In Solidarity with the world

Socioeconomics and Environmentalism
occupyallstreets: Whistleblowing Wednesday: Uzbekistan Government Secretly Sterilizing Women Authorities in Uzbekistan have reportedly been running a secret program in the last two years to sterilize women, often without their knowledge or consent, according to the BBC. Adolat, a victim of the secret sterilization program, told BBC that she had went to see a doctor and discovered that she had been sterilized after birth to her daughter by Caesarean section. “I was shocked. I cried and asked: ‘But why? How could they do this?’ The doctor said, ‘That’s the law in Uzbekistan,’” she told BBC. Adolat, who lives in a country where life centers around children and a big family is a sign of personal success, is deeply ashamed that she cannot have more children.  “What am I after what happened to me?” she told BBC. “I always dreamed of having four - two daughters and two sons - but after my second daughter I couldn’t get pregnant,” she says. Read More

occupyallstreets:

Whistleblowing Wednesday: Uzbekistan Government Secretly Sterilizing Women

Authorities in Uzbekistan have reportedly been running a secret program in the last two years to sterilize women, often without their knowledge or consent, according to the BBC.

Adolat, a victim of the secret sterilization program, told BBC that she had went to see a doctor and discovered that she had been sterilized after birth to her daughter by Caesarean section.

“I was shocked. I cried and asked: ‘But why? How could they do this?’ The doctor said, ‘That’s the law in Uzbekistan,’” she told BBC.

Adolat, who lives in a country where life centers around children and a big family is a sign of personal success, is deeply ashamed that she cannot have more children. 

“What am I after what happened to me?” she told BBC. “I always dreamed of having four - two daughters and two sons - but after my second daughter I couldn’t get pregnant,” she says.

Read More

(via anarcho-queer)

bbanzaiz:

climateadaptation:

Lakota Indians Block ‘Keystone XL Pipeline’ Trucks in Six-Hour Standoff

“Five Lakotas on Pine Ridge Indian land in South Dakota were arrested Monday after attempting to block two tarsands pipeline trucks from entering their land. According to the Lakota activist the six-hour standoff started when the trucks refused to turn around claiming they had “corporate rights that supersede any other law.”

According to the Rapid City Journal “several dozens” of American Indians were part of the blockade but a community journalist reports only five people were arrested.”

More at Color Lines. H/T Sustainable Sam and NS Environmental Studies, a fantastic pair of enviro tumblrs you should follow.

Corporate rights that supersede any other law.

FUCK everything and everyone. You strip us of EVERYTHING and give us tiny parcels of land AFTER we have to fight you to get you to recognize a treaty that YOU MADE WITH US, and after all that?

LOL, THAT DON’T COUNT WHEN WE WANT THE LAND! CORPORATIONS RULE!

GO AMERICA! MANIFEST DESTINY THAT SHIT.

(via anarcho-queer)

Student General Strike in Quebec: 150,000 could be on strike as early as this afternoon

Concordia University’s 40,000 students could join the province of Quebec’s general student strike already in progress, with a general assembly and vote of the undergraduate Concordia Student Union scheduled for this afternoon (March 6). The vote, which is expected to pass, will speak for the entire student body. Many specific student departments, such as Political Science, Fine Arts, Philosophy and the Simone de Beauvoir Women’s Studies Institute have already voted to start striking individually.

The provincial government plans to increase tuition by $1,625 in total, over the next five years, raising current fees from $2,200 to $3,800 for in-province students, and much more for out-of-province and international students. While Quebec has the lowest tuition rate of any province in Canada, the province also has the highest taxes by far, as well as a somewhat low minimum wage in comparison with that of other expensive provinces like British Columbia and Ontario. Students argue that education is not a commodity, and shifting the financial burden for education to individual user fees would force students out of classes and dramatically increase inequality in an already fractured society.

If Concordia joins the student strike this week, that will bring nearly 150,000 students in Quebec on general strike against the government’s proposed fee hikes.

(photos courtesy The Link and CBC)

(via socialuprooting)

occupyallstreets: Nike, Adidas and Puma Accused of Labor Abuse Bangladesh sweatshops producing sportswear for Olympic sponsors Adidas, Nike and Puma repeatedly abuse their workers, an investigation by a British charity has uncovered. A report released Monday by War on Want claims that workers for all three companies have been physically abused. Two thirds of the workers interviewed, mostly young women, had been beaten, slapped, pushed or had their hair pulled by their managers, War on Want claimed. The women workers for all Adidas and Nike factories reported sexual harassment. The workers for all three companies had to work illegally long hours, up to 80 hours a week, for less than the minimum wage. An investigator with the London-based charity and researchers in Bangladesh found that many workers had been beaten, kicked or pushed, and publicly humiliated. Greg Muttitt, the campaigns and policy director at War on Want, said: “Companies such as Adidas, Nike and Puma make huge profits from this abuse, while soiling the Olympic flag in which they wrap themselves.” Workers for all three firms said they faced cruel punishment if they tried to stand up for their legal rights. Aside from the beatings, they said they were swore at, pushed, forced to undress, and humiliated by being made to stand on a table, locked in the toilet or refused permission to use the toilets. Factories supplying all three companies broke the law on overtime. A Nike spokeswoman told The Guardian newspaper that: “Nike takes working conditions in our contract factories very seriously. All Nike suppliers must adhere to our code of conduct. We are investigating the allegations you have presented and will be back to you as soon someone in our sustainable manufacturing team has made an assessment.” In Bangladesh, 3.5 million workers in 4,825 garment factories produce goods for export to the global market, principally Europe and North America. The Bangladeshi garment industry generates 80 percent of the country’s total export revenue. However, the wealth generated by this sector has led to few improvements in the lives of garment workers, 85 percent of whom are women. Source

occupyallstreets:

Nike, Adidas and Puma Accused of Labor Abuse

Bangladesh sweatshops producing sportswear for Olympic sponsors Adidas, Nike and Puma repeatedly abuse their workers, an investigation by a British charity has uncovered.

A report released Monday by War on Want claims that workers for all three companies have been physically abused. Two thirds of the workers interviewed, mostly young women, had been beaten, slapped, pushed or had their hair pulled by their managers, War on Want claimed.

The women workers for all Adidas and Nike factories reported sexual harassment. The workers for all three companies had to work illegally long hours, up to 80 hours a week, for less than the minimum wage.

An investigator with the London-based charity and researchers in Bangladesh found that many workers had been beaten, kicked or pushed, and publicly humiliated.

Greg Muttitt, the campaigns and policy director at War on Want, said: “Companies such as Adidas, Nike and Puma make huge profits from this abuse, while soiling the Olympic flag in which they wrap themselves.”

Workers for all three firms said they faced cruel punishment if they tried to stand up for their legal rights. Aside from the beatings, they said they were swore at, pushed, forced to undress, and humiliated by being made to stand on a table, locked in the toilet or refused permission to use the toilets.

Factories supplying all three companies broke the law on overtime. A Nike spokeswoman told The Guardian newspaper that:

“Nike takes working conditions in our contract factories very seriously. All Nike suppliers must adhere to our code of conduct. We are investigating the allegations you have presented and will be back to you as soon someone in our sustainable manufacturing team has made an assessment.”

In Bangladesh, 3.5 million workers in 4,825 garment factories produce goods for export to the global market, principally Europe and North America. The Bangladeshi garment industry generates 80 percent of the country’s total export revenue. However, the wealth generated by this sector has led to few improvements in the lives of garment workers, 85 percent of whom are women.

Source

(via anarcho-queer)

Rush Limbaugh's sexist rants | SocialistWorker.org

socialismartnature:

 … Sadly, it seems that no one explained to Rush that birth control pills don’t work like Oxycontin, a drug he has more experience with. For birth control, you take just one pill a day, every day, regardless of how many times you have sex.

But even if he grasped this fact, a conservative like Limbaugh wouldn’t let it stand in the way of telling women what to do with their bodies.

 … The angry eruption of opposition to Limbaugh is a positive sign that millions of women and men are fed up with sexism—and are ready to say something about it. The outcry mirrored the response of women’s rights activists in Virginia who staged a series of increasingly militant protests against a law that would required women to undergo an invasive ultrasound before having an abortion.

On March 3, some 1,000 protestors gathered, circling the Capitol and holding signs reading “No war on women” and “Gov. McDonnell, get out of my uterus.” When riot police moved in, the group decided that they would not be moved, sitting in on the Capitol steps. The police eventually dragged them away, arresting at least 31.

That’s a much-needed contrast to the Rush Limbaughs of the world.

climateadaptation:

Largest oil spill in the mid-west.

nrdc:

Far from DC, Michigan Residents Fight Their Own Tar Sands Pipeline Battles
As TransCanada announced it would begin building the southern leg of its Keystone XL tar sands oil pipeline from Oklahoma to Texas—setting the stage for a new Congressional battle over the transnational pipeline—Michigan residents are worried about a massive tar sands oil spill that persists in their backyards.   

That’s because thousands of people along the Kalamazoo River are still dealing with a record tar sands oil pipeline accident  that closed 40 miles of their river, with no end in sight. Residents say it forced people to move, hurt their businesses and continues to threaten their health. Some say they will never let their kids swim in the river again. And they worry that future pipeline company plans to expand tar sands oil operations in the area may endanger their lives even more. Read more.

(via socialuprooting)

A peaceful protest against budget cuts in education in Valencia, Spain on Tuesday ended in bloody police repression. Conjuring up memories of Franco’s brutal dictatorship, squads of riot police violently assaulted a group of some 300 students, arresting at least 26 and leaving scores injured. YouTube footage displayed a policeman forcefully pushing two girls onto a car, while photos emerged of young kids with bloodied faces surrounded by riot police.

While the regional police chief branded the students “as the enemy” and insisted that riot police had merely deployed “proportioned physical force”, reporters on the scene confirmed that the baton-wielding police forces had even fired rubber bullets at the students. Despite the Spanish newspaper El Publico reporting “brutal police aggression”, hundreds of students took back to the streets in the evening and encircled the University of Valencia in protest.

Tuesday’s demonstrations, which come a day after over a million Spaniards took to the streets to contest the governments’s labor reforms, marked the fourth straight day of student protests in Spain’s third largest city. Valencia is one of the most heavily hit region’s in Spain’s crippling debt crisis, and with the newly-appointed Rajoy government pushing through even more harsh austerity measures, budget cuts have left most schools without heating.

[SOURCE]

(Source: domesticterrorism, via socialuprooting)

nrdc: These shrimp without eyes were caught off the Gulf Coast in late 2011. BP Hauls in $7.7 Billion in Profits, Gulf Fishermen Haul in Shrimp with No Eyes Oil giant BP, the company behind the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, reported profits of $7.7 billion for the last quarter of 2011. Company executives and industry analysts sounded bullish about the company’s future in a recent New York Times article, saying they had set aside enough money to compensate victims of the Gulf spill and had plans to expand drilling operations in the Gulf. BP seems to be recovering nicely after the disaster, which killed 11 people and pumped 170 million gallons of oil into the Gulf of Mexico. But stories from the Gulf suggest that the region is anything but healed. The Gulf has been plagued with a suite of unexplained afflictions. Gulf fishermen say this is the worst season they can remember, with catches down 80 percent or more. Shrimp boats come home nearly empty, hauling in deformed, discolored shrimp, even shrimp without eyes. Tar balls and dead dolphins still wash up on beaches. Scientists report huge tar mats below the sand, “like vanilla swirl ice cream.” Read more in NRDC’s Switchboard blog.

nrdc:

These shrimp without eyes were caught off the Gulf Coast in late 2011.

BP Hauls in $7.7 Billion in Profits, Gulf Fishermen Haul in Shrimp with No Eyes

Oil giant BP, the company behind the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, reported profits of $7.7 billion for the last quarter of 2011. Company executives and industry analysts sounded bullish about the company’s future in a recent New York Times article, saying they had set aside enough money to compensate victims of the Gulf spill and had plans to expand drilling operations in the Gulf.

BP seems to be recovering nicely after the disaster, which killed 11 people and pumped 170 million gallons of oil into the Gulf of Mexico. But stories from the Gulf suggest that the region is anything but healed.

The Gulf has been plagued with a suite of unexplained afflictions. Gulf fishermen say this is the worst season they can remember, with catches down 80 percent or more. Shrimp boats come home nearly empty, hauling in deformed, discolored shrimp, even shrimp without eyes. Tar balls and dead dolphins still wash up on beaches. Scientists report huge tar mats below the sand, “like vanilla swirl ice cream.” Read more in NRDC’s Switchboard blog.


(via joshisonlinesometimes)