Alternative News

Articles from non-mainstream as opposed to corporate for profit sources.

Travel Doesnt Have to Cost the Earth

Details: Published on Tuesday, 04 February 2020 00:42; Written by editor

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~(((( T h e B u l l e t ))))~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
A Socialist Project e-bulletin ... No. 1991 ... February 4, 2020
_________________________________________________

Travel Doesn’t Have to Cost the Earth:
Five Concrete Steps Toward a Climate-Smart and Fair Transport Sector in Stockholm

Planka

The climate threat is the most fatal problem humanity has ever faced.

In 2009, the current Kyoto protocol will be replaced with a new international climate agreement, a process in which the EU must be one of the main drivers. As holder of the EU presidency, Sweden will play a key role when world leaders gather to sign the new agreement. Does the Swedish government deserve such a pivotal role? -- We don’t think so.

The politicians take pride in demands for one abstract percentage target after the other, but that’s not good enough. The figures need to be followed by concrete steps, and in that respect today’s politicians are completely paralyzed.

In Sweden, the transport sector is the main climate culprit, being responsible for more than 40 per cent of our climate impacting emissions. Contrary to common assertions, Sweden has in fact not reduced its emissions at all, since the entire...

Realizing 'Just Transitions': The Struggle for Plant Conversion at GM Oshawa

Details: Published on Monday, 03 February 2020 06:58; Written by editor

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~(((( T h e B u l l e t ))))~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
A Socialist Project e-bulletin ... No. 1990 ... February 3, 2020
_________________________________________________

Realizing ‘Just Transitions’: The Struggle for Plant Conversion at GM Oshawa

Sam Gindin

On November 26, 2018, General Motors announced a number of plant closures in North America, the largest of which is in Oshawa, Ontario. The Oshawa facility, once the largest auto complex on the continent, was to end all its assembly operations by the end of 2019.

The response of the federal government, which had used the preservation of jobs to justify giving GM billions in public funds during the financial crisis, was a tepid ‘disappointment’. The provincial government, which had been plastering the province with the slogan ‘Ontario is open for business’ was left red-faced when, as its billboards were going up, GM announced the closing of one of the largest workplaces in the province. Both levels of government essentially closed their eyes and wished the issue away.

Nor did the autoworkers’ union, Unifor, escape its own share of discomfort. Less than two years earlier, its leadership had negotiated lower wages and pensions at GM for new (essentially younger) workers...

Beyond Market Dystopia: Socialist Register 2020

Details: Published on Sunday, 02 February 2020 04:12; Written by editor

LeftStreamed — Recorded in Toronto, 22 January 2020

Beyond Market Dystopia: Socialist Register 2020

The Toronto book launch of Socialist Register 2020 – Beyond Market Dystopia: New Ways of Living (edited by Leo Panitch and Greg Albo).

Connecting with and going beyond classical socialist themes, this volume of the Socialist Register combines analysis of the severe contradictions of neoliberal capitalism with plans for new strategic, programmatic, manifesto-oriented directions for alternative ways of living. Fourteen original essays locate such utopian visions and struggles in the dystopian present.

Amy Bartholomew: Beyond the ‘barbed-wire labyrinth’: migrant spaces of radical democracy.
Michelle Chen: A new world of workers: confronting the gig economy.
Stephen Maher and Sam Gindin: Class politics, socialist policies, capitalist constraints.

Chaired by Leo Panitch and Greg Albo.

Click here to view presentation

Share on Facebook

LeftStreamed YouTube channel

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~(((( LeftStreamed Production ))))~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Produced by the LeftStreamed Collective. Viewers are encouraged to
distribute widely. Comments on the video and suggestions are
welcome - write to This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it." ' + path + '\'' + prefix + ':' + addy90458 + '\'>'+addy_text90458+'<\/a>'; //-->

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

If you do not want to receive any more newsletters:r0

Forward...

Peace Brigades update - January 31, 2020

Details: Published on Wednesday, 18 November 2020 13:22; Written by editor

Capitalism, Socialism, and Existential Despair

Details: Published on Friday, 31 January 2020 02:42; Written by editor

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~(((( T h e B u l l e t ))))~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
A Socialist Project e-bulletin ... No. 1989 ... January 31, 2020
_________________________________________________

Capitalism, Socialism, and Existential Despair

Chris Wright

Decades ago, Edward Said remarked that contemporary life is characterized by a "generalized condition of homelessness." Decades earlier, Martin Heidegger had written that "Homelessness is coming to be the destiny of the world." Around the same time, fascists were invoking the themes of blood and soil, nation, race, community, as intoxicating antidotes to the mass anonymity and depersonalization of modern life. Twenty or thirty years later, the New Left, in its Port Huron Statement, lamented the corruption and degradation of such values as love, freedom, creativity, and community:

"Loneliness, estrangement, isolation describe the vast distance between man and man today. These dominant tendencies cannot be overcome by better personnel management, nor by improved gadgets, but only when a love of man overcomes the idolatrous worship of things by man."

Over a hundred years earlier, Karl Marx had already understood it was capitalism that was responsible for all this collective anguish. "All fixed, fast-frozen relations… are swept away," he wrote in the Communist Manifesto, "all new-formed ones...

Glyphosate falling from the sky

Details: Published on Thursday, 30 January 2020 22:02; Written by editor

I know you care about protecting people, animals, and the planet from toxic pesticides, so I want to make sure you saw this. Airplanes are dumping toxic glyphosate on Indigenous land in Canada, and Indigenous elders desperately need your help to fight back.

Can you chip in so Indigenous elders can win a historic lawsuit to stop glyphosate aerial spraying?

If you’ve saved your payment information with SumOfUs, your donation will go through immediately:

Donate CA$92 now Donate CA$139 now Donate CA$185 now Read more: Glyphosate falling from the sky

Loblaws' plastic nightmare

Details: Published on Thursday, 30 January 2020 07:46; Written by editor

The overpackaging of fruit, vegetables and meat needlessly contributes to the plastics crisis.

Tell grocery giants Loblaws, Metro and Sobeys to eliminate plastic packaging for fruits, vegetables, meat and fish.

Sign the petition

Grocery giants Loblaws, Metro and Sobeys suffocate apples and green beans, meat and fish in plastic. It's hard to avoid filling our grocery carts with harmful plastics.

And the plastic ends up in landfills and polluting our oceans.

Bags that suffocate seabirds, microplastics that season our favourite dishes - it’s an unnecessary price to pay for fresh food.

Already, many supermarkets in Europe have already eliminated plastic from the packaging of their products. Alternatives exist. Grocery stores are starting to change their approach, but they need to kick their ecological transition into high gear.

A strong outcry right now will force these grocery giants to speed up their transition away from plastic and save our oceans from the plastic scourge.

Tell...

It all began at Tim Hortons ...

Details: Published on Thursday, 30 January 2020 07:04; Written by editor

It all began at Tim Hortons ... r1 ...

The Traffic Hierarchy

Details: Published on Thursday, 30 January 2020 04:40; Written by editor

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~(((( T h e B u l l e t ))))~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
A Socialist Project e-bulletin ... No. 1988 ... January 30, 2020
_________________________________________________

The Traffic Hierarchy

Planka

One is not born a motorist, one becomes one.

Mobility and class are deeply entangled. Not only because one’s potential for mobility often has to do with one’s economic position, but also because a society built on today’s mobility paradigm – automobility – directly contributes to growing economic and social differences.

A society which puts the car on a pedestal quite obviously favours motorists. Another obvious fact is that white high-income and middle-aged men are an over-represented group among motorists. And the opposite is true among public transport users. But, a society that prioritizes motoring, and looks at ever-growing mobility as an almost magical recipe for development, increases the differences between its citizens and different parts in other ways as well.

The current traffic hierarchy, with the car on top and with public transport, bikers and pedestrians at the bottom, manifests itself in the fact that these means of conveyance are given different amounts of space and resources. With the car on top of the traffic hierarchy we...

Please tell everyone:

Details: Published on Wednesday, 29 January 2020 21:56; Written by editor

Hi PAOV,

Thanks for signing our petition to call on Standard Bank and Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation to stop financing the East African Crude Oil Pipeline.

This might seem like a very tiny action, but we know that public pressure works. Together, we can make sure fossil fuels are kept in the ground.

There's more you can do: please share the petition!

Thank you!

Landry & the entire 350.org team

350.org is building a global climate movement. You can connect with us on Facebook, follow us on Twitter, and r38

Glyphosate falling from the sky

Details: Published on Wednesday, 29 January 2020 07:10; Written by editor

A small group of Indigenous elders is suing the Canadian government to stop toxic glyphosate raining down on their land. Without you, they won’t be able to win this lawsuit and companies will keep poisoning their land.

Can you chip in today to stop this rain of death?

If you’ve saved your payment information with SumOfUs, your donation will go through immediately:

Donate CA$92 now Donate CA$139 now Donate CA$185 now Donate another amount

Airplanes are flying over indigenous land in...

Abiy Ahmed: Nobel Peace Laureate Who Faces Unrest at Home

Details: Published on Wednesday, 29 January 2020 01:24; Written by editor

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~(((( T h e B u l l e t ))))~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
A Socialist Project e-bulletin ... No. 1987 ... January 29, 2020
_________________________________________________

Abiy Ahmed: Nobel Peace Laureate Who Faces Unrest at Home

Nizar K. Visram

When the 2019 Nobel Peace Prize laureate, Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed, was in Oslo for the award ceremony, eyebrows were raised when he declined to attend any event where he would be asked questions in public. Organizers expected him to meet the international press in keeping with the Nobel tradition, but his spokeswoman cited "pressing domestic issues" and his "humble disposition."

The secretary of the Nobel committee, Olav Njolstad, called the decision "highly problematic," noting that a "free press and freedom of expression are essential conditions for a lasting peace in a democracy." He said the committee would "very much have wanted Abiy to engage with the press during his stay in Oslo."

Abiy is not the only Nobel laureate that failed to "engage with the press." The former US president Barrack Obama also declined to meet the press when he accepted the peace prize in 2009. Perhaps they were both avoiding one pertinent question: Was the decision to...

ICYMI: Quick Survey

Details: Published on Tuesday, 28 January 2020 13:12; Written by editor

Dear Paov,

I wanted to make sure you saw my email from last week. In case you missed it, right now 350 Canada is shaping its priorities for 2020 so we can continue to build a climate justice movement brave enough to fight for the better world we know is possible.

Our movement has shown it can make a huge impact when we work together. Can you take 5 minutes to fill out this survey so we can understand what matters most to you?

This past month has made it crystal clear that we are in the midst of a global climate emergency. And we have no more time to spare. In 2020, we need our elected leaders to freeze all fossil fuel projects, like the Trans Mountain pipeline and the Teck Frontier mine, and deliver a Green New Deal that works for everyone.

350 Canada is committed to keeping the pressure up on our elected MPs to make climate action and a Green New Deal top priorities, but we can’t do it alone.

Shape our work by filling...

Read more: ICYMI: Quick Survey

Nominate your hero

Details: Published on Tuesday, 28 January 2020 07:04; Written by editor

Liberty Awards Nominations Due Feb 14th

No images? Click here

...

From Lockout to Blockade at Co-op Refinery: Solidarity with Unifor 594

Details: Published on Tuesday, 28 January 2020 05:40; Written by editor

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~(((( T h e B u l l e t ))))~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
A Socialist Project e-bulletin ... No. 1986 ... January 28, 2020
_________________________________________________

From Lockout to Blockade at Co-op Refinery: Solidarity with Unifor 594

Socialist Project Steering Committee

Members of Unifor 594 and the union’s national leadership are waging a bitter battle against Co-op Refinery Complex, a division of Federation of Co-operatives, Ltd, and the company’s efforts to force concessions on the workers’ pensions. The company is demanding that the existing workforce as well as new hires move to defined contribution pensions, whereby workers contribute and actual pension levels are no longer guaranteed as negotiated but subject to financial market investments.

The company has viciously attempted to break the strike, initially through a lockout imposed on December 5, after the union gave strike notice. In response, the 800 workers, members of Unifor Local 594, with the support of the union’s national leadership, organized a blockade of the company’s Regina refinery.

Since then, the employer has used scab labour -- especially dangerous in refinery work -- and has relied on two clearly politically driven court injunctions and the use of cops and mass arrests to limit picketing....

1,443 kilometers of crude

Details: Published on Tuesday, 28 January 2020 04:08; Written by editor

A family from Hoima Kigaga in Uganda, whose farming livelihood is threatened by a crude oil pipeline. Photo: Tom Laffay

In Case You Missed It

Crude moves: Activists worldwide are challenging banks and financiers to stop new fossil fuel projects. Now their sights are on stopping South African and Japanese banks from funding a crude oil pipeline in East Africa.

It would run 1,443 kilometers through the Lake Victoria basin and threaten the climate, wildlife and livelihoods of people across Uganda and Tanzania.

So far, the banks have ignored opposition from local groups in both countries — but a strong public outcry could stop them before Uganda’s government makes the deal. Add your voice by signing the petition now, and check out the video at the end of this newsletter for more on this struggle.

10 years later, schools like this pose a huge threat

Details: Published on Monday, 27 January 2020 11:26; Written by editor

Boa Sr died 10 years ago today, and an entire language died with her

Today is a sad day: It marks 10 years since the death of Boa Sr. As the last of her tribe, an entire language, culture and knowledge system died with her.

Boa Sr lived in the Andaman Islands, off the coast of India. Her tribe was decimated by the arrival of the British in 1858.

Most of her people were killed or died of diseases brought by the colonizers, or by the disastrous and cruel policy of taking children from their families to be raised in a children’s home. Of 150 babies born in the home, none survived beyond the age of two. Today, a new danger threatens the survival of many tribes in India – one which will completely destroy their identity.

This month Survival revealed that an Indian mining company has opened a new residential school for tribal children in Odisha, in an effort to “transform” them.

Peace & justice stories - Quaker Concern newsletter

Details: Published on Monday, 27 January 2020 06:10; Written by editor

We're kicking off a new decade in style with a new look for our digital and print newsletter Quaker Concern. Let us know what you think!

The Messy Work of Seeking Justice

by Matthew Legge

Have you ever changed your mind on an issue you cared deeply about? If so, how did that transformation happen? If not, why do you think that is?

Seeking justice and peace—the mission of Canadian Friends Service Committee—only seems easy when we’re overly confident...

700 days of picketing for rights and recognition

Details: Published on Sunday, 26 January 2020 21:02; Written by editor

700 days of picketing for rights and recognition r1

...

Climate emergency

Details: Published on Sunday, 26 January 2020 05:10; Written by editor

Australia is on fire -- but corporations from around the world are still planning to dig up more climate-wrecking coal there for a quick profit.

Germany’s Siemens plans to sell rail signalling equipment for a gigantic new coal mine in Australia, literally giving a green light to a project that will spell disaster for our planet.

Tell Siemens CEO Joe Kaeser to quit the Adani coal mine contract!

Sign the petition

Australia’s Prime Minister has acknowledged that human-caused climate change is partly to blame for the bushfires. But he’s still in lock-step with the coal industry -- and so is Germany’s Siemens, which plans to provide signalling equipment for a massive new coal mining project there.

Siemens is literally giving a green light to a fossil fuel project that will spell disaster for our planet.

A, public pressure on Siemens is spreading across Germany, led by young climate activists who’ve been...

Alternative News