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Troops Out Now!
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We Must Turn Our Outrage Over Katrina into a Movement
On the 50th Anniversary of Dec. 1, 1955, the day in Montgomery
Alabama that Rosa Parks sparked the modern Civil Rights Movement --
A Call for
A National Day of Absence
Against Poverty, Racism, & War
Thursday,
December 1
No School * No
Shopping * No Work
Continued Protests and
Teach-Ins throught Dec. 2 and 3
Mass March on Wall St. in NYC
SHUT THE WAR DOWN
The People of New Orleans and the Gulf Must Control the Rebuilding, not Bush's Rich Friends!
Solidarity with Katrina Survivors - We demand an Independent Investigation
A Job at a Living Wage is a Human Right
Healthcare, Housing and Education, not war and occupation
Bring the Troops Home Now
Healthcare, Housing, and Education -- Not War and Occupation
The Outrage in New Orleans is a clarion call to the antiwar movement
and the grassroots:
The time has arrived to take our struggle to a higher level. Let us
work together and organize a National Day of Absence against Poverty,
Racism and War on Dec. 1, 2005, the 50th anniversary of the day
that Rosa Parks helped launch the modern civil rights movement – no
work, school, or shopping – continued protest through Dec.2 and 3 – and
a Mass March on Wall Street in New York City. It is time for the
people to demonstrate that they can stop business as usual
coast-to-coast when justice requires the people to do so.
We owe it to the victims of Katrina, to poor and working people, to the
world and to ourselves to find the way to help turn the outrage over
Katrina into a mass grassroots movement for social justice, the likes
of which this country has not seen for some time. Moreover, it is
vitally necessary, and much more possible now, to forge real unity on a
phenomenal scale between the movement against the war and the movements
of African Americans, people of color, and poor and working people in a
struggle for economic, social and political rights.
The war and occupation of Iraq and the Katrina outrage have
demonstrated to the world the urgent necessity for fundamental change
and a movement that is big enough and determined enough to achieve the
goal. Katrina has exposed the ugly truths about class and race,
poverty, war and militarism. Our solidarity with demands of the
survivors of Katrina must evolve from empathy, charity and symbolism to
a mighty social force to be reckoned with. Key to this mighty potential
will be the forging of a strong alliance with activists and leaders
within the African American community in the Gulf States, taking
direction from them regarding the kind of solidarity that they need and
the demands they are making. Our demand to end the war in Iraq and to
bring the troops home now must be backed up by the kind of mass tactics
that signal that we mean business.
Fifty years ago, Black people in Montgomery, Alabama were forced by law
to sit in the back of public buses, and give their seats to any white
person who demanded it. When Rosa Parks, a garment worker and civil
rights activist, refused to give up her seat to a white man, she
sparked the Montgomery bus boycott against segregation on public buses,
one of the most successful and truly mass boycotts in history. The
Montgomery bus boycott also introduced to the world a young reverend
named Martin Luther King Jr., who became the boycott’s principal public
leader.
A Dec. 1 Day of Absence Working Committee was set up at a Sept. 10 Natl.
Strategy Meeting of the Troops Out Now Coalition (TONC) attended by
more than 100 activists. The working committee will develop outreach
and building plans for the Dec. 1 Day of Absence.
Dec. 1 Rosa Parks National Day of Absence Against Poverty, Racism and War --
Initiating Organizations: Troops Out Now Coalition, Million Worker
March Movement, Teamsters National Black Caucus, Michigan Emergency
Committee Against War & Injustice.
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