Category: ThinkableWords

Words that induce thought…

Activism In Sport

I was pointed to this video last weekend, where “[a]cclaimed Sports Illustrated and The Nation sportswriter,” Dave Zirin, was in Vancouver “speak[ing] about activism, sports and the Olympics as part of a series entitled ‘Politics in the Ring‘;”

“Zirin talked about the idea of activist athletes, what they’ve fought for, and what they’ve opposed. From feminist uprisings against wearing corsets in tennis, to Muhammad Ali’s activist conversion after his Olympic win, Zirin showed that sports has the power to extend beyond just spectacle. […] Versed in the history of sports, Zirin was critical of the hypocritical stance the International Olympic Committee has taken on several issues over the past century…”

Speaking as an individual who spent most of his childhood attention following and playing various “organized” — even playing hockey with a bunch of idiots in the street involves a little organization — sport, and being thoroughly uninterested in the whole idea of professional incarnations of sport, for going on 20 years, I found this “talk” quite interesting. Even refreshing.

Check it out…

Continue reading Activism In Sport

‘Great Television Makes Bad Journalism’

Get a load of Robert Jensen’s article, posted today, “Great Television Makes Bad Journalism: Media Failures in Haiti Coverage;”

“[I]n the past week we’ve heard journalists repeat endlessly the observation that Haiti is the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere. Did it ever occur to editors to assign reporters to ask why? […] The immediate suffering in Haiti is the result of a natural disaster, but that suffering is compounded by political disasters of the past two centuries, and considerable responsibility for those disasters lies not only with Haitian elites but also with U.S. policymakers. […] But there’s little discussion of how the problems of contemporary Haiti can be traced to those policies. […] When mainstream journalists dare to mention this political history, they tend to scrub clean the uglier aspects of U.S. policy, absolving U.S. policymakers of responsibility in “the star-crossed relationship” between the two nations […] The news media, of course, have a right to make their own choices about what to cover. But we citizens have a right to expect more.”

I’ve spent the past week, say, casually reading Paul Farmers concisely detailed book, The Uses Of Haiti. And what I’ve read, thus far, from Farmer’s book, Jensen has “duplicated”  here. Probably the best, briefest bunch of words I’ve happened to read, personally, concerning Haiti’s tragic history, Western influences on that history, and the media’s failure to accurately inform us, the ignorant masses, on the relevancy of those facts. Not to mention the truth, in general.

I recommend reading it…

Thanks Kelly

Taking a break from my Haiti “commentary” — not that more attention toward the aftermath of the earthquake(s) is/are, by any means, not warranted or undeserved — I thought I’d direct your attention to 2 excellent and separate blog postings, each written by, the same author, Kelly Garbato. Kelly blogs for both V for Vegan: easyVegan.info and Animal Rights & Anti-Oppression. And, as I said, today posted On being a pro-choice vegan and On “trusting women” (all women).

Brilliant! There are way too many instances in which I’d wish to cite, from both articles, so I highly recommend you read them, both of them.

Thanks Kelly…

Haiti Occupied? And For What?

In today’s first segment of Democracy Now’s broadcast, Amy Goodman filed a report straight from Port-au-Prince, Haiti. See what you haven’t seen, or are likely to witness, in the mainstream media. YOU NEED TO SEE THIS!

Near the beginning of Amy’s piece, she talks to Dr. Evan Lyon of Partners in Health, where he says;

“I think it has real potential to be an occupation. If there are 12,000 soldiers here, it is an occupation. I’ve not known of any violence at the hands of the American military. We’ve also just barely had the beginning of collaboration with them, literally within the last thirty minutes. General Keane, their operations person, finally showed up here after some time. And the military is helping us secure the grounds. But of course this is an occupation. It’s not a—this is a disaster area. Warm bodies help, but military is potentially very destructive in this environment.”

But in conjunction to what Cynthia McKinney wrote yesterday, the words I cited above, are ridiculously damnable (against perceived American intentions, not Dr. Lyon, of course);

“I shudder to think that the “rollback” policies believed in by some foreign policy advisors to President Obama could use a prolonged U.S. military presence in Haiti as a springboard for rollback of areas in Latin America that have liberated themselves from U.S. neo-colonial domination. I would hate to think that this would even be attempted under the presidency of Barack Obama. All of us must have our eyes wide open on Haiti and other parts of the world now dripping in blood as a result of the relentless onward march of the U.S. military machine…”

Next month’s Anti-Empire Report is sure to be mighty interesting…