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racefortheironthrone · 2 months

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OK, I'll bite - what's the deal with the United Farm Workers? What were their strengths and weaknesses compared to other labor unions?

It is not an easy thing to talk about the UFW, in part because it wasn't just a union. At the height of its influence in the 1960s and 1970s, it was also a civil rights movement that was directly inspired by the SCLC campaigns of Martin Luther King and owed its success as much to mass marches, hunger strikes, media attention, and the mass mobilization of the public in support of boycotts that stretched across the United States and as far as Europe as it did to traditional strikes and picket lines.

It was also a social movement that blended powerful strains of Catholic faith traditions with Chicano/Latino nationalism inspired by the black power movement, that reshaped the identity of millions away from asimilation into white society and towards a fierce identification with indigeneity, and challenged the racist social hierarchy of rural California.

It was also a political movement that transformed Latino voting behavior, established political coalitions with the Kennedys, Jerry Brown, and the state legislature, that pushed through legislation and ran statewide initiative campaigns, and that would eventually launch the careers of generations of Latino politicians who would rise to the very top of California politics.

However, it was also a movement that ultimately failed in its mission to remake the brutal lives of California farmworkers, which currently has only 7,000 members when it once had more than 80,000, and which today often merely trades on the memory of its celebrated founders Dolores Huerta and Cesar Chavez rather than doing any organizing work.

To explain the strengths and weaknesses of the UFW, we have to start with some organizational history, because the UFW was the result of the merger of several organizations each with their own strengths and weaknesses.

The Origins of the UFW:

In the 1950s, both Dolores Huerta and Cesar Chavez were community organizers working for a group called the Community Service Organization (an affiliate of Saul Alinsky's Industrial Areas Foundation) that sought to aid farmworkers living in poverty. Huerta and Chavez were trained in a novel strategy of grassroots, door-to-door organizing aimed not at getting workers to sign union cards, but to agree to host a house meeting where co-workers could gather privately to discuss their problems at work free from the surveillance of their bosses. This would prove to be very useful in organizing the fields, because unlike the traditional union model where organizers relied on the NRLB's rulings to directly access the factory floors, Central California farms were remote places where white farm owners and their white overseers would fire shotguns at brown "trespassers" (union-friendly workers, organizers, picketers).

In 1962, Chavez and Huerta quit CSO to found the National Farm Workers Association, which was really more of a worker center offering support services (chiefly, health care) to independent groups of largely Mexican farmworkers. In 1965, they received a request to provide support to workers dealing with a strike against grape growers in Delano, California.

In Delano, Chavez and Huerta met Larry Itliong of the Agricultural Workers Organizing Committee (AWOC), which was a more traditional labor union of migrant Filipino farmworkers who had begun the strike over sub-minimum wages. Itliong wanted Chavez and Huerta to organize Mexican farmworkers who had been brought in as potential strikebreakers and get them to honor the picket line.

The result of their collaboration was the formation of the United Farm Workers as a union of the AFL-CIO. The UFW would very much be marked by a combination of (and sometimes conflict between) AWOC's traditional union tactics - strikes, pickets, card drives, employer-based campaigns, and collective bargaining for union contracts - and NFWA's social movement strategy of marches, boycotts, hunger strikes, media campaigns, mobilization of liberal politicians, and legislative campaigns.

1965 to 1970: the Rise of the UFW:

While the strike starts with 2,000 Filipino workers and 1,200 Mexican families targeting Delano area growers, it quickly expanded to target more growers and bring more workers to the picket lines, eventually culminating in 10,000 workers striking against the whole of the table grape growers of California across the length and breadth of California.

Throughout 1966, the UFW faced extensive violence from the growers, from shotguns used as "warning shots" to hand-to-hand violence, to driving cars into pickets, to turning pesticide-spraying machines onto picketers. Local police responded to the violence by effectively siding with the growers, and would arrest UFW picketers for the crime of calling the police.

Chavez strongly emphasized a non-violent response to the growers' tactics - to the point of engaging in a Gandhian hunger strike against his own strikers in 1968 to quell discussions about retaliatory violence - but also began to employ a series of civil rights tactics that sought to break what had effectively become a stalemate on the picket line by side-stepping the picket lines altogether and attacking the growers on new fronts.

First, he sought the assistance of outside groups and individuals who would be sympathetic to the plight of the farmworker and could help bring media attention to the strike - UAW President Walter Reuther and Senator Robert Kennedy both visited Delano to express their solidarity, with Kennedy in particular holding hearings that shined a light on the issue of violence and police violations of the civil rights of UFW picketers.

Second, Chavez hit on the tactic of using boycotts as a way of exerting economic pressure on particular growers and leveraging the solidarity of other unions and consumers - the boycotts began when Chavez enlisted Dolores Huerta to follow a shipment of grapes from Schenley Industries (the first grower to be boycotted) to the Port of Oakland. There, Huerta reached out to the International Longshoremen's and Warehousemen's Union and persuaded them to honor the boycott and refuse to handle non-union grapes. Schenley's grapes started to rot on the docks, cutting them off from the market, and between the effects of union solidarity and growing consumer participation in the UFW's boycotts, the growers started to come under real economic pressure as their revenue dropped despite a record harvest.

Throughout the rest of the Delano grape strike, Dolores Huerta would be the main organizer of the national and internal boycotts, travelling across the country (and eventually all the way to the UK) to mobilize unions and faith groups to form boycott committees and boycott houses in major cities that in turn could educate and mobilize ordinary consumers through a campaign of leafleting and picketing at grocery stores.

Third, the UFW organized the first of its marches, a 300-mile trek from Delano to the state capital of Sacramento aimed at drawing national attention to the grape strike and attempting to enlist the state government to pass labor legislation that would give farmworkers the right to organize. Carefully organized by Cesar Chavez to draw on Mexican faith traditions, the march would be labelled a "pilgrimage," and would be timed to begin during Lent and culminate during Easter. In addition to American flags and the UFW banner, the march would be led by "pilgrims" carrying a banner of Our Lady of Guadelupe.

While this strategy was ultimately effective in its goal of influencing the broader Latino community in California to see the UFW as not just a union but a vehicle for the broader aspirations of the whole Latino community for equality and social justice, what became known in Chicano circles as La Causa, the emphasis on Mexican symbolism and Chicano identity contributed to a growing tension with the Filipino half of the UFW, who felt that they were being sidelined in a strike they had started.

Nevertheless, by the time that the UFW's pilgrimage arrived at Sacramento, news broke that they had won their first breakthrough in the strike as Schenley Industries (which had been suffering through a four-month national boycott of its products) agreed to sign the first UFW union contract, delivering a much-needed victory.

As the strike dragged on, growers were not passively standing by - in addition to doubling down on the violence by hiring strikebreakers to assault pro-UFW farmworkers, growers turned to the Teamsters Union as a way of pre-empting the UFW, either by pre-emptively signing contracts with the Teamsters or effectively backing the Teamsters in union elections.

Part of the darker legacy of the Teamsters is that, going all the back to the 1930s, they have a nasty habit of raiding other unions, and especially during their mobbed-up days would work with the bosses to sign sweetheart deals that allowed the Teamsters to siphon dues money from workers (who had not consented to be represented by the Teamsters, remember) while providing nothing in the way of wage increases or improved working conditions, usually in exchange for bribes and/or protection money from the employers. Moreover, the Teamsters had no compunction about using violence to intimidate rank-and-file workers and rival unions in order to defend their "paper locals" or win a union election. This would become even more of an issue later on, but it started up as early as 1966.

Moreover, the growers attempted to adapt to the UFW's boycott tactics by sharing labels, such that a boycotted company would sell their products under the guise of being from a different, non-boycotted company. This forced the UFW to change its boycott tactics in turn, so that instead of targeting individual growers for boycott, they now asked unions and consumers alike to boycott all table grapes from the state of California.

By 1970, however, the growing strength of the national grape boycott forced no fewer than 26 Delano grape growers to the bargaining table to sign the UFW's contracts. Practically overnight, the UFW grew from a membership of 10,000 strikers (none of whom had contracts, remember) to nearly 70,000 union members covered by collective bargaining agreements.

1970 to 1978: The UFW Confronts Internal and External Crises

Up until now, I've been telling the kind of simple narrative of gradual but inevitable social progress that U.S history textbooks like, the Hollywood story of an oppressed minority that wins a David and Goliath struggle against a violent, racist oligarchy through the kind of non-violent methods that make white allies feel comfortable and uplifted. (It's not an accident that the bulk of the 2014 film Cesar Chavez starring Michael Peña covers the Delano Grape Strike.)

It's also the period in which the UFW's strengths as an organization that came out of the community organizing/civil rights movement were most on display. In the eight years that followed, however, the union would start to experience a series of crises that would demonstrate some of the weaknesses of that same institutional legacy. As Matt Garcia describes in From the Jaws of Victory, in the wake of his historic victory in 1970, Cesar Chavez began to inflict a series of self-inflicted injuries on the UFW that crippled the functioning of the union, divided leadership and rank-and-file alike, and ultimately distracted from the union's external crises at a time when the UFW could not afford to be distracted.

That's not to say that this period was one of unbroken decline - as we'll discuss, the UFW would win many victories in this period - but the union's forward momentum was halted and it would spend much of the 1970s trying to get back to where it was at the very start of the decade.

To begin with, we should discuss the internal contradictions of the UFW: one of the major features of the UFW's new contracts was that they replaced the shape-up with the hiring hall. This gave the union an enormous amount of power in terms of hiring, firing and management of employees, but the quid-pro-quo of this system is that it puts a significant administrative burden on the union. Not only do you have to have to set up policies that fairly decide who gets work and when, but you then have to even-handedly enforce those policies on a day-to-day basis in often fraught circumstances - and all of this is skilled white-collar labor.

This ran into a major bone of contention within the movement. When the locus of the grape strike had shifted from the fields to the urban boycotts, this had made a new constituency within the union - white college-educated hippies who could do statistical research, operate boycott houses, and handle media campaigns. These hippies had done yeoman's work for the union and wanted to keep on doing that work, but they also needed to earn enough money to pay the rent and look after their growing families, and in general shift from being temporary volunteers to being professional union staffers.

This ran head-long into a buzzsaw of racial and cultural tension. Similar to the conflicts over the role of white volunteers in CORE/SNCC during the Civil Rights Movement, there were a lot of UFW leaders and members who had come out of the grassroots efforts in the field who felt that the white college kids were making a play for control over the UFW. This was especially driven by Cesar Chavez' religiously-inflected ideas of Catholic sacrifice and self-denial, embodied politically as the idea that a salary of $5 a week (roughly $30 a week in today's money) was a sign of the purity of one's "missionary work." This worked itself out in a series of internicene purges whereby vital college-educated staff were fired for various crimes of ideological disunity.

This all would have been survivable if Chavez had shown any interest in actually making the union and its hiring halls work. However, almost from the moment of victory in 1970, Chavez showed almost no interest in running the union as a union - instead, he thought that the most important thing was relocating the UFW's headquarters to a commune in La Paz, or creating the Poor People's Union as a way to organize poor whites in the San Joaquin Valley, or leaving the union altogether to become a Catholic priest, or joining up with the Synanon cult to run criticism sessions in La Paz. In the mean-time, a lot of the UFW's victories were withering on the vine as workers in the fields got fed up with hiring halls that couldn't do their basic job of making sure they got sufficient work at the right wages.

Externally, all of this was happening during the second major round of labor conflicts out in the fields. As before, the UFW faced serious conflicts with the Teamsters, first in the so-called "Salad Bowl Strike" that lasted from 1970-1971 and was at the time the largest and most violent agricultural strike in U.S history - only then to be eclipsed in 1973 with the second grape strike. Just as with the Salinas strike, the grape growers in 1973 shifted to a strategy of signing sweetheart deals with the Teamsters - and using Teamster muscle to fight off the UFW's new grape strike and boycott. UFW pickets were shot at and killed in drive-byes by Teamster trucks, who then escalated into firebombing pickets and UFW buildings alike.

After a year of violence, reduced support from the rank-and-file, and declining resources, Chavez and the UFW felt that their backs were up against a wall - and had to adjust their tactics accordingly. With the election of Jerry Brown as governor in 1974, the UFW pivoted to a strategy of pressuring the state government to enact a California Agricultural Labor Relations Act that would give agricultural workers the right to organize, and with that all the labor protections normally enjoyed by industrial workers under the Federal National Labor Relations Act - at the cost of giving up the freedom to boycott and conduct secondary strikes which they had had as outsiders to the system.

This led to the semi-miraculous Modesto March, itself a repeat of the Delano-to-Sacramento march from the 1960s. Starting as just a couple hundred marchers in San Francisco, the March swelled to as many as 15,000-strong by the time that it reached its objective at Modesto. This caused a sudden sea-change in the grape strike, bringing the growers and the Teamsters back to the table, and getting Jerry Brown and the state legislature to back passage of California Agricultural Labor Relations Act.

This proved to be the high-water mark for the UFW, which swelled to a peak of 80,000 members. The problem was that the old problems within the UFW did not go away - victory in 1975 didn't stop Chavez and his Chicano constituency feuding with more distinctively Mexican groups within the movement over undocumented immigration, nor feuding with Filipino constituencies over a meeting with Ferdinand Marcos, and nor escalating these internal conflicts into a series of leadership purges.

Conclusion: Decline and Fall

At the same time, the new alliance with the Agricultural Labor Relations Board proved to be a difficult one for the UFW. While establishment of the agency proved to be a major boon for the UFW, which won most of the free elections under CALRA (all the while continuing to neglect the critical hiring hall issue), the state legislature badly underfunded ALRB, forcing the agency to temporarily shut down. The UFW responded by sponsoring Prop 14 in the 1976 elections to try to empower ALRB, and then got very badly beaten in that election cycle - and then, when Republican George Deukmejian was elected in 1983, the ALRB was largely defunded and unable to achieve its original elective goals.

In the wake of Deukmejian, the UFW went into terminal decline. Most of its best organizers had left or been purged in internal struggles, their contracts failed to succeed over the long run due to the hiring hall problem, and the union basically stopped organizing new members after 1986.

#history #u.s history #labor history #ufw #united farm workers #cesar chavez #dolores huerta #trade unions #social history #social movements #unions

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ibarkatpeoplewoofwoofbitch · 3 months

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So I'm pretty sure lucifers real name was Samael. His original name before he left Heaven.

"Samael, from the amoraic period onward the major name of Satan in Judaism. The name first appears in the account of the theory of angels in the Ethiopic Book of Enoch 6, which includes the name, although not in the most important place, in the list of the leaders of the angels who rebelled against God."

Who knows I could be 1000% wrong but like imagine if the other archangels especially michael call him samael to rub it in his face(he's always the one that's seen as the asshole in a lot of media privacy because he's the angel of "an angelic warrior, fully armed with helmet, sword, and shield, " "He is considered a champion of justice, a healer of the sick, and the guardian of the Church." "mentions of his name are in third- and second-century-BC Jewish works, often but not always apocalyptic, where he is the chief of the angels and archangels")

And if michael is the "mentions of his name are in third- and second-century-BC Jewish works, often but not always apocalyptic, where he is the chief of the angels and archangels"

Adam was the leader of Exorcist. But was it michael who taught them how to attack?. Because as much a warrior adam in most media represent him as head strong. And impulsive, also very arrogant.

The Exorcists' fighting styles pointed out by Carmella carmine "out for blood" and NEVER focus on getting hurt only on hurting others.

And "Gabriel is the herald of visions, messenger of God and one of the angels of higher rank."

Even the seraphim who are the "in the highest rank in Christian angelology and in the fifth rank of ten in the Jewish angelic hierarchy." Are powerful, and yet NEITHER of them knew how someone got into heaven. Is it gabriel that tells Sera to not question it. Especially when she was younger so she wouldn't fall?

And Sera carried that to Emily?

(Im sorry I know most of this don't male any sense I just saw six angels point angelic weapons at lucifer and I wanna know which ones)

These are all archangels I am certain. And I looked up how many arch angels are there and it says Michael, Gabriel, Uriel, Chamuel (Camael), Raphael, Jophiel, and Zadkiel

We all know the first two.

Michael- He is considered a champion of justice, a healer of the sick, and the guardian of the Church.

Gabriel-Gabriel is the herald of visions, messenger of God and one of the angels of higher rank.

Now the others

Uriel- archangel of wisdom, light, and the truth of God.

Chamuel (camael)-Archangel Chamuel's mission is to help bring peace to the world. The Archangel of Love

Raphael- Archangel Raphael is often called upon to help with physical healing. travelers, the blind, happy meetings, nurses, physicians, medical workers, matchmakers, Christian marriage, and Catholic studies.

Jophiel-Widely known as the angel of beauty, Jophiel represents the beauty of God, and he plays a great role in helping you see your inner beauty

Zadkiel- In Jewish mysticism and Christian Kabbalah, Zadkiel is associated with the classical planet Jupiter. The angel's position in the sephirot is fourth, which corresponds to Chesed "Kindness".

Are we gonna see this? Because their gods main seven angels. Maybe we'd see Azrael the angel of death?

(Sorry tho when I'm into something I do research for hours)

#hazbin hotel #hazbin alastor #hazbin hotel fanart #alastor #lucifer x alastor #lucifer hazbin hotel #hazbin lucifer #hazbin hotel lucifer #lucifer #lucifer morningstar #radioapple #appleradio #duckiedeer #hazbin hotel thoughts #hazbin hotel theory

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allthecanadianpolitics · 9 months

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Alberta Teachers' Association wants a Red Deer school board member to resign after she compared the LGBTQ2S+ community to Nazi Germany in a social media post. Monique LaGrange's post shows a picture of children waving the Nazi flag above a picture of children waving pride flags, with the caption "brainwashing is brainwashing." LaGrange, a Red Deer Catholic Regional Schools trustee, has not commented publicly since. On Wednesday, the ATA joined a growing list of groups criticizing LaGrange and calling for consequences. "LaGrange’s Facebook post was vile and repugnant. Not only does it serve to undermine the atrocities of the Nazi regime, but it also acts as a form of oppression to entice further hatred toward members of the 2SLGBTQ+ community," ATA president Jason Schilling said. "Trusteeship, by definition, requires behaviour that engenders trust. LaGrange can no longer be trusted to act in a manner that preserves the safety, well-being and dignity of the students of Red Deer Catholic. She has no choice but to resign."

Tagging: @politicsofcanada @abpoli

#LGBTQ #Transphobia #Homophobia #Alberta #Red Deer #LGBT #Monique LaGrange #Nazism #antisemitism

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angeltreasure · 5 months

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Catholicism Masterlist

NOTE:::: Items highlighted in red are my favorites for learning Catholicism.

Books for Learning Catholicism:

The Word on Fire Bible

Catechism of the Catholic Church second edition (pdf here)

Catholic Faith Handbook For Youth by Brian Singer-Towns and other contributors (pdf here)

Books About Prayer:

The Liturgy of the Hours by Word on Fire

The Secret of the Rosary by St. Louis de Montfort

The Rosary for the Holy Souls in Purgatory by Susan Tassone

10 Wonders of the Rosary by Fr. Donald Calloway, MIC

The Memorare Moment by Rev. Francis Joseph Hoffman

Blessed Sacrament Prayer Book edited by Bart Tesoriero

Heart of the Christian Life: Thoughts on Holy Mass by Pope Benedict XVI

Meet the Witnesses of the Miracle of the Sun by John M. Haffert

Our Father: Spiritual Reflections by Pope Francis

The Prayers & Personal Devotions of Mother Angelica, introduced & edited by Raymond Arroyo

Books About Saints:

Lives of the Saints: For Everyday in the Year by Fr. Alban Butler

Diary of Saint Maria Faustina Kowalska - Divine Mercy in My Soul by St. Maria Faustina Kowalska

Send Me Your Guardian Angel by Fr. Alessio Parente

Forty Dreams of St. John Bosco: From Saint John Bosco's Biographical Memoirs by St. John Bosco

Saint Charbel by Paul Daher

Mornings With St. Thérèse by St. Thérèse Editor: Patricia Treece

The Secret of Mary by St. Louis de Montfort

The Confession of St. Patrick by St. Patrick

Saint Rafqa the Lebanese Nun (1832-1914) Teacher of the Generations and Patron Saint of the Suffers Father Elias Hanna (L.M.O.)

Rediscover the Saints by Matthew Kelly

Other Books:

The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis

7 Secrets of Confession by Vinny Flynn

Our Grounds for Hope by Archbishop Fulton Sheen

How to Share Your Faith by Bishop Robert Barron

How to Discern God’s Will for Your Life by Bishop Robert Barron

An Exorcist Tells His Story by Gabriele Amorth

This Is My Body by Bishop Robert Barron

Apps:

EWTN

Relevant Radio

Formed

iBreviary

CatholicTV

Mass Times for Travel

Websites:

EWTN

Relevant Radio

The Divine Mercy

Word on Fire

The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB)

Some social media:

Bishop Robert Barron

Divine Mercy

Breaking in the Habit

Sensus Fidelium

EWTN

Sacred Music:

Harpa Dei

Floriani

Groups:

The Association of Marian Helpers

Rosary Confraternity

Brown Scapular

Adoration Sodality of the Most Blessed Sacrament

What really happens at a Catholic Mass, short film

— —- —— — —- —— — —- —— — —- ——

This is by no means a complete list because I keep reading more books and finding new resources as a pilgrim in this life. Maybe you’ll find something here to help you grow in faith. May God bless you abundantly.

#resources #reference #masterlist #Catholic #Catholicism #faith

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creature-wizard · 1 year

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Conspiracy thinking on the left

While many of us associate conspiracy thinking with right-wing types, the fact is that no one is immune to conspiracy thinking, and people on the left indulge in it quite often.

I've spoken about how QAnon types believe that everything they see celebrities and politicians do is all a staged drama, which they call "the show." Supposedly, all of the "real" stuff is playing out "behind the scenes."

Left-leaning people are actually prone to a very similar belief - anytime a public figure says or does something incredibly controversial or ostensibly disastrous, you'll find a number of people claiming that it must have been a carefully-calculated move to gain more publicity. This isn't to say that publicity stunts don't exist, but the kind of people I'm talking about basically believe it's impossible that a public figure is genuinely just a dipshit asshole sometimes. They make the same fundamental error as right wingers by assuming that these people are playing 5D chess. You know how right wingers tend to read everything that doesn't go exactly their way as the machinations of an evil conspiracy? Leftists often do basically the exact same thing, interpreting everything that inconveniences or annoys them is part of a deliberate ploy to keep them oppressed. There are, of course, many laws and systems designed to do exactly that. But sometimes, laws and systems are just designed badly, and people suffer as a result.

Many left-leaning people buy into extremely similar conspiracy theories about Christianity as both Evangelical and New Age conspiracy theorists. Like many Evangelicals, they often believe that the Catholic Church is literally nothing whatsoever more than a tool to deceive and control the masses. (Like yes, the Catholic Church has always been a political force, but that doesn't mean they aren't also generally sincere about their spiritual beliefs.) Like many New Agers, they often believe that Christianity was invented by the Catholic Church and took literally everything from older pagan traditions, in addition to being nothing whatsoever more than a tool to deceive and control the masses. Many view all religions, no exceptions, as nothing more than means of controlling and exploiting people. This hypercynical view of religion makes it easier to believe in things like conspiracy theories about Jews controlling media and finances. Hell, some leftists will basically decide that any work of media they don't personally like must have been deliberately made as fascist propaganda, as opposed to just being created by someone with shit political views, or someone who just didn't think things through - and never will these particular leftists ever stop to consider that maybe they just misread the media. This is no different than those right wing assholes claiming every other movie is full of "Illuminati symbols." Leftists also sometimes fall for anti-pharma conspiracy theories, under the reasoning that because drugs are sold for excruciatingly high prices under capitalism, drugs must have been invented for solely capitalist purposes. They're convinced that after the revolution, the causes of our illnesses will no longer exist and we won't need medication anymore. (Yeah, sorry, serious illnesses have always existed.) So yeah, you are not immune to conspiracy thinking. Absolutely no one is.

#conspiracism #conspiracy thinking #antisemitism #leftism #leftists #politics

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the-eternal-quest-for-balance · 3 months

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BREAKING: OMG Team infiltrates secret NO MAS MUERTES encampment in the middle of the desert in Aravaca, Arizona near the border.

When the illegal immigrant asked where the Mexican men dressed in military attire associated with the No Mas Muertes nonprofit were from, one responded, “From Sonora,” while another was from Tijuana – notorious Mexican cartel hotbeds. “I have a friend coming soon. He will take you to the city,” said one of the cartel-appearing men. “How much does he charge?” asked the illegal immigrant. “$300,” responded one of the cartel-appearing men. Hours later, these cartel-appearing men pointed guns at the illegal immigrant.

In the middle of the Arizona desert over 60 miles southwest of Tucson, O’Keefe Media Group (“OMG”) risked their lives to investigate the shady activity of No Mas Muertes, or No More Deaths, a nonprofit organization claiming to provide humanitarian aid to illegal immigrants but has been raided by US law enforcement and whose members have been arrested by border patrol numerous times. Posing as donors and land surveyors, and with the help of an illegal immigrant working undercover, OMG recordings show this nonprofit repeating “we are a little paranoid,” refusing to state their names, voicing hostility towards law enforcement, interrogating the undercover illegal immigrant “Why don’t you ask for asylum? Why don’t you ask border patrol for asylum?” and offering to transport the undercover illegal immigrant for $300 cash before pointing guns at him – actions related more to a human trafficking operation than a humanitarian nonprofit.

No Mas Muertes workers refusing to provide their names or identifications stating: “You also don’t need the mask. I only put it on when the military shows up or when those white people show up, so they won’t take my picture” flies in the face of No More Deaths’ obligations as a 501(c)(3) tax-exempt organization to follow the law. Instead, it seems to skirt immigration laws and traffic humans. OMG’s exposé of secret illegal immigrant compounds funded by Catholic Community Services of Tucson coupled with this undercover footage of No More Deaths reveals the shocking proliferation of private tax-exempt nonprofit organizations working with the government or potentially dangerous cartels to engage in what amounts to human trafficking into the United States under the guise of humanitarian aid, without any scrutiny or accountability.

Off the outskirts of the tiny town of Arivaca 40 minutes on a dirt road from Interstate 15 at 36455 S Papalote Wash Road, several people wearing construction vests planted flags into the ground as land surveyors would before being approached by someone who told them to leave: “Hey guys, this is private property.” These people were not, in fact, surveyors. They were James O'Keefe and members of his OMG team, equipped with hidden cameras to investigate the rise in suspicious nonprofit organizations operating at the U.S.–Mexico border. The team was outside the secretive location of No Mas Muertes, or No More Deaths.

Couched as a ministry of the Unitarian Universalist Church of Tucson, whose tag line is “a liberal light in the desert,” No More Deaths appears to use its relationship to Unitarian Universalist Church of Tucson to evade filing IRS documents of financial transparency (IRS Form 990) under an IRS exemption for religious organizations. After confirming the location was No More Deaths property, an OMG team member posing as a donor called Mary Weiss, an administrator for the Unitarian Universalist Church of Tucson. On the call, Weiss represented No More Deaths was an “organization we actually partner with,” as “a ministry of the church,” located in Arivaca with a staff of 4-5 employees and budget of $400 Thousand.

As the OMG team continued planting flags around the perimeter of the property, they sent a volunteer illegal immigrant with a hidden camera to observe No More Deaths from the inside. No More Deaths workers welcomed OMG undercover illegal immigrant and explained how they “always have threats” at the camp on account of “bad people” and “the [border] patrols.” They described wearing masks so they could not be identified or photographed “when the military shows up or when those white people show up” and declared the men at the perimeter to be white supremacists “looking to cause trouble.” Apparently, government workers, law enforcement, and white people, made them “paranoid” – a very strange mental state for people working at a “humanitarian” nonprofit organization.

Upon the OMG team leaving the area, No More Deaths workers intercepted their car and questioned them. After O’Keefe mentioned the Unitarian Universalist Church and No More Deaths, the No More Deaths workers denied knowing either organization and never provided their names.

Back at the “humanitarian” camp, the two military-dressed men from Sonora and Tiuana – cities famous for Mexican cartels, interrogated OMG undercover illegal immigrant. “Where are you from?” “Why don’t you ask for asylum?” “Where did you cross through?” “Who are they? Who brought you here?” “How much did they charge you?” “Your watch is expensive right, you got a camera in there?” Ultimately, they offered to find someone to take him to Phoenix…for $300 despite the nonprofit’s budget of $400 Thousand. OMG undercover illegal immigrant eventually reunited with the OMG team, but not before having guns pointed at him at “humanitarian” No More Deaths camp.

That night in the desert raised more questions than it provided answers. Why are people at a nonprofit pointing guns at people? Why is a humanitarian nonprofit adverse to border patrol? Why does a humanitarian nonprofit have armed cartel-like men offering for-profit smuggling services? How does an organization which routinely violates the law keep its tax-exempt status? OMG’s investigation into No More Deaths reveals the growing abuse of nonprofit laws by organizations hiding under the cloak of religious affiliation and potentially profiting off human trafficking. One thing is clear – men are armed, secrecy is rampant, and fear is wielded by nonprofit organizations running unfettered.

WATCH MORE ON YOUTUBE / ON X

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pessimisticpigeonsworld · 5 months

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not TG stans saying that the influence of the faith of the seven would be good for the iron throne because the practice of incest would end these stans truly believe that the hightowers would be the salvation of house targaryen

Do they realize that cousin incest is still allowed by the Faith? And do they realize that first cousin incest still counts as incest? I also don't think they realize that the Faith is meant to be a criticism of the real world Catholic Church.

The Faith believe that being gay, having premarital sex, being a non-conforming woman, following another religion, and magic are sins and in some cases are punishable by death. The Faith controlling Westeros will not help it or the people in any way.

Throughout F&B we see Martin critize the Faith and its septons. They are corrupt and power hungry, who don't actually care about the people (the majority of the septons anyway).

Now I'm not saying that everyone who follows the Faith is evil or bad. I'm not even saying the Faith is all bad, after all they believe slavery is an abomination (which it is). What I'm saying is that it taking over the realm will not be a good thing. Let's not forget that they tried to outlaw worship of the Old Gods and the Drowned God, so there'd be war if the Faith controlled the throne.

Thr Hightower stans that infect this fandom just believe that because the Faith is closely associated with the Hightowers, it must be good because their favs are just perfect. It's a massive plus that the Faith militant marched against the Targaryens at one point. But they forget that the Faith is disliked by the Starks and most of the North (these stans usually are also Stark stans).

The Faith is not going to "fix" the realm or the Targaryens, and wanting the Targaryens to conform to it is asking them to abandon what's left of their heritage. Westeros doesn't need to become a theocracy or make the Faith it's state religion, that goes for all the other religions of ASOIAF. GRRM is an atheist, he isn't going to turn his books into propaganda for a fictional Catholic church. It takes a lot of willful ingnorance and lack of media comprehension to think the Faith will fix anything.

#anti team green #anti team green stans #house targaryen #house of the dragon #asoiaf #asoiaf meta #asoiaf fandom #the fatih of the seven

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good-life-cat-sanctuary · 1 year

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History of St. Gertrude: The Patron Saint of Cats

St. Gertrude of Nivelles’ patronage was never made official by the Vatican, but her association with whisking away mice and rats made her, by default, the saint that all cat lovers worshipped. While modern media has associated her with cats in most portrayals, there’s a lot more to the patron saint of cats than just being deemed the cat lady of the Catholic church.

According to history records, St. Gertrude was born in the city of Nivelles in 626, which we now know as modern-day Belgium. As the youngest child of four, St. Gertrude was meant to follow in the footsteps of her eldest sister Pepin when it came to agreeing to an arranged marriage. Devoted to her faith and with the help of her mother, St. Gertrude escaped the bindings of having to agree to an arrangement by opening a separate female-only monastery. Here, she devoted herself to her faith until she left the monastery to tend to those in need.

Most claim her association with cats stems from a feline’s predatory instinct to catch and chase away rodents. During her time serving in her city, St. Gertrude was frequently summoned by the townsfolk to ward off illness and rodent infestations. People swore by her energy to chase away anything disease-ridden, and ultimately this is why she was canonized after she passed away on March 17 at age 33. Many churches were built in her memory, and many claims of miracles have happened at her hands.

In remembrance of her, many Catholic people also celebrate St. Gertrude’s feast day on March 17 alongside St. Patrick’s Day. Each fall, Nivelles holds Le Tour Sainte-Gertrude, a parade around the city that draws many pilgrims and features a mass in honor of St. Gertrude. When you’re donning your favorite green gear for the lucky holiday, give your furry friend an extra pet in honor of our favorite cat lady!

If you want to donate:

Ko-fi.com/goodlifecatsanctuary

we always need food and cat litter and other supplies.! Thanks

we also have an Amazon Wish List: https://www.amazon.com/hz/wishlist/ls/2656NCWR1XQD7?ref_=wl_share

#goodlifecatsanctuary #saint gertrude #cats #kittens #spay and neuter

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cathnews · 2 years

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Pope asks Catholic media to combat ‘toxicity, hate speech and fake news’

Pope Francis says Catholic media communicators need to use extra care and make educational efforts in their work. They need to find ways to combat situations where media can “become places of toxicity, hate speech and fake news,” he says. His message for members of Signis, the World Catholic Association for Communication, makes his position on their work clear: Catholic communicators have an…

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#Media #Pope Francis #Signis - World Catholic Association for Communication

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david-goldrock · 2 months

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So, last night, me and my mom were talking about the I/P conflict and we started getting on the topic of antisemitism and she had some very interesting thoughts!

But I had said “Why do people say things like Jews are behind everything in the media? Why them specifically? Where did that come from?”

And she said her theory was “Well, since they experienced so much hatred and violence and persecution their entire lives, they became more secretive and reserved. Due to that, people started finding them weird and almost creepy, like they were conspiring, leading to them believing they are doing crazy shit, like being behind the media.”

And it really got me thinking. Why has it always been Jews? Why have Jews always, since the dawn of humanity, been the ones who have experienced so much hate and persecution?

Why then specifically. Like, why anyone, really. But the Jews just feel like such a specific group to target and hate. I know there’s a biblical explanation behind it, but I mean within history. Why has everyone hated them?

Why?

I can’t understand this.

The more I think about how horrible it is, the sadder I get. Hell, I’m kind of tearing up as of writing this because the thought is just horrible.

Like, you and Morgana and Shine and every other lovely Jew I have met on this site are so kind and wonderful people. I can’t understand why people, amazing and wonderful people like you guys, could be hated and abused for centuries for simply existing.

It’s horrible…

DISCLAIMER: I do not know enough about the subject, only a couple of articles, and a few classes in high school. this is not a replacement for studying, this is only what I know

tbh the answer is, sadly, Christianity, Islam, Nazism and the protocols.

let's start with Islam as it is simpler there: the Quran tells Muslims to kill all jews, to make everyone Muslim, and that judgement day will not come until the jews are dead. we were dhimmi (second class citizens) for the better part of the last millennia and a half, and jews lived in extreme conditions there.

Now the christian world. your mother is partially right, it has some to do with the separatist nature of jews: after the diaspora began (and even a bit before, when the unrest in Israel grew in the second temple period), judaism got even more separatist than it already was: no marrying outside the faith, stay in the community, you need so-and-so jews to do this and that and so forward. this led to jews living separately from the other people around them, which made them suspicious, this is probably the main reason that even after the fall of fundamental christianity, jews are still hunted in the modern world. that said, the tools and traditions of antisemitism are older, and are still in use

First, in the early days of christianity, it was common in catholic thinking that jews are collectively responsible for the death of Jesus of Nazareth, and that they should be punished for that sin.

Moreover, the Catholic Church has forbidden christians from handling money, and forbade jews from owning land (which is pretty difficult for being a farmer), while the jews had an extremely high literacy average compared to the rest of Europe (because unlike the christians who listened to sermons, jews had to learn the bible and debate it and understand it, while learning in the "Cheyder" (room, also the nickname for a rabbinic school)). this meant that jews were disproportionally attracted to jobs like banking, loaning, lawyering, entertainment, and any job that required literacy, but not land. This was good for the economic worries of the jews, but terrible for their position in society. jews were associated with the people who took your money wrongly, or helped to get you in jail, and made the animosity between jews and christians high. this is the origin of 2 famous conspiracy theories: jews control the world's economy, and jews control the world's media.

This is not mentioning the old libels, such as the blood libel (that jews use christian children's blood to bake matzah [I am certain that none of the people who say that know what a matzah is, it is a pale beige color, how could you hide blood in that?!]) or the well poisoning tale (that claimed that the reason for the Black Death was jews poisoning the water wells). these libels could have been applied to any minority, but jews were the scapegoat, starting a long tradition of similar libels (read the American leftist news, and you'd see the same stories everywhere, each time in a different costume).

Then the nazis came to power, and while drawing a lot from ancient antisemitism, they invented a lot of new stuff (IDK why Hitler chose the jews, but he did, and it was massive): jews were now irredeemable from birth, possessing inherent negative qualities that could be passed down through generations, stealing everything they claim to have invented, being inherently inferior to other germans, being communists (and capitalist) that plan to destroy the economy and get rich, betrayers who made Germany lose WW1, and many more stereotypes that keep on in the cultural memory

A bit later, in Russia, a document called "The protocols of the elders of Zion" was released (I don't know its history, I am sorry), and it is the backbone of every modern conspiracy, you know, the kind that goes "so-and-so" are a secret group of deep state actors trying to take over the world. this is the protocols. its ideas are embedded deep in the cultural understanding of all of us. if you believe in any conspiracy theory, the protocols will be a no-brainer.

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shadowkoo · 8 months

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Every Child Matters

I try to share a similar post each year with the purpose of educating those who may not know about Canadian & American indigenous peoples and the struggles we have gone through generationally. But honestly, this year I am pissed off so my tone in some areas may read as such. I will not apologize for that.

I am angry that so many people don't know (not your fault, it's the media's fault and their lack of coverage up until recent years). I am angry at both countries' leaders for doing the bare minimum for many years. And I am angry that so much of my ancestor's history was removed and altered from the truth for centuries.

However, I am glad that with each passing year, more people are learning, and I truly appreciate those who care enough to show their support.

With that said, please mark your calendars and wear orange on September 30th! This is your official reminder! Please continue reading and consider sharing this post so more people are aware 🧡

September 30th is known as Orange Shirt Day, the National Day for Truth and Reconciliation, across Canada and North America in remembrance of those who suffered in US/Canadian Indian Residential Schools. We recognize the harm done to generations of children by the Indian Residential Schools and share our collective histories as an affirmation of our commitment to ensure that Every Child Matters!

Remembering the 150,000+ Indigenous children who endured physical, mental, and sexual abuse at these residential schools; trauma that continues to be felt to this very day by survivors and their families.

Children were stolen around this time of year to attend these ‘schools’. Parents who fought to keep their kids would often be arrested and/or beaten, it was nearly impossible for them to keep their children once the police and school officials showed up to take them. And even once the school season was over, they were not returned to their families.

We knew many children had likely suffered and died from the abuse, but could have never guessed the atrocious number of remains that we are now finding.

As of May 2022, The remains of over 6,000 children have been recovered from unmarked graves at the locations of these former residential schools within Canada, and 500 have been discovered at 19 schools in the US. However, the Interior Department said that number could climb to the thousands or even tens of thousands.

For reference to help you digest how large the numbers will become when all schools have been properly investigated, there were approximately 139 schools in Canada and so far only (as of May 2022) 36 investigations have been completed in Canada. The US has identified more than 400 schools that were highly supported by the U.S. government during their operations, and more than 50 associated burial sites, a figure that could grow exponentially as research continues.

This wasn’t as long ago as you might think. The last residential school in Canada closed in 1998, only twenty-five years ago. As of 2020, 7 off-reservation boarding schools continue to be federally funded.

“Kill the Indian, Save the man” was a common phrase in these schools. Being Indians was savage, but we were ‘savable’ in the eyes of their Christian / Catholic God if we were stripped of the things that made us indigenous.

I am lucky enough to know survivors. I am alive because of survivors.

Survivors taught us younger generations about the horrors they dealt with in residential schools. Beaten, tortured, murdered. Watching other children die from diseases grown in their unclean living situations. ‘Forgetting’ what tribe a child is from and giving them to another reservation to care for until the following year when they’d be taken away again. Raped girls who survived traumatic births at a young age only for their babies to be thrown in the furnace. Sterilizing boys and girls so that if they were released they couldn’t create any more ‘indians’.

These children were ripped from their homes, watched their parents die if they fought to keep their children, were forced to cut their hair (our hair is as sacred as our traditional clothing), and beaten if caught speaking in their native languages. As a 'reward' for good behavior in school, certain children were sent away to live with white families as slaves to 'learn the white way' during long breaks between school periods.

Keep the families of those who lost loved ones who never returned and the survivors who lived through unimaginable trauma in your hearts. On September 30th wear orange. Join a protest. Support indigenous peoples every day, but especially on September 30th (National Day for Truth and Reconciliation), June 21st (Canadian National Indigenous Peoples Day), and October 8th (American Indigenous Peoples Day). Share our stories. Educate yourself on our history, not the false history written in books by white men, churches, and governments that supported and endorsed these institutions.

Because Every Child Matters.

Resources where you can learn more:

Orange Shirt Society

CBC News - scroll to find the map

NPR

CBS News

CNN News

The Indigenous Foundation

#every child matters #🧡🧡🧡#orange shirt day #september 30th #national day for truth and reconciliation #support indigenous peoples #support first nations #support native americans #bring them home #protect native rights #protect native land #important #boost #native americans #indigenous

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