Beautiful blessing to little ones.

To contact us Click HERE
God loves and cares about orphans!!!

 Look at this adorable little girl!
How about this little sweetie?
 Isn`t she precious?
 We so glad to tell you that BOM was able provide clothes, jackets, to these little ones.They are soooo cute!!! Kids were so thrilled and said all time," look, how I am beautiful!" :)

 At the end they huged and kissed BOM staff.It was sooooo sweet and pleasant.
 They asked: Do you love me?Awww!
 I love his smile!look how he is happy!They all wanted hugs, kisses...
 It is only a small part of blessing to small kids. Other part that was sent by our dear friend Susan, we will bring to other orphans, to our beloved ones.There a lot of nice jackets to smallest ones.It`s such a joy!
 We are so happy for our small friends, they could to receive such beautiful and such cute jackets.Staff of orphanage were amazed and so thankful!What a joy and big blessing!Thank you so much, Susan!Thank you so much for your great support and wonderful care of poor orphans, dear Friends!You are awesome!

Gates

To contact us Click HERE
Praise the Lord!We have one more amazing blessing!Here I told you that BOM helped to an orphanage with gates.So, now I can share with you a picture of this beautiful blessing.

We are so excited to improve orphanage!It`s a great project and we thank God for His mercy and love to poor orphans!It`s so sadly I can not find picture of old gates. :(  There is big difference.These gates on the picture are absolutely new.Director is so and sooo grateful!She was ready to jump and sing!She huged and kissed BOM. :)

Thanks a lot for your support!Your support helps a lot to share Gospel with staff of orphanages and brings glory to the Lord Jesus. :) We are so blessed to have you all!

Bible story to small ones

To contact us Click HERE
Hello to everyone!I had not blogged about a week. Oops! We stay busy as all time.
We so excited and so glad to see new followers of the blog!Thank you! Hope you will enjoy our ministry for the Lord Jesus and it bring you joy, encouragement and many blessings. :)
We are so blessed  had the opportunity  to visit small our treasures this week.We had absolutely amazing and such wonderful day and visitation!God is so good to us!
When we only arrived girls started to run together from everywhere. There was a lot of joy, hugs, questions, kisses.Everyone was sooo glad!!! Because of a lack of time we had a meeting only with smaller children. The older girls were very upset that we couldn't hold a meeting with them. But nevertheless we all were glad of the meeting.
So, this time we told to our dear small friends Bible story about the tower of Babel. All of them sat so silently! It was amazing blessing for us!
 But at the beginning we congratulated, who already had a Birthday. You would see their shining eyes, when they received gifts. How they rejoiced and admired! After all nobody doesn't congratulate them there and gifts doesn't give. For these children it is BIG pleasure, to receive this beautiful and cute blessing from Lord Jesus.Thank you, friends for sending these blessings to the orphans and to bring a joy in their lives!Look at this precious smile!
 When we studied with them a new song that a name of Lord Jesus is a strong tower, they had a possibility to listen and take active part during the story. Some kids helped to build the tower. They so were excited!
 Then they pasted stickers to big picture.It is good game helps them to study and distinguish to distinguish forms of drawings. They very much love it!  Also by means of bricks or squares of a different form, the children built a tower. By means of this game we learned with them where a bigger and smaller brick.And they did very well!

 It was amusing, when one girl sat silently and it seemed didn't pay attention to all events in room. When we took her in this game. One caretaker told that she understands nothing and won't distinguish where a bigger or smaller square and is useless to take her in this game. But she was surprised that this girl found a square of the necessary form! :)

After learned a Bible verse with our small ones...
 we had craft project.
 They love very much to make crafts and so excited!

This sweetheart wanted to make picture  of her with her finished craft.Oh, you would see how she were excited to see her face on camera! :) It`s so and so funny!We love them so dearly.And we thank God for each possibility to have a time with them.
During the meeting with these dear kids, in a corridor the door was open, where several caretakers sat and could hear the God's word also. We are so glad that they can hear everything what is written in Bible! Isn`t it a blessing? :)

The meeting again

To contact us Click HERE
Such a great joy!We had one more possibility to meet our kids in other orphanage and to conduct the Bible lesson. We are so excited and so glad that again met them and could say what tells the precious God's word.

It so warms heart and gives hope. This such blessing to know, when children wait for you. We couldn't visit this orphanage last Saturday(as we visit these kids usually). When we arrived this time, children were so glad, and asked why we didn't arrive last week. And as all the time hugs, kisses, hundreds questions.It`s such a perfect and great joy to see these sweet souls again.We missed them so very much!!!
We had good time with kiddies.At the beginning we congratulated who had birthdays, them was many this time.Oh, how they were glad of their gifts! Some children hid them to themselves closer to heart, others rejoicing, showed to the friends their gift. Some children so strongly wanted to receive a gift that invented their date of birth, if only to receive something.
When we sang the song, which they very much love, remembered what the last time and other earlier Bible stories learned, we could continue studying following according to the plan of history.All of us rejoice to "travel" according to the Bible, studying great heroes and what the Lord speaks in His word.
So, this time we had a story about the great prophet Elisha and about his many miracles, which our alive God created through him.
One of by miracle was, when the Syrian captain Neeman, he was healed having plunged in the Jordan river.(2 Kings 5)  As we had already printed Neeman's picture and laminated, (we made in advance) that wouldn't become wet in water. We drew leprosy by a felt-tip pen and when dipped into water, it was easily washed away. Children simply admired! "Look! Look! He already has no leprosy!" They love it! :)
Children VERY much love puzzles! To make it more fun, interesting and useful. We made big puzzles having printed with help of the printer and having stuck together sheets of paper among themselves. Then it covered with a scotch tape that could serve long and in other orphanages. We didn't laminate, because there is no such big a laminate and it costs a little expensively. Also picture would become very rigid. That would make problems at transportation. After all, all things to occupation with children, we carry with ourselves. Therefore for us it is important that would be not only it is colourful and interesting to children, but that we could carry it in public transport or in our mission van.
Who from children gave the right answer on a question on stories about Elisha, had the right to attach a puzzle piece to the overall picture. It was fun!
Then we studied the Bible verse."But without faith it is impossible to please him." (Hebrews 11:6)KJV
I like something unusual and interesting for children. Therefore having printed big picture and having painted by color pencils. We made a verse unusual. On clouds we pasted cotton wool, leaves of a palm tree, made of a foam and to a fiery chariot pasted a crape paper. It took certainly the whole day that to make. But children loved it! And for us this most important that they would like to study Bible verses, to hear stories by means of different interesting materials.And it`s blessing for us. :)

At the end we did a craft Elijah on chariot of fire with the Bible verse that children could remember history and the studied verse. All were very occupied. :) The room was full of children and it wasn't easy with discipline.But children were delighted with the craft! They were excited very much  and  with pleasure did it. Especially they were struck when the wheel and a chariot could move."Wow!" :) We attached it with the help of brads fastener.
I so excited and so thankful to a friend, who sent to us this Craft book, Bible Stories and Crafts(old and new testament). I LOVE them!Crafts are easy and just perfect for our kids.It helps a lot to save our time, when we prepare for Bible lessons and is such great blessing in many ways.

 
It was so sadly and heartbreaking know that 12 new children arrived to this orphanage in the first class(grade) and some new children in other classes. So painfully  to know that many children on summer vacations having been at home, were hungry and parents absolutely didn't care of them. The majority of children of this orphanage, the social orphans, which parents don't worry and absolutely of them don't care. Therefore children remain on the street hungry, dirty, start to tramp, to steal, that somehow self to support.
They feel lost  sad
 without hope
 and unloved...
 Please, pray God protect these children.Pray they love to hear the God`s word and Jesus change their hearts and lives.Pray, that they will understand, if parents abandon them, they have Heavenly Father, Who never leave and loves them more than they may think.
  "When my father and my mother forsake me, then the LORD will take me up. " (Psalm 27:10)KJV

ANTI ROMA HATE MONGERING IN CANADA

To contact us Click HERE

TO EZRA LEVANT (ABOVE) WE SAY, GAI KUKKEN AFEN YAM

About a month ago the Canadian government announced a plan to detain Roma refugee claimants.  The CBC News reported:

A tougher approach may be necessary if a plan to speed up the screening process and block illegitimate claims isn't "aggressive enough" in reducing the number of Roma applicants from Europe, an internal Canada Border Services Agency report says.

"Other deterrent measures being examined include detention for mass arrivals of individuals seeking refugee protection," says the report, which was drafted before before the Conservative government introduced a crackdown in June on bogus refugee claims.

The newly revised refugee law gives Public Safety Minister Vic Toews the power to designate refugee claimants as "irregular arrivals" and detain them upon entry to Canada. The amendments are to take effect by the end of the year.

Asylum applicants falling under that designation would be held by CBSA pending investigations into their admissibility.

The government falls back on the old adage of Roma as not really being a people, but really being a bunch of criminals and con artists.  They caught a break when the Canadian media began reporting on an "international cartel of thieves" who were slipping into Canada as innocent immigrants.  What was this all about?  It seems that a police operation involving  Durham Regional Police (DRPS), Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA), the RCMP and Toronto Police, with help from the OPP, FBI, Homeland Security, US Customs and Border Protection, Interpol and other police services in Montreal, York Region, London, Sudbury and Peel Region had busted thirty four persons and charged them with "belonging to or recruited by a Roma organized crime group operating throughout Southern Ontario."  

Before you know it tales of immigration fraud was all the rage in Canada and racist sentiment against the Roma was on the upsurge.

This is pretty nasty stuff and it creates a pretty nasty atmosphere where it would come as no surprise to find others taking the next step with viscous anti-Roma hate propaganda.

And they have.   

Enter Ezra Levant.  

Ezra Levant is a columnist for Sun Media newspapers and the anchor of a daily news commentary show on the Sun News Network. Ezra Levant is sort of a Canadian version of Glen Beck...or worse.

Rabble.ca writes:

About a week ago, Levant went on the air to say that "Gypsies constitute a culture synonymous with swindlers" and that "the phrase Gypsy and cheater have become so interchangeable the word entered the English language as a verb: to gyp."

The quicksilver-tongued Levant added that these "Gypsies" have come to Canada "to rob us blind as they have done in Europe for centuries." (The Sun TV "personality" -- calling him a journalist would be a stretch -- eschews the "politically correct" word Roma, which he says is the name for a kind of tomato).

He says of the "Gypsies" that they are "not a race, not a religion, not a linguistic group. They are the medieval prototype of the Occupy Wall Street movement: a shiftless group of hobos that doesn't believe in property rights for themselves -- they're nomads -- nor for other people, whom they rob blind."

Ezra Levant should be charged under Canada's hate crimes code which reads:

"(1) Every one who, by communicating statements in any public place, incites hatred against any identifiable group where such incitement is likely to lead to a breach of the peace is guilty of an indictable offence ...

(2) Willful promotion of hatred: Every one who, by communicating statements, other than in private conversation, willfully promotes hatred against any identifiable group is guilty of an indictable offence ..."

He should be, but he has not been.  Of course, for the Canadian government to charge Levant they would probably have to also investigate itself and the whole of mainstream media in Canada to see how they have contributed to this anti-Roma insanity.

The following is from Lolo Diklo: Rromani Against Racism.



Statement from the Roma Community Centre
September 10, 2012

*INSTITUTIONALIZED RACISM AND BLATANT HATE SPEECH IN THE CANADIAN MEDIA TARGETING ROMA *

Dear friends of Canada's Roma community,

Last week was a very sad time for us in the Canadian Roma community. Durham
regional police held a press conference one week ago today (Tuesday Sept.
5) declaring that they have dismantled a "Roma organized crime ring"
involving individuals from both Canada and Romania. Countless names and
pictures of Roma suspects originally from Romania filled our television
screens. After such clear and blatant racial profiling
,
the prevalent stereotypes of "Gypsies" being inherently criminal was
certainly reinforced into the minds of the viewers. Latter the same day,
media personality, Ezra Levant, delivered by far the most racist, abusive,
hateful, misinformed commentary on live television that the Roma community
has ever received in our Canadian history. The Sun Media News allowed this
same type of hate speech targeting our community, as takes place in Hungary
by the far-right media arm of the Jobbik "neo-Nazi" political party. Shame.
To the best of our knowledge, this is absolutely unacceptable and not
allowed in Canada - apparently, not.
http://www.sunnewsn etwork.ca/ sunnews/canada/ archives/ 2012/09/20120905 -203437.html
Please, see direct, shocking quotes from this racist diatribe, below.

No one can imagine how disappointing the news from the Durham police was to
all of us Canadian Roma. We strongly condemn this type of behaviour in our
community. However, the way that it was handled by the police and the media
was extremely painful ad disappointing to our community.

We have worked very hard in trying to deconstruct "Gypsy stereotypes and
raise awareness about Roma reality. This past year, we have made huge leaps
and accomplishments in engaging Roma families in our HATE CAN KILL project,
which has now been submitted to the Canadian Race Relations Foundation for
its 2012 Awards of Excellence. Throughout the 8 months duration of this
hate crime prevention project, we worked closely with our police partners,
York Regional Police and Toronto Police Services. In total, through the
Hate Can Kill Project we educated over 1100 Canadians, 800 Roma youth and
their families, and 300 police officers. For the first time in our
Canadian history, we had an incredible family event co-hosted by Toronto
Police Services at the Toronto Police Headquarters, which approximately 30
Roma families attended on March 31, 2012, and now a member of the Roma
community is a part of the Community Police Liason Committee for police
division 11 where the Roma Community Centre is located.

Moreover, two weeks ago, two Roma youth went to Montreal to participate in
the Canadian Council for Refugees Youth Conference - another first in our
Canadian Roma history. With a task from their working group, these boys
have returned to Toronto with the goal of researching and raising awareness
about how the removal of healthcare for refugee claimants has affected
their respective communities.

Lastly, this past few months, despite many deportations, a small number of
Roma families have been granted refugee status in Canada. In 2011, 167
Hungarian Roma families were accepted as genuine refugees. I am positive,
that 2012 will be an even better year for our community will much more
support available, hence less withdrawls - and hopefully, more recognition
at the Immigration Refugee Board as Hungary continues to reveal itself as a
country full of racially motivated violence endemic discrimination and
marginalization, and prevalent hatred all targeting the Roma minority.
http://www.economis t.com/blogs/ easternapproache s/2012/08/ hungarian- anti-roma- marches

I share this with you all because I want to exemplify how hard we are
working - this community is working - at healing and educating our members,
helping people understand and navigate our Canadian refugee system, and
provide language support - all with the objective of helping people in
successfully integrating and settling into Toronto, and being a part of and
contributing to the broader Canadian family.

Unfortunately, our efforts are being undermined by the reaction by Ezra
Levant in the Sun Media News (see below), to the Durham Regional Police
Press Release and a document by the Canadian Border Services Agency
(riddled with racist stereotypes, misinformation, and assumptions) is
a blatantly racist document that only focuses exploiting stereotypes of
criminality and parasitism of Canada's social security system. On August
18, there was an article in the Globe “Federal government considers
detaining Roma refugee claimants, report suggests”. The article indicated
that an internal CBSA report dated January 2012 recommended the use of
detention, including mass detention, of Hungarian Roma refugee claimants in
order to deter them from applying for refugee status in Canada, should
other measures not succeed in reducing their numbers.
http://www.theglobe andmail.com/ news/politics/ federal-governme nt-considers- detaining- roma-refugee- claimants- report-suggests/ article4487855/
Sadly, nowhere in any of these government reports or in any media coverage
is there mention of the endemic discrimination, overt hatred, or racially
motivated violence that continues to plague Hungary's Roma minority.

Durham Regional Police's Press Release
http://www.drps. ca/internet_ explorer/ whatsnew/ whatsnew_ view.asp? ID=23391 was
littered with racial profiling and stereotyping, and misinformation
(Romanians require a visa to travel to Canada and are not likely to be
refugees. They are one of the oldest segments of the Canadian Roma
community, many of which were the first Roma to arrive in Canada (late
1800's) after their emancipation from slavery in Romania (1300's - 1862)
http://en.wikipedia .org/wiki/ Slavery_in_ Romania . Few Romanian Roma are
newcomers. the Roma community condemn this criminality - but, hopes that it
can be reported about without drawing upon racist stereotyping.

Below you will find the most blatantly racist media coverage that many have
ever witnessed in Canada. This past week, many Canadians, with no prior
connection to the Roma Community Centre or our community in Canada, have
been writing to express their shock and outrage this this type of hate
speech is taking place in our mainstream in Canada. Certainly, there has
been ongoing exploitation of ("Gyspy") stereotypes in the media in most
articles that discuss the Roma situation in Canada, however this one is
absolutely horrendous and hateful. It typifies the hate speech that has
been ongoing in the public and media discourse in Hungary which has led to
a situation of endemic hatred in that country and continues to fuel it.
Levant is overly inciting the same hatred toward Gypsies in Canada, as he
insists on calling us...a name that the Canadian media has desisted in
using for the past decade since the RCC campaign to stop its usage.

As a result of Levant's hate speech targeting our community, the RCC has
been in contact with the Canadian Race Relations Foundation and is
currently writing formal complaints to
the Canadian Broadcasting Standards Council, the Canadian Media
Association, the Canadian Ethnic media Association, and the Ontario Human
Rights Commission.

The Canadian Roma community would be immensely grateful to anyone who will
take the time to also write formal complaints about
this unacceptable racist language targeting a specific group in our media.
This is something that needs to be eliminated now. Surely, any other
ethnic, religious, or racial group in Canada with adequate resources would
respond in a swift and severe manner had they been the subject of such a
publicly hateful, demeaning, and racist diatribe.

*The Source with Ezra Levant (Sun News Network)*
*Segment: "The Jew vs. The Gypsies"*
*Wednesday, September 5 @ 5pm*
URL with embedded video:
http://www.sunnewsn etwork.ca/ sunnews/canada/ archives/ 2012/09/20120905 -203437.html

*Quotes from Ezra Levant:*

"These are Gypsies, a culture synonymous with swindlers. The phrase Gypsy
and cheater have been so interchangeable historically that the word has
entered the English language as a verb. He gypped me! Well the gypsies have
gypped us too."

"And they [gypsies] come here to gyp us again, to rob us blind, as they
have done in Europe for centuries."

"Let me stop before you start blowing your hate crime whistle at me for
saying Gypsy or gypped. See, political correctness and euphemisms like
calling them 'Roma' instead of Gypsy or as the BBC calls them 'Travelers,'
well the point of that is to obscure the truth. They're Gypsies and one of
the central characteristics of that culture is that their chief economy is
theft and begging. Sorry, it's true!"

* "Gypsies aren't a race, they're not a religion, they're not a linguistic
group. They're the medieval prototype of the Occupy Wall Street movement. A
shiftless group of hoboes that doesn't believe in property rights for
themselves - they're nomads - or for others. They rob people blind. Now the
scourge has come to Canada through fake refugee claims."*

* "Look at this list of suspects released by Durham police. Gypsy after
gypsy after gypsy. They gypped their way into Canada and now they're
gypping the rest of us. Look at this, Dinarca Caldaras, wanted for steeling
two cars, money laundering, theft, fraud. Gypsy. Look at that, not on her
own, as part of a criminal organization. We're used to biker gangs, we're
used to the Hells Angels, the Mafia. They're not races or religions,
they're cultural groups, subcultures, deviant groups that chose to steel
for a living. Look at this! Ovidio Calderas, criminal organization, fraud.
It's not all non-violent, no way, as I told you on Friday, in Italy,
Gypsies are charged with murder at least 6 times more frequently than their
population would suggest." *

* "For Gypsies it [crime] is a family affair, in fact, women and children
are the best at it because we liberal Canadians or Europeans would never
expect a child or a mom or both working together."
*"Every last one of them [suspects] is a Gypsy. Just some of the 5000
who've gamed our system and our causing a Made in Europe crime wave on our
streets."*
*
*
* "Street gypsies have four part*icular [theft] strategies."

* "Just in case you're not clear about this [Durham regional police clip],
they're talking about Gypsies. [Another clip from Durham regional police].
'Roma' you know cops can be politically correct. 'Roma' is the name of a
kind of tomato as you know, but that's what some people call Gypsies. You
can call them whatever you like if you're arresting them, that's fine by
me."*
*
*
* "239 charges, 29 people that we know about so far. There are 5000 of
these Gypsies here!"*
*
*
*"They're gypping us. Sorry, that's a word for a reason, they're thieves!
And women and children, their own wives and kids, are the main tools of it!"
*
*
*
* "Steeling is part of their family-crime organization. Being a Gypsy isn't
like being Black, or being Gay, or being a woman or even Romanian, where
many Gypsies come from. Just like being from Sicily doesn't make you part
of the Mafia. Being a Gypsy is a positive choice, like being a Blood or a
Crip, like joining the Cosa Nostra. For centuries, these roving highway
gangs have mocked the law and robbed their way across Europe. Now, because
of our broken refugee system, they're here in Canada in the thousands. And
they've brought the Gypsy Crime Wave with them. Yeah, no thanks, I'm not
interested in calling them 'Roma' or 'Travelers' or having a Human Rights
Commission investigate where we as a society have done them wrong, maybe
dispatching social workers (laughs) the social workers will just have their
wallets stolen. I want to dispatch cops and send the bad Gypsies to Hungary
on the next plane. Just warn the flight attendants (chuckles) not to wear
any jewelry on the flight!"*

Unsurprisingly, Levant has publically declared that Immigration Minister
Jason Kenney is his "favourite" member of parliament.
http://ezralevant. com/2009/ 01/jason- kenney-is- my-favourite- m.html

*WE CAN DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT *

* *

1. We can contact the *Canadian Broadcast Standards Council*

“HOW TO MAKE A COMPLAINT:

http://www.cbsc. ca/english/ complaint/ index.php
Your Concerns Are Important

If you see or hear something that concerns you, this is what you should do:

*1. Write down the following information. *

1. the name, date and time of the program

2. the name or call letters of the broadcaster

3. a short summary of what concerned you
*2. Let us know.*

Send us the details within 28 days of the date of broadcast. We will
investigate your complaint further.

The Complaint Form<http://www.cbsc. ca/english/ complaint/ complaint- form.php?>
found
on our website makes it easy for you to submit your complaint.

The CBSC's offices are in Ottawa. You can write to us at our
address<http://www.cbsc. ca/english/ about/contact. php>.
You can alsosend in your complaint via fax or
email<http://www.cbsc. ca/english/ about/contact. php>
.

For more information concerning the Complaints Process, see the related Making
a complaint FAQs <http://www.cbsc. ca/english/ faqs/complaints. php> section.”

*3. EXAMPLES OF BROADCAST STANDARDS DECISIONS*
Here is a press release: ‘Derogatory Ethnic Term Unacceptable, Says
Canadian Broadcast Standards Council’

http://www.cbsc. ca/english/ documents/ prs/2012/ 120718.php

Another press release: ‘Abusive Comments on the Basis of Sexual Orientation
Unacceptable, Says Canadian Broadcast Standards Council’
http://www.cbsc. ca/english/ documents/ prs/2012/ 120829.php

-- 
Gina Csanyi-Robah
Executive Director
Roma Community Centre

[image: romacommunitycentre _logo-100. png]

Roma Community Centre

2340 Dundas St. W., Suite G20
Toronto, ON

M6P 4A9

Office: (416) 546-2524

Cell: (416) 561-0770

website: www.romatoronto. org

facebook group: Toronto Roma Community Centre

The Roma Community Centre is committed to Celebrating Romani Culture,
Successful Settlement, Promoting Human Rights, Community Developing
Initiatives, and Cultivating Community Partnerships.

-- 
Gina Csanyi-Robah
Executive Director
Roma Community Centre

[image: romacommunitycentre _logo-100. png]

Roma Community Centre

2340 Dundas St. W., Suite G20
Toronto, ON

M6P 4A9

Office: (416) 546-2524

Cell: (416) 561-0770

website: www.romatoronto. org

facebook group: Toronto Roma Community Centre

The Roma Community Centre is committed to Celebrating Romani Culture,
Successful Settlement, Promoting Human Rights, Community Developing
Initiatives, and Cultivating Community Partnerships.

-- 
Gina Csanyi-Robah
Executive Director
Roma Community Centre

[image: romacommunitycentre _logo-100. png]

Roma Community Centre

2340 Dundas St. W., Suite G20
Toronto, ON

M6P 4A9

Office: (416) 546-2524

Cell: (416) 561-0770

website: www.romatoronto. org

facebook group: Toronto Roma Community Centre

The Roma Community Centre is committed to Celebrating Romani Culture,
Successful Settlement, Promoting Human Rights, Community Developing
Initiatives, and Cultivating Community Partnerships.

A CALL FOR PRISON RACIAL PEACE FROM PELICAN BAY

To contact us Click HERE


It is friday and that means Scission returns to prison and reminds us all to keep in mind the plight of the thousands locked up behind the bars and the walls of this "institutions."

When I was in prison back in the seventies there were, of course, racial divisions amongst prisoners, but not nearly to the extent that they exist today.  Don't forget I entered prison only a few years after prisoners at Attica united together in that historic uprising.

Today anything like that would be practically impossible.  Prisons have turned into gang fiefdoms and are rife with racial hatred.  Race based violence is commonplace.  Prison administrators feign concern, but the reality is these divisions make control much more simple.  A divided prison population is a prison populations whose anger is most often turned within.  The unity needed for a true prison movement within is thus extremely difficult.  That is why the post and statement below is so very important.

The call for unity, for a stepping back from the violence may sound utopian to some.  It may even seem utopian to me.  Still, it also represents some sort of hope, some sort of a re-emergence of sanity.  I hope with all my heart that the call you will read here is heard by the thousands of prisoners who can only gain anything at all by working together in struggle.  There simply is no other way.

The task toward prisoner unity strikes me as an incredibly tough one, but all power to those taking the first step.

The following is from the San Francisco Bay View.

California prisoners make historic call for peace between racial groups in California prisons and jails

by Isaac Ontiveros, Prisoner Hunger Strike Solidarity



Oakland – Prisoners in Pelican Bay State Prison’s Security Housing Unit (SHU) have announced a push to end all hostilities between racial groups within California’s prisons and jails. The handwritten announcement was sent to prison advocacy organizations. It is signed by several prisoners, identifying themselves as the PBSP-SHU Short Corridor Collective. [Their statement follows this one.]
The Attica rebellion in upstate New York Sept. 9-13, 1971, saw thousands of prisoners take over the prison, protesting intolerable conditions and infuriated by the assassination of George Jackson at San Quentin on Aug. 21, 1971. The secret of their unprecedented strength was their multi-racial solidarity. Here, Black and white prisoners sit on a wall during a meeting called by the organizers.The Short Corridor refers to a section of Pelican Bay Prison’s notorious Security Housing Unit (SHU). Pelican Bay’s SHU was the point of origin for last year’s hunger strikes which rocked California’s prison system, at one point including the participation of nearly 12,000 prisoners in over 11 prisons throughout the state.

The statement calls for the cessation of all hostilities between groups to commence Oct. 10, 2012, in all California prisons and county jails. “This means that from this date on, all racial group hostilities need to be at an end,” the statement says.
It also calls on prisoners throughout the state to set aside their differences and use diplomatic means to settle their disputes. The Short Corridor Collective states, “If personal issues arise between individuals, people need to do all they can to exhaust all diplomatic means to settle such disputes; do not allow personal, individual issues to escalate into racial group issues.”

The statement calls for the cessation of all hostilities between groups to commence Oct. 10, 2012, in all California prisons and county jails. “This means that from this date on, all racial group hostilities need to be at an end,” the statement says.

In the past, California prisoners have attempted to collaborate with the Department of Corrections to bring an end to the hostilities, but CDCR has been largely unresponsive to prisoners’ requests. The statement warns prisoners that they expect prison officials to attempt to undermine this agreement.

Occupy San Quentin on Feb. 20, 2012, a major demonstration in support of prisoners, united people across race, class, age and gender dividing lines. – Photo: Alex Darocy, Indybay“My long-time experience in urban peace issues, gang truces, prevention and intervention is that when gang leaders and prisoners take full stock of the violence and how they can contribute to the peace, such peace will be strong, lasting and deep. I honor this effort as expressed in this statement,” says Luis J. Rodriguez, renowned violence intervention worker and award-winning author of “Always Running: La Vida Loca, Gang Days in L.A.”

Rodriguez has helped broker gang truces throughout the U.S. as well as in other parts of the world. This spring, Rodriguez was involved in a historic truce between gangs in El Salvador leading to a 70 percent drop in violence in that country.
According to Rodriguez, “What is needed now – and where most peace efforts fail – is the meaningful and long-lasting support of society and government, in the form of prison reform, training, education, drug and mental health treatment and proper health care. We need an end to repressive measures that only feed into the violence and traumas.”
George Jackson, a strong advocate of solidarity across race lines, recognized “that in every situation where race has arisen to become a sharp dividing social factor, the hands of the capitalists can be seen pulling the strings, and it is only they who benefit from the conflicts,” writes Kevin “Rashid” Johnson, a present-day prisoner often compared to Jackson. This banner graced the Occupy San Quentin demonstration on Feb. 20, 2012. – Photo: Alex Darocy, Indybay

Azadeh Zohrabi of the Prisoner Hunger Strike Solidarity Coalition sees the agreement as a positive development that stems from last year’s hunger strikes. “While living through some of the worst conditions imaginable, the authors of this statement continue to work for change,” states Zohrabi. “While the prison administration drags its feet on even the most basic reforms, these guys are trying to build peace throughout the system. That says a lot about their humanity and hope.”

Advocates and the Short Corridor Collective are eager to spread the word as far and wide as possible and implement peace plans throughout California’s prisons and jails. “We must all hold strong to our mutual agreement from this point on and focus our time, attention and energy on mutual causes beneficial to all of us [i.e., prisoners] and our best interests,” says the Collective.
“The reality is that, collectively, we are an empowered, mighty force that can positively change this entire corrupt system into a system that actually benefits prisoners and thereby the public as a whole.”

“While living through some of the worst conditions imaginable, the authors of this statement continue to work for change,” states Zohrabi. “While the prison administration drags its feet on even the most basic reforms, these guys are trying to build peace throughout the system. That says a lot about their humanity and hope.”

The PBSP-SHU Short Corridor Collective has strongly requested that its statement be read and referred to in whole. It follows here:

Agreement to end hostilities

Dated Aug. 12, 2012
To whom it may concern and all California Prisoners:
Greetings from the entire PBSP-SHU Short Corridor Hunger Strike Representatives. We are hereby presenting this mutual agreement on behalf of all racial groups here in the PBSP-SHU Corridor. Wherein, we have arrived at a mutual agreement concerning the following points:
1. If we really want to bring about substantive meaningful changes to the CDCR system in a manner beneficial to all solid individuals who have never been broken by CDCR’s torture tactics intended to coerce one to become a state informant via debriefing, that now is the time for us to collectively seize this moment in time and put an end to more than 20-30 years of hostilities between our racial groups.
2. Therefore, beginning on Oct. 10, 2012, all hostilities between our racial groups in SHU, ad-seg, general population and county jails will officially cease. This means that from this date on, all racial group hostilities need to be at an end. And if personal issues arise between individuals, people need to do all they can to exhaust all diplomatic means to settle such disputes; do not allow personal, individual issues to escalate into racial group issues!

Like the Attica rebellion, the Lucasville prisoners who took over their prison in April 1993 deliberately united across the racial lines that prison authorities use to divide and conquer prisoners. The multi-racial leadership has remained united to this day throughout their isolation on death row. This photo of a sign made during the rebellion was used as an exhibit during their trial in 1996. – Photo: Courtesy Staughton Lynd3. We also want to warn those in the general population that IGI [Institutional Gang Investigators] will continue to plant undercover Sensitive Needs Yard (SNY) debriefer “inmates” amongst the solid GP prisoners with orders from IGI to be informers, snitches, rats and obstructionists, in order to attempt to disrupt and undermine our collective groups’ mutual understanding on issues intended for our mutual causes (i.e., forcing CDCR to open up all GP main lines and return to a rehabilitative-type system of meaningful programs and privileges, including lifer conjugal visits etc. via peaceful protest activity and noncooperation e.g., hunger strike, no labor etc.). People need to be aware and vigilant to such tactics and refuse to allow such IGI inmate snitches to create chaos and reignite hostilities amongst our racial groups. We can no longer play into IGI, ISU (Investigative Service Unit), OCS (Office of Correctional Safety) and SSU’s (Service Security Unit’s) old manipulative divide and conquer tactics!

In conclusion, we must all hold strong to our mutual agreement from this point on and focus our time, attention and energy on mutual causes beneficial to all of us [i.e., prisoners] and our best interests. We can no longer allow CDCR to use us against each other for their benefit!
Because the reality is that collectively, we are an empowered, mighty force that can positively change this entire corrupt system into a system that actually benefits prisoners and thereby the public as a whole, and we simply cannot allow CDCR and CCPOA, the prison guards’ union, IGI, ISU, OCS and SSU to continue to get away with their constant form of progressive oppression and warehousing of tens of thousands of prisoners, including the 14,000-plus prisoners held in solitary confinement torture chambers – SHU and ad-seg units – for decades!
We send our love and respect to all those of like mind and heart. Onward in struggle and solidarity!
Presented by the PBSP-SHU Short Corridor Collective:

• Todd Ashker, C-58191, D1-119
• Arturo Castellanos, C-17275, D1-121
• Sitawa Nantambu Jamaa (Dewberry), C-35671, D1-117
• Antonio Guillen, P-81948, D2-106

And the Representatives Body:

• Danny Troxell, B-76578, D1-120
• George Franco, D-46556, D4-217
• Ronnie Yandell, V-27927, D4-215
• Paul Redd, B-72683, D2-117
• James Baridi Williamson, D-34288. D4-107
• Alfred Sandoval, D-61000, D4-214
• Louis Powell, B-59864, D1-104
• Alex Yrigollen, H-32421, D2-204
• Gabriel Huerta, C80766, D3-222
• Frank Clement, D-07919, D3-116
• Raymond Chavo Perez, K-12922, D1-219
• James Mario Perez, B-48186, D3-124

Note: All names and the foregoing statement must be shown verbatim when used and posted on any website or other publication.Send our brothers some love and light and solidarity. Write to them using the listed names, numbers and housing and add the address: P.O. Box 7500, Crescent City CA 95532. The Bay View sends them all our highest re