Advocacy – Page 9

20150331

White House & famous actors take stand against sexual assault (1 min video)

The White House just released a very well-done video with major actors, President Obama and Vice-Prez Biden taking a stand against sexual assault. They say men need to be part of the solution to stop it from ever happening, “Because 1 is 2 many.”

Mic.com reports, “Vice President Biden introduced the PSA during the official release of “The First Report of the White House Task Force to Protect Students From Sexual Assault” Tuesday afternoon in Washington.” Biden tells us, “This is about respect. It’s about responsibility.” read more

20150311

Footballer Striker has harsh words for SAE Frat

U of Oklahama footballer Striker posted a furious Snapchat rebuttal to SAE fraternity’s racist chant.

Politics USA posted this transcript:

“You’re the same mother f*ckers telling us racism don’t exist… f*ck you phony-ass, fraud-ass b*tches. I’m so mother f*cking fierce right now, SAE you’ve f*cked it up for all white fraternities. The same mother f*ckers sitting out here giving us hugs … telling us you really love us. F*ck you!”

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Laws making it illegal to feed homeless in 33 cities must be reversed

On HuffPo, Rabbi Shmuly Yanklowitz writes about the 90 year old man arrested for feeding the homeless: “Arnold Abbott in Fort Lauderdale was arrested twice for publicly helping feed the vulnerable in his community.” And adds:

Astonishingly, according to the National Coalition for the Homeless, 33 American cities passed new restrictions on feeding the homeless between January 2013-April 2014.

Jews are commanded against following these laws, since we are obligated to feed and tend to the most vulnerable in our midst. The Shulchan Aruch writes: read more

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America’s war on compassion – and cellphone charging?

Add this story to the growing evidence that a war is being waged in America to make compassion a crime and to deny the most basic services to our #neighborswithnoaddress – the vast US homeless population of over half a million people. Which by the way ‘but for the Grace of God‘ could be you or me. Emily Green of Street Roots News reports on the plight of “Jackie”, whom police arrested for theft for charging her cellphone in an outside receptacle located in a planter box in Old Town, Portland. This story was reported by Street Roots, a Portland newspaper that serves the poor and homeless. read more

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Only people outside of New Jersey could like Christie

My friend Dee Dameron frames Christie’s betrayal of New Jersey residents so well:

What have you done for New Jerseyans lately? Absolutely nothing. There are 15,000 Hurricane Sandy families who remain without a home, 624 bridges that need to be repaired, property taxes are the highest in the nation, unemployment is still on the rise, education for children has been put to sleep, Bridgegate is still pending. These are just a few issues and concerns. there are countless. Yes, its time for you to come home and do your job which you were elected to do and put the people first…not your fantasy to become president. read more

20150207

Disturbing inequity of the School-to-Prison-Pipeline (short video)

Unhappy facts about the school to prison pipeline, which Brave New Films describes as “..another way the United States incarcerates more people than any other country on earth.*”

Zero tolerance policy doesn’t apply to everyone equally.

Blacks and Latinos are 29% of public school students but “are 70% of in-school arrests or referrals to law enforcement.”

32% of youth in special detention are special needs students.

* From NAACP Criminal Justice Fact Sheet: Combining the number of people in prison and jail with those under parole or probation supervision, 1 in every 31 adults, or 3.2% of the (USA) population is under some form of correctional control. read more

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Giving up our fantasy addiction is how we will make life good

This 8 minute film shows us the value of being alive at a time when communication is possible on a scale never before experienced. Yet, while the world is being destroyed and monetized we pay more attention to our screens than everything else around us.

But, we are not in a movie where everything is decided in advance. In real life, WE write the script. Let’s give up our addiction to fantasies that are being fed us and script our own … beautiful future … together. All power to the people!
read more

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On the Matter of Black Lives Panel @ ECC 2/2

A Movement or a Moment panel discussion on police brutality, racial profiling and the matter of black lives will be presented on Monday as part of the Fireside Chat Series at Essex County College.

Monday, February 2 2015 6-8pm
ECC Fireside Chat Series Panel:
A Movement or a Moment,
on the Matter of Black Lives
Siegler Hall, Essex County College
303 University Avenue, Newark, NJ
Cost: free

This free program is being offered in response to the high-profile deaths of Eric Garner and Michael Brown, and the subsequent court rulings and responses. It will center on whether the matter of black lives is an event of the moment, or an ongoing and growing movement. read more

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Can the Jewish approach to education benefit public schools?

I don’t agree with the Orthodox Jewish practice of choking public schools of money in order to fund transportation to, and expenses for, their own community’s schools. But, I do understand why the Orthodox community does feel that the taxes they pay should be funding their children’s education as well as other students’. And I understand why the Orthodox want their children to have yeshiva educations.

Yeshivas are better academically than public schools; they have dual language (Hebrew and English) curricula; midot (values) are taught; and a completely different approach to learning is part of the Torah (biblical) studies component, where students challenge the knowledge and positions of the study mates they partner up with and school days stretch from 7am until almost midnight. The learning culture at traditional yeshivas is fantastic and exceeds anything else I’ve encountered in a school environment. read more

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Hungry for privacy? Facebook de-friending won’t even get you close

I’ve been really thinking about a Facebook friend’s earlier post, saying she feels exposed by having 822 friends and will start deleting some in order to get more privacy. I just had to reply to the privacy issue and afterwards, realized that my assertions needed to be backed up by reliable data. “I must say,” I commented to my friend, “I find it strange that you would play a game on Facebook or post anything here and voice concerns about privacy,” and followed that with my first information point: “Facebook sells your data to game creators – this is a well-known fact.” read more

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Chinese actress’ short takes stand against ivory

Chinese actress Li Bingbing and her children campaign against ivory with this powerful 60-second film. 96 elephants are killed every day for their ivory.

When the Buying Stops, the Killing Can Too. Save the elephants.

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Must-read on the sacredness of voting

On December 14, the New York Times published Op-ed Columnist Charles M. Blow‘s opinion America, Who Are We? Mr. Blow writes on “Politics, public opinion and social justice” and his thoughts are deep and persuasive.

Last week I spoke at a seminary and graduate school in New York about the protests following the grand jury decisions in the Michael Brown and Eric Garner cases.

It was invigorating and inspiring to be among so many young people with so much passion about social justice, young people beginning to feel their power as change agents and brimming to exercise it by disrupting the status quo. read more

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#Afterthoughts: what disenfranchisement does

Friends share #afterthoughts in the days following #Ferguson and #EricGarner.

Analilia Mejía, on Facebook

Analilia Mejia
07 Dec 2014 at 08:42
Watching a White Christmas for the first time this morning and all I can think of is that this exemplifies the economic disadvantage forced on people of color.. There are no black soldiers in the 151 Division, in fact no black characters asides for the AA car porter (whom at the time would have been discriminated against in employment, advancement and pay). All of the happy GI’s who created comfortable lives (enough to drop everything and head to Vermont) did so through their access to higher Ed, a growth in professional jobs and their ability to build equity in a newly created suburbia. Blissfully ignorant (or directly complicit) to the denial of the same benefit to AA GI’s. Redlining prevented home purchases and neighborhood covenants kept them out of suburbia (and its schools). Racism denied (and denies) equal access and advancement into more lucrative jobs and careers. The American Legion and VFW routinely denied claims of African Americans in pursuit of higher education, and those who did access it where barred by racist policies in many universities, or limited to increasingly strained HBCU’s and even then faced the hurdles of an inferior preparation by Jim Crow segregated AND unequal k-12 schools.. This all led to a wealth gap passed on through generations. Your comforts today are DIRECTLY influenced by your grandparents owning a home, generations of superior education impacts how well YOU did (much less if you went). This inequity is exacerbated today by the foreclosure crisis that disproportionately dismantles POC communities thanks to predatory lending. All of this didn’t happen centuries ago and hence we are past it. This systemic racism has tentacles that reach back into times of slavery, peonage re-enslavement, Jim Crow, the struggles of the civil rights era and into today with the subsequent dismantling of that dream through continued inequity in education, mass incarceration, an unjust justice system to name a few.. But much like those soldiers and Bing in that movie, most of white America is OBLIVIOUS to all of this. Insulated or intentionally blind. Lucky them, they get to dream about a White Christmas while black mothers are mourning their sons and WE continue to lose our belief in the system this holiday season… read more

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Gotta love these frank-speaking tekkies

How’s this for plain speaking? We don’t want your opinion, dude. Answer the poster’s question or STFU:

Please refrain from discussing your opinions on design and “why” the poster is asking the question, unless it pertains directly to the answer (or expands on it). In this case, it serves no purpose. We like to see direct answers, not monologues on what they should (or shouldn’t) be asking the question. This place is about getting answers. I hope you can appreciate how frustrating it can be to ask a question and have dozens of people respond with their opinions rather than simply supply the answer (as is found on many online forums). Thanks again for participating, but please, keep it on point. – cksum Jan 31 at 22:53 read more

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Using Gmail filters

I know I’m behind the 8-ball with Gmail use. Reason being, I prefer a client-side (runs on my computer) email application, but my trusted friend Eudora is not ever going to work with Mavericks, so I have to make a switch. I’m using Gmail while I choose a new app and learn how to convert Eudora emails over to it without losing the valuable data associated with it (like, dates, for instance).

Found this good tutorial on setting up Gmail filters. It’s well written, easy to understand and has graphics that assist with that. Maybe you’ll like it too. Or when you’re reading an email, use the more pulldown menu option “filter messages like this” to get to step 1 of the setup process. read more