Martin Luther King Day

Martin Luther King Day

A community reading and discussion of his fabulous
“Letter from Birmingham Jail”

at New Progressive Baptist Church in Kingston.

The event is 6-8pm on Monday, January 20.

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Getting Locked Out of the American Dream

Bill Moyers: Michelle Alexander on Getting Locked Out of the American Dream

After civil rights lawyer Michelle Alexander published her book The New Jim Crow in 2010 on our dehumanizing system of incarceration, she ignited a national conversation about justice in America and sparked a movement. In her book, Alexander explores how the war on drugs, “get-tough” sentencing policies and racism has created a caste system similar to that of our segregationist past.

Since then, Alexander has traveled the country to meet advocates and everyday Americans working to end mass incarceration in America — home to 25 percent of the world’s prisoners, despite representing only five percent of the world’s population.

She tells Bill that she has seen a grassroots movement brewing in communities across the country, “There are enormous victories that are being achieved precisely because the people whom we have written off and viewed as disposable are reclaiming their voice, standing up, speaking out, organizing even as they struggle to survive.”

http://www.commondreams.org/video/2013/12/20-2

"We saw in him what we seek in ourselves." Jacob Zuma

The death of Mandela will send South Africa deep into mourning and self-reflection 18 years after he led the country from racial apartheid to inclusive democracy.

But his passing will also be keenly felt by people around the world who revered Mandela as one of history's last great statesmen, and a moral paragon comparable with Mohandas Gandhi and Martin Luther King.

“No one is born hating another person because of the color of his skin, or his background, or his religion,” Mandela wrote in his memoir Long Walk to Freedom. “People must learn to hate, and if they can learn to hate, they can be taught to love, for love comes more naturally to the human heart than its opposite.”
- From the Guardian UK

The “Who Is Jim Crow?”

The “Who Is Jim Crow?” Film Series

I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character.   MLK, Jr.

NEXT SHOWING

Monday, December 2, 2013      7-9 PM

New Progressive Baptist Church, Upstairs, 8 Hone Street, Kingston, New York

Free – Light Refreshments

Playing:  Slavery By Another NAME, Part I  

… “A shocking reality that often went unacknowledged then and now.  A huge system of forced, unpaid labor, mostly affecting Southern black men, that lasted until World War II,  Based on the Pulitzer –Prize-winning book by Douglas Blackman tells the story of men charged with crimes like vagrancy and often guilty of nothing, who were bought and sold, abused and subject to sometimes deadly working conditions as unpaid convict labor.  Interviews with the descendants of victims….The story is important no matter how painful the reality is.”

Discussion:  Led by Odell Winfield, founder of ENJAN (End the New Jim Crow Action Network) and Rev. G Modele Clarke Pastor of New Progressive Baptist Church

UPCOMING MOVIES:  Monday,  Jan. 6, 7-9 PM, Slavery By Another Name, Part 2

                                                Monday, Feb. 3, 7-9 PM, To Be Announced

                                                Monday, March 3, 7-9 PM, To Be Announced

Sponsors:  ENJAN (End The New Jim Crow Action Network-Kingston)

New Progressive Baptist Church

Move To Amend

Unitarian Universalist Congregation, Kingston, Social Justice Committee Woodstock Jewish Congregation, Task Force to End the New Jim Crow

NY Citizen Action, Hudson Valley

Sadie Peterson Delaney African Roots Library (Family Services, Poughkeepsie NY)

American Association of University Women Kingston NY (AAUW)

Middle East Crisis Response

For More Info:  Odell Winfield, 914-388-3092

Recommended audience: High School, Adult

The “Who is Jim Crow?” Film Series

The “Who is Jim Crow?” Film Series

I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character. MLK, Jr.

KICKOFF Monday, October 28, 2013

7-9 PM

New Progressive Baptist Church, 8 Hone Street, Kingston, New York

Free – Light Refreshments

Playing: The New Jim Crow, with Michelle Alexander A talk delivered at the Abyssinian Baptist Church, NYC in 2012. Alexander’s Book, “The New Jim Crow”

spearheaded a nationwide movement to end mass incarceration and the racial caste system it has created.

Discussion: Led by Odell Winfield, founder of ENJAN (End the New Jim Crow Action Network) and Pastor G. Modele Clarke (New Progressive Baptist Church)

Sponsors: ENJAN (End The New Jim Crow Action Network-Kingston); New Progressive Baptist Church; Unitarian Universalist Congregation, Kingston, Social Justice Committee; Woodstock Jewish Congregation, Task Force to End the New Jim Crow NY Citizen Action, Hudson Valley

Sadie Peterson Delaney African Roots Library (Family Services, Poughkeepsie NY) American Association of University Women Kingston NY (AAUW)

For More Info: Odell Winfield, 914-388-3092 Recommended audience: High School, Adult

NYPD Stops by Race

Unreasonable Suspicion -

Youth Documentary

In 2011, the NYPD made over 684,000 street stops in the controversial policy of Stop-and-Frisk. Most stops occur in Black and Latino neighborhoods and Blacks and Latinos are significantly more likely to be stopped than White people. Unreasonable Suspicion explores the causes and effects of Stop-and-Frisk as produced, documented, and directed by a group of NYC High School youth.

In the summer of 2012, students from the Peapod Adobe Youth Voices Academy at Urban Arts and LatinoJustice PRLDEF, set out to create a student documentary examining the impact of Stop-andFrisk on NYC youth. Students met with attorneys from LatinoJustice PRLDEF to understand the policy of Stop-and-Frisk and learned what to do if they are stopped and frisked by NYPD. Students met with public figures, university professors.

Watch the documentary:      http://vimeo.com/55977221

Civil Rights Win

Stop and Frisk: Bloomberg Loses, Civil Rights Win

by Abby Zimet


Despite relentless threats, trolling and fear-mongering by Mayor Bloomberg and Ray Kelly - "Innocent people will be harmed," like they're not already? - New York's City Council voted to override Bloomberg's veto of two bills aimed at reforming the city's racist stop-and-frisk policy. The Community Safety Act bills call for an end to racial profiling, with a right to take legal action, and an independent inspector general to oversee the NYPD. Supporters and activists, who argued those opposing the bills did so from a vast divide that meant they'd never have to deal with the realities they represent, had worked with an array of local groups, including Communities United for Police Reform, the Center for Constitutional Rights and the New York Civil Liberties Union. Many applauded the vote as a vital first step toward ending racial profiling.

“I am voting to uphold these bills and override the mayor’s veto because he is out of touch with the realities in communities like my own...His children will never be stopped and frisked, or accused of ‘fitting a description.’" - Councilmember Ydanis Rodriguez.