The Art of Indigenous Resistance: Inspiring the Protection of Mother Earth

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 All My Relations gallery held an opening on Friday for their current exhibition, “The Art of Indigenous Resistance: Inspiring the Protection of Mother Earth”, a traveling exhibition of work by 20 Indigenous artists co-curated by All My Relations Gallery and Honor the Earth. The exhibit track’s and highlights Honor the Earth’s 31 year history of community outreach and resistance. Along with wild rice soup being served to attendees, with berry sauce and a delicious white bean spread, the gallery opening hosted Winona LaDuke, speaking about Indigenous resistance and Honor the Earth, the organization she co-founded. Sophie Hunter, one of the younger artists present at 11 years old, proudly showed me her piece before the speakers began, entitled “Treated?”, which asks the viewer the question, “If We Look The Same Inside Why Are We Treated…..” A variety of voices were represented at the exhibit. Ashley Fairbanks, Jay Bad Heart Bull, & Graci Horne welcomed everyone on behalf of The Native American Community Develpment Corporation  and All My Relations Gallery. Votan, Lucie Skjefte, & Gregg Deal discussed how their work was articulating an inherent connection between earth and humanity and about environmental destruction. Continue Reading

Stand-by scheduling creates problems for many workers

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Scheduling problems at airport contractor Air Serv have gotten so bad that workers demonstrated outside company headquarters recently despite sub-zero temperatures. Newly introduced state legislation would bar “just-in-time” scheduling practices that disrupt the lives of airport workers and thousands of other Minnesotans.“The new on-call policy from our company, Delta sub-contracter Air Serv, has cut our hours and made life incredibly difficult for families like mine at the airport,” said Ronda Jama, a wheelchair agent who lives in Minneapolis. “When we don’t know until the day of whether we will work, it throws our families into chaos.”Fair Scheduling Legislation sponsored by Rep. Rena Moran, DFL-St. Paul, would:Require employers to give employees 21 days’ notice of their work schedule.Provide compensation for workers if their shift is cancelled within 24 hours.Guarantee adequate daily rest by requiring at least 11 hours between work shifts unless the employee agrees.Thousands of Minnesotans, many of them in the retail and service industries, would benefit if the legislation is passed, according to the coalition of worker advocacy groups, social justice organizations, labor unions and workers that supports the bill.“Unpredictable hours make economic mobility and achieving the American Dream even harder, especially if you’re already struggling to get by,” said Bree Halverson, state director of Working America Minnesota. “Minnesota families need 21st-century scheduling policies that keep up with the changing nature of today’s workplace.”Researchers from the University of Chicago recently found 41 percent of hourly workers learn their schedules less than a week in advance. Continue Reading

Wisconsin workers again battle Walker’s anti-labor steamroller

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MADISONTrashing his earlier promises to provide a fair hearing, the Republican leader of Wisconsin’s state Senate labor committee rammed through a bill Tuesday that would make union shops illegal in the state. The bill passed in the GOP-controlled labor committee along partisan lines and moves on to the full Senate where the GOP has the votes for approval.The national AFL-CIO Executive Council, meeting in Atlanta, condemned the right wing steamroller in Madison, vowing to support Wisconsin workers wholeheartedly.”So-called right to work laws do nothing to create jobs or close the wage gap,” former Labor Secretary Robert Reich declared at a labor-organized town hall in Atlanta as the Wisconsin workers massed in protest 800 miles away at the Capitol in Madison.At 5:15 p.m. Tuesday, the GOP-run state Senate had finally allowed some minutes of public discussion on the latest GOP attack on labor. The angry members of the public in the Senate chamber had been waiting for their chance to speak since 8 a.m. and they didn’t get that chance until the early evening.With Democratic Sen. Chris Larson of Milwaukee objecting to the obvious rush job, Republican Sen. Steve Nass of Whitewater gaveled the hearings to a close at 6:20 p.m., just over an hour after the public began testifying. So much for his earlier promises to the media that there would be fair and open hearings.His explanation was that the police and later that a newspaper blog had warned him of impending disruption that would allegedly come from the peaceful thousands gathering to protest outside in  the Capitol and from the patient but angry hundreds who were inside waiting to testify.When a few dozen workers who were inside erupted in profanities after being denied the right to speak, Nass went on radio immediately to use their outrage to justify the cutting off of democratic discussion.Such is the blitzkrieg citizens in the once democratic state of Wisconsin face as the Gov. Scott Walker legislative majority pushes past the citizen comments and stakes out unions as the Judas goat to herd the state’s economy to slaughter.It was a playbook taken right out of what happened in Wisconsin when the GOP killed collective bargaining rights for public employees a few years ago and out of states like Michigan where a GOP governor promised he wasn’t out to kill union shops but then turned around to do just that.  The real purpose Tuesday seemed to be to stir disruption so that any possible violence could be blamed on workers.Workers were not alone Tuesday in objecting to the right-to-work-for-less steamroller. Interestingly, during the limited testimony that was allowed, some of the most powerful objections came from business interests.Bill Kennedy, president of Rock County Companies, flew in from Florida to testify how right-to-work-for less would freeze him and all contractors into a state of uncertainty about hiring as well passing the costs of training onto the taxpayer. Continue Reading

“Coyote Dreams” in Dark Fairy Tales

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Julie Buffalohead’s coyotes are more domesticated than the ones from the early Native American trickster tales. The first generations of coyote tricksters were wily firebrands — sometimes heroes, sometimes fools, and almost always males. In her first mid-career retrospective, Coyote Dreams at the Minnesota Museum of American Art, Buffalohead’s gang of woodland creatures float against pink and red backgrounds, wear skirts, eat freshly baked cookies, and hold umbrellas over dead bunnies. The mythological, human, and pop culture figures that inhabit her charming world challenge racial stereotypes while nurturing the tradition of storytelling.Visual narrative (like any good narrative) tells at least two stories — the tale on the surface and the one lurking in its depths. In a majority of Buffalohead’s works on paper, however, those layers of story are inverted. Continue Reading

Broad coalition ramps up pressure for action on transportation

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 Concerned that state lawmakers won’t act to address Minnesota’s transportation needs, advocates delivered thousands of signatures to the state Capitol Feb. 12, after hearing a call to action from Governor Mark Dayton.“The real question comes down to: What kind of Minnesota do we want in 10 years?” Dayton asked a packed room where members of The Transportation Alliance and MoveMn had gathered for Transportation Day. The groups include labor unions, businesses, local governments and community organizations from across the state.“If you’re willing to accept things getting worse in 10 years . . . Continue Reading

Minneapolis Marchers Honor Indigenous Women

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On February 14, a group of Indigenous men and women in red shawls and colorful robes marched down Franklin Avenue in Minneapolis, undaunted by the cold weather. About a hundred participants gathered to remember of the lost members of their community. The Annual Women’s Memorial March is held each year on Valentine’s day in Canada. It calls for the awareness of Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women (MMIW) across Canada and the United States. Sponsored by The Indigenous Women’s Net, Native Lives Matter Coalition and Idle No More Minnesota, Women’s Memorial March aims to bring awareness to the colonial and gender based violence upon indigenous women from North America. This is the first time it was held here in the Twin Cities with title Sing Our Rivers Red. Continue Reading

Democrats, Republicans, Libertarians and Members of Occupy to Propose New Constitutional Amendment to Prevent Unlawful Search and Seizure

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  It’s not often you get Democrats, Republicans, Libertarians, and members of Occupy to agree on something. Today  at 9:45 a.m. that happens as legislators hold a news conference to promote an amendment to Minnesota’s constitution to protect personal data from unreasonable search and seizure without a warrant.Supporters say the amendment is needed to clarify that personal data is covered by the fourth amendment. Bill author Sen. Branden Petersen (R) points to recent revelations that a loophole in federal law allows the government to search and seize any emails that are more than six months old without a warrant.The bill has been passed through the Civil Law Committee and will be taken up in Government Operations committee on Thursday. The bill still does not have a hearing scheduled in the Senate Judiciary Committee. Petersen says Sen. Ron Latz (DFL) still needs to be convinced the bill should be heard. Replay of the video is above. Continue Reading