Yearly Archives: 2011

Over 100 family members, religious leaders and community supporters held a prayer vigil and speak-out on New Year’s Day in front of the Fruitvale BART station to commemorate the second anniversary of the BART police killing of Oscar Grant, a young Black man.

A spokesperson for the Scott Sisters, Nancy Lockhart, announced Wednesday, Jan. 5, that the Scott Sisters will be released from prison on Friday to start their lives on parole. On Dec. 29, Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour, possibly a Republican contender for the presidency in 2012, suspended indefinitely the life sentences of Jamie and Gladys Scott.

"Since the start of the Dec. 9 peaceful work stoppage and appeal for reform and respect for human rights, some inmates have been targeted and others have simply disappeared. We are urging the Department of Corrections and Governor-Elect Nathan Deal to act now to halt these unjust practices and treat these men like human beings,” said Ed Dubose, President of the NAACP of Georgia.

Four prisoners unjustly sentenced to death for the 1993 Lucasville, Ohio, prison uprising began a hunger strike on Monday, Jan. 3, to demand that they be placed on Death Row rather than be held in solitary confinement – and to initiate a campaign that will hopefully lead to executive clemency. Here, the first of the prisoners to begin the strike speaks out.

John Maxwell is one of those rare human beings, one of those rare souls, and one of those rare minds whose death leaves us naked. Bare. Smaller.

"Dec. 9, 2010, marks the first time in a long time that a group of Georgia prisoners were successful in demonstrating that they were – and are – absolutely positively tired of the slavery-like conditions of the state of Georgia," writes 18-year prisoner Eugene Thomas. Listen to a Block Report interview with Eugene by M.O.I. JR broadcast on KPFA’s Hard Knock Radio.

The critically acclaimed film “Precious” dealt with the touchy subject of family incest and how it affects people, from the instigator to the survivor. Within the Black community, incest – unwarranted or wanted sexual contact between an adult and a minor – is a subject that often is a secret tightly held within families.

Today we are going to be talking to Philadelphia Tribune writer and Temple University professor Linn Washington, who is going to give us an update on the case of Mumia Abu Jamal.

After three years of appeals and litigation, I’m pleased to announce that, beginning Jan. 1, 2011, the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCr) will no longer be allowed to furnish prisoners food containing poisonous trans fats.

For Blacks in Greenwood, Mississippi, the notion that America has gotten beyond race isn’t popular today. Many are angry over the recent mysterious hanging death of Frederick Jermaine Carter.

Liberty Builders continues to fight for its right to reinstatement as the prime contractor for construction of the Bayview Branch Library. Liberty Builders is trusted by the people of Bayview Hunters Point, who have long been locked out of City construction work, to give them full and fair opportunity to build the library they love. Tell City Hall: "Our library, our jobs!" Tell Mayor Newsom how you feel about this and what you want – call (415) 554-6141, email gavin.newsom@sfgov.org or visit Room 200, City Hall.

Journalist JR Valrey, who was born in 1978, grew up mostly in Oakland, where the legend of the Black Panther Party was all around him. “A lot of the people around here are Panthers, or knew Panthers or are members of the Black Guerilla Family, which was an organization that Field Marshall George Jackson of the Black Panther Party founded. The revolution is very deep in Oakland. It’s not so cosmetic as it is other places. It’s not just about bandannas and t-shirts and concert throwing and posturing. I think it’s more grassroots here and more ingrained in the spirit of the people.”

Bayview Hunters Point is a community not exempt from poverty, violence, racism, police terrorism, gentrification, institutionalized ignorance, displacement and demonizing media coverage. With the Tough House Project, founder Jamal James Modica hopes to give this community a voice.

With the release of another 250,000 classified diplomatic cables from the U.S. State Department by the WikiLeaks website, Washington’s Africa policy has been further exposed for its imperialistic designs. These revelations point to the necessity of the anti-war and peace movements in the U.S. incorporating anti-interventionist and anti-imperialist demands with specific reference to the African continent into their political programs.

As the 20th year passes since the West waged war against the late Saddam Hussein and the state of war slips into greater violence in Iraq and Afghanistan, there is another war being waged today, one which gets little coverage on TV, radio and newspapers. This war has been essentially a class war – a war against the poor and working classes.

Few people in America, especially the underfunded, don’t have a friend, relative, classmate or colleague in prison. We also know that most prisoners are there for non-violent, often drug related issues. Yet we keep silent. “Your silence becomes approval,” wrote our brilliant journalist and revolutionary, Mumia Abu-Jamal.

Congolese youth, the great Congo of today is ours. This gift is not just hereditary, but also because millions of Congolese have made the ultimate sacrifice for this country since 1482. We must do everything in our power to assure that our beautiful Congo remains in the hands of the sons and daughters of the Congo.

Oscar Grant’s death was a tragedy that affected a lot of people in Oakland, especially youth. The video is meant to be a message to everyone in Oakland about the injustices here and how we use artistic expression to deal with it. The Turf Feinz "turf dancers" have received more than 2 million views for their previous video made by Yak Films. The release of this memorial dance video is a reminder of the fragility of young lives in Oakland, Calif. – and an artistic celebration of the beauty of youth expression and possibility. May 2011 be a happier new year.