Building Tools for Community Organizing — Critical Thought and consciousness raising (Part 1 of 2)

PORTLAND COALITION AGAINST POVERTY

Building Tools for Community Organizing — Critical Thought and consciousness raising (Part 1 of 2)

Discussion and or Roleplays on:

- Libratory language
- Who we are
- Identities, communities and movements
- Power (the ability to enact change)
- Practice (creating space to refine tactics and reflect on power)
- Praxis (action + reflection)

The Portland Coalition Against Poverty is dedicated to creating space to ask questions, and participate in community dialogue. As students in a movement of liberation, we learn and teach from are experience and reflection. As teachers, we root ourselves in listening and asking. Through community conversations we aim to empower ourselves and all individuals participating to become both students and teachers — to listen, ask, experience, and reflect collectively.


SATURDAY NOV. 22ND 6PM - 8PM
FIRST UNITARIAN CHURCH -
BUCHAN BUILDING (Door on Salmon St.)
1011 SW 12TH AVE
SIGNS WILL BE POSTED

LEO CERDA West Coast Speaking Tour: Oil, Indigenous Rights and Creating Just Sustainable Societies

LEO CERDA West Coast Speaking Tour: Oil, Indigenous Rights and Creating Just Sustainable Societies

When: Friday, November 21st @ 4:00 pm
Where: Portland State University
Smith Bldg. Rm 338
1825 SW Broadway

For information on the other dates and places of the tour please visit Rising Tide North America's website @ www.risingtidenorthamerica.com

Leonardo Cerda is an Ecuadorian youth climate, energy and sustainability activist studying International Relations and Political Sciences at the Universidad San Francisco de Quito in Ecuador.

Leo's been involved in resistance movements against the oil industry in Ecuador since he was fourteen years old. He and others in his community starting doing workshops around the Amazon at that time, in different indigenous villages, discussing the causes and the future consequences of the oil industry, it's relationship to climate change and the many other devastating consequences to people and the environment.

Leo's been working on issues related to environmental protection, people's sovereignty over land, coal mining, indigenous resistance, organic products cooperative and others ever since. Currently Leo is part of an organization called FAOICIN that is running a campaign to promote sustainable projects as an alternative for communities, associations, and other indigenous social actors to promote the recovery of ancestral customs. He's also in charge of the human rights club at the Universidad San Francisco de Quito!

He'll be discussing his communities work in Ecuador, the damage done by the oil industry, and efforts to build a more just, sustainable society in Ecuador.

Hope to see you there. Peace!

School of the Americas documentary screening Thurs Nov. 13th

Hi lovelys,

Thank you to all who made it out last week for the documentary and discussion on "Voices of a Mountain," and thank you to Caitlin for taking the time to educate us on the community of Santa Anita.

This week at the Green House Collective we will be showing a short documentary on The School of the Americas (SOA). The intent of this weeks showing, like all weeks, is for educational and informational purposes. The majority of this weeks event will be discussion, Q & A, and what you can do to help close the SOA. Below is a brief introduction into the SOA:

The School of the Americas (SOA), in 2001 renamed the “Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation,” is a combat training school for Latin American soldiers, located at Fort Benning, Georgia.

Initially established in Panama in 1946, it was kicked out of that country in 1984 under the terms of the Panama Canal Treaty. Former Panamanian President, Jorge Illueca, stated that the School of the Americas was the “biggest base for destabilization in Latin America.” The SOA, frequently dubbed the “School of Assassins,” has left a trail of blood and suffering in every country where its graduates have returned.

Over its 59 years, the SOA has trained over 60,000 Latin American soldiers in counterinsurgency techniques, sniper training, commando and psychological warfare, military intelligence and interrogation tactics. These graduates have consistently used their skills to wage a war against their own people. Among those targeted by SOA graduates are educators, union organizers, religious workers, student leaders, and others who work for the rights of the poor. Hundreds of thousands of Latin Americans have been tortured, raped, assassinated, “disappeared,” massacred, and forced into refugee by those trained at the School of Assassins.

Green House resident Ryan has been volunteering with the local non-violent activist group SOA Watch OR for the last year, and will be traveling to the annual vigil next week for his first time, where he will be one of over 20,000 people that travel to Ft. Benning annually to close the SOA. We look forward to seeing you all this week

What: Vegan Potluck @ 5:30, movie starts @ 7
Where: The GHC, 4407 SE Tibbetts St, located of the Clinton St bike superhighway, and bus lines 4, 9, 75, and 14
When: Thursday November 13th

Also, the GHC is having it's first book club on Sunday Dec. 7th. We will be reading and discussing "The Will to Change: Men, Masculinity, and Love" by Bell Hooks. This book is currently available for sale at Powells Books, available for check out at most library locations, and one copy is available for check out at the GHC. If you are interested in participating in this months book discussion or future book club discussions, please email us at thegreenhouse@riseup.net.

In peace and solidarity,

The GHC

Officers Fired Over Executions Received U.S. Training and Funds

Hi everyone,

The School of the Americas (SOA/WHINSEC) continues to train Latin American Death Squads here in the United States; as documented by the article below. SOA/WHINSEC located in Ft. Benning, GA has had a continued path of terrorism throughout Latin American countries. Columbia currently has been sending the highest amount of troops to train at the Army School of the Americas since Bill Clinton signed and funded over $6 billion for Plan Columbia. Plan Columbia has seen some of the greatest human rights violations occurring throughout the Americas. Columbia is also the largest receipient of financial aid from the United States. The US has a new plan, known as Plan Mexico or Plan Merrida, that will undoubtedly follow a similar path as Plan Columbia. With their being a new President elect and a Democrat majority in Congress, the time is NOW to stop being silent and petition our newly elected representatives to stop funding the SOA and close the base, to stop funding the failed Plan Columbia, and to stop the expansion and funding for Plan Mexico. These plans are not benifiting our citizens and have certainly not benifited the people of Columbia, the only benifiters are the MNC's and those in power positions. You all have a voice to stop these atrocities from continuing, and unless we petition our elected representatives, our voices will be ignored. Call write, email your representative and demand the SOA close, demand our tax dollars stop funding the murder of innocent people through Plan Columbia and Plan Mexico, and demand those responsible are held accountable under international law.

In peace and solidarity,

The GHC

"Officers Fired Over Executions Received U.S. Training and Funds"

Nov 5 2008
John Lyndsay-Poland

Colombian Army commander Mario Montoya resigned on November 3, in the wake of a scandal over army killings of civilians that a United Nations official on Saturday called "systematic and widespread." A protégé of the United States, Montoya received training at the notorious U.S. Army School of the Americas (SOA) and has also taught other soldiers as an instructor at the SOA.

Montoya was an architect of the "body count" counterinsurgency strategy that many analysts believe led to the systematic civilian killings. Colombian President Álvaro Uribe announced the dismissal of 27 military officers on October 29, including three generals and 11 colonels and lieutenant colonels, for human rights abuses. The abuses include involvement in the killings of dozens of youths who were recruited in Bogotá slums and shortly after were reported as killed in combat by the army, hundreds of miles away.

The dismissal is a positive action, which we at the Fellowship of Reconciliation (FOR) applaud. Officers responsible for killing civilians must face consequences, or the killing will continue.

Human rights organizations have documented more than 500 reported extrajudicial killings by the army since the beginning of last year. This week, Amnesty International issued a scathing report on worsening conditions in Colombia, including massive displacement of internal refugees, increased extrajudicial killings, and attacks on human rights defenders. A New York Times front-page story on October 30 also highlighted the problem, and cited FOR's research on extrajudicial executions, as did a Los Angeles Times story.

Detonating the issue was a report that poor Bogotá youths, whose families said they had disappeared, had been recruited by the army or others, and then reported as dead in combat. Defense Minister Juan Manuel Santos admitted that the army still harbors "holdouts who are demanding bodies for results."

The dismissal of officers also demonstrates extensive U.S. complicity with the abuses. The United States gave military training directly or assisted the units of nearly all of the officers implicated in the killings. At least 11 of the officers, including Brigadier Generals Paulino Coronado Gamez and José Cortes Franco, were trained at the U.S. Army School of the Americas, and Cortes even served as an instructor at the school in 1994. Most of the officers commanded units that had been "vetted" by U.S. officials for human rights abuses and approved to receive assistance in 2008, or received training for some officers, despite extensive reports that their units had carried out murders of civilians.

Yet the dismissal, which focuses on officers operating in a northeastern region of Colombia where the disappeared youths were found, addresses only a small number of the army units responsible for civilian killings.

In the oil-rich Casanare and Arauca departments, the U.S.-trained 16th and 18th Brigades have reportedly committed dozens of killings, as has the U.S.-supported 9th Brigade in the coffee-growing department of Huila. In southwestern Valle and Cauca, the Third Brigade's Codazzi Batallion receives U.S. support and reportedly committed at least nine killings of civilians last year, and it might be implicated in firing on peaceful indigenous protesters this month. In southern Meta and Guaviare departments, the United States supports multiple mobile brigades in areas where the army has committed a large number of civilian killings.

The government named General Oscar Enrique González Peña to replace Army chief Montoya. Unsurprisingly, Gen. González Peña is also a graduate of the School of the Americas with a history of extrajudicial executions under his command. General Peña was commander of the Fourth Brigade, based in Medellín, from December 2003 to July 2005, when units under his command reportedly committed 45 extrajudicial executions in eastern Antioquia, according to a report published last year by a coalition of human rights organizations known as the Human Rights and Humanitarian Law Observatory.

Most of the Colombian army's current leadership—including 17 of 24 brigade commanders—was trained by the United States at the School of the Americas. This is in addition to the U.S. training provided to Colombian officers at dozens of other military schools and in Colombia. Washington is involved in the army's human rights problem through and through, and journalists, activists, and Congressional staff ought to ask when the United States will stop financing such murderous criminal operations. We believe the time is now.

Organizing 101 training Cramer Hall at PSU in Room 150 Saturday, Nov. 8th

Two training times offered – 12:00-2:00 and 3:00-5:00

Portland Coalition Against Poverty is offering an organizing 101 training. The focus will be on consciousness raising and grassroots movement building in the post-election era. If you’re wondering what comes next, or looking to organize in a more focused fashion, this is a great training to attend. What problems do you see in your community? In your home? In your family? At your place of work? Will they be solved by the new administration? How can you solve them at the local level? If you’re troubled by what you see, or are eager to make empowering change happen, this training will meet help keep your fire burning. We’ll be discussing consciousness raising, communication styles, and power dynamics, but the folks who attend will be setting most of the agenda. Sliding scale, no one turned away. RSVP if possible. We have room for 60 folks at each training.

PDXCAP@gmail.com
503.839.3670
Power is the ability to enact change

"Voice of a Mountain" documentary this week at the GHC

Hi beautifuls! Many many thanks to everyone who was able to make it out this week to the GHC; it certainly was a busy one. Our first of many Open Mic Nights was a great success, lots of music played, some poetry read, and lovely people to boot. We'd also like to thank Defend Oregon for taking time out of their busy election schedule to make it out and breakdown many of this years confusing ballot measures. In addition, thank you thank you thank you to Dr. Atomics Medicine Show for coming out and putting on a great and funny show Saturday evening; if you haven't seen these people before it's well worth your time. Finally, thanks to those who were able to make it out for an off and on rainy day garden work party; lots of progress made!!!

This week at the GHC we will be showing a powerful documentary titled "Voice of a Mountain," which talks about the development of the community Santa Anita. We'll also be having a person who lived in the community come speak about the community and their cause. Here is what their website has to say about the film:

"Voice of a Mountain is a video documentary of the lives of rural Guatemalan coffee farmers who took up arms against their government in a civil war that lasted 36 years. This documentary explores Guatemala's dark history from the perspective of those who saw armed revolution as their only hope for change in a poverty-ridden nation under years of military dictatorship. Ex-combatants talk about the bleak reality of the country that led to their involvement in the war, and the response of genocide from the Guatemalan government against its people. The documentary gives insight into their motives for joining an armed conflict as interviews reveal personal accounts of struggle, hope, tragedy, and the fruits of their resistance. Voice of a Mountain documents the reality of rural Guatemala in the wake of the civil war. It looks at the ideals and goals of patriots who fought against their government with the goal of changing their country and asks if they achieved what they were fighting for. The societal conditions that led to civil war are compared with the reality of three rural communities in present day Guatemala in an attempt to discover if conditions for the majority of those living in the country today have changed since the signing of the Peace Accords. The day-to-day realities of these three different communities who find their livelihood intricately connected to agricultural labor are documented, as they cope with the struggles of poverty, increasing debt, decreasing job opportunities, and the temptation to migrate north in search of a better life for their children."

There are also many other beautiful things happening in Portland this week as well. One of which is Siren Nation "Women's Music and Arts Festival" which runs today through November 9th; for more info go to www.sirennation.com. In addition, Green House resident Sarah and the band she's playing with has a show at Wonder Ballroom on November 8th; cost is $15 but will most certainly be worth it. For other events happening at the GHC and in Portland check out our blog at www.thegreenhousecollective.blogspot.com

What: Documentary and Vegan Potluck
When: Thursday Nov. 6th beginning at 5:30
Where: 4407 SE Tibbetts St, off the Clinton St bike superhighway, and bus lines # 4, 9, 75, and 14

In peace and solidarity,

The Green House Collective

Nonviolence Is the Right Choice-- It Works

Nonviolence Is The Right Choice—It Works
By Amitabh Pal, October 30, 2008

Nonviolent resistance is not only the morally superior choice. It is also twice as effective as the violent variety.

That's the startling and reassuring discovery by Maria Stephan and Erica Chenoweth, who analyzed an astonishing 323 resistance campaigns from 1900 to 2006.

"Our findings show that major nonviolent campaigns have achieved success 53 percent of the time, compared with 26 percent for violent resistance campaigns," the authors note in the journal International Security. (The study is available as a PDF file at http://www.nonviolent-conflict.org)

The result is not that surprising, once you listen to the researchers' reasoning. "First, a campaign's commitment to nonviolent methods enhances its domestic and international legitimacy and encourages more broad-based participation in
the resistance, which translates into increased pressure being brought to bear on the target," they state. "Second, whereas governments easily justify violent counterattacks against armed insurgents, regime violence against nonviolent movements is more likely to backfire against the regime."

In an interesting aside that has relevance for our times, the authors also write that, "Our study does not explicitly compare terrorism to nonviolent resistance, but our argument sheds light on why terrorism has been so unsuccessful."

To their credit, the authors don't gloss over nonviolent campaigns that haven't been successes. They give a clear-eyed assessment of the failure so far of the nonviolent movement in Burma, one of the three detailed case studies in the piece, along with East Timor and the Philippines.

In some sense, the authors have subjected to statistical analysis the notions of Gene Sharp, an influential Boston-based proponent of nonviolent change, someone they cite frequently in the footnotes. In his work, Sharp stresses the practical utility of nonviolence, de-emphasizing the moral aspects of it. He even asserts that for Gandhi, nonviolence was more of a pragmatic tool than a matter of principle, painting a picture that's at variance with much of Gandhian scholarship. In an interview with me in 2006, Sharp declared that he derives his precepts from Gandhi himself.

Gandhi's use of nonviolence "was pure pragmatism," Sharp told me. "At the end of his life, he defends himself. He was accused of holding on to nonviolent means because of his religious belief. He says no. He says, I presented this as a political means of action, and that's what I'm saying today. And it's a misrepresentation to say that I presented this as a purely
religious approach. He was very upset about that."

One of the authors of the study, Maria Stephan, is at the International Center on Nonviolent Conflict. The group's founders wrote a related book a few years ago, "A Force More Powerful: A Century of Nonviolent Conflict." Erica Chenoweth
is at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard.

This study is manna for those of us who believe in nonviolent resistance as a method of social change. We don't have to justify it on moral grounds any more. The reason is even simpler now: Nonviolence is much more successful.