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Friday, June 06, 2025
2025 Cultic Studies Conference
Wednesday, June 04, 2025
ICE Watch Training
From IfNotNow --
The Trump regime has been kidnapping, imprisoning, and deporting pro-Palestinian organizers — and claiming to do so in the name of Jewish safety. Now, ICE agents are terrorizing and abducting people at routine immigration court hearings.
It’s time to get serious about noncompliance. But how?
Join our Sanctuary Everywhere ICE Watch training on Tuesday, June 10 at 8PM ET / 5PM PT. |
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We’re collaborating with Never Again Action and Jews for Racial and Economic Justice for this crucial virtual call on what to do if you see ICE in your communities. |
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.png "Tues, June 10 8 PM ET Sanctuary Everywhere Jews Against Deportations ICE Watch Training What to do when ICE is in your neighborhood: A virtual mass call")
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On the call, we'll learn about how anti-Arab racism is baked into the detention and deportation machine, discuss what to do if ICE shows up in your community, and explore new ways to plug in and act on our values to not comply.
We know that abductions of Palestinian rights activists are part of Trump’s larger mass deportation agenda. They’re pushing for a multi-billion dollar expansion of detention infrastructure, demanding immigrants register with the government, and ripping hundreds of thousands of people’s immigration status out from under them.
This administration is trying to divide and separate us from our own communities and our neighbors. As Jews, we say: no more!
Join me for this important ICE Watch Training on Tuesday, June 10 at 8PM ET / 5PM PT.
When we all resist and look out for our neighbors, we can fight the fear on which fascism thrives and expand sanctuary to the streets of all of our communities.
Thank you,
Eva Borgwardt Public Engagement Director, IfNotNow |
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Monday, June 02, 2025
From Gateway Green Alliance: Green Party of St. Louis, MO -- Ethnic Cleansing in Palestine’s West Bank
From Gateway Green Alliance:
Tuesday, May 27, 2025
(Brief) Review: No Apologies
Yesterday I finished reading No Apologies by Katherine Brodsky for an upcoming online discussion by the Prohuman Book Club. As I had read it on my Nook app, when I got to the end I was prompted to write a review, and this is what I submitted.
This book looks at the experiences of a number of people who've stood up
to cancel culture over the past several years. This focus on personal
narratives likely makes it more relatable for many readers than a more
abstract approach would.
The point is made near the end of the
book that we need to keep our minds open to all points of view, even
those we may find abhorrent. This is commendable, but it may be somewhat
undercut by the repeated use of the phrases "the silenced majority" and
"the reasonable majority," which wrongly suggest that it's only those
with "extreme" views who may be intolerant. In fact, as one of the
contributors to another recent book that I highly recommend, Ideological and Political Bias in Psychology, has noted, there's also
such a thing as "Left-Right bias," where both ends of the spectrum skew
public discourse on a topic in the same direction. In such instances,
it's the majority that needs to learn intellectual tolerance and
humility.
Monday, May 19, 2025
Rally for SEPTA
Sunday, May 18, 2025
My Public Comment on Technology Platform Censorship
The Federal Trade Commission is seeking public comments on censorship that people have experienced at the hands of technology platforms. In its "Request for Public Comment," it states:
"FTC staff is interested in understanding how consumers have been harmed—including by
potentially unfair or deceptive acts or practices, or potentially unfair methods of competition—
by technology platforms that limit users’ ability to share their ideas or affiliations freely and
openly. FTC staff encourages members of the public, including current and former employees of
technology platforms, to comment on any issues or concerns that are relevant to the FTC’s
consideration of this topic."
You can read the request for comment in its entirely, including instructions for submitting comments, here: https://www.ftc.gov/system/files/ftc_gov/pdf/P251203CensorshipRFI.pdf
The deadline for submitting comments is 11:59pm ET on May 21, 2025.
The text of my comment follows.
The platform (Meetup.com) deleted my account at the request of another user. This was done in response to my suggestion of a preparatory reading for an upcoming meetup. My de-platforming was not in response to off-platform activities. Meetup.com did not notify me of its actions. When I found I couldn’t log in, I sent an email for an explanation, and was told the opinion I had allegedly expressed by suggesting the reading was not permitted on the platform. No countervailing benefit was claimed for my de-platforming. It was for overtly ideological reasons.
Meetup.com’s terms of service mentioned that certain ideas could not be expressed on the platform. Its action, however, was not in response to my expressing any opinion on my own behalf, but merely my suggestion of including a scholarly paper -- included as a chapter of a book from a major academic publisher -- in the preparatory readings for a meetup. As far as I know there have been no pertinent changes to the terms of service since I posted the suggestion that led to my deplatforming. I don’t know how it has responded to other users who have suggested similar readings.
The representative who responded to my email made clear that no appeal of the decision to delete my account was possible.
The effect of my account’s deletion is that I cannot discuss political and social issues with others who are interested in such discussions, preventing any networking with those interested in the same ideas. Although I have also experienced deletion of accounts with Twitter and Truth Social, I never learned the reasons for these deletions. So far, I have not found an equivalent substitute for the networking I could have done by means of Meetup.com.
I do not know what motivated Meetup.com to act in the way that it did. I do not know whether having more competition would have caused them to act differently, nor whether they have colluded with other platforms in their censorship policy.
My view is that companies that offer their services as communications platforms, especially if they are publicly chartered, should be obligated to uphold users’ First Amendment rights. Any government regulation must be viewpoint-neutral and aimed at ensuring that platforms’ policies are also viewpoint-neutral.
Rally for Free Speech Friday
The next Fridays @ Fetterman's will be joining with the ACLUPA in a rally for free speech. Here are the details:
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Saturday, May 10, 2025
Ariel Durant
Major 20th Century historian Ariel Durant was born on this day in 1898. A Ukrainian-born American researcher and writer, she was the coauthor of The Story of Civilization with her husband, Will Durant. They were awarded the Pulitzer Prize for General Nonfiction.
A charming video about their romance is linked below.
https://fstube.net/w/dVk6LVyxy3ooNKUWLC15xq
Quaker Leader to Speak at People's Tribunal
This announcement comes from Fridays @ Fetterman's:
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