Monday, February 20, 2006 

"How movements rise and then dissolve, melted by our shallow breath"

As the post-split AFL-CIO faces the likelihood of further defections, the trade union movement's siege mentality ushers in new lows in the internecine chaos. I guess it isn't enough to construct chimerical debates and let the bosses kick our asses; evidentially we have to beat one another to death. A glimmer of hope comes from the news that the NEA is allowing locals to join the AFL-CIO. Maybe this thawing of relations can translate into a NEA-AFT merger at some point in the next quarter century, but I don't plan on holding my breath.

"Sing 'Oh what force on earth could be weaker than the feeble strength of one' like me remembering the way it could have been. Help me with this barricade. No surrender. No defeat. A spectre's haunting Albert Street. I am your pamphleteer."

posted by Nelson H. 2:20 PM | |

Friday, February 17, 2006 

"It was a natural death": should have know, part ii

Several months ago I posted a snippet on Kevin Francois's suspension for refusing to end a call from his mom (who happened to be actively deployed in Iraq at the time) while at school. The post focused on the ridiculous nature of the news coverage and the very important omission of the boy's race in light of certain statements made about his behavior ("very belligerent and very threatening").

Now we come to this story on CNN.com (*NOTE* this story is currently developing, and the posted link is dynamic - so later versions of the story are different from the one I am responding to). The family of a 14-year-old west Florida boy claims that Bay County sheriffs brutally beat their son, Martin Lee Anderson, to death while he was at a local juvenile boot camp. The coroner’s office claims that he died from complications arising from a blood disorder. The article completely omits any mention of Anderson's race/nationality. Ten paragraphs into the fifteen paragraph story, the boy's "blood disorder" is finally names: sickle cell anemia. Legions of authors have written on white-supremacy's complicated, layered structure, facts demonstrated so very clearly in this instance. A major evolutionary advancement is reduced to a "blood disorder;" the prison-military-industrial complex is reduced to four words: "juvenile detention boot camp"; and the neo-colonial killing of a fourteen-year-old is presented as "a natural death."

posted by Nelson H. 2:43 PM | |

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