December 27, 1914 The International Fellowship of Reconciliation (IFOR), an inter-religious peace group, was founded in Cambridge, England. “The International Fellowship of Reconciliation (IFOR) is an international spiritually based movement composed of people who commit themselves to active nonviolence as a way of life and as a means of transformation – personal, social, economic and political.” “Your goal is, in my opinion, the only reasonable one and to make it prevail is of vital importance.” –Albert Einstein, in a letter to the FOR Read more
December 27, 1971 Vietnam Veterans Against the War staged a peace protest at historic Betsy Ross House, Philadelphia.
December 27, 2002 North Korea ordered U.N. nuclear inspectors to leave the country and said it would restart the Yongbyon plutonium Plant to meet the fuel needs of its nuclear power reactor. The plant had been shut down and sealed by the U.N. in 1994 in exchange for shipments of fuel oil. When it was discovered that the North Korean had been pursuing a uranium-based weapons program, the U.S. and Japan, South Korea and the European Union suspended the fuel shipments.
December 27, 2002 1500 people gathered in Tel Aviv, Israel, the protest the Israeli military occupation of land beyond the 1948 borders of the country. With the slogans “End the Occupation” and “No to Racism,” and dressed mostly in black, they used a variety of means – drumming, singing, art installations, giving away olives and olive oil – to express their frustration and anger over the ongoing occupation. Alternative Ten commandments at demonstration in Tel Aviv, Israel The Coalition of Women for Peace also showed a movie, Jenin, Jenin, which had been banned for public showing, in defiance of police orders to stop the projector. Shown on a large outdoor screen, it was a narrative about the actions of the Israeli army the previous Spring in the occupied West Bank town of Jenin.
tRump’s illegal military war crime actions / tRump’s gift to the oil companies that paid him prior / This is a war crime and illegal / tRump trying to get other countries resources for his own profits / tRump grifts and seeking bribes
It has nothing to do with US national security and all the minerals / traffic rights to make ships pay / and the “rare earth” metals that tRump wants a piece of. It is about profit. Hugs
The paying tribute and bribes to tRump and his slush funds is so anti what the US should and used to stand for. It is the very thing the founding fathers were most against. The courts have gutted the holding of tRump to account but the emoluments cause is what this was designed to stop. Ask yourself if Biden / Obama / Clinton had been so blatant in demanding bribes would you tRump cult supporters be OK with it still? Hugs
The appeals court told her to have it completely wrapped up by the first week of January and this is not doing that. I expect more to happen fast with this. She ignored the appeals court order to please tRump.
“There was blood everywhere, screams, people crying, people who couldn’t take it and were urinating and vomiting on themselves,” the college student from Venezuela who sought U.S. asylum, said. “Four guards grabbed me, and they beat me until I bled until the point of agony. They knocked our faces against the wall. That was when they broke one of my teeth.”
Mr. Miller’s belief that seven decades of immigration has produced millions of people who take more than they give — an assertion that has been refuted by years of economic data — is at the heart of the Trump administration’s campaign to restrict immigration and deport immigrants already in the country.
tRump trying to hold on to power illegally / Jan 6th insurrectionists / trying to change the history everyone seen live / Scamming / Using the US treasury & taxpayer funds to pay off tRump cult members.
The U.S. Air Force will provide Jan. 6 rioter Ashli Babbitt with military funeral honors, reversing a Biden-era decision that denied her family’s request, according to a legal group that has represented her family.
In June 2025, the Pentagon agreed to pay the Babbitt family a $5 million “wrongful death” settlement. Below, see the latest from Proud Boys leader Enrique Tarrio, who is himself reportedly suing the DOJ for $100 million.
Gay Pride Day on June 28, 1975 in downtown Minneapolis. Credit: Minnesota Historical Society/John Hustad Papers/Tretter Collection in GLBT Studies/University of Minnesota
It was likely one of the last pieces of city policy passed that winter, just before the New Year, a parting gift from a progressive city council.
On December 30, 1975, Minneapolis became the first city to adopt a trans-inclusive LGBTQ+ non-discrimination ordinance. Fifty years later, the United States still lacks similar protections on a federal level.
Minneapolis was special in that the right people were there at the right time, said Seth Goodspeed, director of development and communications at OutFront Minnesota, the state’s largest LGBTQ+ rights organization.
“Minneapolis, since the early ’70s, has really been a leader in the gay rights movement,” he said. “That comes out of a lot of the student organizing at the University of Minnesota in the late ’60s.”
It was home to Jack Baker and Michael McConnell, two men who, in 1971, figured out how to legally marry, the first recorded same-sex marriage in history. It was also the stomping ground of Steve Endean, who founded the nation’s largest LGBTQ+ rights organization, the Human Rights Campaign.
Endean started lobbying a city alderman, Earl Netwal, in 1973 to pass a gay rights ordinance. His timing was just right. In 1974 progressives won the mayoral race and the city council. That year they voted 10-0 to ban discrimination on the basis of “sexual preference.”
The next year, Tim Campbell, a local activist and publisher of the GLC Voice in Minneapolis, penned a trans-inclusive policy.
“I think it was a pendulum,” Goodspeed said. “The pendulum was sort of swinging back toward a more conservative mayor and a conservative city council.” (snip)
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“You’re able to say, ‘We passed this two years ago, last year, in the past five years, and nothing’s really changed, there is no boogeyman under the bed,’” he said. “We’ve had these protections since the 1970s and all these fears that they might have … just never came to fruition.”
The public spaces in Nantes, a city along the Loire River in the west of France, might at first glance seem just like those in any other part of Europe. Across the city, there are numerous bike lanes, bustling fresh produce markets and pretty, historic squares.
But on closer inspection, there are signs of a profound attempt to make the city, its facilities and its built environment a more equitable place for women.
Hundreds of streets now bear the names of women, including Joséphine Baker, Frida Kahlo and Clémence Lefeuvre — the little-known creator of local specialty beurre blanc sauce. School yards, once dominated by soccer pitches, have been remodeled to incorporate spaces for calm and creativity. Stations for breastfeeding have been built in the city center to improve maternal comfort and visibly counter stigma. Free tampon dispensers have been installed in libraries, gyms and all kinds of other municipal buildings.
The new Boulevard Gisèle Halimi, named after the feminist lawyer (1927-2020), is located in the Prairie-au-Duc district on the Île de Nantes. Credit: Patrick Garcon / Nantes Métropole.
These initiatives form part of mayor Johanna Rolland’s bold plan to make Nantes, which is home to around 700,000 people and is the sixth largest city in France, a ville non-sexiste, or non-sexist city. From redesigning public areas to reallocating spending and inaugurating France’s leading center to counter gender-based violence, Nantes is trailblazing the way to safer, less discriminatory urban life.
“We couldn’t wait for change anymore, we had to take action,” says Mahaut Bertu, the deputy mayor of Nantes in charge of equality, the fight against discrimination and the non-sexist city project. “Femicides continue every year. Women suffer harassment every day. [To make change], we had to take a hold of the problem ourselves.”
Shortly after taking power in 2014, Rolland and her team set about carrying out research and compiling statistics on the extent of inequality in Nantes, since at that point limited information existed.
The findings of the research, which included income, violence and public spaces, were striking. Analysis found, for example, that of the 3,000 streets in Nantes, fewer than four percent of them were named after women compared with more than 36 percent bearing men’s names. More broadly, it found that, in 2014, 58 percent of women aged 15 to 64 were employed, compared to 63 percent of men. And women represented 70 percent of the so-called “working poor” — those in employment but below the poverty line.
From that understanding, city authorities went about introducing women-centered policy and ramping up investment. One of the most pressing issues was responding to gender-based violence.
In France, 99 percent of women have been victims of a sexist comment or act at least once in their lives, according to the French High Council for Equality, an independent advisory body. “Far from declining, sexism is becoming entrenched, even increasing,” its 2024 report concluded.
In November 2019, following years of consultation with residents, women’s rights groups and nonprofits, the city opened Citad’elles, a shelter for women victims of violence that provides free, centralized support 24/7 — something that to this day does not exist anywhere else in France. (snip)
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This year, a pilot study is taking place in four of the schools to assess the impact of the new playgrounds. Fischer’s team is also working with school employees to help promote fairer use of the spaces.
At the same time, Nantes has an initiative to fight “period poverty” and to help reduce the costly burden of women’s sanitary products.
This is incredible and the best I have felt in 5 months. I have had so much old news, many hundreds of back logged news I wanted to share. I recently found out that the mail stuff I would share was stuck on my phone so did not post. I cleared that. Today right now all old news mail articles are posted, the stuff I want to share is posted. I still have to do the video on what happened because I got long term Covid. Sadly I was able to do this because Ron was gone to Texas to help his sister and now they are on their way home. More pressure to do as much as I can with my pain and disability. So I have two more rooms to work on before they get here later this week. I want to do a video on the entire thing but may not. My goal was to clear all these tabs and then do videos …. but we will see, Hugs
The city, home to one of the largest Muslim populations in the United States, has recently become a repeated target for out-of-state activists who falsely claim it operates under “Sharia law.” The tensions began when Jake Lang, a Jan. 6 rioter who has described himself as a political prisoner, arrived on Michigan Avenue attempting to burn a Quran.
Federal law enforcement agencies are detaining US citizens who do not carry proof of their citizenship in what civil rights advocates describe as a flagrant violation of constitutional rights—and a top Trump administration official is claiming the government has the authority to do so. Bovino recently lied in court about being hit with a rock by anti-ICE protesters, despite video showing that never happened. According to reports, some Border officials privately refer to Bovino a “Little Napoleon” due to his height and volatile temper.
Things that are just wrong on too many levels / Medical Misinformation / tRump’s illegal war to steal oil / Rule by decree
The pilot of a JetBlue flight reported on Friday that he narrowly avoided colliding with a U.S. military aircraft over the Caribbean after an Air Force refueling tanker passed in front of the commercial plane without broadcasting its position, according to air traffic control radio communications.
It would reduce in prominence the headquarters of U.S. Central Command, U.S. European Command and U.S. Africa Command by placing them under the control of a new organization known as U.S. International Command. Those familiar with the plan said it aligns with the Trump administration’s national security strategy, released this month, that declares that the “days of the United States propping up the entire world order like Atlas are over.”
Their way to rid themselves of officers who will refuse to follow an illegal order and put command in the hands of those who will. All of this is to reduce the number of Admirals and Generals who could credibly disobey the illegal orders that will be coming soon.
This past September, the Trump administration terminated these agreements. The center’s former head, James Rubin, called this decision “a unilateral act of disarmament,” and no wonder: In effect, the United States was declaring that it would no longer oppose Russian influence campaigns, Chinese manipulation of local politics, or Iranian extremist recruitment drives. Nor would the American government use any resources to help anyone else do so either.
blundersonword mentioned “Imagine” the other day in a post, and here we are on the morning of Dec. 14th. There are several items in Peace&Justice History for 12/14, including mourning the loss to the world and the effort for peace across the world, with the murder of John Lennon. 14 years later, the US acknowledged and honored New Zealand’s nuclear weapons ban, and 15 years later, the Dayton Accords were achieved, which guided the cessation of conflict between Serbia, Croatia, and Bosnia-Herzegovina. Progress happens.
December 14, 1917 U.S. peace activist and suffragist Kate Richards O’Hare was sentenced to five years’ imprisonment for a speech denouncing World War I. Occupying a neighboring jail cell was Emma Goldman, the well-known anarchist organizer, feminist, writer and anti-war critic was imprisoned for obstructing the draft. O’Hare was one of a number of prisoners Socialist Party leader Eugene Debs cited in his “Canton Speech” for which he in turn was imprisoned. More about activist Kate Richards O’Hare Read the speech
December 14, 1961 In a public exchange of letters with South Vietnamese President Ngo Dinh Diem, U.S. President John F. Kennedy formally announced the United States would increase aid to South Vietnam, including the expansion of the U.S. troop commitment. Kennedy, concerned with recent advances made by the communist insurgency movement in South Vietnam, wrote: “We shall promptly increase our assistance to your defense effort.” President Ngo Dinh Diem President Kennedy and Secretary of Defense McNamara Kennedy – Diem letter exchange
December 14, 1980 At Yoko Ono’s request, John Lennon fans around the world mourned him with 10 minutes of silent prayer. In New York over 100,000 people converged on Central Park in tribute, and in Liverpool, England, his hometown, a crowd of 30,000 gathered outside of St. George’s Hall on Lime Street. johnlennon.com >“You may say I’m a dreamer. But I’m not the only one.” Time capsules to mark John Lennon’s legacy
December 14, 1985 Wilma Mankiller became the first woman to lead a major American Indian tribe when she took office as principal chief of the Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma. Wilma Mankiller on the day in 1985 when her election as chief of the Cherokee Nation was announced
December 14, 1994 After eight years of negotiations, the United States finally agreed to honor New Zealand’s ban on nuclear weapons in its territory. U.S. Navy ships armed with nuclear weapons no longer visited New Zealand’s ports.
December 14, 1995 Leaders of the states that were parts of the former Yugoslavia signed the Bosnia peace treaty, formally ending four years of bloody and vicious ethnic/religious conflict. The Dayton Accords, as they are known, committed the Balkan states of Serbia, Croatia, Bosnia-Herzegovina to accept a division of territory, a process to deal with the more than 2 million refugees, and the introduction of 60,000 NATO peacekeeping forces. The negotiations were led by U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Richard Holbrooke, and held principally at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base near Dayton, Ohio. The Dayton Accords
Photographer Janette Beckman and curator Julie Grahame have organized a one-time fundraiser for the ACLU that showcases images of musicians who have recorded protest songs or are known for their activism. Forty-three photographers have donated images of 50 artists, from John Lennon to Nina Simone to Bad Bunny, and 100% of the profits will go towards the ACLU and their efforts to protect equality, freedom and rights. In addition to the images there is a playlist of songs for the fundraiser.Bob Marley, who performed at Crystal Palace Bowl in 1980, is known for songs such as Get Up, Stand Up, War, Redemption Song and Concrete Jungle that advocate for social issues, human rights and resistance. Photograph: David Corio
(I posted a few here; go see the whole piece with all the photos. It’s motivating! A.)
Bruce Springsteen, New York, 2017
Songs such as American Skin (41 Shots), The Ghost of Tom Joad and Born in the USA highlight systemic injustice, racism and the struggles of working-class people and immigrantsPhotograph: Danny Clinch, Transparent Clinch Gallery
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Doechii, New York, 2025
She is known for songs like Anxiety that advocate for mental health awareness and has used awards show speeches to speak out against government overreach and oppression. Photograph: Sacha Lecca
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Nina Simone, London, 1968
One of Simone’s most prominent songs, Mississippi Goddam, was a direct response to systemic racial inequality in the US exemplified in the handling of the 1963 16th Street Baptist Church bombing and Medgar Evers’s murder. The song became an anthem for the civil rights movement. Photograph: Michael Putland
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Dolly Parton, Tennessee, 2003
Her songs, including A Woman’s Right and Coat of Many Colors, have addressed social issues, and she has been outspoken and financially generous as a philanthropist. Photograph: Clay Patrick McBride
I am not transgender. And, perhaps like some who read Scottie’s blog, there are times when I wonder why I am reading so much about transgender and non-binary issues, since they don’t really effect me. I’m simply me, an overweight white guy who has struggled with his orientation and confidence. Interestingly enough, I’m – as written – not Hispanic. I was born in the USA, so why should I care about some of the other posts Scottie shows on his blog about ICE/Immigration? I think you know where I am going with this.
On the first day of tRump’s occupation, he signed an executive order that the United States would no longer recognize anything but born male/born female as a gender to the applause of a disappointingly large number of people. With the literal stroke of a pen, a person’s identity was made to be unrecognized by their very own government.
And, just as he has chosen to remove men and women from our communities without the right of Habeas Corpus, one of the very principles our country was founded upon, who will be next to learn they are a non-person and suddenly unworthy of liberty? Will it be me, a struggling fat white guy who doesn’t conform to the cis ideal? Will it be when I become old and can no longer work? Will it be because I don’t agree with the Maga mantra? What will I have to fake to be still acceptable to the powers?
I’d like to paraphrase and steal another’s words here:
The Declaration of Independence identified “the pursuit of happiness” as one of our unalienable rights, along with life and liberty… Benjamin Franklin, George Washington, John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, and Alexander Hamilton (spoke about what) happiness meant in their lives, how they understood the pursuit of happiness as a quest for being good, not feeling good—the pursuit of lifelong virtue, not short-term pleasure. Among those virtues were the habits of industry, temperance, moderation, and sincerity, which the Founders viewed as part of a daily struggle for self-improvement, character development, and calm self-mastery. They believed that political self-government required personal self-government.
Now this is arguable, but I want to believe it. I want to believe and agree that the creation of this country was about more than the pursuit of power, but about the pursuit of happiness, of completion, of understanding and identity. I believe that the creation of this country was to be about self-determination and self-actualization, not conformity to some distorted and corrupted image of a diseased head of state.
It is for this reason that I embrace the rights and honor of those who are transgender, non-binary, or any who are seeking to understand that person in the mirror. In fact, I see it as a fundamental aspect of being an American that we accept those who are in the journey of self. Further, just as Jesus Christ is reported to exhort us to welcome the stranger – because it is only by befriending those different from whoever I am that I can hope to one day fully understand Randy.
I welcome respectful comments and even disagreements to this post. hugs.
Scottie's Playtime 