November-December 2011 issue of News & Letters now on the web…
Lead: Occupy Wall Street strikes deep chord, challenges rulers
The Occupy Wall Street (OWS) movement, since beginning in New York City’s Zuccotti Park–renamed Liberty Plaza–on Sept. 17, has spread to hundreds of cities and towns across the U.S. and linked with the occupation movements in Europe. On Oct. 15, Occupy demonstrations took place in 951 cities in 82 countries.
Occupy everywhere, the whole world is watching!
From the Writings of Raya Dunayevskaya: Spontaneity and new beginnings
The 1960s signaled the birth of a new generation of revolutionaries on every subject, from anti-Vietnam War to Women’s Liberation, with the Black Dimension making it global both in Africa and in the U.S. Nevertheless, once the near-revolution in Paris 1968 aborted, it became necessary to draw a balance sheet between what were truly new, epochal beginnings, and what were only new stages of revolt.
To Yemenis ‘rape is worse than death’
“I would rather she died than be raped,” said Um Ahmed Alam angrily. A woman in her fifties, she fears the chaos the country will suffer if civil war breaks out in Yemen.
Her fear of sexual harassment is bigger than her fear of losing any of her four daughters. “Death is death, we all will die eventually, but the shame of rape is what we cannot handle,” she said sadly.
Editorial: Failed U.S. occupation of Iraq
To the consternation of the people who voted for an avowedly anti-Iraq war candidate, Obama will have withdrawn troops not one month earlier than Bush agreed to do in 2008 in the Status of Forces Agreement with Bagdad. He has continued indefinite detention at Guantanamo for prisoners that Bush had rounded up, and he renewed the Patriot Act.
As Others See Us: The masses as Reason
Opposed equally to the tyranny of “ordinary” capitalism and its counterpart in the Soviet Union, China, and other Stalinist states, Marxist-Humanism states that the Hegelian struggle for freedom is primary in the movements of the masses against oppression. … I believe Dunayevskaya’s thought is very relevant today in addressing the political tasks of progressive people faced with the current economic crisis.
SHU prisoners: We want to be treated like human beings!
On Sept. 26 Security Housing Unit (SHU) prisoners resumed their hunger strike, suspended on July 20, to give California prison authorities a chance to make good on their promises to address the prisoners demands. Especially important to the prisoners was getting out of perpetual solitary confinement, starting with an objective review of their status as active/inactive gang member. To follow developments and join solidarity actions, visit prisonerhungerstrikesolidarity.wordpress.com.