~ politics petitions pollution and pop culture

Yelp and ALEC are partners ?

12/12/2013 Nativegrl77 2 Comments

Yelp! is silencing thousands of its users who oppose its recent decision to join ALEC.

At our new site TELLYELP.NO, submit your own Yelp! “review” and we’ll deliver it directly to Yelp’s CEO.

Friends ,

According to documents ColorOfChange obtained from the highly-secretive American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) last month, user-review site Yelp! joined ALEC — and gave the group at least $10,000 — during the opening week of George Zimmerman‘s murder trial.

More than 50 corporations have pulled their funding from ALEC over its responsibility for deadly so-called “Stand Your Ground” — or “Shoot First” — laws. It’s due to Shoot First that Zimmerman was not only acquitted of all criminal charges for his confessed killing of unarmed teen Trayvon Martin,¹ but will likely be immune to any civil penalty for wrongful death.²

Pressed to explain the company’s bizarre decision to join ALEC now, Yelp!’s Director of Public Policy admitted he “can’t ignore” the damage ALEC has done.³ But the company is suppressing thousands of negative reviews posted to ALEC’s Yelp! page opposing the move, and Yelp!’s CEO has made every effort to sidestep the growing controversy. To cut through Yelp!’s filter and reach company decisionmakers directly, ColorOfChange is launching a new site — TELLYELP.NO — that drives home the harm Yelp! inflicts on our communities by funding ALEC.

Check out TELLYELP.NO now, and urge CEO Jeremy Stoppelman to withdraw Yelp!’s funding from ALEC.

In the wake of Zimmerman’s acquittal, Shoot First — with its legal presumption that subjective, racist fears are justifiable grounds for vigilante homicide — has served to paint a target on the backs of Black youth.⁴ Shoot First endangers millions of people living in more than two dozen states, and there is now eight years of available data on the laws’ racially-biased outcomes.⁵ But ALEC has taken no steps to repeal Shoot First laws in the states where they’re on the books — nor to stop ALEC legislators from continuing to introduce new ones. Ten Shoot First bills have been introduced so far in 2013, and two have passed.⁶

ALEC is a bill mill that thrives on millions in fungible corporate “membership,” “scholarship” and “sponsorship” monies;⁷ this explicit pay-to-play legislation pipeline ensures that ALEC will continue to produce extreme profit-driven laws⁸ that exploit and endanger our communities. By funding it, Yelp! is directly furthering all aspects of the ALEC legislative agenda, and is responsible for the harms caused by the laws that result.

Join us in urging Yelp!’s CEO to withdraw funding from ALEC and TELLYELP.NO now. And when you do, please ask your friends and family to do the same.

Thanks and Peace,

–Rashad, Matt, Arisha, Kim, Johnny and the rest of the ColorOfChange team
September 26th, 2013

Help support our work. ColorOfChange.org is powered by YOU—your energy and dollars. We take no money from lobbyists or large corporations that don’t share our values, and our tiny staff ensures your contributions go a long way.

References

1. “Fox News Still Denying Role Of Stand Your Ground In Zimmerman Acquittal,” Media Matters for America, 08-20-13
http://act.colorofchange.org/go/2975?t=10&akid=3138.1174326.5lrQmV

2. “‘Stand your ground’ law may snarl any civil suit vs. George Zimmerman,” Orlando Sentinel, 07-16-13
http://act.colorofchange.org/go/2966?t=12&akid=3138.1174326.5lrQmV

3. “Agree: can’t ignore it,” @lutherlowe (Twitter), 08-15-13
http://act.colorofchange.org/go/2967?t=14&akid=3138.1174326.5lrQmV

4. “Open season on black boys after a verdict like this,” The Guardian, 07-14-13
http://act.colorofchange.org/go/2969?t=16&akid=3138.1174326.5lrQmV

5. “Uneven application, shocking outcomes,” Tampa Bay Times, 07-03-12
http://act.colorofchange.org/go/2970?t=18&akid=3138.1174326.5lrQmV

6. “ALEC at 40: Turning Back the Clock on Prosperity and Progress,” Center for Media and Democracy, 08-08-13
http://act.colorofchange.org/go/2971?t=20&akid=3138.1174326.5lrQmV

7. “How the ALEC corporate bill mill works,” Capital Times, 08-16-11
http://act.colorofchange.org/go/2972?t=22&akid=3138.1174326.5lrQmV

8. “Big Money, ALEC and the Gun Agenda,” Truthout, 12-16-12
http://act.colorofchange.org/go/2098?t=24&akid=3138.1174326.5lrQmV

~ politics petitions pollution and pop culture

NMAAHC

12/12/2013 Nativegrl77

2013 has been an exciting year for us!
Since our ground breaking in February 2012, the Museum has been taking shape at our construction site on the National Mall, located at the corner of 14th Street and Constitution Avenue NW, in Washington, DC.
Just before Thanksgiving, we installed by crane two signature objects — a Southern Railway railroad car (segregated) and a 1930s guard tower from Louisiana State Penitentiary at Angola — too massive to be installed after the Museum is built. These will be a part of our inaugural exhibition on segregation.
As construction continues, the beams and pillars are beginning to rise. When finished, the Museum will be nearly 400,000 square feet, crowned by a 3-tiered bronze colored corona, but we still need additional funds to reach the finish line.
Can I count on your help? Please consider making a special, year-end tax-deductible gift to the Museum.
Your support is vital to preserving and promoting the cultural legacy of African Americans. Imagine seeing firsthand a PT-13 Stearman Bi-plane actually used to train Tuskegee pilots, viewing the lace shawl Queen Victoria gifted to Harriet Tubman, or enjoying a presentation of jazz music from the Harlem Renaissance!
With artifacts like these and more, the Museum will be a place that becomes a lens into a story that unites as all. To make this possible, Carmen, please consider making a tax-deductible donation today and ensure we stay on schedule to open the Museum’s doors in just a few short years.
Thank you for all you’ve done to support the Museum so far!

Sincerely,
Signature

Lonnie G. Bunch
Director

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Please Support the Black Institute

12/12/2013 Nativegrl77

Since 2010, The Black Institute has been the premiere “action tank” mobilizing the immigration reform movement from a Black perspective. We have advocated for low wage fast food workers, a Walmart Free NYC, Caribbean DREAMERS, comprehensive immigration reform, the rights of immigrants, environmental justice, and the deprivatization of public education. The latest TBI initiative is The G Project. The G Project aims to impact Comprehensive Immigration Reform by shifting the perception of immigrants in this country to include Black immigrants. This is achieved by identifying blacks and black immigrants as “G’s.”

We need you to support our initiatives and help us fight back! Our opponents are well funded by big corporations and wealthy donors. You can make a big difference and give us a fighting chance. Make your end of the year tax-deductible donation RIGHT NOW!!!!!
Please take Action today with a contribution of $25, $50, $100 or $250 today by clicking here!!

Sincerely,

Bertha Lewis

The Black Institute http://www.theblackinstitute.org/

~ politics petitions pollution and pop culture

a message from Gov.Jay Inslee

12/12/2013 Nativegrl77

This year, we saw the JayInslee.com community play a critical role in some of our biggest successes.

As the year winds down, my team and I are gearing up. The next legislative session is a little more than a month away, so we don’t have much down time as we prepare for another round of budget negotiations and fight for our key priorities: good jobs, excellent schools, and quality health care.

And that means we need you to gear up, too.

This Friday at midnight, we have to close down fundraising for our ongoing political operations — the same operations that helped us fight and win our key budget priorities this year — until the legislative session ends next spring.

So I’m asking for your help to raise the additional $25,000 we need to keep going strong and send the message that we’re ready for anything as we head into the legislative session.

Will you contribute $5 now to help us raise an urgent $25,000 before Friday’s midnight deadline?

This year, we saw just how difficult our job can be. But we also saw the JayInslee.com community play a critical role in some of our biggest successes.

With your help, we made an unprecedented investment in the future of our education system. We protected vital services for our seniors. We expanded Medicaid and changed the lives of hundreds of thousands of Washingtonians. We put in place Results Washington, a data-driven effort to measure and constantly improve the performance of state government every day. And our work getting the Washington Health Plan Finder up, running, and helping Washingtonians find excellent health care coverage has been the envy of the nation.

I’m proud that we’ve had such success in just our first year. But none of that came easy, and our work will only get tougher as we strive to protect what we’ve accomplished while continuing to move Washington forward.

That’s why your support now is so important. Just like when I ran for governor — just like when we fought for the successes of this last year — the grassroots community we’ve built is a powerful force that can carry us forward and help build a working Washington.

We need your help today — before our early end-of-year deadline — to keep our community strong and make sure we can keep working together for the future we all want for the state of Washington.

Will you contribute $5 now to reach our $25,000 goal and help support our work throughout the legislative session?

I can’t tell you how helpful it is to know that, when I’m working hard in Olympia, I have you and tens of thousands of activists like you standing with me across the state.

We’ve already accomplished so much. With your support today, we can keep our momentum going and build a working Washington.

Let’s go get ’em!

Jay Inslee. Governor

~ politics petitions pollution and pop culture

Extinction for palm oil

12/12/2013 Nativegrl77

We must act fast to stop rainforest destruction and save the last home of the Sumatran tiger.
Donate today to save the Sumatran tiger

Make an urgent gift today to help us reach our goal of $150,000 by December 31st and support all the work we do to protect the environment. Donate button EOY

A century ago, thousands of Javan, Bali and Sumatran tigers roamed the rainforests of Indonesia.
Not any more. The Javan and Bali tigers have been driven to extinction. And only a few hundred Sumatran tigers — the last survivors of their kind — remain. Every day they have less forest to hunt, to raise their cubs, to evade poachers. Every day brings them closer to extinction.
But we have the power to swing the balance back in the tigers’ favor.
Greenpeace just launched a new campaign to transform the single biggest threat to Indonesia’s rainforests: the palm oil industry. Changing the industry means saving the Sumatran tiger’s remaining habitat from the bulldozer. Reversing this century of destruction can only happen with your support.
Carmen, if you have been waiting for the right time to make your first gift to Greenpeace, this is it. Please chip in 5 dollars or whatever you can today. Make an urgent gift to help us reach our goal of $150,000 by December 31st to support our campaigns to stop environmental destruction worldwide. Help save the last home of the Sumatran tiger.
In just two years, an area of Sumatran tiger habitat twice the size of Los Angeles has been destroyed to make way for palm oil and pulp and paper plantations. The companies behind the destruction are only thinking about profit and have been allowed to get away with it, no questions asked. Until now.
With your help, Greenpeace is exposing companies that buy palm oil linked to rainforest destruction. And using public pressure to convince these companies to end their role in deforestation. So you never have to wonder if the palm oil in your cookies or your shampoo was grown on former tiger habitat.
After the progress we’ve made this year, it’s clear that we are on the verge of something BIG. Just last week, Wilmar — a company that buys and sells over a third of the world’s palm oil — committed to stop trading palm oil linked to rainforest destruction because of Greenpeace’s research and campaigning. This, less than a month after major company Mondelez (formerly Kraft) committed to a zero-deforestation palm oil policy for its products.
But we are only part way there. We need more big companies to start demanding accountabilityin order to change the palm oil industry as a whole. This is a pivotal moment for the forests of Indonesia. We can’t back down now. For Greenpeace to keep the pressure up, we need your help.
Help us protect the Indonesian rainforest and home of the endangered Sumatran tiger by making an urgent donation in support of our campaigns to end forest destruction and all the work we do to protect the environment. Our goal is to raise $150,000 by December 31st.
Greenpeace is dedicated to doing whatever it takes in 2014 to reverse the march towards extinction for the tigers of Indonesia, and to save the crucial rainforests there from destruction.
We are committed to tracking dirty palm oil from its source on destroyed rainforest land in Indonesia all the way to your supermarket shelf. And then exposing the supply chain so that everyone — from the palm oil trader, to the consumer company, to the customer — knows that a product is tied to habitat destruction. Make a donation to help us expose rainforest destruction in products we use everyday, and for all our work protecting the environment.
But it isn’t enough just to shine the spotlight on dirty deeds. Just last week, almost 50,000 supporters sent messages to the Consumer Goods Forum — an organization of over 400 consumer goods companies — demanding that the organization require its member companies to end their part in deforestation. And we won’t stop putting palm oil companies and consumer companies in the hot seat until they commit to no deforestation palm oil.
The rainforests in Indonesia, like all forests around the world, are critical for our planet to thrive. The species that live in forests — and the carbon that the forests hold — keep our world rich with life and our climate stable.
2014 can be a year for action and promise for our world’s forests. But only if you join in.
Make a donation today to support all of Greenpeace’s work on the frontlines of environmental injustice, and to help stop the destruction of tiger habitat for palm oil.
Greenpeace has a goal of zero global deforestation by 2020. It’s ambitious, but with your support I know it’s possible. Thanks for all you do.
For the tigers,
Dr. Amy Moas Greenpeace Senior Forests Campaigner
P.S. Time is running out to save the Indonesian rainforest and the Sumatran tiger. Donate today to Greenpeace’s campaigns to protect the environment and stop rainforest destruction.