The Susan G. Komen race for the cure
By Brandon Astor Jones
I have before me the first page of the D-section of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. It carries a photograph of Atlanta's Piedmont Avenue. From curb to curb it is covered with
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Actively Radical TV — Sydney community television's progressive current affairs producers tackle the hard issues from the activist's point of view. CTS Sydney (UHF 31), every Sunday, 9-11pm. Ph 9565 5522. Access News — Melbourne community TV,
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The Wall What could be more symbolic than thousands of people using their bare hands, chisels and sledgehammers to pull down a wall? Not just any old wall. Not a partition some renovating yuppie decided simply had to go in order to justify the
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Winning elections by killing prisonersBetween 1980 and 1998, the Australian prison population on any given day rose from an average of 9600 to an average of 19,906. The vast majority of prisoners serve sentences of less
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Why work is getting harder"Reasonable hours are safer hours", the ACTU declared during its October 25-29 national campaign publicising the health and safety dangers of longer working hours. The dangerous hours campaign
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Kids rally against violence WILCANNIA — Fifteen children and young people marched through Wilcannia on October 28 as part of the town's first Reclaim the Night rally. Staff from the Women's Safehouse and the Far West Ward Aboriginal Health
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East Timor: defeat or victory for the left?"John Passant's Requiem for the Left" is the title of a peculiar article in the November issue of Workers Online, the internet magazine of the NSW Labor Council. Passant, who describes
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Networker: Why prosecute Microsoft? Why is the US Justice Department engaged in a court battle with Microsoft Corporation, the country's most highly valued company? On November 3, Judge Thomas Jackson attacked Microsoft's conduct toward Netscape,
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Government backs away from nuclear reactor rhetoricWhen the federal government decided to fund the construction of a new nuclear "research" reactor in 1997, it faced a difficult public relations exercise. The government decided to
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What are the CPSU officials afraid of?The NSW branch of the Community and Public Sector Union (CPSU) has "suspended" its sponsorship of Organising Works trainee John Gauci just four weeks before the end of his traineeship.
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An Australian businessman has shown his entrepreneurial spirit by opening a new "hotel" in East Timor, the Dili Lodge, where stubbies of VB and Carlton Cold can be purchased, along with plastic thongs. For $110, you can spend the
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Australia gets greenhouse gongThe Australian government has been gonged for its performance in derailing climate change negotiations at the international climate change conference in Bonn, Germany, held from October 25 to November
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SYDNEY — The Carr Labor government of NSW has passed legislation making it almost impossible for political smaller parties without a lot of money to run in state elections. All parties will have to pay $2000 to register and submit
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The world cop and Afghan women "I think that what has happened to the women and children of Afghanistan is atrocious. The first lady and I had an event at the White House to highlight that on Human Rights Day, including having two Afghan women
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The republic was crushingly defeated on November 6; 55% of the electorate voted "no", and not a single state approved it. The preamble was rejected by 61% of voters. The biggest losers are the "official", minimalist republicans —
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Rainforest projects hit the roadLISMORE — Ruth Rosenhek and myself, from Lismore's Rainforest Information Centre (RIC), will be doing workshops and presentations in Melbourne, Canberra, Sydney and Newcastle in the next month to
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Artists reclaiming the streetsSYDNEY — "Reclaim the streets" is a striking phrase. It implies that some activities are now wrongfully excluded from the streets. It implies that someone imposed and maintains the exclusion, and it
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Vegetarianism I was disappointed to read an article (GLW #383) condemning vegetarianism as politically specious. It is divisive to do so, considering that there are a lot of vegetarians in social change movements, and "splitting the camp" is surely
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In the East there is a proverb: "Don't brag when you're on your way to war". Russian President Boris Yeltsin's generals have obviously never come across this saying. They still have not won a major battle in
News
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Women's liberation discussed in WollongongWOLLONGONG — On November 6, Green Left Weekly held a women's liberation forum titled "It's Time to Get Angry Again". Dr Margaret Perrott from the Democratic Socialist Party outlined
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PERTH — After striking for 96 hours, hospital worker members of the Liquor, Hospitality and Miscellaneous Workers Union have won a 5% pay rise and are now entering into arbitration. Five hundred orderlies, caterers and patient
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The federal Coalition government has set its sights on the National Tertiary Education Industry Union as part of its anti-union offensive. The NTEU has suspected for some time that the government will come after it. Industrial
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Bill on same-sex domestic violence welcomedBRISBANE — Gay and lesbian organisations have welcomed the passage of Queensland government legislation giving same-sex couples the same access to domestic violence protection as that
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East Timor benefit CANBERRA — On November 6, Action in Solidarity with Indonesia and East Timor (ASIET) and the Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union organised a benefit for East Timor at the University of Canberra bar. The folk-rock
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"Identity politics" emerged from British and US feminism towards the end of the 1970s. It developed in reaction to the failure of liberal feminism to adequately incorporate or acknowledge the differing experiences and demands of women
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South Coast teachers bury government offerWOLLONGONG — Teachers in the northern suburbs of Wollongong buried a coffin outside Labor state MP David Campbell's electoral office on November 11. On the previous day their colleagues
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Tutorial sizes to be capped at 30 until autumn 2000; Employment to be guaranteed for five staff crucial to a number of courses continuing; No internet-only subjects to be offered; Enrolments to be made not only via the internet; No car
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Royal plural "Our industry is intensely competitive and innovative." — Bill Gates after a US court ruled that his Microsoft has a software monopoly that harms consumers and "quashes innovation". Political talent "We are trying not to
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BANKSTOWN — A major victory has been won by the students at the University of Western Sydney-Macarthur's (UWSM) Bankstown campus, a result of a 14-day long occupation of the Student Information Centre which ended on November 10. The
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Despite much talk about a youth "crime wave", statistics show that youth crime is not out of control and that young people themselves are often the victims of crime. It is true that most criminal offenders are young people. The
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Casual workers to strikeMELBOURNE — Contract workers at the Victorian state government's Land Titles Office, members of the Australian Services Union (ASU), are planning to strike on November 14 and 15. The workers are
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Defence Department opposes nuclear dumpChiefs of the three defence forces and the secretary of the federal Department of Defence have written to the government expressing opposition to hosting a nuclear waste dump on land used
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Another win for the NTEUMELBOURNE — A strike scheduled for November 10 at the Victoria University of Technology was called off after management indicated it would settle an agreement with the National Tertiary Education
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SA union secretary resignsADELAIDE — Paul Noack resigned as the Australian Manufacturing Workers Union (AMWU) South Australian branch secretary on October 29. Noack's resignation followed a meeting of the AMWU's federal
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Thousands rally to save LeightonFREMANTLE — "You all know what you see when you're sitting on the train or driving along Stirling Highway; you come over the hill to this glorious view over the beach and the ocean, and it
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Government slashes funding to green groupsOn November 8, the federal government announced another round of funding cuts to environment groups. The government's funding program, which totals $1.65 million, will now include grants to
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Mapoon elder slams Lingard over 'straw hut' remarksBRISBANE — A leader of the Aboriginal community at Mapoon on the Cape York Peninsula has slammed National Party MP and former Aboriginal affairs minister Kev Lingard over racist
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High school students will walk out on November 30 in Seattle to join a protest against the World Trade Organisation (see Green Left Weekly page 20). The protest is being organised by the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) and
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Union members support sector-wide campaign The Family and Community Services section council of the Community and Public Sector Union passed a motion on November 4 calling for a union campaign for a public service-wide agreement on pay and
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HOBART — Recent articles in the Murdoch-owned Mercury are an example of how the media can reinforce racist myths and whip up nationalism. The government's crackdown on "boat people" has been an excuse for the
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Forest summit warns of new threatsFifty representatives from forest conservation groups around Australia concluded the 15th national forest summit in Victoria's East Gippsland on November 9. The summit warned that forests face
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Building unions stake their claimMELBOURNE — An alliance of four Victorian unions has launched a united claim for a new collective agreement for the building industry. The Victorian branches of the construction and general
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In Dili, more than 10,000 East Timorese marched through the streets on November 12 in a solemn commemoration of friends and relatives killed in the 1991 massacre by Indonesian troops at the Santa Cruz cemetery. It was the first such commemoration
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Telstra walks out of negotiations By Tim E. Stewart In an effort to secure an enterprise agreement without union endorsement, Telstra management walked out of negotiations with unions on November 5. The following week, management express-posted
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Two arrested at bridge protestADELAIDE — Builders are preparing to sink pylons for the controversial Hindmarsh Island bridge, sparking a new outbreak of anti-bridge protests. Two people were arrested at a protest near the
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Gay and lesbian pride springs outCANBERRA — The ACT's first Gay and Lesbian Pride Festival — Spring Out — included a rally and march on November 13, attended by 300 people. The rally was addressed by,
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The Australian Broadcasting Authority (ABA) inquiry into the "cash for comments" scandal involving 2UE's shock jocks John Laws and Alan Jones has the rest of the Australian media running scared. Alan Kohler commented in the
Analysis
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A matter of life or death The national crisis in public health care was dramatised last week when emergency wards in at least five public hospitals in Sydney were closed to all patients except those with life-threatening conditions. "You don't get
World
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Zimbabwe doctors win, nurses strikeNurses in several Zimbabwean cities went on strike on November 9 to demand a pay increase, three days after doctors ended their seven-week strike in protest at low salaries, poor working
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There has been much discussion in Colombia about the "peace" dialogue between the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia-People's Army (FARC-EP) and the government. After decades of unsuccessfully trying to wipe out left-wing
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US blockade aids Iraqi regime FARIS MAHMOOD, a member of the politburo of the Workers Communist Party of Iraq (WCPI) is in Australia until early next year. He spoke to Green Left Weekly's PAUL BENEDEK. In Iraqi-occupied Kurdistan (in the north),
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BRISBANE — United States doctor Warren Hern was detained and questioned by immigration authorities for two hours at Sydney airport on November 10. Hern, a supporter of women's right to choose abortion, was in Australia to attend
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The view from DiliDILI — Burned-out buildings and people on foot — these were the immediate impressions of East Timor's capital when I arrived on November 4 for a 36-hour visit. Jakarta-backed militias had done enormous damage
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East Timor Solidarity Aid Action in Solidarity with Indonesia and East Timor (ASIET) is launching Timor Solidarity Aid to provide material assistance to people's power-based activism in East Timor. Strength in organising, campaigning and mobilising
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Despite extraordinarily brutal oppression, India's working people are resisting the new attacks that the ruling coalition, regrouped after the October election, is seeking to impose. The offensive, loaded with privatisation and
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HARARE — More than six months after Zimbabwe's Supreme Court shocked equal rights campaigners worldwide by relegating African women to the status of "junior males" within the family, many Zimbabweans are worried about the
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Budiman Sujatmiko likely to be freed soonThe Indonesian People's Representative Council (DPR) is likely to recommend the release of at least 44 political prisoners, including People's Democratic Party (PRD) chairperson Budiman
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BANDA ACEH — The mass action that overwhelmed Aceh's capital city on November 8 is undeniable proof of the people's desire for a referendum and their resolve to campaign for it. Some 2 million people took to the streets, in the
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Win for pay equity in CanadaIn a monumental victory for women's rights, the Canadian government agreed on October 29 to implement the July 1998 findings of a human rights tribunal which ruled that there existed a discrepancy in
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East Timorese refugees: no end of traumaMore than 200,000 East Timorese refugees are still languishing in militia-controlled camps across West Timor. United Nations personnel and representatives of human rights groups continue to be
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UN again demands US end its embargo against Cuba The United Nations General Assembly on November 9 overwhelmingly endorsed a resolution, for the eighth successive year, calling for an end to the 40-year-old US economic embargo against Cuba. The
Culture
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The dictatorship of US$ and Wall Street The Global Gamble: Washington's Faustian Bid for World DominanceBy Peter GowanVerso, 1999320 pp., $39.95 Review by Eva Cheng Guns and tanks are usually very visible, but those who control the world also do
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Bad medicineI accidentally caught the last segment of Good Medicine, on Channel Nine at 8.30pm Wednesday night. It was one of those times you are so horrified you can't stop watching. Those 10 minutes were a segment on breast
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Reclaiming the language of East TimorStandard Tetum-English DictionaryBy Dr Geoffrey HullAllen and Unwin$24.95 As the transition to independence begins in East Timor, a debate around language is assuming critical importance. What