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Tag: Racism

Pushing Back Against The Demonization Of Antifa

Posted in Audio, Gonzo Notes, and Journalism

Kit O’Connell talks with Scott Harris of Counterpoint Radio about Antifa’s philosophy and views on the danger posed by the Trump presidency and the rise of white supremacist, Neo-Nazi, KKK and “Alt-Right” groups nationwide. He also examines the media coverage Antifa has received, much of it demonizing the movement’s activists as committing indiscriminate violence equivalent to that of extreme right wing groups.

Laughing Ourselves To Hell: Trolling As A Lifestyle (Gonzo Notes)

Posted in Austin, Creative Commons, and Gonzo Notes

I was a teenage (and young adult) troll.

In my early 20s especially, I hung out on SomethingAwful, a website with a lively associated forum that would often target groups we perceived to be low hanging fruit (furries, goths, and so on) for online attacks.

Our viciousness never rose to the level of today’s super-trolls, who send SWAT teams to their enemies’ houses or wage ongoing campaigns that drive vulnerable people to suicide, but I can see how I took part in the early days of this trend, and I’m not proud of it.

Part of maturing for me has been recognizing that I can’t eradicate this prankster side of myself, so I’ve instead learned to direct it against the corrupt systems that promote inequality and the powerful people who profit off modern day, extractive capitalism.

Pranking up, not punching down.

We Will Never Have A Legit Democracy Until We Change These 3 Things

Posted in Journalism, and Lee Camp

Decades of racist attacks on voting rights have given the far right a virtual stranglehold on American politics. (And this doesn’t mean the neoliberal left is blameless.)

Republicans control Congress, the Presidency, the majority of state legislatures, and the majority of state legislatures. You combine that with the fact that most Democrats only defend their corporate sugar daddies and the result is a heavily right-wing agenda sweeping America. Many are now looking to the mid-term elections in 2018 as an opportunity to turn things around.

Efforts such as Bernie Sanders’ “Unity Tour” are meant to lure voters back into the Democratic fold and also to the polls. They also hope to encourage new candidates to run for office. Unfortunately, they’re likely to fall far short of their goal, thanks to voter ID laws, gerrymandering of districts, and a system called Interstate Crosscheck, all blatantly racist moves by the GOP which purged millions of mostly minority voters from the rolls or otherwise kept them home on election day.

Israel Denies Entry To Impoverished Venezuelan Jews

Posted in Journalism, and MintPress News

Despite frequent assertions that it is a homeland for all Jews, Israel has rejected a group of would-be immigrants from Venezuela despite years of devotion to their religion.

Under the policy known as aliyah, a Hebrew word meaning “ascending,” any Jewish person may emigrate to Israel, regardless of their nation of origin. Once in Israel, new arrivals are provided with stipends and benefits to help them get on their feet. When Europe was struck by deadly anti-Semitic violence two years ago, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu urged all Jews to move to Israel.

“I would like to tell all European Jews and all Jews wherever they are: Israel is the home of every Jew,” Netanyahu said after an attack on a synagogue in Copenhagen in January of 2015.

However, this policy has been selectively enforced in cases involving poor or non-white Jews.

Drexel University Abandons Professor After Attacks Over Satirical ‘White Genocide’ Tweets

Posted in Archive, Journalism, and MintPress News

George Ciccariello-Maher, a professor at Drexel University, is facing death threats after a series of satirical tweets about “white genocide,” a concept invented by white supremacists.

The university is also facing criticism for its refusal to wholeheartedly support the free speech rights of its employee in the midst of an onslaught of complaints driven, in part, by far-right news outlets like Breitbart.

“All I Want for Christmas is White Genocide,” Ciccariello-Maher tweeted on Saturday, according to a report published Monday by The Philadelphia Inquirer. A second tweet created on Sunday read: “To clarify: when the whites were massacred during the Haitian revolution, that was a good thing indeed.”

Ciccariello-Maher teaches in Drexel’s Department of History and Politics. According to his university bio, he often appears in the media to comment on “social movements, particularly in Latin America” and also frequently writes about “race, racism, prisons and policing in the U.S. and internationally.”

Stephen Bannon: Anti-Black, Anti-Muslim, Anti-Semitic, But Pro-Israel

Posted in Journalism, and MintPress News

The elevation of Stephen Bannon, former boss at the extreme right-wing news outlet Breitbart News, to chief strategist in the incoming administration of President-elect Donald Trump has provoked a firestorm of criticism over his racist views on minorities and his support for anti-Semitism.

However, despite what may seem like a contradiction between the xenophobic views of Bannon and the news outlet he guided, Bannon’s appointment as Trump’s chief strategist could actually be good news for apartheid Israel and its ongoing occupation of the indigenous Palestinian population.

Under Bannon, Breitbart News published articles that were Islamophobic, homophobic, and anti-women. The site fueled racist attacks on the Black Lives Matter movement and journalist Shaun King. The KKK and other white nationalist groups are celebrating his appointment to the post, while human rights groups are condemning it.

Bannon, himself, was accused of making anti-Semitic remarks by his ex-wife, a charge he denies, while Breitbart News has been accused of hosting anti-Semitic content. Bannon also bragged that the site had become the online home of the so-called “alt-right,” a far-right white nationalist movement that is openly anti-Semitic.