Readers’ Views on: Iran and Philosophy of Revolution; Corruption of ‘Justice’; Prisoner Unity; Voices from Behind Bars
Agreement to End Hostilities
Baridi speaks to Free the Caged Voices
March 17, 2020Baridi, one of the signers of the 2012 “Agreement to End Hostilities,” talks about the contradictions of the U.S. prison system.
Free Sitawa Jamaa
January 21, 2020It is more important than ever to free Sitawa Nantambu Jamaa, one of the four main representatives in the historic 2011-13 hunger strikes initiated in Pelican Bay prison’s Security Housing Unit, after his stroke.
Essay: Black August, from 1971 to 2011-13
November 17, 2019In the spirit of Black August Memorial, Faruq talks about the conditions of Black prisoners, the need to break race divisions between them and white prisoners, and the quest for the Idea of Freedom.
Free Sitawa Nantambu Jamaa!
November 10, 2019It is more important than ever to free Sitawa Nantambu Jamaa, one of the four main representatives in the historic 2011-13 hunger strikes initiated in Pelican Bay prison’s Security Housing Unit, from prison as in early November 2019 he suffered a stroke.
Essay: Black August, from 1971 to 2011-13
September 4, 2019Ex-prisoner Faruq takes up the revolutionary history of Black August Memorial and relates it to his life and the historic Pelican Bay Hunger Strike.
Prisoners endangered
January 31, 2019Families of prisoners and supporters rallied in front of the California Department of Corrections and rehabilitation’s (CDCr) headquarters against the CDCr-induced violence that many of their loved ones are experiencing.
Three years after Ashker vs. Governor of California
Pelican Bay Prisoners speak of the third anniversary of the landmark agreement in the class action lawsuit that ended indefinite solitary confinement in California prisons.
Voices From the Inside Out: Learning the meaning of parole
December 3, 2018Prisoner Faruq writes of his pending parole and the obligation to fight the designation that prisoners are the “worst of the worst,” to fight the dehumanization of prisoners; he forwards the importance of prisoner activism in changing draconian conditions.
Voices from the inside out: ‘Agreement to End Hostilities’ 5th anniversary
September 5, 2017Prisoner Faruq writes about the meaning of the fifth anniversary of the historic “Agreement to End Hostilities” that continues to challenge the racism imposed on prisoners in the California prison system and elsewhere. .
Solidarity with Folsom hunger strike
July 2, 2017Report on the 21-day hunger strike begun by prisoners at Folsom State Prison’s administrative segregation on May 26th.
Humanism: a way forward for prisoners
September 17, 2016Prisoner and hunger striker Faruq looks at the way forward after the historic California prisoners’ hunger strike and emphasizes the importance of “the banner of our humanism that allowed the forging of a tremendous unification across the racial divides.”
Upon leaving Pelican Bay: my firsts (of many :))
July 6, 2016Prisoner Brutha Baridi tells what it means to be released from the hell of solitary confinement and experience several new “first” experiences.
California prisoners battle barbaric U.S. ‘justice’ system
October 26, 2015In California the ongoing struggle of prisoners against the U.S.’s barbaric criminal justice system reached a milestone in the effort to totally transform a society in which millions of poor, unemployed and people of color end up in an inhuman gulag.
Hugo “Yogi” Pinell (1945-2015)
September 3, 2015On Aug. 12, Hugo “Yogi” Pinell (1945-2015) was killed in the California State Prison-Sacramento. Pinell was a comrade of George Jackson, W.L. Nolen, James Carr, and other founders of the modern prison movement.
California prisons’ punitive ‘wellness checks’
Pelican Bay Prison guards use court-ordered “wellness checks” to harass prisoners. They make it impossible for anyone to get any sleep as they rampage through each SHU pod for 10-20 minutes.
No rehabilitation
July 7, 2014From the July-August 2014 issue of News & Letters
Oakland, Calif.—On June 14 Critical Resistance (CR), an organization working for the abolition of the prison system, held a community forum on California Department of Corrections and rehabilitation (CDCr). (Prisoners refuse to capitalize the “R” because there is no “rehabilitation.”)
The forum took up new [=>]
Prison hunger strikers demand: Stop torture and violence!
September 20, 2013On July 8 over 30,000 prisoners in California started an indefinite hunger strike to demand their human rights. Prison officials have retaliated against the prisoners’ right to peacefully protest.
Pelican Bay families support prisoners
February 21, 2013From the January-February 2013 issue of News & Letters:
Pelican Bay families support prisoners
Editor’s note: California Families Against Solitary Confinement (CFASC) came together during the prisoners’ 2011 hunger strike initiated by prisoners in Security Housing Unit (SHU). To support the prisoners’ ongoing movement, specifically the Agreement to Cease Hostilities (see Nov.-Dec. 2012 N&L), CFASC [=>]