Paradigm Shift

Announcement:

Saturday –  March 10th – 12:00 noon

For International Women’s Day: Protest & March against the War on Women!

We’re going to sites of women’s oppression to say:

— Pornography & Patriarchy: The Enslavement and Degradation of Women!

— Fight for the Emancipation of Women All Over the World!

**  Announce this to your group & come out on March 10th.
**  Find us on facebook
**  Donate to help make this happen!

Here’s where we’re going and why:

STARTING at St. Patrick’s Cathedral – Fifth Avenue btw 50th-51st Sts:
►The Catholic Church’s approach to women, gender, science and sexuality – like that of many religions – is a Dark Ages disaster! The Pope has condemned condoms (causing millions of HIV/AIDs deaths). The Church condemns homosexuality and insists that “divorce is a sin” (contributing to women staying in abusive marriages). Recently, Catholic Bishops urged “non-compliance” with new regulations requiring health insurance to cover birth control!

MARCH to TIMES SQUARE:
►Protest the objectification of women! Women’s near-naked and rail-thin bodies are displayed, often in subservient poses, and used to sell everything from clothes  to cars to “American culture” to the entire world.
►Protest the U.S. Military Recruiting Center!  The U.S. Military concentrates violence against women!  This includes its quasi-official reliance on brothels as a “perk” to male soldiers; the role of military forces in trafficking women and girls; and the epidemic of rape, harassment and violence against female soldiers.

MARCH to and PROTEST STRIP CLUBS in the area!
►U.S. men spend an estimated $15 billion annually on strip clubs, as compared to $4 billion on baseball. Strip clubs have always objectified and degraded women. But with women entering – and fighting for increasing respect in – the public sphere, strip clubs have become the new “all male preserve” and an enclave for male chauvinism and entitlement towards women’s bodies. Further, strip clubs prey upon the desperation, abuse and addiction of many women, including women who’ve been kidnapped and trafficked.

ALONG THE WAY: Protest “Crisis Pregnancy Centers” & Celebrate Abortion Provider Appreciation Day:
►Crisis Pregnancy Centers are fake “clinics” that knowingly prey on women for whom being pregnant is a crisis. However, they are driven by an anti-abortion agenda. They often have no clinical staff, spread lies, guilt-trip women, and enormously delay and complicate women’s ability to access abortion.
►In contrast, we’ll celebrate abortion providers because March 10th is Abortion Provider Appreciation Day!

Read the call to action that started this whole campaign.

Call to END PORNOGRAPHY AND PATRIARCHY:
THE ENSLAVEMENT AND DEGRADATION OF WOMEN!

We are told that “equality for women has been won” and that “there are no limits to what girls can achieve.” BULLSHIT!

Every 15 seconds a woman is beaten. Every day three to four women are killed by their partners. One out of four female college students will be raped or sexually assaulted while in college.

In recent years, pornography has become increasingly violent, cruel, degrading towards women; women are referred to as “cumdumpsters” and “fuckbuckets”; the “money shot” (ejaculation in a woman’s face) is standard; humiliating cruelty-like violent “ass-to-mouth” penetration-is normalized, and racist bigotry is sexualized. Meanwhile, the broader culture has been pornified: pole dancing is taught at gyms, “sexting” is a national phenomenon among teens, and the strip club is the accepted backdrop to “male bonding.” All this is tied in with, and reinforces, the trafficking of millions of women and girls as literal chattel in the international sex industry.

This is NOT society becoming more comfortable with sex. This is society becoming saturated with the sexualized degradation of women. If you can’t imagine sex without porn, you’re fucked.

At the same time, a Christian fundamentalist-driven assault is imperiling abortion, birth control, real sex education and women’s lives. Lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgendered (LGBT) people who do not conform to traditional patriarchal gender and sexual norms are demonized and threatened. Abortion doctors are killed. Women who seek abortions-or even birth control-are stigmatized. 2011 saw the largest spate of legal restrictions on abortion since Roe v. Wade in 1973.

ALL THIS MUST BE STOPPED!

Fetuses are not babies. Women are not incubators. Abortion is not murder.

Women are not objects. Women are not things to be used for the sexual pleasure of men NOR are they breeders of children. WOMEN ARE HUMAN BEINGS CAPABLE OF FULL EQUALITY IN EVERY REALM!

It is long past time that this new generation stand up, reject, and RESIST this culture of rape and pornography; this culture that labels women “selfish” if they choose not to become mothers; this culture that reduces women and girls to sexualized objects while denying their full multi-dimensional humanity (including their right-as one essential part of this-to explore their sexuality without shame or stigma); this culture that demonizes and bullies LGBT people.

Our purpose is NOT to lobby for new legislation to ban pornography (“decency laws” have always served to further repress homosexuality, boundary-challenging art, and scientific sex education). We oppose the criminalization of women in the sex industry. Our mission is to challenge the new generation in particular to reject this culture of rape and pornography, to resist the shaming of women who have sex and/or abortions, to wage fierce cultural and political resistance to wake others up, and to bring forward a liberating culture that celebrates the full equality and liberation of women.

contact: stoppatriarchy@gmail.com

Join the Largest Unemployment Line
http://youngfeministtaskforce.blogspot.com/2012/03/tue-march-6-8am-830am-join-largest.html

WHAT: Come and show your support for your unemployed and underemployed sisters and brothers.  Get the attention of those running for President.  Become a part of the largest unemployment line – from Zuccotti Park to Times  Square.

WHEN: Tuesday, March 6, 2012, from 8 am to 8:30 am (total time half an  hour) — at the latest must be there 14 minutes after 8 am to wave pink  slip.

WHERE: Meet on Broadway between 11th and 12th Street. A person there will hand out pink slips to participants.

Please dress in business attire, if you can. Please come at 8 am on Tuesday morning so that we can form a dramatic but silent protest line by 8:15 AM. The press is interested in this event and may show up.

Economic inequality and uncertainty are women’s issues.  Single mothers,  teenage girls, recent college graduates, and women near retirement have high unemployment rates.

Only 25% of new jobs created since 2008 have gone to women.

National Organization for Women (NOW) NY State is proud to join with HERE Arts Center and Working Theater in collaboration with Occupy Congress, Upper West Side MoveOn, and culture groups in protesting the lack of action in solving the Nation’s unemployment and underemployment problem.

Please contact Info@nownys.org if you plan to participate in this important event.

Please join MYD at Engendering Progress, our third annual event to honor women leaders, activists, entrepreneurs, and philanthropists.

Wednesday, March 21, 2012 6:30pm – 10:30pm

Honorees include:

Hollaback! — A movement dedicated to ending street harassment using mobile technology.
Catalyst — A leading nonprofit organization expanding opportunities for women in business.
Engender Health — A global reproductive health organization working to improve the quality of health care in more than 20 countries around the world.
More to be announced!

**Greenhouse, 150 Varick Street in Manhattan**

Tickets prices:
*$5 for MYD members
*$15 for non-members
*$20 yearly MYD membership and free admission at the door.
(A yearly membership comes with discounts to upcoming events! Check out www.gomyd.com for more information on who we are and what we do!)

Check out pictures from last year’s event here:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/mydphotos/sets/72157626376931264/

CO-SPONSORS:
Eleanor Roosevelt Legacy Committee
NARAL Pro-Choice NY
NYSYD Caucus of Color
NYSYD Women’s Caucus
Paradigm Shift
Richmond County Young Democrats
WomenElect

Facebook event: http://www.facebook.com/events/307088612685594/
Buy tickets: https://secure.actblue.com/page/ep3

This year, you can take part in CARE’s celebration of International Women’s Day from the comfort of your own living room by joining CARE for an online screening of Pray the Devil Back to Hell, in partnership with ITVS.

After the film, stay online and participate in a panel discussion with the film’s executive producer, Abigail Disney, and other experts on women’s empowerment around the world.

http://www.care.org/getinvolved/iwd/invitation.asp

LOW LIVES: OCCUPY!
Event Date: Saturday, March 3, 2012
Event Time: 6:00 – 10:00 pm (EST)
The Hemispheric Institute of Performance and Politics
20 Cooper Square, 5th Floor
Online: http://www.occupywithart.com/llo-live-channel/

Low Lives has partnered with Occupy with Art and The Hemispheric Institute of Performance and Politics to present “Low Lives: Occupy! a unique one-night-only program of live performance art, happenings, and public actions, simulcast to presenting host venues around the world. Low Lives: Occupy! will take place on Saturday, March 3, 2012 from 6 -10 pm (EST). Low Lives: Occupy! partner Mark Read of the 99% Bat Signal / The Illuminator, will contribute a special projection and performance in conjunction with Low Lives: Occupy!

Jorge Rojas, Founding Director of Low Lives, comments: “Over the past four years Low Lives has developed a platform that invites and enables artists, audiences, and presenting venues to “plug in and participate” from anywhere an internet connection exists. This technological platform which brings a history of supporting artists’ full creative freedom to imagine new worlds, is ideally suited to be the support structure to enable artists, activists and Occupy groups from around the globe to present work in solidarity with #OWS.

Low Lives: Occupy! recognizes the powerful opportunity that is the presentation of performances from around the world, within which artists are invited to facilitate the process of opening eyes and minds – and present a radical re-imagining of possible ways of existing and relating. The Occupy Wall Street protests have given us The People’s Mic and The People’s Stage. Thanks to a partnership with Occupy with Art and The Hemispheric Institute, Low Lives: Occupy! has the potential to become the The People’s Virtual Stage.”

The Low Lives: Occupy! program will include thirty-five performance artists, Occupy groups, and artist collectives located worldwide in solidarity with Occupy Wall Street and the Occupy movement for the 99%. Participants will expand the reach and visibility of the Occupy protests by broadcasting to an international audience community. Thirteen co-presenting organizations in eight countries including U.S., México, Spain, Colombia, Brazil, Northern Ireland, France, and Argentina, will project Low Lives: Occupy! in their own venues and public spaces. The Occupy protests, and the myriad of perspectives and experiences related to this unique movement, will be amplified, explored, and experimented with, through Low Lives’ internet-based creative platform.

The Hemispheric Institute, presenting partner and official New York City venue for Low Lives: Occupy! will present one live performance during the March 3 event, and screen all other selections in real time using live-streaming technology.

Presenting partner and event organizer, Occupy with Art, will host the live simulcast at OccupywithArt.com, providing the means for viewers around the world to access the program online. Co-presenting partners of Low Lives: Occupy! will present the simulcast in their venues and public spaces.

Presenting Partners
Occupy with Art / Hemispheric Institute of Performance and Politics / Low Lives /

Co-Presenters
99% Bat Signal – The Illuminator (NYC, US) / Antena Mutante (Bogotá, CO) / Casa Brandon- Ciudad Autónoma (Buenos Aires, AR) / La Casa de la Cultura Comunitaria “Guuze´ Benda” (Oaxaca, MX) / Co-Lab (Austin, TX, US) / Dimanche Rouge (Paris, FR) / GT Gallery (Belfast, NIR) / Guerrero Project (Mexico City, MX) / Kaxinawá Occupy. Som, Música e Poesia (Greater Rio de Janeiro, BR) / Museo de Arte Efimero de Cartago, MAEC (Cartago, CO) / Nau Còclea (Girona, ES) / Performance Exchange at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago SAIC (IL, US) / Zona de Tolerancia (Hidalgo, MX) /

Participating Artists and Artist Collectives
99% Bat Signal – The Illuminator (NYC, US) / Alejandro Chellet (Cancun, MX) / Alejandro Guzman (NYC, US) / Alternative Art College (London, UK) / Angela Alegria + Lucía Andújar + Dani d’Emilia (Lisbon, PT) / Antena Mutante + ChicoBauti (Bogotá, CO) / Arun Storrs (Oregon, US) / Astrid Menasanch (Madrid, ES) / Bados Earthling (Melbourne, AU) / Christina Sukhgian Houle (Alabama, US) / The Civilians (NYC, US) / Egg No Ego (Bucharest, RO) / Emerge Collective (NYC, US) / Francesca Fini (Rome, IT) / Ginna Vélez (Bogotá, CO) / Guerrero Project (Mexico City, MX) / Heather Warren-Crow (Wisconsin, US) / Justine Marrion Massey (Buenos Aires, AR) / Kanene Ayo Holder (NYC, US) / Kaxinawá Occupy. Som, Música e Poesia (Greater Rio de Janeiro, BR) / Lukas Avendaño (Oaxaca, MX) / Miles Pflanz (NYC, US) / Minipimer.tv (Barcelona, ES) / Moe Beitiks (Illinois, US) / Nyugen E. Smith New Jersey, US) / Occupy Your Spirituality (NYC, US) / The People Staged (NYC, US) / Proyecto 21 (Mexico City, MX) / Revolutionary Games (NYC, US) / Second Front (Second Life) / The Super Art League (DC Universe) / Tempest Productions + Pilgrim Theatre + Bread and Puppet + Occupy Boston’s CASA working group (Massachusetts, US) / Tara Raye Russo (New Jersey, US) / Tutu-Marambá: Pesquisas das Artes do Corpo (Sao Paolo, BR) / Victoria Gibson (Vancouver, CA) /

About Low Lives
Founded in 2009, Low Lives is an international platform for live performance-based works transmitted via the internet and projected in real time through online broadcasting networks. These networks provide a new alternative and efficient medium for presenting, viewing, and archiving performances. Low Lives celebrates the transmission of ideas beyond geographical, political, and cultural borders, and opens multicultural and intergenerational dialogue through visual language, new technologies, and contemporary expressions.

Interested co-presenters can contact Low Lives at lowlivesoccupy@gmail.com before March 1. For information on presenter requirements, visit lowlives.net

Celebrate International Women’s Day March 10! NYC

Saturday March 10th
Celebrate International Women’s Day!

End Pornography and Patriarchy: The Enslavement and Degradation of Women!

Abortion On Demand and Without Apology!

Fight for the Emancipation of Women All Over the World!

Read the call to action that started this whole campaign

NYC Plan
12:00 Noon
Protest and March against sites of women’s oppression!

12 noon: GATHER AT ST. PATRICK’S CATHEDRAL!
Fifth Avenue between 50-51st Streets:
The Catholic Church’s approach to women, gender, science and sexuality is a Dark Ages disaster! The Pope has condemned condoms (causing millions of HIV/AIDs deaths). The Church condemns homosexuality and insists that “divorce is a sin” (contributing to women staying in abusive marriages). Recently, Catholic Bishops urged “non-compliance” with new regulations requiring health insurance to cover birth control!

MARCH to TIMES SQUARE:
Protest the objectification of women! Women’s near-naked and rail-thin bodies are used to sell everything from clothes to cars to “American culture” to the entire world.
Protest the US Military Recruiting Center! Protest the US military’s quasi-official reliance on brothels as a “perk” to male soldiers; the role of military forces in trafficking women & girls; and the epidemic of rape, harassment and violence against female soldiers.

MARCH to and PROTEST STRIP CLUBS in the area!
U.S. men spend an estimated $15 billion a year on strip clubs, as compared to $4 billion on baseball. Strip clubs have always objectified & degraded women.  But as women have entered – and fought for increasing respect in – the public sphere, strip clubs have become an enclave for sexism and male entitlement towards women’s bodies.  Further, strip clubs prey upon the desperation, abuse and addiction of many women, including trafficked women.

ALONG THE WAY: Protest “Crisis Pregnancy Centers” & Celebrate Abortion Provider Appreciation Day:
Crisis Pregnancy Centers are fake “clinics.”  They are driven by an anti-abortion agenda, often have no clinical staff, spread lies, guilt-trip women and enormously delay and complicate women’s ability to access abortion.

In contrast, we’ll celebrate abortion providers because March 10th is Abortion Provider Appreciation Day!

PLANNING/MOBILIZING MEETINGS  are held THURSDAYS @ 7 PM

If anything in this flier resonated with you… If you care about the conditions of women… If you want to do something that can really make a huge difference – not only for yourself, but for women (and all people) worldwide and for future generations…

CONTACT US at stoppatriarchy@gmail.com

3 things you can do right away:
1. Invite us into your class, club or dorm.
2. Spread this call to action on Facebook and Twitter.
3. Distribute this flier everywhere/anywhere you go.

Organize actions on March 10th to Stop Patriarchy! Email us at stoppatriarchy@gmail.com or submit your action via tumblr to post them here.

Indwelling: Living in a Female Body . . . . at The Women’s Therapy Centre Institute

http://www.wtci-nyc.org/page39/page39.html

Saturday, March 3, 2012
1:00pm-3:00pm
Friends Meeting House
15 Rutherford Place @ East 15th St. between 2nd and 3rd Aves (a short walk fr/Union Sq.).
Last March The WTCI convened an international summit – Endangered Species Preserving The Female Body. We launched the Endangered Bodies Campaign- partnering with like-minded body positive organizations in 5 different countries who are engaged in the the same fight to free women’s/girls’ bodies from commodification and objectification.

This year, INDWELLING honors Jamia Wilson, a feminist media activist, organizer, and storyteller. Jamia is currently Vice President of Programs at the Women’s Media Center where she works on amplifying women’s voices and changing the conversation in the media. She trains women and girls so they are media-ready and media-savvy, exposes sexism in the media, and directs the WMC’s social media strategy. Before joining the Women’s Media Center team, Jamia worked for Young People For the American Way, the Planned Parenthood Action Fund and Planned Parenthood Federation of America where she managed their youth outreach program Vox: Voices for Planned Parenthood.

After working with coalition partners and campus organizations to help bring thousands of students to the historic March for Women’s Lives, Jamia was honored as one of the “Real Hot 100” by the Younger Women’s Taskforce. After growing up as an expatriate in Saudi Arabia, Jamia Wilson graduated from American University in 2002. Jamia received her M.A. in Humanities and Social Thought at NYU, where she focused on research and writing inspired by critical race theory. Her words and works have been featured in GOOD Magazine,  CBS News, Alternet, GRIT TV, In These Times, The Today Show, Fox.com,  and more. Jamia serves on the leadership committee for SPARK Movement and is on the board of directors for Feminist.com and REVEAL.

Please join us for a rousing celebration of the revolution so far!

$25 Registration / $15 Students / underwritten tickets available

–Honoring Jamia Wilson, SPARK

–For the last 30 years, The WTCI has offered a Speakout, a time honored traditional forum for women to find their individual voice and share experiences, allowing the personal story of each woman to be heard, dignified, and transformed by our coming together.

–Performance by SPARK Youth

–Reception

REGISTER

The Women’s Therapy Centre Institute, partner of Paradigm Shift!

Dr. Catherine Baker-Pitts, Co-Director of the training program for psychotherapists at The Women’s Therapy Centre Institute, was Paradigm Shift’s featured presenter for our 4th webinar for Berkley College “Is Love Blind: Seeing and Being Seen In Relationships”

Again this year, CARE’s supporters and advocates will gather in Washington, D.C., on March 7-8 for our annual celebration of International Women’s Day. Because your members of Congress are being asked to weigh in on several key issues related to women, girls and communities that live in poverty, we hope you’ll participate!

March 7: Join us on the eve of International Women’s Day as we kick off this year’s event with a special screening of the film, Pray the Devil Back to Hell, which will be followed by a panel discussion that I’ll host.

March 8: Team up with advocates from around the country for our one-day conference. You’ll learn about key legislative issues and take part in Congressional meetings. Come raise your voice and help educate policymakers about the importance of U.S. government investment in poverty-fighting programs.

We’ve designed the conference to be a little different this year. We’ll have a smaller group of advocates representing CARE on Capitol Hill, which will make for a more targeted and intimate experience. And we’ll be joined in spirit by thousands of CARE supporters who will stand with us from home. Together, our actions will make a powerful noise on behalf of poor people around the world.

Space is very limited, so please register today!

We hope to see you soon.

Sincerely,

Helene D. Gayle, MD, MPH
President and CEO, CARE

Friday, February 10th, 2012

Screening of Ann Richards’ Texas
Diana Event Oval, LL100 Diana Center, Barnard College
6:00 PM

Ann Richards’ Texas is a new feature length documentary about the late Texas Governor Ann Richards (1933 -2006) one of the most beloved Democratic politicians of her day. Attend at a special MYD rate for just $7! Further details available HERE.