Dear friends,
I hope I can write a coherent post from the hash served up by world this week. Even the news that seems fairly innocuous is dangerous.
School trips to see performances of James and the Giant Peach have been canceled in Houston because the seven actors who play 19 roles sometimes play characters of another gender. Do not get me started.
The Main Street Theater, which has been producing plays for almost 50 years, told The Guardian:
“In our productions, as in theater across the world, we regularly have actors playing multiple roles: male, female, insects, animals, and more. Again, this has been done since the creation of the art form of theater, and this is how theater remains to this day.”
An increasingly repressive environment is taking shape. A letter has been circulating in defense of intersectionality and Black feminism.
It’s a long read; the conclusion gives you the gist:
In this pivotal moment in which illiberal censorship is cresting around the world, where the freedoms to think, to create, to teach, and to learn are at stake, it is a betrayal of democratic values for any responsible leaders to actively participate, to stand by or to capitulate to such destruction. Because we know that attacks on knowledge are fueling threats to freedom, and that repression in one place fuels its spread elsewhere, we call for global resistance to all efforts to destroy the vital tools that help us to imagine and create more equitable and inclusive futures for us all.
Sign the Freedom to Learn open letter.
According to the Committee to Protect Journalists, there were 363 reporters imprisoned around the world at the end of 2022, up 20 percent from the year before. That number includes Austin Tice, who has been held in Syria for more than 10 years, and Evan Gershkovich, the reporter jailed in Russia facing false charges of espionage.
Learn more about Reporters Without Borders and the Committee to Protect Journalists. Consider donating to support their work.
Earlier this week, I wrote about labor exploitation. Hollywood writers have less at stake than journalists working in war zones. They are, however, struggling to make a living.
Let Hollywood CEOs know that you support striking writers. This action is from More Perfect Union.
The striking writers are unionized, in contrast to most workers. The US continues to be a tough place to organize workers, as the folks who work processing seafood learned this spring. Their story is less familiar than that of workers at Starbucks and Apple.
Call on the US Dep’t of Labor to protect workers being fired for organizing. This quick action is from Unemployed Workers United.
Two 10-year-olds employed by Bauer Food LLC
did a variety of tasks like prepping food, cleaning the store, and taking drive-thru orders — working as late as 2 AM.
According to the Labor Department, one of the 10-year-olds also operated a deep fryer, which is prohibited for workers below the age of 16. Neither of the 10-year-olds were even paid for their work, the Labor Department determined.
There were more than a hundred instances of children working outside permissible hours — working during school hours, late at night, and/or for too many hours each week.
The exploitation of child workers is on the rise, as some states are actively seeking to relax child labor standards.
Federal child labor law generally prohibits the employment of minors in nonagricultural occupations under the age of 14, restricts the hours and types of work that can be performed by minors under 16, and prohibits the employment of minors under the age of 18 in any hazardous occupation.
Call on the President to direct the Department of Labor to enforce federal child labor protections.
I had planned to write about the NYS budget, but the world served up a local tragedy.
Jordan Neely, a talented Michael Jackson impersonator familiar to many subway riders, was choked to death on Monday by another subway rider. Neely, who has a history of mental health challenges, homelessness, and dozens of encounters with the NYPD, was having a terrible day.
Neely was yelling because he was hungry and thirsty and tired and out of emotional resources. He did not attack anyone. It’s possible that Neely might have lashed out physically, as he has done on occasion. He did not deserve to die.
We have all shared subway rides with people having a bad day. We avert our eyes or we offer food or some money or some kind words. Sometimes we change cars, or just give people a wider berth.
The police released the man who choked Neely without charging him.
Protesters assembled in the Broadway-Lafayette subway station on Wednesday afternoon, and
pointed their fingers at the two New York politicians who have spent the past several months leading a charge against homeless New Yorkers and moving to criminalize the city's mentally unwell—while at the same time, doing little to stem an affordability crisis in the city that leaves more people homeless, stressed, and with no good options.
The staff at Jews For Racial and Economic Justice (JFREJ) offered this scathing assessment:
The devastating, violent killing of Jordan Neely reflects so much about what is broken in our city: The inadequacy of quality and accessible mental healthcare. The cost of food and rent that leaves so many New Yorkers hungry and without a safe place to sleep. The unprocessed mass grief and trauma of the pandemic that still has us all on edge, intensified by constant dehumanizing, inciting, and fear-mongering headlines. The racism. The harsh statements from the mayor that tell us anyone behaving out of the ordinary or who looks like they’re struggling is violent and dangerous.
Jordan’s death is an indictment of Mayor Adams’ failed approach to public safety; the mayor's budget spends billions on policing but refuses to adequately invest in housing and healthcare.
Join JFREJ this Sunday, May 7th, for a public safety canvass in Brooklyn to talk to neighbors and community members about policing, bystander intervention, transforming public safety, and demanding investments to change the system.
Later this month, JFREJ and other grassroots groups are holding a mass mobilization against the Mayor’s budget.
Join the mass mobilization to go all out for CARE, not criminalization on Wednesday, May 24.
There’s the hash. You should still eat a good dinner. Take extra care to be good to yourself and the people around you. Carry fruit or protein bars and small bills when you board the subway.
Remember that if you see someone choking someone, it’s your job as a human to step in. In an extreme situation such as this, delegating authority to other people who can help intervene is an important strategy, as is directing the person acting violently to stop. As a naturally bossy person, I find this intuitive. If you don’t, watch and learn.
Watch the animated 5Ds of bystander intervention. This important guide is from Asian Americans Advancing Justice.
We’ll end with some good news. Four Proud Boys were convicted today of charges of seditious conspiracy. This is important on so many levels, not least of which that it establishes that there was a seditious conspiracy. It is only a matter of time before Individual 1 feels the heat of this ruling.
with love,
L