Jonette OKelley Miller's blog

FOR’s 2010 Peace Awards Celebration — where Scott Kennedy, Medea Benjamin and Drs. Tashi Dolma and Tashi Rabten will be presented respectively with the International Pfeffer Peace Prize, the Martin Luther King, Jr. Peace Prize, and the Nyack Area Peace Prize — is fast approaching on Sunday, October 3, from 1 to 4 p.m.

Planning is underway for our 2010 Peace Awards. This year’s theme is Peace of the Action! Just as in years past, choosing recipients for our International Pfeffer, Martin Luther King, Jr. and Local Nyack Area Peace Awards (from over 50 nominations) proved to be a formidable challenge.

This year’s winners are: Scott Kennedy, co-founder and Middle East Program Coordinator for Resource Center for Nonviolence; Medea Benjamin, co-founder of CODE Pink and Global Exchange; and Drs. Tashi Dolma and Tashi Rabten, founders of the Tibetan Home of Hope.

I live in the mid-Hudson Valley, technically “up North.” I often visit my mother who is currently living in a nearby nursing home. I used to have conversations with one of her co-residents, (I’ll call her Mrs. P). Mrs. P is an elderly white woman who likes to tell “humorous” stories about black people and white people that most often include thinly-disguised racist stereotypes. Frankly, I’ve grown tired of them. She seems to unconsciously have a thing about ethnicity. I say ”˜ethnicity’ rather than ”˜race’ because both religion and science agree there is only one race — that being the human one. But I digress.

In Celebration of the 39^th Anniversary of Earth Day join us at FOR as we commit to being more mindful of others and the environment. Feel free to add your own!

"10 Personal Greening Steps to Celebrate Earth Day"

Yesterday, the New York Post published a racist cartoon, portraying President Obama as a monkey. That newspaper has published content with racist overtones for many years; I stopped buying it in the 1970s because I found its stories frequently used race-baiting and bordered on titillation rather than true journalism. Today, Color of Change organized a campaign to demand an apology so that we could let the Post know that this is not OK.

I would encourage people, both individually and collectively, to pressure newsstands, stores, and other vendors that sell the Post to discontinue distributing the newspaper. Now, here's what the message says — please join me in signing on:

Spend an evening enjoying good music and help support FOR!

Join us on Saturday, November 15 at 8pm for a special Benefit Concert featuring singer/songwriter and harpist, Gillian Grassie and her band at Riverspace in Nyack, NY. Riverspace is an innovative, not-for-profit cultural center that presents established and emerging artists in the fields of music, theatre, dance, film and education located at 119 Main Street.

Classically trained in both harp and voice, Gillian’s diverse influences include Dexter Gordon, Joni Mitchell and the Indigo Girls. She has developed a unique style fusing jazz, folk and rock music. Saturday, November 15 also marks the debut of Gillian’s new album, Serpentine.

As we remember the 40th anniversary of Dr. King’s death today, this message from ColorofChange.org serves to remind us that even as we live through these historic, politically-heady times — there is still much work to be done.

Innocent. And in solitary for 35 years.

Take action to achieve justice for the Angola 3:

After a week of intense public pressure, officials at Angola prison moved Herman Wallace and Albert Woodfox out of solitary confinement for the first time in 35 years.¹ But they’re still locked up—for a crime everyone knows they didn’t commit.

Together, we’ve started to turn things around by making it a political liability for the authorities at Angola to keep Wallace and Woodfox in solitary confinement for challenging the violence and segregation at Angola.² We need to keep the pressure on to force federal and state authorities to intervene and release these innocent men. Will you join us?

http://colorofchange.org/a3/