Ongoing actions

[Editor’s note: Here’s a new feature we’re trying out in hopes of giving notice to nonviolent actions we may have missed or following up on ones already mentioned in the daily “Experiments with truth” posts. –BF]

An officer who is not displaying badge numbers holds a protester's face for the camera during last year's Climate Camp in Britain.

• A government review of the Kent police force’s handling of last year’s week-long UK Climate Camp protest at Kingsnorth power station has called the widespread use of stop and search tactics “disproportionate.” But a Freedom of Information request by the Lib Dems found the misconduct to run much deeper, citing instances of police hiding badges, searching kids, blasting music, and misrepresenting injuries.

• Environmentalists and Indigenous peoples of Guatemala have been protesting a proposed mining law that doesn’t provide for community consultation, provides tax breaks for mining companies and sets royalties payable to the state at too low a level.

• Conscientious objector Josh Stieber is on a walking and bicycling tour across the United States to promote peace and give away nearly $30,000 in combat pay he earned in Iraq.

• Many adoption and foster care advocates have been protesting the new horror film Orphan over fears that it will further add to the negative stigma attached to adopting older children. They’ve already succeeded in persuading the studio to remove the following line from an ad: “It must be hard to love an adopted child as much as your own.”

• Plans to mine for coal in Australia’s prime agricultural region have been met with protests—particularly in the form of blockades—from farmers and rural folk, who aren’t typically known for their interest in green issues. They fear contamination of aquifers and the loss of valuable grain production at a time of world shortage.

• Voters angry at the scandals surrounding Brazilian Senate President José Sarney have turned to a bizarre form of online protest: posting pictures of themselves wearing their own version of his trademark moustache.

• Three kiss-ins have been held since the July 9th arrest of a gay couple kissing on Mormon temple property in Salt Lake City. A movement is beginning to take shape, in which organizers are stressing dialogue with church leaders and peaceful confrontations with anti-gay objectors (as opposed to the shouting matches that took place at the first kiss-in). A nationwide kiss-in is being scheduled for Aug. 15.

• Daily protest rallies in the Georgian capital of Tbilisi by a group of opposition parties demanding President Mikheil Saakashvili’s resignation ended last week after 107 days. Some have only called this the first stage of protests, while critics say the opposition is too split and rife with infighting to mount a serious campaign.

• Last week, a federal grand jury indicted Greenpeace and the eleven activists involved in unfurling a banner of President Obama on Mount Rushmore, calling for firm action on climate change.