"That until the philosophy which holds one race superior and another inferior is finally and permanently discredited and abandoned: That until there are no longer first-class and second class citizens of any nation; That until the color of a man's skin is of no more significance than the color of his eyes; That until the basic human rights are equally guaranteed to all without regard to race; That until that day, the dream of lasting peace and world citizenship and the rule of international morality will remain but a fleeting illusion, to be pursued but never attained." – Haile Selassie, English translation of 1968 Speech delivered to the United Nations, and popularised in the song War by Bob Marley...
STILL I RISE~ You may write me down in history With your bitter, twisted lies, You may trod me in the very dirt But still, like dust, I'll rise.Does my sassiness upset you? Why are you beset with gloom? 'Cause I walk like I've got oil wells Pumping in my living room.Just like moons and like suns, With the certainty of tides, Just like hopes springing high, Still I'll rise.Did you want to see me broken? Bowed head and lowered eyes? Shoulders falling down like teardrops. Weakened by my soulful cries.Does my haughtiness offend you? Don't you take it awful hard 'Cause I laugh like I've got gold mines Diggin' in my own back yard.You may shoot me with your words, You may cut me with your eyes, You may kill me with your hatefulness, But still, like air, I'll rise.Does my sexiness upset you? Does it come as a surprise That I dance like I've got diamonds At the meeting of my thighs?Out of the huts of history's shame I rise Up from a past that's rooted in pain I rise I'm a black ocean, leaping and wide, Welling and swelling I bear in the tide. Leaving behind nights of terror and fear I rise Into a daybreak that's wondrously clear I rise Bringing the gifts that my ancestors gave, I am the dream and the hope of the slave. I rise I rise I rise.~Maya Angelou
Bobby Sands was only 27 years old when he died while on hunger strike in the H blocks of Long Kesh prison. Sands began his hunger strike on March 1, 1981 and died 66 days later. Nine of his comrades followed him to their graves. Bobby Sands was a believer in the spirit of the common man. "I believe and stand by the God-given right of the Irish nation to sovereign independence, and the right of any Irishman or woman to assert this right in armed revolution. That is why I am incarcerated, naked and tortured." As part of their refusal to be criminalized, the Republican prisoners began a blanket protest in which they wrapped themselves in blankets rather than wear prison uniforms. These prisoners were subjected to torture and held in solitary confinement. Sands believed in revolutionary change for the oppressed and said that "Our revenge will be in the laughter of our Children". (O'Brien, Jack -British Brutality in Ireland)
The above mural painted by the Bogside artists of N. Ireland depicts one of the events that took place on 'Bloody Sunday' in Derry on January 30, 1972. On this day the British Army opened fire on a Civil Rights demonstration and killed 14 people. The mural shows a group of men, led by a local Catholic priest (later to become Bishop Daly), carrying the body of Jack (Jackie) Duddy from the scene of the shooting. Depicted in the background are the marchers carrying a 'civil rights' banner. The same banner became bloodstained when used to cover the body of one of those killed. The construction lines draw the eye downwards through the lifeless body of the victim to the banner. Marching for civil rights is how and why this young man lost his life. The blood stained banner upon which the soldier is standing speaks a great deal for the price people pay everywhere for democratic freedom. (Kelly, William -The Bogside Artists)
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The Tiananmen Square protests of 1989, commonly referred to as the Tiananmen Square Massacre, were a series of demonstrations led by students, intellectuals, and labor activists in the People's Republic of China (PRC) between April 15, 1989 and June 4, 1989. While the protests lacked a unified cause or leadership, participants were generally critical of the ruling Chinese Communist Party and voiced complaints ranging from minor criticisms to calls for full-fledged democracy and the establishment of broader freedoms. The demonstrations centered on Tiananmen Square in Beijing, but large-scale protests also occurred in cities throughout China, including Shanghai, which stayed peaceful throughout the protests. In Beijing, the resulting military crackdown on the protesters by the PRC government left many civilians dead or injured. The toll ranges from 200–300 (PRC government figures), to 400–800 by The New York Times, to an astonishing 2,000–3,000 stated by the Chinese student associations and Chinese Red Cross. Following the violence, the government conducted widespread arrests to suppress protestors and their supporters, cracked down on other protests around China, banned the foreign press from the country and strictly controlled coverage of the events in the PRC press. Members of the Party who had publicly sympathized with the protesters were purged, with several high-ranking members placed under house arrest. The violent suppression of the Tiananmen Square protest caused widespread international condemnation of the PRC government and opened the world's ears to the cause. Today 13 protesters remain incarcerated for their participation in the protest against the government.
Raoul Gustav Wallenberg (August 4, 1912 – July 16, 1947?) was a Swedish humanitarian sent to Budapest, Hungary under diplomatic cover to rescue Jews from the Holocaust towards the end of WWII. Wallenberg stared the Nazi beast straight in the eye and refused to blink as he saved thousands of Jews from the fires of Auschwitz by issuing them protective passports from the Swedish embassy.In December 1944, upon learning that Hungarian Nazis planned to murder the 70,000 Jews remaining in the Budapest Central Ghetto, Wallenberg warned a Nazi commander he would make sure the commander would be hanged as a war criminal if he would allow the massacre to occur. The general ordered the conspirators to desist, and the lives of 70,000 Jews were saved. When the Russian army entered Budapest on January 13, 1945, they took Wallenberg into custody and accused him of being an American spy; he was taken to a Soviet Gulag and never heard from again. Often Wallenberg is credited with being the greatest rescuer of Jews during the Holocaust. His story is told now to ensure that “our children shall know that even in a dark period, when evil took over the world, one brave and determined man was able to save tens of thousands of Jews.†~("Righteous Gentile"- J. Bierman ) ThÃch Queng Ãoc was a Vietnamese Buddhist monk who burned himself to death with gasoline at a busy Saigon intersection on June 11, 1963. This photograph was taken during his self-immolation to protest against the way the administration of South Vietnamese President Ngô Ãình Diem was oppressing the Buddhist religion. The photographer Malcolm W. Browne went on to win the 1963 World Press Photo of the Year for this image. Another reporter that witnessed the event, David Halberstam, remembers "As he burned he never moved a muscle, never uttered a sound". After his death, his body was recremated. During the cremation, his shrunken heart still remained intact. It was thenceforth considered holy and placed in the care of the Reserve Bank of Vietnam.Madame Nhu, the first lady of South Vietnam at the time, commented with regard to this that she would "clap hands at seeing another monk barbecue show". This supposedly resulted in her receiving the alias of "Dragon Lady". (Higgins, Marguerite- Our Vietnam Nightmare) YELLOW PERIL (sometimes Yellow Terror) was a color metaphor for race that originated in the late nineteenth century with the immigration of Chinese laborers. Its historical roots can be traced to the persistent theme in Western culture that the barbarian hordes of Asia, a yellow race, were always on the point of invading and destroying Christendom, Europe, and Western civilization itself. The notion of "yellow peril" manifested itself in government policy with the U.S. Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882, which reduced Chinese immigration from 30,000 per year to just 105. Those restrictions were not eased until 1952 when Congress created quotas for Asian immigration and made people of all races eligible for naturalization. "The superior whites had to exclude the inferior Asiatics, by law, or, if necessary, by force of arms."(Labor leader, Samuel Gompers) Lynchings of Asian immigrants by vigilante groups were common in the early 1900s, paralleling the activities of the Ku Klux Klan and related groups in the South against African Americans. Asian immigration history bears the scars of humiliation, exploitation, and segregation just as brutal and inhumane, simply not as often talked about. ~Oliver, Revilo- The Yellow Peril.... "THE ENEMY OF MY ENEMY IS MY FRIEND" ~Mao