Tag: Fight Back

Informed Comment

Educators as Public Intellectuals in an Age of Tyranny: Confront, Fight Back and Organize – CounterPunch.org

In his landmark book The Sociological Imagination, C. Wright Mills argues that social scientists (and educators) have an obligation to address the question of truth and its political meaning during a time of widely communicated nonsense. He further argues that in addition to a politics of truth, social scientists have to support the values of reason and human freedom. He also believed that the role of social scientists was to disturb, bear witness, and resist systems of oppression. In this view, intellectuals have to have a deep sense of commitment and civic courage while “writing with vigor and clarity for the general reader [in order] to sustain the idea and the hope of a public culture.”[1] These principles, in the age of emerging fascism, are under attack in the age of gangster capitalism by a horde of anti-public intellectuals and far-right members of the GOP.

Source: Educators as Public Intellectuals in an Age of Tyranny: Confront, Fight Back and Organize – CounterPunch.org

Informed Comment

How Republicans Could Steal The Next Presidential Election | The Smirking Chimp

First, expand the Supreme Court to add balance to a branch of government that has been stolen by radicalized Republicans. This is not a far-fetched idea. The Constitution doesn’t specify how many justices there should be — and we’ve already changed the size of the Court seven times in American history.

Second, impose term limits on Supreme Court justices, and have them rotate with judges on the U.S. courts of appeals.

Third, Congress must restore federal voting rights protections and expand access to the ballot box. We need national minimum standards for voting in our democracy.

But these congressional reforms can only happen if Democrats retain control of the House in the midterm elections and add at least two more senators willing to reform or abolish the filibuster.

Your vote is important, and not just in federal elections. Make sure you also vote for state legislators who understand what’s at stake and will preserve our democracy.

Because, as this Supreme Court case shows, the future of our democracy is not guaranteed.

How Republicans Could Steal The Next Presidential Election | The Smirking Chimp
Pro - gun lobby

Daniel Defense Uvalde shooting: Gun manufacturers aren’t fazed by mass shootings.

Photo of a toddler boy holding an AR-style rifle in a Daniel Defense tweet displayed on a cellphone

On May 16, the gun company Daniel Defense tweeted an ad featuring a toddler holding an AR-style rifle—the same kind of gun that would be used to kill 21 people in Uvalde, Texas, days later. According to Todd C. Frankel, an enterprise reporter at the Washington Post, ads like these are as routine as the “thoughts and prayers” Daniel Defense and other gun companies offer up after every mass shooting. There is “a Groundhog Day quality to all this,” he says. “They just follow the same playbook and no variation.” On Thursday’s episode of What Next, I talked to Frankel about why gun manufacturers aren’t worried about bad publicity and how guns became identity politics. This conversation has been condensed and edited for clarity.

Source: Daniel Defense Uvalde shooting: Gun manufacturers aren’t fazed by mass shootings.

Media, Uncategorized

2020 How to Kill Propaganda with Three Blows – » The Australian Independent Media Network

Digital Literacy

All Left Parties in opposition or in State Power, must make it a priority to encourage or fund digital literacy programs. If they can do neither, the Federal Leadership must be proactive in promoting this via their own channels.

The Labor Party has the power and the technology to create tools to counter claims from all types of propaganda. Speak loud and speak often, via text and video. Importantly, be bold enough to respond to claims made via comments on Social Media. Make it known that truth telling in Democracy is paramount and false claims and misrepresentations will no longer be tolerated by the voting public.

via 2020 How to Kill Propaganda with Three Blows – » The Australian Independent Media Network

Israel, Uncategorized

Jewish-Arab partnership as an antidote to Jewish supremacism | +972 Magazine

A Jewish Israeli man holding an Israeli flag confronts a Palestinian woman holding a kaffiyeh on the sidelines of the ultra-nationalist "Jerusalem Day" march, May 13, 2018. (Yonatan Sindel/Flash90)

via Jewish-Arab partnership as an antidote to Jewish supremacism | +972 Magazine

Science

Ahead Of Marches This Month, Scientists Are Speaking Up Against Trump And GOP’s Attacks On Science

President Donald Trump and the Republican Party have demonstrated an alarming disregard for science and evidence-based policy and decision-making, prompting scientists to voice their concerns.Since the election, multiple media outlets have accused the Trump administration and the Republican Party of waging a “war on science.” And with

Source: Ahead Of Marches This Month, Scientists Are Speaking Up Against Trump And GOP’s Attacks On Science