The only real difference between white extremists of today and their cousins 100 years ago is ‘ Who are we discriminating against?’ In 1920 Congressman Albert Johnson of Washington State introduced legislation to slash the numbers of immigrants allowed into our country. Infatuated with the new pseudoscience of Eugenics ( a way to perfect people through genetics and[Read More…]
On June 30, 2023, the US Supreme Court struck down affirmative action at colleges, except for military ones. Justice Sotomayor says it’s “arbitrary” that affirmative action can continue only at military academies; Justice Gorsuch chastised the continued tolerance for “preferences for the children of donors, alumni, and faculty….” But there is nothing new or shocking about this ruling. It is[Read More…]
by Darrel Jackson and Antoine Davis As Black men in prison, we live the tension between celebrating the abolition of slavery and struggling inside the system that replaced it. Juneteenth is a bittersweet day for us — and all Black people in prison holding onto the promise of freedom. Let’s start with history. The Emancipation Proclamation — issued by Abraham[Read More…]
by Amy Goodman and Denis Moynihan Juneteenth is the newest federal holiday, signed into law by President Biden in 2021. It commemorates June 19th, 1865, the day enslaved people in Texas first learned they were free, more than two and a half years after they were declared free by President Lincoln in his Emancipation Proclamation. For generations, formerly enslaved people[Read More…]
There is no god but God: Islamic belief. There is no race but human: scientific fact. The first holds true for many if not all the 1.8 billion Muslims of the world as a foundational belief. The second is true for all Muslims, Jews, Christians, agnostics, atheists, and all the other many belief systems based on creativity, hopes, dreams and[Read More…]
On the 25th anniversary of the brutal killing of Nirmal Singh Gill by white supremacists, one of the fastest growing municipalities of Canada made a proclamation to recognize the incident. Gill, a caretaker at the Guru Nanak Sikh Gurdwara in Surrey, laid down his life in the line of duty on January 4, 1998 when a group of neo Nazis[Read More…]
The European Union’s Foreign Policy Chief Josep Borrell is not particularly perceived by the EU’s political elite or mainstream media as a rightwing ideologue or warmonger. But seen through a different, non-western prism, it is hard not to mistake him for one. Borrell’s recent comments that “Europe is a garden” and that “the rest of the world is a jungle”[Read More…]
When Shushma Datt started Rim Jhim (drizzle) radio, she was partly influenced by the rainy weather of Metro Vancouver to pick the name for her station. When she looks back almost four decades later, it does not feel the same. Once known as wet coast or Raincouver, the lower mainland is now constantly grappling with drought-like conditions and heat waves from summer[Read More…]
With the invasion of Ukraine, the international campaign against Russia seems to have surpassed the levels of anti-Communist and anti-Soviet Union hysteria of the Cold War era. In addition to economic sanctions, there is pressure against Russian athletes and artists. Russian soprano Anna Netrebko, for example, has had her concerts canceled and has been virtually banned from theaters in Western[Read More…]
Already in its eighth year, an anti-racism campaign started by Canada-based Spice Radio got a major boost when world renowned humanitarian Ravi Singh joined it on Wednesday, February 2. The Khalsa Aid founder from England, known for his philanthropy in countries hit by conflicts and natural disasters, raised his hand in the air while holding out a sign reading, “Sarbat[Read More…]
York is a cathedral city in northern England, located at the junction of the Ouse and Foss rivers. It is home to two universities as well as a burgeoning ethnic population. In 2021, the city council adopted an anonymous motion expressing the City’s intention of being an anti-racist city. There is much to say about the motion’s process, procedure, and[Read More…]
[An earlier version of this essay was presented to the National Conference on Racial and Social Justice on November 17, 2021.] We are at a tipping point in the racial history of the United States — perhaps the most important moment since the civil rights and more radical black/brown/indigenous movements of the 1960s and ’70s. Two dramatically different currents in American life[Read More…]
What are western values? One often hears a representative of a western country praising its western values. In a 2017 statement Canada’s prime minister Justin Trudeau adumbrated Canadian values as “openness, compassion, equality, and inclusion.” Given the psychological torture that Julian Assange has been subjected to over the years at the hands of western nations like the Britain, the United[Read More…]
Today is the first anniversary of the loss of John Lewis, a civil rights crusader. At the time of his death, Lewis was one of the last Selma-era civil rights leaders. In 1965, Selma, Alabama became a battle ground in an effort to guarantee Blacks the right to vote. During that time, a system of racial apartheid was in the[Read More…]
A must read for all who wish to study our Civil War history is Barnet Schecter’s 2005 book The Devil’s Own Work. He carefully covers the 1863 NYC Draft Riots, the major and important Civil War battles, and finally, the Reconstruction years leading up to the 1868 elections. I am focusing on the latter events, which are too sadly reminiscent[Read More…]
Another football ‘controversy’ has started when football players participating in the ongoing ‘UEFA Euro 2020’, kneeled down during national anthems to protest racism, a serious problem that has plagued football stadiums for many years. Yet, while some players chose to kneel down, others opted not to, offering flimsy excuses as “players weren’t ready”, and “politics should stay out of football”.[Read More…]
The Pandemic’s End in View When I first started writing the following reflections, the country was all but trapped in the dreaded clutches of the pandemic. In the midst of what then appeared as an unstoppable plague utterly mismanaged by an inept, feckless, brazenly unprincipled administration, the lockdown put all of us in the position of terrified witnesses to a[Read More…]
With more anti-Asian hate crimes than 10 of the most populous U.S. cities combined in 2020, Vancouver has reportedly become the “Anti-Asian Hate Crime Capital of North America.” A report in Bloomberg looked into police figures collected by the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism (CSHE) at Cal State San Bernardino. The Bloomberg report looks deeply, with historical[Read More…]
The very word is chilling, but has become normalised political currency in Denmark. Since 2010, the Danish government has resorted to generating “ghetto lists” marking out areas as socially problematic for the state. In 2018, the country’s parliament passed “ghetto” laws to further regulate the lives of individuals inhabiting various city areas focusing on their racial and ethnic origins. The[Read More…]
Americans’ trust in the Black Lives Matter movement has fallen and their faith in local law enforcement has risen since protests demanding social justice swept the nation last year, finds an exclusive USA TODAY/Ipsos Poll. On many issues, the survey finds a chasm in the perspective between Black people and white people. A report by USA Today said: Last June,[Read More…]
“Since August 20, the young Red Guards of Peking, detachments of students,have taken to the streets. With the revolutionary rebel spirit of the proletariat, they have launched a furious offensive to sweep away reactionary, decadent bourgeois and feudal influences, and all old ideas, culture, customs and habits. This mounting revolutionary storm is sweeping the cities of the entire nation.Red Guards[Read More…]
Hate crimes targeting Asian-Americans rose 150% in U.S.’s largest cities last year, even as overall hate crimes decreased, according to alarming new data released Tuesday. There were 122 hate crimes targeting Asian-Americans in 16 of the U.S.’s most populous cities in 2020, according to a study of police records by the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism at[Read More…]
And the first thing the American power structure doesn’t want any Negroes to start is thinking internationally. Malcolm X – Autobiography Color is not a human or a personal reality; it is a political reality. James Baldwin, The Fire Next Time The United States, with the complicity of local oligarchies, used lawfare to overthrow the governments of Manuel Zelaya[Read More…]
On July 11, a video footage, which showed a popular Israeli TV celebrity demeaning Palestinian children from the Bedouin community in the Naqab area, went viral on social media. “Let’s feed a Bedouin. Don’t you want to feed a Bedouin?” Israeli children TV host, Roy Oz, repeatedly asks his children, who were seated in the back seat of his car.[Read More…]
Recently, when a retired Chilean U.N. employee tried to enter ECLAC (United Nations Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean, based in Santiago de Chile) to claim her pension in a bank inside the compound, her car was stopped by a U.N. security officer. She was asked to complete formalities. To her taste, the process was taking too much[Read More…]
If you look at a US $20 bill, you might notice Andrew Jackson nervously watching statues of Columbus and Robert E. Lee coming down and wondering if his face is going to disappear from currency. As Democrats ponder which militarist they wish to glorify in the next round of monuments, it is critical to realize that statues which go up[Read More…]
The finest clothing made is a person’s own skin, but, of course, society demands something more than this. — Mark Twain An advertisement for Fair and Lovely, a skin whitening product showing results of before and after use Pico Iyer who writes about cultures converging refers to India as his “stepmother land.” In next to the last chapter of his[Read More…]
Prominently placed statues of famous racists are no longer acceptable, just as policemen shooting African Americans has finally become unacceptable. Why not dispense with the far out illusion of a racist colonial capitalist USA being worth celebrating. Meanwhile left undone is the protecting of non-American Black lives from killer American GIs invading and bombing their beloved countries. Since prominently placed[Read More…]
During the course of agitation ‘Black lives matter’ some protestors defaced the statue of Mahatma Gandhi in US. Mahatma Gandhi, the Father of Indian Nation, has the unique distinction of leading the biggest ever mass movement in the World and leading the strong anti colonial movement. In this direction he contributed two major tools as the basis of the[Read More…]
Co-Written by Kevin Zeese and Margaret Flowers The system-wide challenges the United States faces with policing are entrenched and deeply rooted. When the historical and current practices of police are examined, it is evident police have been designed to uphold the status quo including racial injustice and class inequality. Whenever political movements develop to respond to racial and class unfairness,[Read More…]
The fight against racist killer cops helps all workers For decades over 1,000 people a year have been murdered by the police and almost never has a cop been fired or put on trial for murder. During the last 40 years we have had both Black and White presidents, and the killings go on. We have had Black and White,[Read More…]
Recently, in this Black Lives Matter protest moment, my five-year-old son looked at me and asked, “Mommy, where did all the brown people go? Did the police here shoot them?” We’d just moved to the outskirts of a more affluent rural town from a city where my son and three-and-a-half-year-old daughter mixed daily with black, Latino, and Asian American kids[Read More…]
“I can’t breathe.” The end line of helpless George Floyd is burning the mighty America inside out. Mr. President is hiding in a Bunker and darkness is looming over the White House. Just like the many brutal dictators before him, the rage of the people is shattering the throne and slowly the protesters are triumphing over Trump. During this time[Read More…]
On this Juneteenth, we must confront the impacts of racism dating back to the founding of the United States with the slave trade of Black people brought from Africa, Jim Crow segregation, and policies that continue to this day that cause wealth inequality, disinvestment in Black communities, police violence, mass incarceration, and white nationalist violence. A pre-eminent African historian, Basil[Read More…]
And if we don’t fight if we don’t resist if we don’t organize and unify and get the power to control our own lives Then we will wear the exaggerated look of captivity the stylized look of submission the bizarre look of suicide the dehumanized look of fear and the decomposed look of repression forever and ever and ever And[Read More…]
I was dismayed to recently read that all whites should be removed from societies via interbreeding with darker skinned people. No, I am not making this wackiness up in my mind. it is real and stems from a professor in NYC [1]. Some people, apparently she included, feel that the way to get around the dilemma of all-white families is[Read More…]
Co-Written By Margaret Flowers and Kevin Zeese Last weekend, tens of thousands of people marched in Washington, DC in the combined March for Racial Justice and March for Black Women. Native Americans joined black and brown people to lead the march. At the march, Rev. Graylan Hagler said, “White Supremacy has been given aid and comfort by a so-called president and so-called administration,[Read More…]
And the cop will not go to jail. This is what has sparked protests by thousands in St. Louis from September 15 through today. In 2011, St. Louis cop Jason Stockley fired 5-7 shots at Anthony Lamar Smith, killing him. Stockley claimed that Smith was selling drugs and chased him at high speed and shot him to defend himself. [Read More…]
I’ve been upset to read that some blacks in the USA want to burn down white people’s properties and homes or take them over. It reminds of events currently happening in some African nations wherein whites are being murdered and their properties are being taken over by others. I’ve been unhappy with our recent strife in Charlottesville, VA and elsewhere[Read More…]
Racism is not a new phenomenon and while it is an ongoing daily reality for vast numbers of people, it also often bursts from the shadows to remind us that just because we can keep ignoring the endless sequence of ‘minor’ racist incidents, racism has not gone away despite supposedly significant efforts to eliminate it. I say ‘supposedly’ because[Read More…]
“In 1937, Winston Churchill said of the Palestinians, I quote, ‘I do not agree that the dog in a manger has the final right to the manger even though he may have lain there for a very long time. I do not admit that right. I do not admit for instance, that a great wrong has been done to[Read More…]
Several years ago, I saw a dark skinned woman in her early twenties and sporting Nigerian clothes in front of me at a bank ATM station. (I was many decades older than she while also a blond and white skinned. I figured that it was a great opportunity to hear her views about racism in the USA, the country[Read More…]
Over the last 2-3 years there have been a surge in targeted attacks on African nationals living in India, people from the North-Eastern provinces settled elsewhere in our country, people belonging to minority communities and members of backward castes particularly Dalits. Last year alone a Congolese teacher was attacked and killed in Delhi, a group of six Africans—two women, a[Read More…]
That Europe has jumped to the Right and the Far Right is no longer a matter of debate. Each day sees a a new and closer ‘solution’ to the ‘problem’ of the rejected, the unwanted, the ‘other’ and those variously described as not belonging to Europe. To use an Apartheid term: the Non-Europeans. Each day sees a more outrageous ‘debate’[Read More…]
The Association of African students in India is calling on the government of India to taking concrete steps to protect the lives and properties of all African students in India, and especially in Uttar Pradesh following the recent false allegations laid on five Nigerian students. We are tired of the appeasement and promises made by the Indian government and therefore[Read More…]
A young boy was found dead in Noida. The family and the people alleged that it is the Africans who have drugged him so he got cardiac arrest and after that the crowd swell and become violent against them. Police as usual arrest some of the Nigerian students and found nothing incriminating against them so release them later but the[Read More…]
“They had to kill him to prolong the life of apartheid.” Nelson Mandela Commemorating birthdays in the aftermath of a person’s death tends to be a false exercise. At best, it reminds us about an era that will have, almost certainly, vanished. This goes for whatever that era entailed – brutality, or peace; tranquillity or chaos. Then comes the issue[Read More…]
On four occasions in the last year, white acquaintances have extolled their children for being “colorblind,” for not even considering race when speaking of or interacting with other kids. In all four cases, the same “example” of this “post-racial” attitude was brought to the conversation: that when attempting to describe a fellow (minority) student, their children did not use the[Read More…]
The police are estimated to kill three white people and two black people every day. The US Government does not compile or publish annual statistics on the number of people killed by the police. The Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health states “no reliable data exist on the number of person’s killed by the police”(12/8/15). There are estimates of[Read More…]
Chip Ward has made the clear case for our needing to collectively address Climate Change issues with Native Americans in mind, and it’s undeniable that any inroads which black activists carve out respecting identity issues won’t amount to nearly enough if — simultaneously — certain environmental matters aren’t faced up to post haste. By us all, colors all across the spectrum
I thought of giving the more provocative title of—Are you a racist or casteist, here is a simple test for you—but decided to go with the more sober title that you see. Most of us do not want to be painted with a racist or a casteist paint brush and would not express such brash opinions even if we harbor[Read More…]
The African-American community has long suspected that they have been profiled, unjustly pulled over and killed by the police for the most ridiculous reasons. The typical response of the police and the authorities has been that the cops acted in self-defense and the broader community of whites and other privileged sections of the society supported the cops. Things began to[Read More…]
I find my White American students – even the very bright ones – totally confused, the moment I ask them if White police brutality against Black people in America amounts to terrorism. Most White students attribute the killings of black people by White police as undesirable, accidental, or simply due to bad judgment by the proverbial “bad cops”. Mostly Black[Read More…]
Facing what seems like an endless stream of news about racialized conflicts and violence, many people call for us to get beyond our history and find solutions for today, concrete actions we can take immediately, ways of expressing love right now to help us cope with the pain. This yearning is understandable, but it’s just as important that we grapple[Read More…]
Union Health Ministry placing a cap on new medical colleges in States on the basis of the population criterion violates federalism 
Reflections on the Revolutionary Legacy of Makhan Singh in Kenya 
Armenian civilians flee Nagorno-Karabakh after new offensive by Azerbaijan 
Manipur: a statement of concern and suggestions for peaceful resolution 
Global Leaders Plead for Peace in Ukraine at UN 
Ghosts of the Past: For Israel, War on UNESCO is an Existential Battle 
Keeping Cattle on Public Land Is Bad for People, Cows, Wildlife, and the Planet 
The United States in the World: Making Sense of the Past Forty Years (1981-2023) 
Canadian Youth At Risk and the Discrimination of Marginalized Demographics 
While Searching Worldwide for Terrorists, Uncle Sam Should Also Look in a Mirror 
American Abrams tanks roll into Ukraine 
An open letter to JNU VC – Your association with RSS defies humanism, anti-colonial struggle Indian democracy! 
From Education to Incarceration 
Tunakataa! Saying ‘No’ to Capitalism and Imperialism in Kenya 
Rising Islamophobia and Communal Discord: An Alarming Trend in BJP-Ruled States 
Speak Truth to Power and Pay the Price! 
USA’s Wars Took 12 Million Lives in The Last 25 Years 
US to send long-range ATACMS missile to Ukraine 
In Jawan, Shah Rukh Khan makes us an offer we can refuse 
Nijjar affair poses an existential dilemma 
On the Brink of Famine 
Appeal to withdraw the notification for the public hearing for the proposed Sijimali Bauxite Mining Project 
“Making a thriller from grain” 
Key Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC) Likely To Collapse In 2025-2095 
Global Biofuel Alliance at G20: Land vs Water vs Food Security- Has the government addressed the trade-offs? 
The Nijjar Murder and Indian Government’s alleged “involvement”: Reactions and Reflections 
France Will Pull Out Its Diplomats And Military From Niger, Says Macron 
Imperial Footprints in Africa: The Dismal Role of AFRICOM 
Hunger in Africa has its roots in a History of Colonialism and Neo-colonialism 
The Climate March: Magnificent and Misdirected 
Imagining a Progressive Pentagon 
“Lost Voices of Fentanyl” Rally at the White House 
Indian Government Must First Evict Dalai Lama & his Followers before Admonishing Canada for Separatist Activities 
Peasant-rebels: lineages of insurgency 
Mission to Free Assange: Australian Parliamentarians in Washington 
Bayer-ICAR Collaboration Raises Serious Concerns Regarding Indian Farm Policy 
Place of Minorities as Allotted by Savarkar, Golwalkar and Upadhyaya 
What is in the name? Attempt to stop the usage of ‘India’ by the Government 
Poona Pact: A Reappraisal 
Hate Speech Inside Parliament: Reaching a New Low 
My Amma (Malayalam word for Mother) passed away on August 22, 2023 at 3.10 AM. It is always difficult to deal with the passing of a parent, that too one’s mother. I thought the grief would go away. No it didn’t. All those bitter sweet memories won’t go away. At night I lie awake for hours. My friend, guide and[Read More…]
