#Human rights and equality

[whatareyoureallyafraidof]

[wanderingcritter]

I think we need to normalize using "people" as a species neutral word.

Like idk in my brain the word people just doesn't automatically = human. To me it's just a way to signify intelligence and individuality, and to emphasize the need for respect towards another creature, not specific to any one species.

Dogs can be people, mice can be people, dragons can be people, humans can be people, birds can be people, elves can be people, robots can be people, and so on.

It's also (in my opinion) just much easier than always saying "beings" or "individuals" when referring to varying assortments of creatures.

[archerinventive]

Pride month may be over, but that doesn't mean support for the community isn't still needed.

Here’s a list of a few resources you can use to help the LGBTQ+ community this month and for as long as it takes to rid the world of bigotry.

The Pride Foundation

The Equality Federation

Trans Veterans

The LGBT Aging Center

If you know of other trusted groups, please feel free to leave recommendations in the comments section. :)

Lots of love and well wishes to you all.

❤️ 🧡 💛 💚 💙 💜

A  huge shout out to my wonderful crew Abie Eke, Calla  Parmly, Dawn Vice, Josephine Chang, Lexi the First, Rae, Taze Campbell, and Xero Nazarova, for being such amazing Pride Knights! ❤️ 

[saddayfordemocracy]

How the Watermelon Became a Symbol of Palestinian Solidarity

The use of the watermelon as a Palestinian symbol is not new. It first emerged after the Six-day War in 1967, when Israel seized control of the West Bank and Gaza, and annexed East Jerusalem. At the time, the Israeli government made public displays of the Palestinian flag a criminal offense in Gaza and the West Bank. 

To circumvent the ban, Palestinians began using the watermelon because, when cut open, the fruit bears the national colors of the Palestinian flag—red, black, white, and green.  

The Israeli government didn't just crack down on the flag. Artist Sliman Mansour told The National in 2021 that Israeli officials in 1980 shut down an exhibition at 79 Gallery in Ramallah featuring his work and others, including Nabil Anani and Issam Badrl. “They told us that painting the Palestinian flag was forbidden, but also the colors were forbidden. So Issam said, ‘What if I were to make a flower of red, green, black and white?’, to which the officer replied angrily, ‘It will be confiscated. Even if you paint a watermelon, it will be confiscated,’” Mansour told the outlet.

Israel lifted the ban on the Palestinian flag in 1993, as part of the Oslo Accords, which entailed mutual recognition by Israel and the Palestinian Liberation Organization and were the first formal agreements to try to resolve the decades-long Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The flag was accepted as representing the Palestinian Authority, which would administer Gaza and the West Bank.

In the wake of the accords, the New York Times nodded to the role of watermelon as a stand-in symbol during the flag ban. “In the Gaza Strip, where young men were once arrested for carrying sliced watermelons—thus displaying the red, black and green Palestinian colors—soldiers stand by, blasé, as processions march by waving the once-banned flag,” wrote Times journalist John Kifner.

In 2007, just after the Second Intifada, artist Khaled Hourani created The Story of the Watermelon for a book entitled Subjective Atlas of Palestine. In 2013, he isolated one print and named it The Colours of the Palestinian Flag, which has since been seen by people across the globe.

The use of the watermelon as a symbol resurged in 2021, following an Israeli court ruling that Palestinian families based in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood in East Jerusalem would be evicted from their homes to make way for settlers.

The watermelon symbol today:

In January, Israel’s National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir gave police the power to confiscate Palestinian flags. This was later followed by a June vote on a bill to ban people from displaying the flag at state-funded institutions, including universities. (The bill passed preliminary approval but the government later collapsed.)

In June, Zazim, an Arab-Israeli community organization, launched a campaign to protest against the ensuing arrests and confiscation of flags. Images of watermelons were plastered on to 16 taxis operating in Tel Aviv, with the accompanying text reading, “This is not a Palestinian flag.”

“Our message to the government is clear: we will always find a way to circumvent any absurd ban and we will not stop fighting for freedom of expression and democracy,” said Zazim director Raluca Ganea. 

Amal Saad, a Palestinian from Haifa who worked on the Zazim campaign, told Al-Jazeera they had a clear message: “If you want to stop us, we’ll find another way to express ourselves.”

Words courtesy of BY ARMANI SYED / TIME

[progressive-memes]

[my-midlife-crisis]

[sher-ee]

If you aren’t pissed then you need to do your research or find a woman that can clue you in to the devastating changes America faces under a Republican presidency. Because let’s face it, if it’s not Trump there will be a MAGA soldier to take his place. We will never be safe or free if Republicans have control.

[decolonize-the-everything]

"the revolution isn't real"

There are people setting themselves on fire on major streets. These are real pictures from the DNC today (convention where Democrats officially name their presidential nominee).

This is what US democracy looks like. This is what our lesser evil is. This is what Kamala's "democratic" nomination looks like after a year of protests.

"The revolution isn't happening"

It is, you just aren't participating in it.

You probably think if the revolution was Really happening, you'd be on the right side of it. So that means this can't be it, right?

Wrong.

What do you think a revolution looks like if not the people facing off with the government? Where were you when this was happening?

You think being on the Right Side looks like supporting the prosecutor who's aides says things like "the presidential candidate would not support an arms embargo on Israel," while the DNC is swarmed with police, people are getting arrested for exercising their 1st amendment rights against genocide, and women are being forced into birth?

That's not even getting into the fact Harris is also Actively aiding in genocide either.

"what am I supposed to do vote trump" is such a dishonest reaction to have and it only serves to reinforce your denial so I don't wanna see it in the notes of this post. Both trump and Kamala can be awful for the planet, it doesn't need to be one or the other.

"what am I supposed to do then."

Be the revolution.

Join a protest and show up extremely prepared. They couldn't arrest everyone in a crowd of 30k people, you know?

You don't have to pick Kamala.

We don't have to do anything we don't want to if there are enough of us in one place.

We protect us

So start showing up.

Esp if you're a white ally, you should absolutely be showing up to help keep others safe and uplift their voices. There's a lot of fucking cops around, you see those pictures of the DNC? Cops don't protect us. They protect the status quo. I couldn't find a more accurate representation of that if I tried.

[ihhfhonao3]

I’m a firm believer in the passive and small acts of activism.

You’re actively fighting capitalism by resting and taking a break. You’re actively fighting homophobia by wearing a rainbow pin to signify to others your allyship. You’re actively fighting climate change by air drying your hands after washing them. You’re actively fighting childism by letting a minor talk to you about how they’re doing. You’re actively fighting oppressive systems by simply existing.

There have always been others like you, and there always will be others like you. Your existence is rebellion. As long as you’re alive, conservatives and bigots have lost.

You’re a rebel. You’re a warrior. You’re a fighter. And you don’t even know it.

[macleod]

Thailand’s Cabinet on Tuesday approved an amendment to its civil code to allow same-sex marriage, with an expectation for the draft to be submitted to Parliament next month.

Karom Polpornklang, a deputy government spokesperson, said the amendment to the Civil and Commercial Code will change the words “men and women” and “husband and wife” to “individuals” and “marriage partners” for same-sex couples to be able to receive the same rights that heterosexual couples receive.

He said the law would guarantee the right to form a family in a relationship between same-sex couples, adding that the next step will be an amendment to the pension fund law to recognize same-sex couples as well.

Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin told reporters that the draft law is expected to be proposed to Parliament on Dec. 12. If it becomes law after Parliament’s approval and King Maha Vajiralongkorn’s endorsement, Thailand will be the third place in Asia, after Taiwan and Nepal, to allow same-sex marriage.

Source: AP News, November 21, 2023

[wavecorewave]

Most people today believe they live in free societies (indeed, they often insist that, politically at least, this is what is most important about their societies), but the freedoms which form the moral basis of a nation like the United States are, largely, formal freedoms. American citizens have the right to travel wherever they like – provided, of course, they have the money for transport and accommodation. They are free from ever having to obey the arbitrary orders of superiors – unless, of course, they have to get a job. In this sense, it is almost possible to say the Wendat had play chiefs and real freedoms, while most of us today have to make do with real chiefs and play freedoms. Or to put the matter more technically: what the Hadza, Wendat or ‘egalitarian’ people such as the Nuer seem to have been concerned with were not so much formal freedoms as substantive ones. They were less interested in the right to travel than in the possibility of actually doing so (hence, the matter was typically framed as an obligation to provide hospitality to strangers). Mutual aid – what contemporary European observers often referred to as ‘communism’ – was seen as the necessary condition for individual autonomy.

From The Dawn of Everything: A New History of Humanity (2021), by anthropologist David Graeber and archaeologist David Wengrow

[whatareyoureallyafraidof]

[wanderingcritter]

Massive gripe ive been having with primarily the therian community lately, I really dont feel like we focus enough on animal rights causes considering how "connected" we're supposed to be to nonhumans.

Like I see it around for sure, but when I do it usually isn't more than just "hunting for sport is bad👍" or "dont beat your dog 👍" and that's it. The main focus of the community is still very much on biologically human individuals rather than on bio nonhumans, who are very literally treated like garbage in society and it's frustrating because i feel like we should be right there on the front lines when it comes to animal liberation.

Im not saying all of us need to be members of ALF or anything, im not even vegan and have no plans to be, but as of rn the community's overall acknowledgment and support of animal rights causes is pretty pathetic. Hell, I still hear therians confidently and proudly infantilize adult/highly intelligent nonhuman species ("animals have the intelligence of human toddlers") and spread blatant misinformation about them. Shit just annoys me

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Elsie Carson-Holt at LGBTQ:

Jack Daniel’s has joined a growing number of brands that have cut their commitments to diversity, after conservative influencer Robby Starbuck threatened to make the company his next target. Last week, it was Harley Davidson, and before them it was Tractor Supply Co. and John Deere. Starbuck’s method of rallying his online followers to deluge companies social media with complaints about their diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiatives and donations to social justice organizations has proven effective.

Jack Daniel’s, the whiskey company, is the latest. On August 21, Starbuck posted on X (formerly known as Twitter) “Big news: The next company we were set to expose was Jack Daniels,” but that the company had ended several initiatives and partnerships.

Starbuck said, “They must have been tipped off by us going through employee LinkedIn pages” and that the company had “just preemptively announced” changes to DEI programs. Starbuck had obtained an email from Brown Forman (Jack Daniel’s parent company) saying that “the world has evolved” since launching a DEI campaign in 2019. The company said that since January, it had been evolving the current program to a “strategic framework,” which includes ending its partnership with the Human Rights Campaign and its Corporate Equality Index (CEI), which tracks how large employers treat their LGBTQ+ employees through various policies.

Jack Daniel’s is the latest company to shamefully cave into right-wing faux outrage artist Robby Starbuck’s bad-faith campaign against DEI and LGBTQ+ initiatives in workplaces by ending their participation in Human Rights Campaign’s CEI program and diversity initiatives.

[saddayfordemocracy]

Barbara Kruger, Untitled (flag), 2020,

Screenprint in colours on cotton, created for Artists Band Together, published by Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Sheet: 55 x 55 cm (unframed).

Courtesy: Roseberys

[progressive-memes]