---

 

---

 

---

 

---

 

---

 

---

 

---

 

---

 

---

 

---

 

---

 

---

 

---

 

 

SPECIAL ALERT:
SUPPORT CALIFORNIA PRISONERS on HUNGER STRIKE!

Closer to the action, in the Bay Area, a Prisoner Hunger Strike Solidarity Coalition has been established. They have a blog at http://prisonerhungerstrikesolidarity.wordpress.com and can be reached by telephone at 510-444-0484.

 

What follows is an incomplete list of actions and events and forms of support planned regarding the hunger strike, both in the united states and in canada. Send me an email at info@kersplebedeb.com to let me know about events in YOUR area!

Ed Mead, editor of California Prison Focus, was interviewed by On the Hour at CKUT Radio, on the subject of the upcoming strike. It is a short twelve minutes, and well worth the listen - just click here!

There is an online petition you can sign to register your support for the prisoners' five core demands.

 

The petition will be delivered to Warden Lewis, Secretary Cate, and Governor Brown. Now, while i personally don't have a lot of faith in petitions, i did sign this one - prisoner support is one of the rare places that petitions and the like can have an impact - plus, when signing, you should also see it as a personal commitment to do something in your area to support the strike!

 

To sign the petition, just click here.

AND IN OTHER NEWS...

The letter (which was mailed to the wrong address, and that we only received on May 27), explained that this was due to alleged promotion of “gang activities”.

We are challenging this ruling on the grounds that the New Afrikan Black Panther Party does not meet the definition of a "gang" as established by the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation.

Accusing people of belonging to a “gang” has become a convenient way to deprive those people of the ability to communicate, to develop politically/intellectually/culturally, and to pursue what are supposed to be their rights under the system's laws. Many people are understandably fearful of the violence and mayhem associated with many criminal organizations, and these fears are exploited by institutions such as the CDCR in order to justify clamping down on any collective activity, accusing those they don’t like of being members of “gangs” whether or not this is true. Perhaps not so coincidentally, this works to isolate these people from their communities, further eroding the ties of solidarity that exist between poor and oppressed people, leading to an increase in atomization and antisocial violence which in turn makes these communities all the more vulnerable to actual criminal organizations and oppressors operating on both sides of the law.

In other words, repression of “gangs” serves as a fig leaf for the repression of any collective action or organization by the oppressed that does not suit the plans of the oppressor. This dynamic exists in oppressed communities throughout the united states, but like most oppressive dynamics it appears in its most concentrated form within your prison system.

 

For the details of Kersplebedeb's challenge to this ruling, see http://www.kersplebedeb.com/mystuff/profiles/rashid/kersplebedeb_pelicanbay.html

 

For more information about Kevin "Rashid" Johnson and the New Afrikan Black Panther Party (Prison Chapter) see: http://rashidmod.com/

  and