Sparrow’s cofounder Andy Stepanian joined the Indypendent’s all-star team of would-be cabinet appointees, Bill McKibben (Dept. of Energy), Michael Ratner (Attorney General), Laura Flanders (Secretary of State), Sarah Jaffe (Dept. of Labor), Remi Kanazi & Alex Kane (Special Envoy to Palestine & Israel), Deborah Small (Director, DEA), Nathan Schneider (Dept. of Defense) and accepted the appointment of “Secretary of Department of Homeland Security.”  The following is his contribution, written as an acceptance letter…

AN AMERICAN STORY OF EMPATHY & HEALING

In the weeks between my appointment and when I entered this office I had the privilege of spending several days alongside former Secretary Janet Napolitano. I found Secretary Napolitano’s leadership to be exemplary as applied to the terms defining her position as DHS secretary. These terms, framed 11 days after the 9/11 terrorist attacks, provide a foundation for what it means to direct our Department of Homeland Security. However, I regretfully, and respectfully, submit to you today, that these terms upon which we apply the responsibility of securing of our homeland are flawed. I intend to spend my term as secretary redefining these terms, and eventually redefining the position of secretary to the Department of Homeland Security.

With no disrespect intended to Secretary Napolitano, I will share with you a conversation she and I had regarding these aforementioned terms.

When I asked Secretary Napolitano to recall her first days in office, she waxed nostalgic about a conversation she had in 2009 with her predecessor, Secretary Michael Chertoff, about “the cornerstone of our security apparatus.” This “cornerstone” was handed down from Tom Ridge to Chertoff to Napolitano. When I asked her what this “cornerstone” was she simply replied, “the enemization of everything.”

Over the past nine-and-a-half years, this department has grown exponentially to employ more than 240,000 Americans around a principle that in order to innoculate our population against an attack by an invisible enemy we must first “enemize” everything, treating each and every living thing (and at times even non-living electronic entities) as if she, he, they or it were plotting the next attack on our homeland. The private sector has also seen unfettered growth around its ability to monetize “the enemization of everything,” from developing security technologies in response to unforeseen “enemies” to using the specter of terrorism to draft and fast-track model legislation that serves business interests.

While taking a position that everything is an “enemy” can make it harder for an “enemy” to execute his or her plans, it also creates an ugly, fear-driven environment that sows seeds of distrust, from misplaced suspicions about your neighbor’s religious or political affiliations to fears of crowds or airplanes. Moreover, this “enemization of everything” has been observed to have a profound psychological impact on some individuals. For some, being told over and over by peers or media that they are “an enemy” makes them want to react by becoming that enemy. After surviving a decade rife with violent outbursts and mass shootings, we as a nation cannot afford to ignore the psychological impacts of our post-9/11 terror culture and security-industrial complex on the moral fabric of our communities.

I intend to use my directorship here at the Department of Homeland Security to transform this agency into a restorative agency. To do so we must first undo this prerequisite “enemization” model. We then need to reach an understanding that terrorism, whether political or apolitical like a shooting in a movie theater, almost always has an origin. These origins should be treated as wounds that we as an agency have a responsibility to heal. If we as an agency can isolate these origins on various cultural, systematic or personal levels, we can begin to heal the wounds that jeopardize our security.

From deeply personal individual battles with cancer to the global war on terror, human responses to these acute onslaughts are almost always reactionary and seldom preventative.

Amid the immediacy of our tragedies we rarely question what brought us to those malignant moments; instead we desperately reach for quick fixes — surgery, chemotherapy, torture, drones, carpet-bombing. In the global war on terror, preventative medicine is often practiced as pre-emptive military action, rendition, entrapment, torture and sanctions. These means never challenge the cultural roots of the problem and often serve as a tool for terrorist recruitment.

Like flourishing bacterial cultures in a petri dish, terrorism is a symptomatic cultural reflex that can be easily seen growing out of its own hospitable environments. Oppression, poverty, inadequate education, constant subjugation to the accepted institutionalized abuse of animals and a lack of individual autonomy are the stagnant waters in which this global disease of terrorism takes root and grows. As secretary, I intend to use this agency to analyze, isolate and ultimately treat the prerequisite events that give way to future acts of violence.

To make this agency a restorative agency, not only must we speak in a restorative manner, but our actions and our policies must also promote restoration.

Many of my detractors have speculated about my proposed policy changes, some have gone as far as to call them “treasonous.” I will reserve any comments regarding my policy plans for a later date, but can assure those detractors that I fully intend to re-write their script of “enemization” to an American story of empathy and healing.

Sincerely,

Andy Stepanian
Secretary, Department of Homeland Security

This beautifully illustrated special edition of The Indypendent is a powerful testimonial of the alternatives we can create. A list of distribution locations are available here, a .pdf download is available here.

Join Dr. Benjamin Chavis, co-founder of Occupy the Dream; Allison Kilkenny, contributor for The Nation, In These Times and co-host of Citizen Radio; Malik Rhasaan, co-founder of Occupy the Hood; Rachel Schragis, designer of the Flow Chart of the Declaration of the Occupation of NYC, Steven Syrek of the Occupy Wall Street People’s Library and Ryan Devereaux reporter for The Guardian by way of Democracy Now! along with Julie Gueraseva and Andy Stepanian of The Sparrow Project as they discuss where Occupy has taken us, where it can bring us, and what to expect in 2012.

The Declaration of the Occupation of New York City 2nd ed. booklet is a collection of the official statements drafted by the New York City General Assembly, a Letter from the Occupiers at Tahrir Square to the Occupiers of Wall Street, and an expanded resource list for occupiers to organize and network with. Taking inspiration from the pamphlet that sparked the Mai 1968 uprisings in Paris, France, the crowd-funded, design-savvy Declaration has already received acclaim from Vanity Fair, Current Television, and other forward-thinking media outlets.

20,000 copies of The Declaration of the Occupation of New York City will be made available for free during the event. Attendees are encouraged to each take a bundle and help distribute them around the city.

To view the event page on the Housing Works website use  THIS LINK

To view & RSVP the facebook event page for the event use THIS LINK

To watch the full interview visit — http://www.democracynow.org/2011/6/21/if_a_tree_falls_new_documentary

If a Tree Falls will be screening from June 22nd to the 28th at The IFC theatre located at 323 6th avenue (at west 3rd street) in NYC.

For a full list of the screenings at the IFC visit — http://www.ifccenter.com/films/if-a-tree-falls-a-story-of-the-earth-liberation-front/

For a list of screenings nationally visit — http://ifatreefallsfilm.com/screenings.html

Daniel McGowan is currently being housed in the Communications Management Unit (CMU) at the United States Penitentiary at Terre Haute, Indiana. In a controversial ruling an Oregon court ruled that McGowan’s acts of property destruction as part of the ELF although wholly non-violent were to be considered acts of terrorism and designated McGowan as such. The CMU is a designer penal program aimed at severely restricting the communications of McGowan and other specially designated inmates like him as well as cutting off their access to the outside world. This includes a ban on contact visitation with immediate family members.

Daniel and all of the men housed at the CMU need your support! For a list of things that you can do to support Daniel McGowan as well as information about Daniels case visit — http://supportdaniel.org/

To learn what you can do to fight for the rights of prisoners secretly held within CMUs the Center For Constitutional Rights has set up a webpage dedicated to the CMU at — http://ccrjustice.org/cmu-factsheet

Thursday, April 28th 7pm
Terrace 124,
Green Mountain College
1 Brennan Circle
Poultney, VT

RSVP here via Facebook*

Andy Stepanian, cofounder of the Sparrow Media Project & defendant in the SHAC7 trial will dissect contemporary activist movements, highlighting which tactics are working, when they work best, and how a diversity of tactics often yield the largest benefit. Andy will reflect on his past involvement with non-violent direct action movements, his role in the campaign to close down Huntingdon Life Sciences, as well as his current with Sparrow work as a grassroots activism PR consultant.

Join us on Tuesday, April 26 at NYU’s Kimmel Center, Room 803 from 6:00 to 7:30 PM

You can RSVP this event on facebook HERE*

The semi-elusive UK street artist Banksy was commissioned to storyboard the intro to the primetime animated television show The Simpsons which airs weekly on the Fox network. It is amazing that this passed, and perhaps even insulting to know that a company as crude and oppressive as NewsCorp feels ok about parodying themselves in this manner. Whether you hate Banksy or love him, there is no question that he shanked 20th Century Fox & NewsCorp in the jugular with this one. Watch, laugh, and then do your part to disassemble the corporate media…

One year ago Cassi Amanda Gibson visited their handmade skatepark and emailed us photos. Since then the kids of the skateboard union and Jackson Mubiru, the union’s founder, have consistently inspired us and everyone else who we shared their story with.

To say that skateboarding will put an end to a 20 year long civil conflict would be naive, but the principals exercised by the Uganda Skateboard Union have, and will continue to change lives for the better. In a region where international non-profits and NGO’s providing aid are often viewed with skepticism, or viewed as parental, these youth have created their own social epicenter where their positivity and creativity is infectious.

Their numbers are growing exponentially every day, and with the growing numbers, gear and resources are being run through faster then they can arrive in the region. Sparrow was stoked to team up with Sky High Skateshop, Special Sauce, Supreme, and Boundless NYC in helping provide the Union with over 100 pairs of brand new skate shoes, dozens of new decks, trucks, clothes, books & magazines. The kids were stoked too. Cassi and her sister Nicolette returned to Kampala twice over the course of the year to bring the kids more supplies and to film a short video for http://sparrowmedia.net. The kids are also pretty good at getting their own press, like this photo feature on BBC.com and most recently this video feature on CNN.com

With their growing numbers their dreams are growing too…

The kids hope to expand their park and build an adjacent school. In a country where publicly subsidized schooling ends at age 12 and only the most fortunate can further their education, this kids are taking their DIY approach one step further with a plan to build a solar powered learning center as part of the programming offered through the union. This will cost them $13,800 (US Dollars) to build and outfit with books & five computers. The Sparrow Project has made these shirts to support the dreams of the Uganda Skateboard Union, when you purchase one %50 of the proceeds will go directly to the Uganda Skateboard Union. The kids in Kitintale live the very essence of solidarity, we tried to capture a piece of that and put it on a shirt.

Last week Andy Stepanian of The Sparrow Project wrote an article for The Huffington Post declaring that, “all of BP’s greenwashing can clean up their spill,” and this week that is becoming evident. The article drew a lot of responses from activists and readers alike, but one was most interesting…

Last week we got a tip from a twitter follower, that the re-branding of BP & similar greenwashing campaigns came out of a design studio in the UK called Ogilvy Earth even worse they have issued a sort of greenwashing manifesto, they call their “greenwashing guide; without the greenwashing.” It takes a lot of audacity to keep doing what they were doing without even a hiccup considering the reality of the situation in the gulf of mexico.  Now it would be foolish to somehow blame Ogilvy Earth for BP’s current mess, but they are a symptom in a larger sickness to which all of us that drive, buy plastics, or consume animals, take part in daily. These events will only stop when we drastically shift our worldview from that of a mentality of taking to that of peaceful coexistence. What if each of us upheld a worldview that the earth, it’s elements, and it’s animals existed for their own reasons and not simply for our consumption?

That said, our prior notions are being challenged all the time now, and not just from activists. Wether it’s figures that show a waning ecological carrying capacity, figures that show that we may have already reached global peak oil, or an exponential increase in species extinction people are being challenged with a reality that we, and the things on this earth are finite and not inexhaustible. Activists are also challenging this notions, and some of them are doing so in very creative ways. In the UK alone there were two brilliant actions last week that creatively shut down business for those responsible for the BP spill, and the destruction of the Alberta tar sands.

Greenpeace held a contest for the best re-branding of BP’s flower re-brand. This is what the very talented winner came up with, and it was so good that before it ended up on any handbills it had to replace the company flag at BP’s headquarters. This video is brilliant…

“Before Abu-Sayyaf was an inmate in a secretive US political prison called a ‘Communications Management Unit’ Abu-Sayyaf was a computer programmer for a software company in Florida. Abu-Sayyaf was an immigrant, he attained rights as a US citizen, he gave back to his community, to his co-workers, he generously donated to UNICEF, and he gave much of what he had to people outside of this country, specifically to children in Bosnia…”
(to read the full story click here)

Please Submit Comments to The Bureau of Prisons & Please Share This Article With Your Friends. You can submit your comments online or through the mail.  If you submit comments via regular mail, please send them to the following address and include the following docket number in your correspondence:

BOP DOCKET #1148-P COMMUNICATION MANAGEMENT UNITS
Rules Unit, Office of General Counsel Bureau of Prisons
320 First Street, NW. Washington, DC 20534

Please consider submitting your comments by June 2, 2010* and sending The Center for Constitutional Rights a copy of your comments as we’re hoping to collect these pieces to illustrate the depth of collective public outcry over the creation of the CMUs.

*The official deadline for comments is June 7, 2010.
**Please send copies via email to: nzamani@ccrjustice.org

or via regular mail to:
Nahal Zaman //  Center for Constitutional Rights
666 Broadway, 7th floor, New York, NY 10012.
To download a sample letter click here.

]]> https://sparrowmedia.net/2010/04/dave-denenberg/ Tue, 20 Apr 2010 05:28:52 +0000 http://blog.sparrowmedia.net/?p=752
For more info on the Green Expo click here.

Long Island says, “NO TO LNG!” With little public review a group of investors proposed the construction of an artificial island 13 miles south of Long Beach that would import and re-gas foreign Liquid Natural Gas (LNG.) The plan is bad for our environment, it poses a threat to our coastal security, and has a laundry list of negative social & economic impacts. Nassau County legislator Dave Denenberg, Claudia Borecky chair to Denenberg’s Anti-LNG Taskforce, Marvin Weiss, and Andy Stepanian of the Sparrow Media Project will present an overview of the proposal, list it’s environmental and social impacts, and will highlight what we as Long Islanders can do to stop it before it is built.

Dave Denenberg