"The Shocking Move to Criminalize Nonviolent Protest" - TedTalk

On the heels of the detainment of our friends at Solidarity Uganda, we find this TedTalk:




"In 2002, investigative journalist and TED Fellow Will Potter took a break from his regular beat, writing about shootings and murders for the Chicago Tribune. He went to help a local group campaigning against animal testing: "I thought it would be a safe way to do something positive," he says. Instead, he was arrested, and so began his ongoing journey into a world in which peaceful protest is branded as terrorism." From Ted.com

VIOLENCE: A CONTAGIOUS DISEASE?

Physician Gary Slutkin spent a decade fighting tuberculosis, cholera and AIDS epidemics in Africa. When he returned to the United States, he thought he'd escape brutal epidemic deaths. But then he began to look more carefully at gun violence, noting that its spread followed the patterns of infectious diseases. A mind-flipping look at a problem that too many communities have accepted as a given. We've reversed the impact of so many diseases, says Slutkin, and we can do the same with violence. (Filmed at TEDMED.)

Could our culture have misdiagnosed violence? As the director of the initiative Cure Violence, Gary Slutkin approaches gunfire on neighborhood streets as a contagious disease, looking to science and public health for strategies to stop it.

Bryan Stevenson and the Equal Justice Initiative - Fighting Against Inequality in the Justice System

During Pacifist Fight Club: Round 3, Deshonna Collier-Goubil spoke on the racial inequality found in the US Prison System. In this TEDtalk, Bryan Stevenson addresses the elephant in the room: "We Need to Talk about Injustice." He urges us to explore our national past to discover the connecting points to where we are today in our imbalanced system of justice.

While some efforts are being made to reduce the over-capacity of prison systems (in California, and other states) Compton's Mayor Brown recently stated in an interview with Vogue, that these plans aren't "very well thought out." While she advocates state-initiated training programs, Stevenson insists change won't be made—that justice won't be served—until we as a nation take a hard look at our past. Bryan Stevenson is a story teller, and weaves memorable moments with his grandmother, and sitting in a living room with Rosa Parks, into his even-handed case for racial equality and system reform.

Stevenson founded and serves as executive director of the Equal Justice Initiative. EJI fights against the Death Penalty and the sentencing of children to adult prisons, as well as fighting for policy and system reform, all the while challenging the blind-eyes of the status quo.

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Fight Club Homework Assignments:
Revisit: Pacifist Fight Club: Round 3 and watch Deshonna weigh in on the issue.
Discuss or Ponder: What are the effects of a voting system where 1/3 of a demographical voice has been systematically silenced?

TED TALK: Scilla Elworthy: Fighting with non-violence