GlobalShift

On Sunday, March 7th, the Oscars will be giving out awards to this past year’s best films. One of the potential winners is the documentary “Burma VJ” which stars U Gawsita, a Buddhist monk from Burma who has been living as refugee in Utica, NY for the past year.
“Burma VJ”is about a peaceful protest lead [...]

It is no secret that the women of Saudi Arabia live under a great deal of oppression. It’s not much of a stretch to claim that they are treated like property under, what has so far been, a rather strict fundamentalist Islamic law. They are subservient to men in every way. Women must be fully [...]

In the wake of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, the pressure for Washington to take drastic action in protecting Americans was immense. With emotions flying high the Patriot Act, also called Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism, was passed nearly unanimously, with only Russ Feingold voting against the [...]

The constitution reserves rights for everyone in America, not just citizens, an outrageous conclusion for people that want to incarcerate domestic criminals without charge, torture anyone deemed a terrorist, or enslave their immigrant neighbors.

Brave New Films has recently released its 5th Anniversary Activist Collection, a DVD box set spanning 2004 – 2009. Containing a whopping 40 hours of material (something that shocked me – I was expecting closer to 8 or 10), the box set offers a compilation of short and long films, conversations with distinguished guests like [...]

Sixty villages in Kachin, the northernmost state in Burma, are being forced to relocate to make room for a Chinese dam. The Myit Sone dam, will produce between 3600 and 6000 MW of power for export to China and will be the first and largest in a series of 6 other Chinese dams eventually to be built. [...]

Burma recently freed the vice-chairman of the National League of Democracy (NLD), the opposition party of Aung San Suu Kyi’s.
Mr. Tin Oo, 82, has been in prison or under house arrest for over a decade. His release comes as ruling military junta in Burma prepares to hold national elections in 2010, though no date has [...]

The Democratic Republic of Congo is home to the world’s deadliest war since World War II and chances are, you don’t know much about it. In fact, the relative obscurity of the ongoing violence that has caused 10 million deaths and led to millions displaced has become almost as dumbfounding as the conflict itself. The [...]

Hedy Epstein is what some might see as a contradiction in terms: a survivor of the Holocaust and also a staunch advocate for the Palestinian people. Born in 1924 in Freiburg, Germany, Epstein was 14 when she escaped from Nazi persecution via the Kinderstransport to England. Since her 1948 arrival in the U.S., Epstein has [...]

The Obama administration recently announced that they would stand firm on having President Obama meet with the Dalai Lama even though China warned that such a move would place Sino-American relations in a precarious position.
The Chinese Government responded to this decision from the White House by saying they “resolutely oppose” any meetings between the Dalai [...]