Category: Freedom

Reading for Faster Freedom in Brazil

Prisoners in Brazil may be able to shorten their stay in jail by reading and writing. It’s only 48 days but it can make a difference, the prisoners need to read from a collection of philosophy, science, literature, or the classics then reflect on them in a submitted paper.

Educational programs like this are a good way to help people returning to society restart with more focus and support.

Prisoners will have up to four weeks to read each book and
write an essay which must “make correct use of paragraphs, be
free of corrections, use margins and legible joined-up writing,”
said the notice published on Monday in the official gazette.

…

“A person can leave prison more enlightened and with a
enlarged vision of the world,” said Sao Paulo lawyer Andre
Kehdi, who heads a book donation project for prisons.

“Without doubt they will leave a better person,” he said.

Read more.

A New Wave of Feminism in Concert with OWS?

Megan Boler has a new article on the Occupy Wall Street (OWS) movement and the current state of feminism and it’s a good read. She looks at the relationships between the feminist movement and the concerns of the people involved in OWS activities.

But the tide seems to have turned. Feminism’s re-emergence was spotted on the horizon by numerous long-term feminist organizers months ago. Kathy Miriam, a professor and feminist organizer who lives in Brooklyn, recognizes this as a, “fluid, dynamic moment” in which anything is possible. As Miriam wrote in a blog post this fall:

“Can feminist solidarity reap the whirlwind and reinvent itself within new forms of social association too? … [T]he dynamism released by Occupy Wall Street [OWS] involves women – lots and lots of young women – who, like their male counter-parts are caught up in the momentum of movement-creating. This means that women are agitating, aroused anew as political actors on the stage of history. If there is any situation then, in which feminist ideas might stick and take root, this is it.

Will Occupy Wall Street be open to re-orientation through the lens of feminist action and vision? Will feminism re-invent itself as a movement within the new political situation and its forcefield of political possibilities?

Read more here.

Why We Went Down Yesterday

Yesterday you probably noticed that most of your favourite websites were down yesterday or had a notice up warning you about two bills in front of the American government. Those bills are SOPA and PIPA and essentially if these bills pass the internet would be all but dead to American citizens and beyond!

Here’s a video by the Kahn Academy explaining the bills:

So why is this on a website dedicated to good news? Here’s why:

Never forget that when people work together stupid policies and backwards thinking from old corporate powers (who are being replace by new and better technical solutions) can be stopped! Just look at how people also stopped the Keystone XL pipeline!

United Republic: Creative Organization Grows from OWS

Democracy takes time, and it’s rough and tedious work, so it’s amazing that in the two short months since the Occupy Movement began an organization has sprung up that will help the movement. United Republic aims to support the Occupy Movement by championing the idea that political decisions should be based on reality and not on the claims of lobbyists.

Lawrence Lessig Welcomes Rootstrikers to United Republic from Rootstrikers on Vimeo.

We aim to transform our nation’s outrage over corruption, gridlock, and cronyism into a powerful political force that can demand and deliver lasting change. We will hold politicians accountable; expose how corporate lobbyists hurt ordinary Americans; build a coalition of supporters from left, right and center; and provide financial support to the best people and organizations working on solving the problem.

Already our coalition is growing. In the fall of 2011, we joined forces with Rootstrikers, a group founded by Harvard law professor Lawrence Lessig that shares the goal of ending the domination of Big Money over the political process. The group’s name is inspired by the Henry David Thoreau quote, “There are a thousand hacking at the branches of evil to one who is striking at the root.” And we’ve recently merged with the Get Money Out campaign, an effort started by MSNBC host Dylan Ratigan that shares similar goals.

Via bOing

UN: Canada Prevented Torture

The Afghanistan war that has been going for 10 years(!) has caused a lot of horrible things to happen to all the belligerents. The American forces have been accused of torture and other horrible actions to Afghanis, and in Canada a few years ago there was accusations that Canadian forces let people be tortured as well. Unlike the American government, the Canadian government has been found by the UN to actually stop torture form happening!

“For those arrested by Canadians, two NDS officials were allocated for further interrogation and those interrogated by them never complained about ill-treatment by NDS officials.”

Between 2009 and 2010, Canadian and British forces reportedly handed over some 2,000 detainees to Afghan authorities, according to the report, with caveats and monitoring in place to ensure they were not tortured.

The treatment of Afghan detainees became a political issue for the federal government after allegations of abuse and mistreatment first arose five years ago.

Read more.

Thanks Janet!