Experiments with truth: 8/25/09
More than 300 native Hawaiians marched through the streets of downtown Honolulu on Friday afternoon to protest a commemoration marking 50 years since Hawaii became a state. Protesters chanted in Hawaiian, blew on conch shells, waved ti leaves and yelled, "We are not Americans! We want our country back!" They also carried an effigy of a 12-foot-tall Uncle Sam, eventually knocking off its hat with colonial feathers representing countries that fell under the US imperialism. They then cut off the 50th star on an American flag and set it on fire.
- Members of the Cree aboriginal peoples are set to join the Climate Camp protests in London this week in an attempt to draw attention to corporate Britain’s “criminal” involvement in the tar sands of Canada.
- About 250 Detroit residents gathered at a public hearing yesterday to protest plans that would suspend bus service in the city on weekends and drastically modify more than a dozen other routes in order to save money.
- Workers at a chemical plant in Armenia’s third largest city staged a walk-out yesterday to protest the company’s withholding of back wages.
- Iowa State’s student environmental group gathered yesterday to greet returning students and faculty with a protest against the University’s coal power plant ash disposal practices.
- About 600 protesters blocked operations in and around Dublin Port for three hours yesterday in an escalation of the eight-week long protest at Marine Terminals, where new owners are attempting to replace the existing workforce with lower paid, non-unionised employees.
