Dear friends,
The days are getting longer as the earth tilts toward the sun here in the northern hemisphere. It may also feel that time is not moving forward at its usual pace. I am seized regularly by contradictory feelings of wanting to slow the passage of time and wanting to speed it up.
Getting outside always helps. This Saturday, come outside to stand for reproductive justice.
Sign the petition from Planned Parenthood Action and find an event near you. I’ll be at Union Square at 2 PM.
Unsurprisingly, the US Senate failed to pass the Women's Health Protection Act yesterday.
Although the Senate defeat was widely expected, Democrats hope the vote will help propel more of their candidates to victory in the Nov. 8 midterm elections, as public opinion polls show deep support among voters for abortion rights.
November 8 is a long way off in a world that is constantly churning, so we will have to work hard and hit the streets to keep the issues of health care and bodily autonomy at the forefront of the national conversation.
With a million people uninsured in our state, this law, which would cover the costs of hospice care as well as in-home and institutional care, is long overdue. Obviously, reproductive health care is also part of the package.
Contact your state legislators to let them know you support the NY Health Act! This is ready-made!
If you can’t come out on Saturday to march for abortion rights or if you will be busy counting birds in honor of World Migratory Bird Day, you can still contribute.
Support SisterSong’s organizing for reproductive justice, to mobilize a large base of women of color and allies in rapid-response online and in-person action.
It may be hard to open your wallet right now for the causes that matter to you because inflation is keeping prices high. Fuel prices are driving up the cost of everything else.
A Big Oil Windfall Profits Tax would extract funds from those who are profiting by price gouging.
Send this ready-made letter from Fossil Free Media to your Congressional delegation in support of a Big Oil Windfall Profits Tax!
Here’s a statistic I keep seeing:
Only 8% of private sector office workers are back at their desks five days a week.
It came up in conversation last evening as we were returning from a book event. It was after 7 PM and the streets downtown seemed relatively lively.
The statistic is misleading. It doesn’t tell us what percentage of workers are back in the office three and four days a week, and it makes one think the city is dead.
NYC is not dead. There are, however, a number of forces that are restraining its recovery. One is that every intersection offers an opportunity to die.
Contact the Mayor and other elected officials to call for prompt and effective action to prevent traffic fatalities and injuries. The actions are ready-made.
The book event was for Elise Engler’s amazing Diary of the Plague Year: An Illustrated Chronicle of 2020. A number of years ago, Elise nearly lost her arm as a result of a traffic crash, and the thread of traffic violence runs through her diary, as the temporary quieting of the streets gave way to egregious lawlessness.
You will be stunned by the events of 2020 that already seem part of a remote past. At the same time, the immediacy of the illustrated news will remind you of how connected those events are to this moment.
Day by day, Engler drew every shocking turn of the year: the police murder of George Floyd and protests around the globe; a war against science and those who preached it; fires consuming California; a vicious election, absurdly contested. Other stories appeared, too: "Harvey Weinstein Sentenced," "Ruth Bader Ginsburg Hospitalized," "China Extends Control over Hong Kong," and--on repeat--"Stock Market Plunges."
The past is always present. I find that sometimes I want to leap into the future, hopefully to the other side of today’s problems. But we must move through time.
To accomplish the energy transition we need, there is work to be done to remove gas infrastructure:
No city has yet announced a plan to remove gas infrastructure that already exists. The focus has been firstly on new construction—which has to stop, ASAP—but all the current gas lines and gas appliances will eventually need to go, too. We’ll need a robust gas workforce for years to come to ensure that work happens safely.
Call on our city council to be the first to write legislation to transition workers to the task of safely removing gas infrastructure from buildings. This action is ready-made!
To build a better future, we need a healthy planet, as well as health care, childcare, and education. Moms Rising is collecting childcare stories to frame the issue and build momentum for policy change.
Tell your childcare story. Reminisce, complain, AND shed light!
Ultra-Orthodox communities often seem stuck in time. In NYS, many Yeshivas offer little to no instruction in secular subjects, leaving their students unprepared for the world, with few opportunities for further schooling or employment. This has continued because the schools have not been held accountable to meaningful standards.
Submit a comment to the NYS Department of Education urging them to pass and enforce regulations to require nonpublic schools to offer adequate secular education. This 30-second action is from YAFFED.
This morning, I wanted to stop time entirely, so that I could finish writing this ‘in time’ for my imaginary morning deadline. In the end, it seemed more important to proofread.
Have a great day!
with love,
L