A History of Poor Support for Immigrants

(This post was written by Guadalupe Cruz, a Sophomore at June Jordan School for Equity and an intern here at the Freedom Archives.)

Recently I listened to a cassette recording that had a lot of information about different topics. It was a recording of a radio program called “Crossroads” that originally aired in 1992. The radio program had 3 parts to it. The section of the program which interested me the most was the first section which talked about how the government of California was cutting the budget for English classes for immigrants at city colleges.

The reason that it interested me was that many of my family members are immigrants and they are trying to make themselves legal residents or citizens of the USA. For that to happen it is required for them to learn English. If California had these budgets cuts and cut off English classes how can the immigrants become citizens? I’m thinking, if the government wants immigrants to become legal citizens why are they taking away the resources for them to actually become a citizen?

My mother right now is taking English classes. It took her a really long time to find a place to learn where it is free and convenient for her. Most of the time, when she looked for classes it was either she had to pay for them, change her daily schedule, or they would turn her away because the classes were too full. One of the main points in the program was that if the government cut the budget then there would be less classes and fuller classrooms. If the classrooms are full then teachers would have to turn away many potential students and those students would have to wait a really long time until they could get in. It’s hard for an immigrant to get a nice job if they do not know how to speak English.

I am not entirely sure if the government has added more money to the budget to help out immigrants enroll in English classes but there is still a problem because it took my mother some time to find a decent place to learn English. It would be really nice if the government paid a little more attention to immigrants’ needs than just trying to kick them out of the country.

Preserving a Radical Past: Ten Years of the Freedom Archives

Our friend, Dan Berger, wrote up a great article about us for War Resisters. Check it out:

Tucked in San Francisco’s Mission District lies a treasure trove of social movement history and culture. The Freedom Archives is home to more than 8,000 hours of audio and video, as well as countless papers and publications from the last 50 years of people’s struggles.

The materials housed at the Freedom Archives cover topics ranging from actor/singer/activist Paul Robeson to Puerto Rico. The collection emphasizes the struggles for Black liberation, Native American sovereignty, Chicano liberation, peace and social justice, and women’s liberation. It is home to rare publications and recordings of these and other radical movements since the 1960s. Its focus is local, national, and global. Particularly noteworthy is the collection of radio programs and raw audio footage of interviews and events from the 1970s about a variety of organizing endeavors.

The archives makes this material publicly available, allowing the researcher and the documentary producer, as well as the curious activist, access to radical history that cannot be found elsewhere. The basic collection is also searchable online.

Perhaps the strongest aspect of the collection is the variety of materials it contains about prison organizing. This emphasis should not be surprising: The reporters whose programs are housed there covered prisoner organizing and political trials around the country throughout the 1970s, and the archives also has a plethora of prison-themed newspapers and flyers from the heyday of prison organizing. These materials were donated by dozens of activists in the Bay Area and beyond, making the Freedom Archives home to an impressive array of political ephemera.

Prison radicalism can also be found in the creation of the Freedom Archives. Founder and director Claude Marks began locating materials and old friends to build this social movement archive while he was finishing a four-year sentence as a political prisoner for actions taken in solidarity with the Puerto Rican independence movement. His experience, along with the continued activism of the archives’ other founders and board of directors, means that the archives emphasizes prison issues in the context of struggles against repression and for justice.

Since the archives opened its doors in 1999, it has continued to publicize the history of prison organizing through audio and video documentaries. It produced an hour-long audio documentary called Prisons on Fire, about prisoner and Black Panther field marshal George Jackson (killed in prison on August 21, 1971) and about the Attica prisoner uprising in September 1971.

The archives has also produced a CD of poetry by political prisoner Marilyn Buck and four documentaries about prison struggles. These documentaries have addressed women in prison (Charisse Shumate: Fighting for Our Lives), oral histories with political prisoners (Voices of 3 Political Prisoners: Nuh Washington, Jalil Muntaqim, and David Gilbert) and prison activists (Self-Respect, Self-Defense, and Self-Determination: Mabel Williams and Kathleen Cleaver, with Angela Davis), and contemporary cases of political repression (Legacy of Torture: The War Against the Black Liberation Movement).

Its next project is an hour-long DVD about the FBI’s Counterintelligence Program (COINTELPRO), which tried and imprisoned hundreds of activists in the 1960s and 1970s—including several who remain incarcerated today.

The Freedom Archives is no passive outlet for radical history; it played an active role in the campaign to free the San Francisco 8, which succeeded in forcing the state to drop the charges against most of the defendants, all former members of the Black Panther Party.

The archives’ resources cross media formats and technological capacity: whereas using the space in person provides access to reel-to-reel audio from radio programs in the late 1960s and throughout the 1970s, the archives also maintains two email announcement listserves. One list supplies news articles about prisons and political prisoners, and the other discusses general anti-imperialism topics. The archives recently began a monthly podcast of its materials as well. Its office is open by appointment.

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Dan Berger lives in Philadelphia and writes about prison organizing and political prisoners. He is the author of Outlaws of America: The Weather Underground and the Politics of Solidarity and editor of a forthcoming book about U.S. social movements in the 1970s.

Reflections on a Legacy of Torture

(This post was written by Juan Manjivar, a sophomore at June Jordan School for Equity and an intern at the Freedom Archives.)

From watching The Legacy of Torture, I learned about a group of Black activists who were arrested in 1973 on suspicion that they were a part of a 1971 shooting in San Francisco. They were caught in New Orleans and then taken to jail cells. They were tortured into saying they were guilty.

Another thing I learned is that they never charged the police department for torturing the group of men. Even after a couple decades, there hasn’t been a trial against the torturers.

I think that the police who tortured them should be prosecuted. It is unbelievable that they were not charged. Racism was bad in those days, and what is hard to believe is that it still happens today.

Not a Quiet Country: Learning About Pilippino Women’s Movements

(This piece was written by Guadalupe Cruz, a sophomore at June Jordan School for Equity and an intern for The Freedom Archives.)

In the Freedom Archives’ archives there is a recorded interview with women in the Philippines about how women are getting into politics in the Philippines. Four women were interviewed by Maricel Pagalayan and talked about how politics and culture changed when the Philippines elected their first woman president, Corazon Aquino. When she became president all the women organizations like MAKIBAKA, GABRIELA , and KAIBA became more present than ever.

This information got me thinking and wondering about how the Philippines were. It made me research more about the Philippines and their past with how they used to treat women. I found out a lot of information about the main big organization, GABRIELA and how the organization helped a lot of women in the Philippines get independence and freedom. The organization helped a lot in the struggle to stop human trafficking. What the organization would do is make more people aware that women’s trafficking is happening and how the people can help to stop it. GABRIELA became nationally known and has a sister network in the U.S. called GABRIELA network (GABnet). One very memorable thing that GABnet did was in May 2005 they organized a vigil. The vigil was a protest against the political killings in the Philippines.

I never knew that any of this happened in the Philippines. I always thought that the Philippines was a nice quiet country. But once I heard the recording and got to know more about the Philippines I was so wrong. I’m glad that I got to learn about the Philippines and more about its history, culture, and how they have come a long way from their past and now they have a better future ahead.

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Photo: Gabriel Mistral/Getty Images, Jul 12, 2002

PASAY CITY, PHILIPPINES: Filipino women display placards during a protest to express the plight of women who were used as comfort women or sex slaves by Japanese soldiers during World War II during a rally, July 12, 2002 in front of the Japanese Embassy in Pasay City, Philippines. The Filipino women are in the 10th year of their struggle to receive an apology and compensation from the Japanese government.

Malcolm X: The Human Behind the Man

(The following piece was written by Stephanie Jones, a University of San Francisco Senior and an intern at the Freedom Archives.)

How many times have you heard the “I Have a Dream” speech? How many pictures of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. or Malcom X have you seen? Growing up hearing the speeches of these men, more specifically Dr. King, I am no stranger to the idea that civil rights were, and perhaps are, a sensitive issue within the United States. The stories told of the rights leaders above, as well as others such as Che Guevara have always given me the image of these men are greater than human – heroes; men who died for doing what was right of course. But with this title of hero, they were more than human to me.

Last week I listened to a panel discussion of race in the United States in the middle of the civil rights movement. The panel had various key figures of the movement including James Farmer, the Director of CORE at the time, and Malcom X. Before I even began the tape I was excited because although I had heard Malcom X speak a little, I am ashamed to say, the greatest influence on my image of him was Denzel Washington’s portrayal of him in the film, Malcom X. Aside from my excitement about hearing him, I selected the tape with hopes of finding useful material in my search for quotes regarding race relations throughout the world.

The panel discussion began with speeches from the participants, one discussing problems he has encountered with the government, others talking about the success of the bus boycotts in Montgomery. While I anxiously awaited Malcom X’s speech, as I assume the rest of the crowd did, I listened to the other speaker give real, but uplifting speeches about the hopes for the future while being supported by the crowd through applause.

Unlike the other speakers, when Malcom X took the podium, the crowd was silent … I could almost feel the crowds anticipation through the tape. His speech was not unlike the other presenters, discussing the need for change, but more some reason his voice connected in a different way. I was unable to pinpoint exactly what this was until the crowd began to applaud him or the second or third time and he silenced them. Never in my life have I heard a speaker silence a crowd in this manner – as if he had no patience for the praise they were giving him … that is was more important for them to hear him, really hear what he was saying. It was this that distinguished him. His speech was not a speech, I would label it more as a call to action. His disregard for the praise (he without a doubt deserved at the time) was shocking but essential. He was not asking for action, or attention, or respect – he was demanding it.

After his speech, the preliminary part of the panel was over, and the panel fielded questions from the audience. Although other panel members received some questions, the focus was without a doubt on Mr. X. In this discussion, the hero, in the film, in the speeches I had heard before this tape, and in the images I had seen, became human. This was the most exciting part of this tape to me. His responses to the questions were unscripted and uncontrolled; his anger came bursting through the headphones, and with each response he once again demanded. His tone was unlike any other speaker in its urgency and rhetoric.

While many people did not agree with what he was saying, everyone that addressed him did so with a respect that you could hear in their voices. Listening to this man’s unscripted response to question after question with an unwavering tone, confidence, and message was heroic, as I had imaged before, but also human … which I think was the most amazing part.

Major Social Upheaval Takes Place in Puerto Rico

(Orginially posted by “El Tipo Comun” (The Common Guy, Roberto Garcia), from primerahora.com on Sept 30, 2009 )

The unsuspecting governor, smack in the middle of an important press conference, missed being hit by a projectile by mere inches.  The projectile?  Not a bullet, but an egg.  We’re unsure if it was a nationally produced Puerto Rican egg or an imported American egg.  Nonetheless, an outraged citizen calling himself The Common Guy interrupted the press conference by screaming in outrage at governor Luis Fortuno and throwing a slider that landed on a sign highlighting a new development project the governor was announcing.  As officers locked the man in a bear hug and carted him off and as the press swarmed this Common Guy, many things became suddenly clear.  For starters, the Common Guy has poor aim.  But in addition, his public display of resistance is not only transcendental for its raw expression of pain and anger, but is also symbolic and representative of everyone’s frustration and open outrage at the turn of events on the island.

Puerto Rico is witnessing the kind of social, economic, and political upheaval not witnessed in decades.  This week, the government- the largest employer on the island – laid off close to 17,000 workers, in its 2nd phase of downsizing that was initiated in May of this year, with the release of around 5,000 workers.  Over 20,000 government employees have lost their jobs in a matter of months.  Considering the fact that Puerto Rico ’s unemployment rate is around 16%, it is obvious that the island continues to confront a serious economic crisis.  Government officials contend that they inherited a bankrupt government from previous administrations along with a huge debt load.  They are scrambling to prevent their credit ratings to be classified in the lowest of categories: the junk rating.  In order to do so, they passed a law declaring a fiscal emergency, and part of the fiscal restructuring taking place is the downsizing of the government work force.

This, however, also takes place against a backdrop of other sorts.  Incidents of police abuse are being denounced at an increasing rate across the island, with a recent incident involving university students targeted and attacked with batons and indiscriminate use of tear gas by the police.  Squatter communities (also known as developers of rescued lands) have recently been targeted by the conservative administration; these interventions have also been characterized by the use of force against women and children.  Part of the fiscal emergency response has been to declare the end of gains won by collective bargaining agreements, drawing a sharp outcry from the union sector.  Opposition political parties called for a larger burden to be held by the rich and by large corporations, only to be rebuked by the administration that has gone ahead with cost of life increases in basic services and with layoffs which mostly affect the ever-shrinking middle class.  The conservative administration also censured several books by renowned authors in the island’s schools, a deed met with fierce opposition.  The main political parties continue to squabble publicly about future political roles and future candidates for office, and opposition parties either have no presence or struggle against marginalization by news media.   Independence advocates in September commemorated their most holiest of anniversaries in remembrance of a historical insurrection in 1868 and of the 2005 FBI murder of revolutionary leader Filiberto Ojeda Rios, with calls of unity, revolution, and struggle with those affected.  And to top it off, the governor signed an executive order authorizing the use of the National Guard to quell public disturbances and deal with national emergencies.

Even the outlawed anti-colonial guerrillas Los Macheteros re-appeared and issued a statement on September 23 calling for struggle and for solidarity with the affected working class.

The union movement has now taken center stage and has declared a national strike for October 15, 2009.  Union leaders are publicly expressing that if some of the more painful measures – like layoffs – are not rolled back, they will move ahead with a general strike, bringing the country to a complete halt in order to force the government to change course.

The general public, alarmed by the turn of events, finds comic relief in the egg-sistence of amusing public displays of anger expressed towards the person blamed for several social crises: the governor.  The administration, however, is deeply worried.  Aside from losing the next election, they know that the seeds of a general insurrection are being sowed: unemployment, discontent, desperation, and fear.  In light of the disturbing developments on the island, including the ever climbing crime & suicide rates, the general public, or the Common Guy, has reached a level of tension that is culminating in direct action.

Simply put, the common person in Puerto Rico is tired of being abused by their government.  It is no eggs-aggeration to conclude that something is amiss in Puerto Rico and to wonder where this social upheaval will lead to.  In the interim, the Common Guy will continue to look for simple ways to fight back.

Freedom Archives 10 Year Anniversary Party!

Join us in celebrating 10 Years of preserving the past, illuminating the present and shaping the future!

Wednesday, November 11, 2009
7:30pm – 2am
330 Ritch
San Francisco, CA

This event will honor the contributions of all our volunteers and interns for their work and imagination in bringing the archives to life.

Featuring:
MC Anita Johnson, Hard Knock Radio
DJs Sake-1 and Emancipation
And a silent auction where you can win a quilt hand-made by Linda Evans, a former political prisoner
(Raffle tickets are available: $5 each or 3 for $10)

Please come prepared to dance and celebrate 10 years of filmmaking, audio production and archiving of progressive histories!

A History of Oakland Resistance to Police Violence

The Freedom Archives was happy to have hosted summer interns to help us catalog new materials and produce audio projects that include the archives. Projects that use our archived material is so integral to our intentions as an organization. Without these projects, radical histories would not be able to live outside of our library and off the shelves.

One of our summer interns, Sophie Ashley, a senior at Pitzer College, produced a short 3 minute piece documenting Oscar Grant’s death at the hands of police and how the community mobilized to confront police violence. She connects the community mobilization we saw earlier this year with the efforts of the Black Panther Party in the 60s and 70s to show how Oakland communities have historically found creative ways of resisting police violence.

This is what Sophie had to say about the process of making this project.

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Making this audio documentary was a humbling experience. The amount of work that goes into a piece five minutes long is unimaginable to someone unfamiliar with the software and art of audio production.

It was interesting to learn about story telling through audio production because modern media so often has a visual component too. Making a piece about such a sensitive subject come alive through music and narroration was a challenging task.

I want to thank all the artists whose music made the project what it is:
Mistah Fab, Jasiri X and Rukus. I also want to thank Leticia for her help with the story and the physical production. Her advice about the mecanics of the project and her guidance about telling a story of violence in a sensitive manner were very important. It was a really good summer at the Freedom Archives and I recommend it to everyone. Thanks to all parties involved!

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Check out the audio project here:

The Young Lords Party at 40

On Sunday August 23rd at the First Spanish Methodist Church, Lexington Ave and 111 Street, Manhattan (El Barrio) there was a celebration of the 40th Anniversary of the Young Lords. According to the front page story of El Diario, the church was absolutely packed with an enthusiastic public which included Congressmembers Nydia Velazquez and Jose Serrano and Assemblyman Jose Rivera. At that gathering was read the attached message sent by Ricardo Alarcón.

Brothers and sisters,
Hermanas y hermanos

I wish I could be there physically commemorating the 40^th anniversary of the Young Lords. Being that impossible allow me to convey to all of you my thoughts which is the only way for me to be there joining you in this celebration with my heart and soul.

With the birth of the Young Lords the Sixties, that beautiful revolt of a new generation seeking a heaven of love, peace and solidarity on Earth, enter the Latino community in the United States. They were really young, some in their teens, but they showed the way to many others with passionate love for their homeland and their community, with their generous dedication to the struggle that took the lives of some who will live forever in our gratitude.

They are part of my personal history and I always owe a lot to the Lords. In those days I also was a young, the youngest Ambassador to the United Nations. Representing Cuba, almost completely isolated in those days, was a real challenge to me, my wife, my daughter and mother-in-law. We faced a lot of hostility, we felt harassed and discriminated in our daily lives in Manhattan. They – you know who they are – forced us to feel as Puerto Ricans. And we are thankful for that. We are proud to be boricuas from New York.

Defending the Cuban Revolution was not easy there in those days. As it was not easy to demand the independence of Puerto Rico and the liberation of Oscar Collazo, Lolita Lebrón, Andrés Figueroa Cordero, Irving Flores and Rafael Cancel Miranda, the five Puerto Rican nationalist heroes whose freedom we were able to win with our sustained efforts.

May I call upon you to rise in solidarity demanding the release of Oscar López Rivera, Carlos Alberto Torres and Avelino González Claudio, Puerto Rican patriots, who deserve to be free as Gerardo Hernandez Nordelo, Ramón Labañino Salazar, Antonio Guerrero Rodríguez, Fernando González Llort and René González Sehwerert, the Five Cubans being unjustly punished there for fighting US sponsored terrorism against Cuba. Let’s build a strong and powerful movement for the freedom of the Cuban Five and the Puerto Rican patriots with the vigor and the passion that the Young Lords taught us.

Latin America and the Caribbean have entered a new epoch in their history in which Cuba is not alone any more. This is the result of many sacrifices of our peoples who fought generation after generation for freedom, independence and justice.

That epoch should bring for Puerto Rico the realization of its sacred right to self-determination and independence.

We will be always united. It was José Marti who anticipated the common destiny of the Antilles “the sister islands that will succumb together or together will be saved”.

Long live the Young Lords.
¡Viva Puerto Rico Libre!
Hasta la Victoria Siempre.

Malcolm X: Message To the Grassroots

The famous speech, “A Message to the Grassroots,” by Malcolm X has caught my attention as a great speech that youth need to hear.

In the speech, he speaks about Black people’s mentality traced back all the way to slavery. He speaks of house Negroes and field Negroes as two different people that have two opposite views on their existence and role. A house Negro is a Black person who is clearly mistreated and held captive but has the mindset that their maltreatment is normal or called for. On the other hand, field Negroes were historically treated worse, hated, despised and fought against the master.

Comparing that to his current time period, Malcolm connected slave and house Negroes with the “Uncle Toms” that he considered to be the Negro leaders at the time. He defined the Uncle Tom as the one who the white slave master dressed up  so other slaves would look up to him. He would convince the other slaves to calm down their uprising and keep people from uniting or running away.

He likened that character to leaders like Martin Luther King Jr. and Whitney young and other who were around at the time spreading a message of integration and “suffering peacefully”. He told of documents that showed those same leaders partnering up with white millionaires and getting paid to be in the spotlight and have the media at their disposal. He felt that the white influence on the march on Washington weakened the revolutionary stance and thus turned out to be a circus.

This speech is valuable not only because of the wisdom that Malcolm drops but also because of the history and knowledge he shares about the psychology that Black people  have towards one another and with themselves.

I chose to use excerpts from this speech for the same reason. I felt that Malcolm’s powerful and intelligent speech would be even stronger with some hard hiphop drums coupled with a soulful sample. When listening, don’t just bob your head to the beat; listen to the words just as you would any great song and use those words to secure your freedom.
Click the Play Button Below: