palestine. While we will never fully understand what those in Gaza are experiencing, we do all that we can to ensure the impacts are felt in Washington DC.

The White House Washington DC

13 January 2024

What Are You Going To Do About It?

In case you missed it, mayor Bud Maynard "issued a request" for Vinton residents at the close of last week's city council meeting. But to clarify, his 'request' is actually a form of political gaslighting and you don't want to miss my response!

I wish I could ask each and every person that owns property or lives here that question. Preferably in a face-to-face conversation! Where’s ‘here,’ you ask? Welcome to Vinton I live in Vinton. It is the county seat in Benton County, Iowa with right around 5000 people according to the 2020 census. Located on the Cedar River, it is Home of the Vinton Vikings, site of the former Iowa Braille…

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“The world is full of evil people who do shitty things but I can’t deal with that right now because I have to go and kick a little ball around which those same people love me for. That is until I fuck up or miss a penalty or I decide to fight back and then they’re just going to want to ship me back wherever I fucking came from.”

Following on from Sam’s storyline in episode 7 of Ted Lasso I want to talk about how it relates to football in real life.

Three England players, Bukayo Saka, Marcus Rashford, and Jadon Sancho received immense amounts of racial abuse over social media in response to them having missed penalties in the final against Italy during the Euros. 11 arrests were made as part of a hate crime investigation into the messages/posts/comments sent. In addition to this, the mural of Marcus Rashford created in recognition of the work Rashford did during COVID-19 to help tackle child food poverty was vandalised. More information here:

Recently the Alpha United Juniors team based in Bradford reported that children as young as seven received threats of violence and slurs from the sidelines during matches. Abuse like this exists at every level of the game on and offline, in the stands, on grassroots pitches.

It is so important that the severity of this storyline is not overlooked given the relevance of it to both players and fans of football alike. Whether the storyline is continued or not, I am so glad that they have addressed this.

Palestinian liberation is a feminist issue. While this truism should need no elaboration, it has, as with so much that relates to Palestine, necessitated discussions, clarifications, analysis and documentation, again and again. Palestine rights activists have long been familiar with the all too common phenomenon known as PEP: Progressive Except for Palestine. Less known, but no less common in feminist circles is FEP, the Feminist Except for Palestine phenomenon. Books such as Evelyn Shakir’s 1997 Bint Arab recount incidents of FEP going back to the ’60s, with many Arab feminists being shunned by their American friends over their support for Palestinian liberation. FEP had one of its early expressions on a global stage at the 1985 United Nations World Conference on Women in Nairobi, Kenya, when Betty Friedan, an icon of second‑wave western feminism, with its slogan ‘the personal is political’, tried to censor the late Egyptian feminist Nawal el‑Saadawi as she was about to walk up to the stage to deliver her address. ‘Please do not bring up Palestine in your speech,’ Friedan told el‑Saadawi. ‘This is a women’s conference, not a political conference.’ Sadly, little has changed in global north feminism’s rejection of the very humanity of the Palestinian people, as evidenced in their continued exclusion from national and global discussions of women’s issues. White feminism has continued to align itself with orientalist imperialist militarism; Ms Magazine cheered the Bush Administration’s US war on Afghanistan in 2001, calling it a ‘coalition of hope’, and suggesting that invasion and occupation could, indeed would, liberate Afghan women. The white feminists in the Feminist Majority Foundation, which bought Ms Magazine in December 2001, never consulted with Afghan feminist organisations such as the Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan, who denounced both religious fundamentalism and western intervention in Afghanistan, and who opposed the US attacks on their country. More recently, hegemonic feminism’s desire to exempt Israel from criticism led to the fragmentation of the Women’s March, the coalition of women’s and feminist groups that came together to denounce the election of Donald Trump to the presidency of the US. The co‑chair of the 2017 Women’s March was Brooklyn‑born Palestinian American Linda Sarsour, a grassroots organiser who had long championed Palestinian rights. When journalist Emily Shire asked in the New York Times ‘Does Feminism Have Room for Zionists?’, Sarsour responded with a resounding ‘No’. Many felt threatened by her outspokenness and visibility. Another Palestinian feminist, Mariam Barghouti, also asserted in a 2017 article that ‘No, You Can’t Be a Feminist and a Zionist’, and explained that: ‘When I hear anyone championing Zionism while also identifying as a feminist, my mind turns to images of night raids, to the torture of children and to the bulldozing of homes.’ In the wake of Israel’s latest war on Gaza, white feminists are denouncing the unsubstantiated accusations of sexual violence against Israeli women, without addressing the Israeli state’s amply documented gendered violence against Palestinian women, children, and men. ‘Feminism cannot be selective. Its framework comes from true and absolute liberation not just of women, but of all peoples,’ Barghouti continues, building on bell hooks’ analysis of feminism as a complete liberatory movement. ‘A feminist who is not also anti‑colonial, anti‑racist and in opposition to the various forms of injustice is selectively and oppressively serving the interests of a single segment of the global community.’ Simply, ‘feminism’ that aligns with regimes that engage in racial and ethnic oppression is gendered supremacy; no ideology that hinges on supremacy and discrimination is reconcilable with feminism.

If you are in the United States, please join the 86,000 others (as of this posting) in demanding more resources in the fight against Long Covid, including robust research funding, healthcare protections, improved air quality in schools, information transparency, and more. Addressing these concerns will not only assist the Long Covid community but create a healthier life and future for all Americans. This campaign is the result of grassroots organizing by Long Covid Action Project (LCAP).

Gloria Walton and I are honored to be recognized by the inaugural TIME CO2 Earth Awards! We are grateful that they see the work The Solutions Project and our grantee partners are doing to create a more equitable and sustainable world. This award is for all the frontline leaders, organizers, movement builders, and the power that the grassroots has been building for decades.

Please join us in celebrating the other honorees: Vanessa Nakate, Former U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lisa P. Jackson, and United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres!

Physical copies of the magazine will be on newsstands April 28!