NEWS BROKE THIS WEEK ABOUT ALLEGATIONS OF INACCURACIES in Three Cups of Tea, the bestselling memoir by Greg Mortensen, the story of his school-building work in Central Asia. Mortensen is accused of fabricating events in the book, and now a charity run by Mortensen is also under scrutiny.
Despite the news and controversy about this particular project, there is a need to hear about the social conditions facing Afghans today. One place to find that perspective is Community Supported Film. They train Afghans to use video to tell their own stories.
Brewing Tea in a Kettle of War is a documentary focussing on the economic development process in Afghan villages. The project is spearheaded by filmmaker Michael Sheridan, who was inspired to mentor Afghan journalists and filmmakers.
Here’s the introduction to the film:
Community Supported Film has also just wrapped a series of shorts called The Fruit of Our Labor. You can view excerpts of the finished works on their official Vimeo channel.
A CRACKDOWN AT THE KIRTI MONASTERY in Tibet’s Ngaba region has led to one of the most violent crackdowns yet by China’s authorities against Tibetan culture this month. On Friday, the Dalai Lama appealed to the international community to persuade China to act with “restraint.”
The Kirti monastery, in Tibet’s Ngaba region, has a history of protest against the Chinese occupation, and was the site for a major demonstration in March of 2008. On March 16 of this year, Tibetan monk Phuntsok [Phuntsog] self-immolated to mark the third anniversary since Chinese armed forces cracked down these protesters.
Last week, residents attempted to stop Chinese authorities from taking monks away for “re-education.” Currently, the monastery is still surrounded by armed troops. Police also went house-to-house questioning residents, and there are now reports of arrests and enforced disappearances. The International Campaign for Tibet published a list of those who were forcibly disappeared.
The U.S government criticized China over its violent actions and says it is “monitoring the situation.” But that sounds like empty words yet again.
The world’s attention is currently on the arrest and disappearance of Chinese artist Ai Weiwei. It’s the most obvious and high-profile example of China’s relentless violation against the rights of its own citizens, artists, and pro-democracy advocates.
Chinese authorities will continue to ignore the West’s tsk-tsking and appeals from rights’ groups unless people speak out. Sunday’s peaceful action in support of Ai Weiwei is a start. Now it’s time to do the same for Tibet. Go here and here to learn more and support democratic freedoms.
IN THE FACEBOOK-BASED GAME “AMERICA 2049,” SOCIAL ACTIVISM-MEETS-’24′, all in the name of building awareness for human rights issues. The creators hope players will see human rights as more than just a game.
The global human rights organization Breakthrough developed the game and populated it with well-known celebs and stars (Victor Garber, Harold Perrineau) who act out the “story”: over 12 weeks, players take on missions dealing with immigration, race, sexual orientation, sex trafficking, religion, labor, and national security.
And there is always old guard Games For Change, who will host its eighth annual conference this June in New York.
But leveraging the power and prevalence of Facebook with a game is an intriguing idea. There’s certainly potential for Facebook users to raise awareness for a cause.
The subject of human rights is not one that ignites a fire under those people who are more interested in Angry Birds or Call of Duty. Do either of those two games make one think about, say, food insecurity or the effects of war?
The fact is people already use Facebook to bring attention to a cause or issue. We all know Facebook has even been credited with a revolution (see: Egypt). Aren’t those who want to make a social impact already doing so, without the help of a game?
Will a Facebook-tied game make you more aware of an issue if it comes in the form of entertainment? Judge for yourself:
GLOBAL MILITARY SPENDING IS AT AN ALL-TIME HIGH of 1.5 trillion dollars—if you could spend that money on something else, what would you choose? Education, healthcare, or poverty reduction…?
What would it cost to save the world?
Two organizations, the International Peace Bureau (IPB) and Institute for Policy Studies (IPS) advocate for a new paradigm where military expenditures do not exceed what is spent on human needs. They’ve organized a Global Day of Action on Military Spending on April 12.
The following video, from campaign partner Fundació per la Pau, demonstrates how much is spent on maternal and child mortality and combating infectious diseases, vs. military spending:
For more on today’s global day of action on military spending, visit the official website.
LOOKING INTO THE FACES OF FORMER ABU GHRAIB DETAINEES is to confront pain and suffering, but also some measure of survival. It forces the viewer to see the human cost of the U.S. government’s recent history and practice of torture.
In his portrait series, “Bearing Witness,” artist Daniel Heyman looks into the face of this history directly. Heyman is a first-person witness to the aftermath of imprisonment of over 40 Iraqis held and subsequently released from Abu Ghraib.
Heyman sat in on interviews between human rights lawyers and these former Abu Ghraib detainees, sketching not only their images but adding their testimony as part of the overall work.
On his site, Heyman writes about the impact of hearing first-hand the experiences of the detainees:
I am a proud American citizen who needed to know the truth of what was happening. In 2004, when the first reports of Americans torturing Iraqis appeared, I no longer recognized my own country. My only stake in the matter was that I love my country and what it stands for in the world —civil rights, the rule of law, habeas corpus, and something as simple as the right to wear clothing in prison. I have no special access to information and no security clearance. I only have my ears and a desire to listen to what happened. I continue to be astonished and disturbed at what I’ve seen and heard. (Source)
THE STORY OF HOW A FORMER JUNTA MEMBER and soldier, Myo Myint, changed sides and became a pro-democracy activist is the subject of the film Burma Soldier. Now, secretly made copies of the film are making the rounds in Burma. The producers of the film have also made the film available in Burmese through Vimeo, and it’s gone viral.
The film’s upcoming release in the U.S. (it’s scheduled to air on HBO in May), is good timing for Burma watchers: all eyes are on how the recent regime change will play out.
The film, co-directed by co-directed by Nic Dunlop, Annie Sundberg and Ricki Stern, goes inside the military and effectively reveals how Burma became a military dictatorship. It’s also a very personal look at one man’s life and how he comes to understand his nation’s history and his place in it. “I will fight for peace,” he says in the film. “That’s what I decided.”
Here is a photo essay about Myo Myint, and the story of how he switched sides. You can watch the film in its entirety on Vimeo (in Burmese):
LIFE FOR ACTIVISTS AND DISSIDENTS IN CHINA GROWS MORE DESPERATE after this week’s extrajudicial detention of artist Ai Weiwei. He was last seen Sunday as he tried to board a flight to Hong Kong.
It’s the latest, and most high profile, arrest of any dissident so far in China’s latest crackdown on dissidents and artists.
China is afraid of an Arab-style uprising. Persistent and anonymous calls for a “jasmine revolution” keep cropping up. Ai Weiwei, always an outspoken critic of China’s ruling communist party, made no secret of his support for civil disobedience.
Meanwhile, the dissidents are rounded up: there were dozens of arrests last week.
It was not until Ai Weiwei’s forced disappearance that governments joined human rights groups in condemning China’s actions, including the United States, France, and Germany.
The EU and China have a scheduled dialogue for the end of May. This is yet another opportunity for democratic nations to fully engage China and call them out for their lack of human rights. The EU must not let China slither away with its double talk about “misunderstandings.”
The appeasement of China must stop.
Time and again China acts preemptively, and with impunity, to silence dissent, while the West looks the other way or wrings its hands, and releases mealy-mouth statements to “free such-and-such.”
Dissent in China is real, otherwise the government wouldn’t be reacting so violently. The nascent flowering of revolution was nipped in the bud (here’s a timeline of how the original non-protests went down), but repression will not make it go away.
We’ve forgotten that revolutions once happened without cell phones, the Internet, or computers. They happened by word-of-mouth, pamphleteering, meetings between people.
In 1989, there was no Internet—but students organized in Tiananmen Square anyway.
It’s true this generation doesn’t know a world without digital connection. And the people who remember Tiananmen, or who were there and survived, may not be able to speak of it today. But that’s what China needs now: the passed note and human voice. It’s time to rescue the old tools of revolution.
The human voice is ultimately the most powerful tool we have: we must speak up, and speak loudly. We must all do this now to support democracy and defend the voiceless.
SISTER FA IS SENEGAL’S MOST FAMOUS RAPPER and a role model for youth. She’s also a determined and outspoken activist who campaigns against FGC (Female Genital Cutting).
Sister Fa was herself a victim of genital mutilation, and is using her voice to raise awareness to end the practice of FGC. Her career and activism have always gone together: in 2008, Sister Fa took her tour “Education without Mutilation” through the villages and cities of Senegal, using her music to speak out about ending female genital mutilation.
In this interview, she talks about why FGC, while outlawed in Senegal since 1999, is still carried out in some communities:
A documentary about her life and work, Sarabah, shows the singer returning to her native village to engage with the women in her community. The film was recently honored at the Movies That Matter Festival.
THE PRO-DEMOCRACY BLOGGER IS TODAY’S VOICE in the cyber-trenches. The blogger occupies a unique place in journalism and politics, speaking and writing from a personal standpoint but also taking on the biggest issues in her society.
This post looks at three regions of the world where dissidents are denied their freedom of speech: Egypt, Cuba, and Tibet. Here are 3 top human rights bloggers to read now:
1. Dalia Ziada, Egypt: This young human rights activist, translator, and researcher has been recognized as an engaged activist, and outspoken voice, for an inclusive Egyptian society that does not marginalize women or minorities.
Ziada is also currently the director of the Egypt office for the American Islamic Congress. Her blog’s voice is enthusiastic and inspiring. After Mubarak’s overthrow, she posted, “WELCOME DEMOCRACY… We can’t wait to embrace you.” Read her blog at dalia.ziada.blogspot.com.
2. Yoani Sánchez, Cuba: As a leader for advocating human rights and democratic freedoms in Cuba, Sánchez increasingly comes under fire from the government. Earlier this month Cuban authorities accused her of engaging in a “cyber war” against the government. Meanwhile, her blog, Generation Y, is an important portal for news and other Cuban blogs. Plus, it’s available in over a dozen languages. Read her post about meeting with President Jimmy Carter during his recent visit to Cuba.
3. High Peaks Pure Earth, Tibet: This blog is a must-read for translated posts from both Tibetan and Chinese blogs. High Peaks Pure Earth regularly publishes translations and links to posts from leading activist Woeser, and writing from other blogs. It’s a particularly good source for news about crackdowns and blackouts on Tibet-related social networking and blogs.
Learn More about Bloggers Writing for Freedom of Speech from these sites:
THE BLACK POWER MIXTAPE 1967-1975 is a new documentary made from 16mm films taken by Swedish journalists, who covered the Black Power movement from the late 1960s to early 1970s.
This includes never-before seen interviews and footage of Stokely Carmichael, Martin Luther King, Eldridge Cleaver, and Angela Davis (the latter during her imprisonment and trial in 1972).
The footage sat in a basement for 30 years, and it’s a remarkable find. Director Göran Hugo Olsson shaped the footage to form a narrative in 9 chapters, one chapter for each year. The film adds contemporary voice-overs from poets Sonia Sanchez and Abiodun Oyewole, musicians Erykah Badu and John Forté, historian Robin Kelley, and others.
While the Black Power movement may be too big to squeeze into a short documentary (the run time is barely over 90 minutes), you come away with a significant understanding of the events and people who participated and shaped the time.
Olsson’s decision to create a strict chronological story, moving from year to year, is the film’s strength. You literally see, hear, and feel change happening on-screen. The archival footage includes public appearances and speeches that are profound and sharp, like Eldridge Cleaver calling out 1968′s presidential candidates as “three pigs: oink Nixon, oink Humphrey, and oink Wallace.”
But the film also reveals personal moments that are no less effective; for example, Stokely Carmichael interviews his mother about their early family life. Carmichael gently pokes and prods, but the questions get more pointed and we learn how his father was often the first one laid off from a job.
“Why was he the first one laid off?” he asks. “Because he was a colored man,” his mother answers, an exchange that is both poignant and incisive for its context and meaning.
The crisp and immediate images give the now-familiar touchstones of black history, such as MLK’s Nobel Prize, and his final speech on the night before he was assassinated, a new immediacy and import, as if we’re seeing them for the first time.
The year MLK was killed is of course also significant for Robert F. Kennedy’s assassination and the murder of . And footage of young black men and women shortly thereafter is a key point in the film. In this moment when so many leaders are being killed, everyone interviewed on-camera tell reporters they feel “there is no future,” and that they “have no hope left.”
As we enter the 1970s, the Southern roots of the movement fade, and we witness the beginnings of the Black Panther Party. The setting also shifts from public to private: large auditoriums and public spaces are replaced by houses and apartments, or a detention cell, the inside of a dealer’s car.
This is an urban mise-en-scene populated not just by the newsmakers and boldfaced names, but by everyday people.
The later chapters take place almost entirely in Harlem of the 1970s, where we glimpse a population struggling with poverty, disenfranchisement, and drug addiction. By the time Louis Farrakhan appears on-screen, and we’ve reached the middle of the decade, we’ve been on a journey that shows the evolution of a southern nonviolent movement into a more northern, urban-set base.
Although the people and events we’ve witnessed are an enormous part of who and what the United States is today, there is still the feeling of a parallel narrative—a story happening “somewhere else” to other people that the dominant, white, middle-class culture chose to marginalize and ignore. But as The Black Power Mixtape proves, the issues Americans faced then—war, income inequality, and racism—remain with us today.
