Featured, Women — March 9, 2010 at 11:12 am

In January, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) convened a so-called gender symposium in which medical ‘experts’ concluded that intersex athletes should be treated as having a medical disorder, and that eligibility of such athletes be decided on a case-by-case basis. They also suggested that photographs of athletes be taken and sent to experts to determine whether the athlete might have a “Disorder...

Policing gender and sex through sport

March 9th, 2010 | Featured, Women | Read More

Does “Asian America” leave some Asian Americans behind?

I had lunch a few months ago with Bill Tamayo, the regional attorney in San Francisco for the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. We both have roots in Hawai‘i. Tamayo is a second-generation Filipino American. I’m a fourth-generation Japanese American. Many would consider us both “Asian...

March 8th, 2010 | Featured | Read More

Teen suicide and infant mortality in Indian Country rising

The British statesman, Benjamin Disraeli, purportedly said, “There are three kinds of lies: Lies, damned lies and statistics.” Native Americans have been the guinea pigs of statistics since the politicians in Washington began to use arithmetic to figure out their landholdings and numbers...

March 8th, 2010 | Featured | Read More

Time for US revolution – fifteen reasons

It is time for a revolution. Government does not work for regular people. It appears to work quite well for big corporations, banks, insurance companies, military contractors, lobbyists, and for the rich and powerful. But it does not work for people. The 1776 Declaration of Independence stated...

March 8th, 2010 | Featured | Read More

Does your race and income matter if face the death penalty?

It is no secret that our country’s criminal justice system has consistently proven to be biased against minority communities of color. Statistics published by the NAACP show that even amongst those found guilty of crimes, African-Americans continue to be disproportionately sentenced to life in prison,...

March 5th, 2010 | Racial Equity, Talk About Race, US | Read More

Also about us: South Asians and civil rights

Every year, the South Asian Bar Association of New York (SABANY) awards fellowships to law students who will be pursuing unpaid summer internships in the public interest. The fellowship winners are recognized at a reception, where an experienced South Asian public interest attorney speaks about a current...

March 5th, 2010 | Featured, South Central/South Asia | Read More

A reflection on the wages of whiteness: Violence and the politics of privilege in the UAH shootings

The faculty shooting at the University of Alabama – Huntsville in February, in which Amy Bishop, a white faculty member, murdered three of her colleagues of color and wounded three others after being denied tenure for a second time, is the most recent evidence of how hard it is to talk about race in...

March 4th, 2010 | Talk About Race | Read More

King and the Palestinian struggle for freedom

In two of Martin Luther King, Jr.’s most memorable writings, his “Letter from a Birmingham Jail” and his 1967 speech, “Beyond Vietnam – A Time to Break Silence,” he bemoaned the failure of Americans to speak out, to break their silence when witnessing injustice and immoral acts against humankind. ...

March 4th, 2010 | Featured | Read More

Looking ahead to 9/11/2011: The time for national healing begins now

In mid-February, people around the country marked the National Day of Remembrance to acknowledge the impact of Executive Order 9066, which led to the internment of 120,000 Japanese American citizens and residents during World War II on the basis of their national origin and ethnicity. It has been over...

March 4th, 2010 | Featured, South Central/South Asia | Read More

Facing the Other: Challenging Islamophobia within the South Asian community

In the nearly 10 years since September 11, progressive writers of color have written a great deal about Islamophobia and the U.S. wars against majority Muslim countries. A lot of this commentary has centered on white mainstream politics and the U.S. government’s flawed response to 9/11 encompassing...

March 3rd, 2010 | Featured, South Central/South Asia | Read More

Cold Case: Coming to grips with racial killings in America

The U.S. Justice Department is about to conclude its three-year investigation of 108 unsolved civil rights era murders, including that of Jimmie Lee Jackson, who was shot and killed in 1965 by Alabama state trooper James Bonard Fowler. Other than Fowler, however, who was charged with murder in 2007,...

March 3rd, 2010 | Talk About Race | Read More

Mercenaries circling Haiti

On March 9 and 10, there will be a Haiti conference in Miami for private military and security companies to showcase their services to governments and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) working in the earthquake devastated country. On their website for the Haiti conference, the trade group IPOA...

March 3rd, 2010 | Featured, Haiti | Read More

Race, Love and Sex

In the film “Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner?” the progressive attitudes of an affluent white couple are put to the test when their daughter announces her engagement to Sidney Poitier’s dashing Dr. John Prentice. In the thematic sequel, “Guess Who,” Bernie Mac grapples with the notion...

March 3rd, 2010 | Culture | Read More

Undocumented South Asians: The numbers, the faces, the call to action

By Priya Murthy, Policy Director, South Asian Americans Leading Together When family, friends, and community members heard that I was an immigration lawyer, often I would be asked, “How can I bring my mother over to the United States?” or “When will I get my green card? I’ve been on an H-1B...

March 1st, 2010 | Featured, South Central/South Asia | Read More

There is a colonization connection the indigenous people of Australia and America share

Both were driven to the brink of annihilation by invaders. Both had their children ripped from their arms and placed into institutional boarding schools intent upon acculturation by whatever means (See the movie Rabbit Proof Fence). Aborigines make up two percent of Australia’s population of 22 million...

March 1st, 2010 | Talk About Race | Read More

Prince Abdul Ali Seraj on the status of women in Afghanistan Part 1

Historically, the Afghan women have always stood by their men. In fact, their bravery in times of defending their family or country is heralded in our history books. Rudyard Kipling had some choice verses about the valor of the Afghan women. During battles, the women accompanied the men in...

March 1st, 2010 | Featured, South Central/South Asia | Read More