Nonviolence News Editor’s Note From Rivera Sun
Looking around the globe in this week’s Nonviolence News, it’s evident that people are gripped in “struggles of survival”. The demands are sensible, reasonable: people want safety from brutal repression, they want wages that pay the bills, and they want a planet they can live on that won’t poison them with every breath or sip of water. Is that too much to ask?
South Africa is bracing for a general strike over cost-of-living increases. It’s a tactic many countries’ workers could be considering, mobilizing across sectors and tapping into the power of both unions and social activist groups. In South Korea, 400,000 people are planning on joining the upcoming two-week-long general strike. While strikes are usually aimed at business owners, this one is specifically designed to turn up the heat on the government and push back against attacks on labor rights. South Koreans have been increasingly mobilizing around labor, with mass protests extending into other issues, such as the recent large protests over Japan’s plan to release 500 Olympic-sized swimming pools of radioactive wastewater from the tsunami-destroyed Fukushima plant.
After the police murder of 17-year-old Nahel Marzouk, France has been gripped by protests – both largely peaceful, nonviolent demonstrations and riots marked by smashed windows, cars in flames, and clashes with police. The riots have had triggered increasing levels of repression from President Macron, who shut down the internet in the outskirts of Paris and mobilized tens of thousands of police officers to quell the unrest. In a chilling move, he is also threatening to fine the parents of underage protesters up to 30,000 Euros. Meanwhile, in the United States, the #StopCopCity Week of Action is once again showing how dangerous and important it is to push back against the rise of the police state. It’s both a local and a global problem that we should all be working to end.
In other Nonviolence News, Peruvians are preparing for a 10-day struggle against the repressive and discriminatory policies of the Duarte administration. Argentines continue to rise up to defend the right to protest and Indigenous Rights in a region run by a right-wing governor. Thousands of Australians rallied in support of a proposed revision to the constitution that would recognize Indigenous People.
Find these stories and dozens more in Nonviolence News>>
A favorite story this week: Extinction Rebellion shut down a coal plant that is operating without a license, accomplishing something the government and the courts apparently could not. It reminded me of a story from Mexico about how Yaqui women dismantled an illegal pipeline and sold it for scrap metal. This approach uses nonviolent direct action to enforce laws, rather than disobey them. It’s creative, and often quite effective.
There’s power in seeing how people like us, around the world, share similar demands. We have a vision of the world we want to inhabit. It’s beautiful. It’s worth the struggle.
In solidarity,
Rivera Sun
Photo Credit: South Koreans protest plan to discharge Fukushima waters.