From: riva pearson (rivapearson@yahoo.com)
Date: Tue Oct 22 2002 - 18:29:37 EDT
Is anyone else doing something in solidarity with the meeting is Quito on Halloween? I'd love to know what else is going on.
-Riva
john brown <makhno68@yahoo.com> wrote: Don't Be Tricked by the Free Trade Area of the
Americas
On October 31, while children across the U.S. dress up
as ghosts, witches, and NY fire fighters, threatening
their neighbors with tricks if they don't get treats,
some far scarier trickery will be attempted by
business men and heads of state dressed up as trade
negotiators as they meet in Ecuador to discuss the
Free Trade Area of the Americas. Their meetings will
be met by fierce resistance as multitudes of
dissenters from across Latin America take direct
action to stop the meetings. Here in Portland, we are
planning a radical street festival in solidarity with
those actions to denounce the expansion of
neocolonialism promoted by the FTAA. By taking to the
streets, we will celebrate the world we want to live
in, a world where autonomy, self-organization,
meaningful work, and access to land are valued more
highly than patents, power, and profit.
What is the FTAA?
The FTAA is a proposed trade agreement, negotiated in
secret by trade ministers from 34 countries--all of
the countries of the Americas except for Cuba. It is
modeled on the North American Free Trade Agreement
(NAFTA), and its goal is to impose trade
liberalization, patent protections, deregulation, and
privatization hemisphere-wide. The FTAA draft texts
are secret, but leaked information reveals that many
of the FTAA's chapters are literally extensions of
NAFTA rules. NAFTA has been a miserable failure in
terms of workers and the environment. The FTAA seeks
to expand that failure so it will affect the 755
million people that live in the Western Hemisphere,
and the land, water, food, forests, health care,
education, and work which sustains us.
Why A Radical Street Festival?
In this world where corporations are striving to
homogenize us into passive and faithful consumers, our
culture is our greatest weapon of resistance.
Traditional demonstrations and protests, while
essential, often alienate the general public, are
disregarded by corporate media, bore the participants,
and are ignored by policy makers. Taking to the
streets with dance, music, street theater, poetry and
the spontaneous eruption of joy breaks through the
numbing isolation induced by wage slavery and
condescending media and lights a fire in people's
consciousness. Ordinary folks creating meaningful art
and sharing culture captures the imagination, and
deepens our vision of a movement which is reflective
of the worlds we aspire to create.
In creating a radical street festival, we are
responding to calls from Ecuador's indigenous and
peasant organizations which have asked that people
around the world do local solidarity actions. By doing
this, we will strengthen local networks, and get the
word out that the FTAA is not welcome in the Americas.
We will show that we want a better world -- one which
values mutual aid over private ownership, people over
markets, rights over riches. We will demonstrate our
firm conviction that another America is possible.
Meet on October 31 at 3:30pm in Terry Schrunk
Plaza--SW 3rd & Jefferson. Come in costume and dancing
shoes, prepared to have a good time! For more
information, call 503.499.1116, write to
noftaapdx@yahoo.com or check out
http://www.stopftaa.org for background info on the
FTAA (follow the link to go to the old site too)!
Also, coming up this Thursday (October 24th)at 7pm we
will be holding an open outreach and organizing
meeting at ILWU Local 5 (917 SW Oak, about a block
southeast of Powell's). The purpose of the meeting is
to inform the community about what are plans are for
this Street Festival, as well as to give a space for
people to ask questions, raise concerns, and get
involved in making Halloween a success. We would love
to see you there.
__________________________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Y! Web Hosting - Let the expert host your web site
http://webhosting.yahoo.com/
The STARC Alliance
Students Transforming and Resisting Corporations
http://www.starcalliance.org
Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
Riva Pearson
National Coordinator: STARC Alliance
Students Transforming and Resisting Coorporations
2732 SE Belmont
Portland, OR 97214
(503) 235-0760
rivapearson@yahoo.com
---------------------------------
Do you Yahoo!?
Y! Web Hosting - Let the expert host your web site
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.4 : Mon Oct 28 2002 - 02:52:34 EST