WW News Service Digest #249
1) Sister of man killed by Boston cops speaks out
by "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
2) Boston event celebrates International Women's Day
by "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
3) Mumia: The 'other' women's history month
by "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
4) Workers around the world: 3/29/01
by "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
5) Gay GIs: up against the brass
by "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
-------------------------
Via Workers World News Service
Reprinted from the March 29, 2001
issue of Workers World newspaper
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SISTER OF MAN KILLED BY BOSTON COPS SPEAKS OUT
COMMUNITY MOBILIZES TO STAND WITH HER
By Frank Neisser
Boston
On Feb. 27, a group of 70 concerned community members--
including the family and neighbors of Ricky Bodden and
supporters--packed a Boston City Council hearing to demand
justice. The hearing was called for by African American City
Councilor Chuck Turner to investigate the police killing of
Bodden.
Last Dec. 27, Bodden was shot in the back of the neck and
killed by Boston Municipal Police Officer Kyle Wilcox. The
cop claimed he mistook the cigarette Bodden was smoking for
marijuana. Bodden was shot in the back of the neck as he ran
away from the cop.
The cops claim he had a gun. But eyewitnesses who were right
behind Bodden testified that he never reached in his pocket
and had no weapon.
But Councilor Turner was not even allowed to present the
facts of the case before being cut off in a racist fashion
by City Councilor Dan Conley. Conley, who chaired the
hearing, attempted to adjourn the meeting rather than allow
Turner to speak.
At that point the family members, neighbors and supporters
all got up and chanted, "What do we want? Justice! When do
we want it? Now!"
Carole Bodden, sister of the man the police killed,
addressed the crowd and the hearing. "My baby brother Ricky
was shot in the back of the neck and killed as he was
running away from a Boston Municipal Police officer.
"We are calling on the City Council and the [police]
department to establish an independent investigation of my
brother's death. We also demand an apology from the
department and Officer Wilcox, prosecution of the murderous
officer, and the establishment of an independent, community-
controlled civilian review board."
The entire group of community members and supporters then
left the hearing room as a body. The event was well covered
by the Boston media.
The family has continued to demand the police report and the
autopsy report in the case, but has been stonewalled by the
Boston police and the district attorney's office. In
addition to Ricky Bodden's sister, his mother Evelyn and
father Esteban Bustillo are active in the campaign.
On March 27 at 3:45 p.m., the Campaign for Justice for Ricky
Bodden will hold a rally at Park Street Station in Boston.
Demonstrators will march to District Attorney Ralph Martin's
office to demand that he take action in the case.
A strong coalition continues to meet weekly on the case,
coordinated by Streets Is Watching, a group that is
organizing against police misconduct and harassment of
African American youths.
Carol Bodden told Workers World that she urges all justice-
loving people in Boston to come to the rally on March 27 and
let their voices be heard. She pointed to a pattern of
harassment of youths by the police and other incidents of
police violence in recent years.
-------------------------
Via Workers World News Service
Reprinted from the March 29, 2001
issue of Workers World newspaper
-------------------------
BOSTON EVENT CELEBRATES INTERNATIONAL WOMEN'S DAY
By Phebe Eckfeldt
More than 50 women and their supporters crowded into the
Boston office of Workers World Party on March 17 to
celebrate International Women's Day. They came to hear
Monica Moorehead--a national leader of WWP and the Party's
1996 and 2000 presidential candidate--speak on how to fight
back against the impact of "globalization" on women.
Activists came from Rhode Island, New Hampshire and several
local colleges--including a big delegation from Simmons
College undergraduate women's school.
Also speaking on the program were representatives from DARE--
a group fighting racism and police brutality in Rhode
Island, United American Indians of New England and the
Simmons College Feminist Union.
They addressed issues such as the April 20 meeting in Quebec
of the "Free Trade Area of the Americas" and how women are
organizing against this attempt by U.S. banks and
corporations to super-exploit the Americas.
Also high up on the agenda were fighting racism and sexism,
the origin of women's oppression, the right of women to
reproductive freedom, the history of International Women's
Day, and the struggle for lesbian, gay, bi and trans
liberation.
Before the meeting everyone enjoyed a delicious dinner. Much
discussion followed the meeting.
-------------------------
Via Workers World News Service
Reprinted from the March 29, 2001
issue of Workers World newspaper
-------------------------
MUMIA ABU-JAMAL FROM DEATH ROW:
THE "OTHER" WOMEN'S HISTORY MONTH
By Mumia Abu-Jamal
["If the first woman God ever made was strong enough to turn
the world upside down alone, these women together ought to
be able to turn it back, and get it right side up again!"
--Sojourner Truth, "Ain't I A Woman?" (1858)]
Within weeks of the arrival of Women's History Month, the
nation's cultural and financial center explodes into yet
another controversy over religious art, with Gotham's tight-
lipped mayor, "Rudolf" Giuliani, fulminating against the
depiction of a Christ-figure as a dark-skinned, naked woman.
Some called it blasphemy.
This cultural critique serves as a perfect introduction to a
month which memorializes the distinctive histories of women.
However, the women discussed here will rarely be seen on TV
or featured in newspaper reports, for these are not "safe"
women, as are those usually portrayed.
The world's history is one of resistance, of rebellion and
of radical action, which is usually suppressed in
traditional history.
How many of us know of the food boycotts of the early 1900s,
when poor and working women organized tens of thousands into
mass demonstrations that rocked cities across the nation?
In 1910-era New York, Jewish women "declared war on Kosher
butchers" because of high prices. In August 1914, over 1,000
Italian women in Providence, R.I., broke into wholesaler's
storage and threw macaroni into the streets, battling for
lower pasta prices.
A few years thereafter, in 1929, the Women's Revolt took
place in Nigeria, shaking the colony to its foundations.
These brave, radical women were protesting an agricultural
tax imposed by the British through the chiefs. The women
seized colonial offices (and held some for four days!),
organized mass protests and mass community meetings. Before
it was over, over 50 women were killed, and at least 50
wounded, by colonial military forces. However, the women
forced the British to revoke the tax.
Nor are women limited to mass actions of resistance, as
shown by the examples of some of the following: Sarah,
Harriet Ross, Mangobe, Jo Ann Robinson and uncounted others.
Sarah was a captive in 1822-era Kentucky. One Kentucky slave
owner described her as the "biggest devil that ever lived."
The fierce 6-foot-tall Black woman poisoned her owner's stud
horse, set several stables afire, destroyed over $1,500
worth of property, and escaped five times!
Mangobe was described by the late revolutionary historian
C.L.R. James as the "most revolutionary woman in the Congo"
for her role in leading the popular religious movement of
the Prophet, Simon Kimbangu, which had a deep anti-colonial
character. The imprisonment of Kimbangu and Mangobe sent the
Belgian colony into righteous and sustained revolt in 1921.
Harriet Ross thwarted the will of a slave trader who was
seeking her son by barring the door and telling the man,
"The first man that comes into my house, I will split his
head open." When her (so-called) owner's son tried to beat
her, she grabbed a pole, "and beat him nearly to death with
it." Her daughter stood by, watching and learning this
tradition of resistance.
Such a woman as this could truly be no man's slave, and
shortly thereafter, Harriet Ross demonstrated as much by
mounting a cow and riding away from slavery and the
plantation in broad daylight.
Oh. Her daughter? She learned her lesson well. You know of
her by the name Harriet Tubman, a woman revered as "Moses."
The American Civil Rights Movement made the great orator the
Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. a household name. Almost as
well known is the sweet, quiet presence of Rosa Parks, the
proud woman who refused to relinquish her seat to a white
man on a bus.
But few recognize the name of Jo Ann Robinson, whose work as
an organizer insured that you now know Mme. Parks' name. She
was the chair of the Women's Political Council, a
professional women's group in Montgomery, Ala.--the little
known organizers of the historic bus boycott. Robinson wrote
the leaflet that informed and energized thousands, and the
WPC worked the phones getting the word out.
The names of women warriors of Black Liberation, of those
who are still politically active, and of radicals of later
generations are known to us, perhaps, as contemporary
visions of resistance that continues to move us: Angela
Davis, the Africa sisters, Assata Shakur, Kathleen Cleaver,
Nehanda Abiodun, Alice Walker, Marilyn Buck, Afeni Shakur,
Kiilu Nyasha, Linda Evans, Susan Rosenberg, Tarika Lewis,
Elaine Brown, Rosemari Mealy and on and on, show us a new
face spawned by an ancient seed of female fighters for
freedom. Many of these names are not well known (perhaps
with the exception of Angela, Assata and Alice), but neither
were those of history.
They are, nonetheless, valuable contributors to a rich
history of women who rebel.
-------------------------
Via Workers World News Service
Reprinted from the March 29, 2001
issue of Workers World newspaper
-------------------------
WORKERS AORUNGD THE WORLD
CHILE:.PROTESTS VS. INTER- AMERICAN BANK
The wave of protest that has met world bankers and
financiers since the November 1999 Seattle protests against
the World Trade Organization continued in the streets of
Santiago, Chile. Demonstrations against the annual meeting
of the Inter-American Development Bank opened up on March
15, despite a massive police presence.
The opening protests began with a march organized by the
Chilean activist group Funa Commission. Demonstrators
chanted, "IDB out of Chile! Capitalism out of Latin
America!"
They charged that the IDB is a "promoter of neoliberalism in
Latin America." Neoliberalism is a term used throughout
Latin America for the economic policies of austerity and
privatizations that are promoted by international financial
groups like the International Monetary Fund.
The Funa Commission is a human rights group that publicizes
the identity of torturers and other agents of the brutal
U.S.-backed dictatorship of Gen. Augusto Pinochet from 1973
to 1990. Some 40 other community and leftist groups joined
the protests, including the Federation of Construction and
Wood Workers' Union.
Major clashes between demonstrators and riot police took
place throughout the weekend leading up to the opening
sessions of the IDB on March 19. Over 200 people were
arrested in the two days leading up to the opening,
according to the Ecuador-based Pulsar news agency.
A bomb exploded outside a bank in Santiago on March 19.
Leaflets around the bank warned, "Death to the IDB." No one
was injured in the blast.
"Elite meetings of global wealth and its governmental
promoters, of the same type that will take place in
Santiago, are generating growing universal rejection due to
the total devaluing that they demonstrate in the face of
social and human problems that billions of people across the
planet are suffering," said a statement issued by the
Communist Party of Chile. "That is being shown by the
gigantic demonstrations in Okinawa, Bangkok, Melbourne,
Washington, Prague, Nice and Zurich this year alone."
IDB representatives adopted a tactic used by organizers of
the recent World Economic Forum in Cancun, Mexico. They
invited representatives of unions and other popular
organizations to "debate" banking representatives about the
supposed benefits of imperialist exploitation.
The United Workers Federation (CUT), Chile's largest union
umbrella, did not participate in the demonstrations. Union
leaders were invited to some of the IDB's events leading up
to the summit.
Chilean President Ricardo Lagos, a member of the Socialist
Party who postured as a leftist during the election
campaign, opened the IDB meeting. He made a point of backing
Argentinean President Fernando de la Rua's economic
austerity plan during his opening remarks. Argentinean
unions are planning a wave of strikes to combat de la Rua's
austerity program.
Leftists from across Latin America are preparing for a
massive demonstration against a meeting of Latin American
trade ministers in Buenos Aires on April 6-7. As many as
100,000 people are expected for those demonstrations.
COLOMBIA: UNION LEADERS MURDERED
Two leaders of a union representing coal miners at the Loma
mine near Chiriguana, a town in northern Colombia, were
dragged off a bus and executed by paramilitary death squads
on March 12. Valmore Locrano Rodriguez and Victor Orcasita
had represented workers at the Loma mine, owned by the U.S.-
based Drummond Corp.
Trade unionists are frequent targets for right-wing death
squads in Colombia. The United Workers Federation, CUT,
reported that 1,522 labor leaders have been killed in
Colombia since 1995--116 in the year 2000 alone.
Witnesses reported that several of the gunmen who executed
the union leaders wore military uniforms. The paramilitary
death squads have been linked directly to Colombia's
official armed forces, which use the death squads to
terrorize the civilian population against supporting the
country's powerful insurgencies.
In response to the murders, the Loma mine's 1,200 workers
walked off the job. Several international unions, including
the International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and
General Workers (ICEM) and the United Steelworkers of
America issued statements condemning the attacks.
BRAZIL:.OIL WORKERS DEMAND SAFETY
An explosion on an oil rig owned by Brazil's state-owned
Petrobras oil com pany provoked demonstrations by workers
for increased safety measures. One worker was killed
outright, another was critically injured and nine were
missing and presumed dead in the March 15 explosion at the
Campos Basin rig.
The Oil Workers Federation FUP staged a series of slowdown
and workplace demonstrations to protest the accident,
according to the international energy workers union ICEM.
The FUP charged that Petrobras was endangering worker safety
by subcontracting work to lower-paid and lower-skilled
workers. It demanded the right for workers to refuse any
work they considered dangerous.
An FUP statement called Petrobras management "clearly
responsible" for the accident--one of a series of fatal
accidents at Petrobras facilities. The "brutal
subcontracting implemented within the company" combined with
the "criminal cutbacks in the regular workforce" have
"multiplied the risks already inherent in this sector," the
FUP statement charged.
MOLDOVA: COMMUNISTS WIN PARLIAMENTARY ELECTIONS
The Communist Party swept parliamentary elections held in
Moldova on Feb. 25. Election returns showed that the CP won
over 50 percent of the popular vote and 71 out of 101 seats
in the former Soviet republic's parliament.
The vote was a reflection of disillusionment among the
country's poor for the country's pro-capitalist orientation
since Moldova seceded from the USSR in 1991. It was also a
show of support for greater unity with Russia and Belarus.
Moldova was among the first of the former Soviet republics
to declare independence from the USSR. Two-thirds of the
country's population is Moldovan, closely connected to
neighboring Romania, with the remaining one third of Russian
background or with backgrounds from former Soviet republics.
So the majority vote for the Com mun ists, who campaigned
for greater unity with Russia, was a clear defeat for
nationalists in the orbit of Western European and U.S.
imperialism.
Whether the CP can chart a truly independent course remains
to be seen. Communist leader Vladimir Voronin declared that
"Moldova is interested in extending cooperation with the
International Monetary Fund, the World Bank, and other
international financial institutions," according to a March
15 TASS report.
UKRAINE:.COMMUNISTS DEMAND GOV'T RESIGN
Thousands of communist demonstrators filled the streets
outside of Ukraine's parliament building on March 15 calling
for President Leonid Kuchma and his government to resign.
The leftist demonstrators also called for a restoration of
the Union of Socialist Soviet Republics.
"We have called on the president and the prime minister to
resign," said communist leader Petro Simonenko. "If not,
millions of people are ready to take to the streets to sweep
out this regime. The people are tired of this regime that
has plunged them into the depths of misery."
While the thousands rallied outside the building, activists
inside the parliament's visitors' gallery unfurled a banner
calling for "Union of Ukraine, Belarus and Russia." The
activists were expelled from the gallery after a struggle.
Demonstrators came to the capital city of Kiev from the coal
regions of Donetsk and Luhansk, as well as from the
industrial areas of Odessa and Kharkov. The Ukrainian
Workers' Union and the All-Ukrainian Union of Soviet
Officers joined the protest.
-------------------------
Via Workers World News Service
Reprinted from the March 29, 2001
issue of Workers World newspaper
-------------------------
EDITORIAL: GAY GI'S: UP AGAINST THE BRASS
How should anti-war activists of all sexualities here and
around the world, who are working so hard to stop the
Pentagon drive towards war and domination, view the question
of the right of gays and lesbians and bisexuals to serve
openly in the military?
For those who really understand the class nature of the
military, this question is not hard to figure out. The
Pentagon is the death squad of U.S. bankers and
industrialists hell-bent on squeezing every drop of profit
possible out of the peoples, land and resources of this
planet. When anything or anyone gets in the way of that
objective, the brass are called on to blow them out of the
water.
This rapacious drive toward war is an armed continuation of
trade wars and competition for profits that is built into
the capitalist system. There's no way to create a kinder,
gentler capitalism or imperialist war machine.
But the reactionary character of the U.S. military is made
even clearer by its terror campaigns against its own GIs--
most all of whom are from the laboring class and are
disproportionately people of color. These Rambo campaigns to
create "fighting men" feed off misogyny, anti-trans
oppression, and all the worst bigotries aimed at lesbians,
gays and bisexuals.
And racism is always, always a part of Pentagon efforts to
brainwash GIs into believing that oppressed peoples are the
enemy.
To fight against these forms of oppression is to attempt to
disarm the brass--the largest "employer" in the United
States. And that's a war we have to win.
The Servicemembers Legal Defense Network seventh annual
report demonstrates that the witch hunts against lesbian,
gay and bisexual GIs declined ever so slightly last year.
Why? Because of the public outrage about the brutal murder
of Army private Barry Winchell, who was in a loving
relationship with a trans woman. He was bludgeoned to death
in his barracks in 1999 at Fort Campbell, Ky., after having
endured a long campaign of harassment.
The outcry from across the country called into question the
"Don't ask, don't tell" policy. The Pentagon's own Inspector
General conducted a survey of 75,000 servicepeople. The
report concluded that 80 percent of them had heard anti-gay
epithets within the last year. Of those, 37 percent said
they had seen or experienced anti-gay harassment.
Little has changed. The SLDN's "Conduct Unbecoming" report,
released March 15, concluded "reports of death threats,
assaults and verbal gay bashing continue almost unabated."
Who will lead the charge to overturn this violently bigoted
"business as usual" within the military? A Democrat? After
making "gays in the military" a campaign promise in his
first 1992 election bid, Clinton surrendered to the admirals
and generals once he resided in the White House. He proposed
this "compromise" that resulted in stepped up witch hunts
against lesbian, gay, bisexual and trans servicemembers.
Both houses of Congress, it should be recalled, were
controlled by Democrats at that time.
Does anyone expect a Republican to lead the offensive?
President George W. Bush summed up his position quite
clearly and succinctly when he said on Jan. 7, "I'm a 'Don't
Ask, Don't Tell' man."
It's going to take a movement in the streets and in the
barracks, led by those who are fighting the Pentagon in
their own interests, who will strip this divide-and-conquer
weapon from the bloody hands of the brass. And let the
banners that lead this march inexorably forward read:
"Pentagon out of Colombia, Vieques, Cuba, Iraq, south Korea,
Okinawa, the Balkans--and the United States!"
