(privilages) white, cis and am in a het relationship!
This is a place for my thoughts and things I rather like, come say hi.
Disabled protesters clash with police over welfare demands — La Paz, Bolivia
Scores of disabled people on crutches and in wheelchairs fought police in La Paz, Bolivia’s capital, over demands for better welfare support, injuring several and fuelling anger against the state.
A caravan of about 50 adults and children ended a 1,000-mile, 100-day trek through Bolivia at the protest near government offices in La Paz on Thursday. Scuffles broke out and pepper spray was used after the group were blocked by riot police, who stopped them reaching the legislature and presidential palace to petitioning MPs and the presidential palace for a tripling of the £91 monthly state subsidy for disabled people. The protesters tried to break through the lines using their crutches and wheelchairs but were forced back in a melee in which several people were injured and four detained. The protest organisers then declared a hunger strike by 10 adults and a round-the-clock vigil by the rest.
The clashes were another public relations PR fiasco for President Evo Morales, who has seen his once-huge popularity plunge amid protests from coca farmers, indigenous rights activists and environmentalists. Bolivia’s first indigenous leader swept to power in 2006 promising to ease poverty and inequality, and was hailed a saviour in his first few years. But marches on La Paz – notably one over a controversial Amazon road in October – illustrate the level of disenchantment.
The disabled protesters relied on charity on their journey to the highland capital from Beni, bordering Brazil, in November. As well as higher subsidies, they want greater efforts to integrate them into a society that makes little provision for those with physical or mental disabilities.
Domitila Franco, a wheelchair-user, said she struggled. “It’s very hard to be a person with a disability,” she said. “Even our own husbands abandon us because they feel ashamed of us. … I look after my four children alone, washing and ironing clothes for people.”
The protesters to end their trek at Plaza Murillo, the heart of government, having seen other marches do so. “Why not us?” Camilo Bianchi, a protest leader, asked local media. “It’s a public space.”
Carlos Romero, a government minister, told a press conference that opposition groups had infiltrated the march and it was necessary to block it. “There are other groups trying to politicise this, trying to create a climate of disorder and confrontation,” he said. “Our obligation is to secure Plaza Murillo.”
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/feb/24/disabled-protesters-clash-police-bolivia?newsfeed=true
(via ceasesilence)
Drawing for Kiowa, Comanche, Apache and Wichita Indian Lands: Oklahoma, 1901. The tops of the freighter cars furnished seats for some 30,000 people who witnessed this drawing
The Homestead Act of 1862, which provided the basis for land giveaways such as these, turns 150 years old on May 20.
“Giveaway”! what a neat phrase. a land giveaway meant the genocide, internment, and renaming of peoples on a scale so massive that drove me to a breakdown a few years ago. It’s like you think you know, but you really don’t have any idea until you wade around in it for a few months, look for the blood spilled under the freeways and the interstates, listen to what you can still stomach, and then read some more accounts — that is, what is accounted for. and believe that there is much more that isn’t.
Article: I Didn’t Know There Were Cities in Africa!
Please substitue the word “children” for “99 percent of the idiots using the #peace tag on tumblr.”
I always get too angry to articulate why images of malnourished African children bothers me. Why it is racist. Why it’s wrong.
This article above helps.
The way you think about Africa is wrong.
The way you think about the entire world beyond you is probably wrong.
But let’s start with Africa. Because chances are you paid the 30 dollars for that stupid fucking Invisible Children starter kit. That at one point in time you participated in a 30 Hour Famine at church. Or you “adopted” a starving child with a few friends after you saw a 5 minute infomercial. Possibly you really like Bono. Or Blood Diamond made you feel really bad. Hotel Rwanda made you cry. Maybe you have one of those shirts with the heart in the middle of the continent. Or that you really want to internationally adopt an “orphan.”
The way you think about Africa is wrong.
Did you know that the UNICEF definition of orphanhood as the loss of one or both parents. Did you know that children are adopted by white parents all the time when their biological parents are still alive. Did you know that foreign adoptions happen all the time because parents see themselves as too impoverished or incapable to raise their children on their own. Did you know that Madonna, the supposed savior of Malawi, abducted her child because international adoptions aren’t even legal in that country.
Did you know that the never-ending stream of donations you send to Africa is destroying local economies and small businesses. Did it ever occur to you that your donations are putting people out of business. Did you consider that you might be creating poverty just for participating in a capitalist system that steals from the poor and then throws them whatever is left over and calls it “charity.” Did it never occur to you, while you were donating money and feeling good about it, why it is that your dollar is needed in the first place.
Did you know that organizations like World Vision (the asshats who brought you the 30 Hour Famine) have set up camps for survivors of war and violence in Uganda, where they regularly impose Christian teachings and values through a process called “sensitization,” in order to get survivors to think more like they do. Did it ever occur to you that there are thousands of languages, cultures, and lives that are being homogenized by “charitable” organizations, and that it’s on your dime.
Did you know that money you donate comes with strings, and sometimes it doesn’t even come at all. Did it occur to you that organizations don’t spend their money unless they want to, and that frequently comes with stipulations. Did you consider that maybe there are places in Africa and elsewhere that really need your money or economic support, but don’t give a fuck about your hegemonic religious values. Did you have any clue that organizations like Invisible Children take in millions of dollars annually, but don’t even spend a third of it in Uganda.
Did you have any idea that countless charities, hospitals, adoption agencies, etc., set up in Africa are illegal, and done without credence to national or local government. Have you heard of volunteer tourism? Did you have any idea that completely untrained and uneducated people are hauling ass to Africa, and building charities that board, educate, and treat young children illegally with absolutely zero recognition of the law of the land in which they are in.
Did it ever occur to you that maybe some people in Africa are doing just fucking fine. They have a house. They own shoes. They have parents and siblings and food and an education and a favorite restaurant and hobbies and ambitions and a happy life. Did you consider that maybe your stupid generalizations and conceptualizations bother and insult them, and make it more difficult to be them.
Did you ever consider that Africa is a living, breathing continent of millions of people who are different. Economically, socially, religiously, lingually, culturally, ethnically different. And that your stupid fucking pictures of malnourished kids, your idolization of Angelina Jolie and Madonna, your ridiculous Invisible Children bracelet, your idiotic KONY 2012 posters are racist. They’re simplifying a place that is not simple. They’re portraying an enormous continent as singular, backward place. Instead of more complicated than you have ever bothered to understand.
You operate autonomously, offering your “help” where it has not been asked for. Blindly donating your dollars and your time without having any idea how it is being spent.
There are people there. Governments. Cities. There are people living their lives in a continent that you do not understand, but you claim to help.
This rant was long-winded but I’ll conclude.
Just please if you take nothing else away from this. Be critical of the shit you are fed. Africa is a continent. And at least take the time to learn about it before you even consider throwing money or used books or Toms sneakers at it.
I am now officially in love with whoever wrote this!
Imma need almost everyone on my facebook to read this.
I decided to make a tumblr that’s pretty much just a safe space full of nice things and cute animals and stuff of that sort! So if you’re into that you can find it at: http://snugglysafeplace.tumblr.com/
every time someone is like “but see (animal) has (whatever behavior) and so this whole transgender thing is clearly (natural or unnatural, depending on the stupid-ass nature-based argument the person is trying to make, because who fucking cares about a gay penguin or a snail with 2 dicks or whatever)”
I always wanna be like “YO OMG you know what animal proves that being transgender is a thing that exists and that it’s okay?………………………THEY’RE CALLED HUMANS”
(via brazenbitch)
