George Mann is a folk singer from New York. He is also an activist, artist and staunch unionist.
Mann is returning to Australia to perform his inspiring collection of activist folk songs. He is an annual visitor to Victorian Trades Hall and Geelong Trades Hall. He has a dedicated following, especially among the trade unionists who love his rousing rendition of labour movement favourites like, 鈥淯nion Maid鈥 and 鈥淭he Internationale鈥.
Marginalised communities from Native Americans to Black people to Muslims and Latino immigrants, who have suffered under successive US governments for centuries, are now up against a new aggressive and blunt attack by President Donald Trump. Aside from rolling back a slew of rights in just weeks in office, Trump has also stoked the sparks of a new resistance across identity lines with the potential to draw on diverse histories of oppression and struggle.
Amid the horrors of Syria鈥檚 multi-sided civil war, a ray of hope has broken out in the north.
Led by left-wing Kurdish forces in Rojava following a 2012 insurrection that liberated the area from the regime鈥檚 control, the Rojava Revolution aims to build a new system on the principles of women鈥檚 liberation, a multi-ethnic participatory democracy, ecology and solidarity.
In a very lacklustre ceremony, with almost no international presence save a delegation of US diplomats, Jovenel Mo茂se was appointed president of Haiti this month. But no media outlet reported that, at the same time, Haitian streets were boiling with protests in rejection of Mo茂se and his administration.聽
US meddling in Ecuador's politics is likely to continue, especially if left-wing candidate Lenin Moreno wins the presidential election, set to enter a second round on April 2, Norwegian journalist Eirik Vold, told TeleSUR.聽
In Honduras, indigenous leader Jose Santos Sevilla has been assassinated by armed gunmen in his home in Montana de la Flor, north of the capital, Democracy Now! said on February 21.
Santos Sevilla was the leader of the indigenous Tolupan people, who are fighting to protect their ancestral lands from industrial mining and logging projects. In 2015, the United Nations special rapporteur on the rights of indigenous peoples warned of rampant violence against Tolupan organisers, including assassinations, as well as state impunity for the perpetrators of these crimes.
鈥淲here did you get your name from?鈥
鈥淎re you Muslim?鈥
These were聽. at Fort Lauderdale鈥揌ollywood International Airport on February 7, before being detained for 鈥渟everal hours鈥 by immigration and customs officials.
Below is the platform of the International Women鈥檚 Strike US. It is slightly abridged from .
***
The International Women鈥檚 Strike on March 8聽is an international day of action, planned and organised by women in more than 30 different countries. 聽
聽is a feminist collective against male violence based in Argentina. In an article below, translated by Liz Mason-Deese, the group explains how its strike against gender violence last year has evolved into the call for an International Women鈥檚 Strike on March 8, International Women鈥檚 Day.
I often hear that music and politics should remain separate. I snigger at such a concept; as if they have ever been separate.
Those proponents may as well take the next logical turn and suggest that drugs and pop have never taken the same fork in the road.
Without some form of statement, music would have become as relevant as the novella, or Spanish mime.
Every turn in society has been reflected in the music of the day, from medieval folk to early jazz and blues, to punk and beyond. In some societies, it is one of the few ways of telling how brutal life is.
Hundreds of thousands of people overflowed the streets of central Barcelona on February 20 in the largest ever European demonstration in support of refugee rights. The city police estimated attendance at 160,000 people; the organisers 鈥 the 鈥淥ur House, Your House鈥 campaign 鈥 put it at half a million people.
All along the vast march, its thematic sea-blue placards stood out in the light of the bright winter鈥檚 day: 鈥淓nough excuses! Let鈥檚 take them in now!"
The Australian government, at the behest of the United States, has decided to boycott major United Nations nuclear disarmament beginning on March 27. It argues that US nuclear weapons are essential for Australia鈥檚 security and therefore should not be prohibited under international law.