Greenpeace in Asheville Today

North Carolina Coal Ash Ponds, a photo by Greenpeace USA 2012 on Flickr.

Greenpeace on Long Shoals Rd in Asheville right now.

Activists have secured themselves to the coal loader and conveyers, which will prevent coal from entering the facility.

h/t to Michael Jordan, aka DudeinAvl

Occupy Wall Street Asheville

Lots of action around town. I've been busy and out of town and checking out a few events so here's a rushed version of what I've found so far. Feel free to add to the list in the comments, dear friends.

Here's a list of links to check out a few of the nationally links and in Asheville:

https://www.facebook.com/occupyashevillemediagroup
http://www.imageasheville.com/2011/10/occupy-wall-street-asheville-day-one
http://www.mountainx.com/article/35903/Occupy-Wall-Street-moves-to-camp-out-in-Pack-Square-Park
http://occupyasheville.org

Why I'm in solidarity with Occupy Wall Street - http://www.commondreams.org/view/2011/10/05

Bloody Hell, Jeff Mangrum at Occupy Wall Street yesterday!

Global Revolution's Live Stream is covering the New York Wall Street peaceful event around the clock. Go take a look. http://www.livestream.com/globalrevolution

Asheville TravelingBonfires

The Indie is BACK! Now called, “The Indie of Asheville,” this community publication that plied the streets and back-alleys and lounged at indie cafes and stores of Asheville for 7 seven years, will be back in August—alongside a rejuvenated Traveling Bonfires. We had a two-year sojourn in Los Angeles and another two years of “hiatus” in the mountains of Candler—but we are BACK, for sure! In case you want to hop in the beautiful madness (as intern/volunteer, writer-journalist, cool spirit)—CHECK OUT http://theindieasheville.blogspot.com/ and email me: pasckie@yahoo.com

Activist Clare Hanrahan

Activist Clare Hanrahan may leave the front lines, but her voice still rings out - by Jason Sandford, Citizen-Times

In her younger days, she marched with garbage workers in Memphis, Tenn., in the wake of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.'s assassination.

She has shaken her fist at the front gates of bomb-making factories. She has chanted with immigrants demanding fair treatment. She has stood silent vigil with women advocating for an end to war.

And she once trespassed on the grounds of the Fort Benning, Ga., military base, home to a military training school commonly known as the School of the Americas — an offense for which she spent six months in federal prison in 2002.

“At one point in my life, I thought if I screamed loud enough and worked hard enough and was unrelenting in my kind of advocating and demanding, I could make change,” Hanrahan said.

Read More

Great story on a true peace warrior from Asheville.

Activist Community Potluck

5-8pm, Sunday September 19
Malvern Hills Park
Asheville, NC

This is the first of many monthly potlucks, each on a different topic, and each in a different location. All activists, community builders and leaders, and any community members are welcome. This is a great opportunity to get together, build relationships, network, share ideas, brainstorm, and synergize.

Link

The Return of Free Water Project

Saturday, April 24, 2010 at 7:00pm

The Garage at Biltmore
101 Fairview Rd. Suite B
Asheville

The Return of Free Water Project is a multimedia installation exploring issues surrounding the commodification of our world's water supply. We hope that you will join us at 7pm for an educational reception hosted by Ilsa Ananda Door of Creatrix Laboratories. Following the reception, at 8pm, you may mingle and dance the night away to fine local artists for the ear, eye and heart!

The Story of the Oasis…

The Oasis is a grove of trees made from the detritus of the water industry (plastic water & soda bottles, discarded PVC pipe, etc.) linked together to filter rainwater, pond water, or gray water into pure, clean water that you can drink. The Oasis is one phase of the Return of Free Water Project, an immersive, collaborative multimedia installation with the intention of helping people realize that they have the power to make a difference in our world’s water crisis by transforming their own relationship with water.

We invite you to join us in an evening of wonderful music and dance, live art, and transformation. Your donation at the door not only grants you entry to the event but helps the RoFW Project to purchase materials crucial to the timely development of this installation. Art has the powerful ability to draw people’s attention to the relevant issues of our time. When complete, the Return of Free Water will tour the Americas to spread its message to the masses.

For ideas on how you can make a positive difference, opportunities for participation, and for more information about the Project and our world’s water crisis, visit:

http://www.ReturnofFreeWater.org

7p - Reception and overview of The Return Of Free Water
8p - 5am(ish) - Music with:
LOGOS (live) http://www.logosmusic.net
Annuaki (live) http://www.touchsamadhi.com/live-acts/Annunaki
Gilbot http://www.ashevillefullmoongatherings.org
Arun - AVLFMG
Zennsie - TOUCH Samadhi
PoiZen - AVLFMG / TOUCH Samadhi

Visuals by Creatrix Laboratories & Awe Lucid http://www.awelucid.com

$10 entry 21+ to drink

Saturday, October 24, 2009

2pm – 4pm
In front of Asheville City Hall
2 – 3pm Kids and Adult Activities
3:00 pm Climate Action Rally
3:30 – 3:50 pm Be in the Big Photo that is going to Copenhagen!

350 is the most important number in the world--it's what scientists say is the safe upper limit for carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.

Everyone from Al Gore to the U.N.’s top climate scientist has now embraced this goal for stabilizing the planet and preventing complete disaster. Our leaders need to craft a treaty and policies that will put the world on track to get to below 350.

Asheville 350 | Global 350

This Dancin's Not Dirty

Although painful to watch, it is not criminal for Madison County's Rebecca Willis to dance which she proved after an eight year battle in court and a payoff of $275,000.

She had been banned for life in late 2000 from the Town Depot because some thought her dance moves were too provocative. Her case against the town of Marshall was dismissed, but a fourth District Court of Appeals ruling allows her to keep fighting. The ACLU contends that the dancing ban was a violation of Willis' civil rights.

Go Granny, Go! How tenacious was she to hang in there for eight long years?

link

The 2008 National Convention

Latest SDS Convention Updates:

This summer, from July 24-28, join SDSers from around the country for our Third National Convention! SDS has grown in numbers, in organizational capacity, and in prominence over the past year, and it’s time to celebrate those successes and decide how to move forward as an organization. We left the second convention, and the subsequent ratification process, with several excellent instruments that have served us quite well, including many of the National Working Groups, the SDS News Bulletin, and more.

We still do not have a formal national structure yet, however, and it’s time to ask, once again, how do we organize ourselves? How do we make SDS as horizontal, diverse, and accessible as possible? How do we spread out national work and empower more people to take on leadership? How can we better provide support for chapters around the country? In short, how can we become a truly effective organization that can seriously challenge the power structure of this country, and work towards building a truly democratic society?

Join us in College Park, MD to discuss these questions and more, to build skills, to network, and build our organization! We’re working on travel stipends, so don’t let a lack of funds get in the way of participating in this important event!

Folks are encouraged to arrive on Thursday, July 24th and depart Monday, July 28th. Although all decision making will start July 25th and end the evening of July 27th, there will be social events and good times July 24th and possibly an action July 28th.

Demonstration at Staples

There will be a noon demo out in front of Staples on Merrimon Avenue this Sunday, June 29th.

Staples supplies Huntingdon Life Sciences, a notoriously cruel laboratory, and doesn't care about its customers concerns regarding this.

www.closehls.net

Activist/Artist 'Zine and Blog Workshop

6:00pm - 8:00pm

Pack Memorial Library

Free

Grrly Show by filmmaker Kara Herold is an 18-minute film about the feminist 'zine explosion of the 1990s.

Lori Horvitz, Associate Professor of Creative Writing and Women's Studies at UNC-Asheville, will discuss what evolved out this richly independent feminist media and the way blogs have erupted.

The event will include hands-on workshops with local artists in 'zine-making, blogging, screen printing and knitting in the spirit of Do-It-Yourself culture.

This event is being held in conjunction with the smArt Speak: Distinguished Artist Series.

link

Guerrilla Girls in Asheville

Guerrilla Girls Talk / Performance
Monday, March 31, 2008, 7:00 p.m.
Asheville Community Theatre
$18 general admission, $16 Museum Members, $14 students

During this event, the famous feminist masked avengers will talk about their work, philosophy of activism while campaigning against an appalling lack of ethics in the art world.

Go to http://www.ashevilletheater.org and click on the 'buy tickets now' button to reserve your seat.

Monkey Bizness with the Guerrilla Girls
Hands-On Workshop
Tuesday, April 1, 2008, 10:00 a.m. – Noon
Asheville Art Museum
Cost: $20 general admission, $15 students

Space is limited for this event and advance registration is required.

To register please contact Nancy Sokolove at the Asheville Art Museum, 828.253.3227, ext. 120.

A founding member of the Guerrilla Girls will lead visitors through the chaotic process of brainstorming, collective give-and-take and larger group input that has helped these anonymous art activists perfect their in-your-face work during the past 20 years. As participants ‘aestheticize their anger,’ they may get some career advice about ethics and the art world along the way.

Iraq Body Count @ UNCA

Iraq Body Count is a display of over 3,700 white flags on the UNCA quad to represent the number of American soldiers that have died in the Iraq war thus far (since we ordered the flags, unfortunately even more casualties have occurred).

more pictures

link

Flagged down: Activists arrested in row over protest flag, allege abuse by Buncombe deputy

by David Forbes

The Buncombe County Sheriff’s Office arrested activists Mark and Deborah Kuhn in West Asheville Wednesday morning after a complaint that the couple was desecrating an American flag. They say a deputy invaded their home and used excessive force. [The photo at right, taken by a neighbor, shows Mark on the ground, with Deborah standing by, during the arrest.]

The flag was hung upside down as an act of protest and had several statements pinned to it, including a picture of President Bush with the words “Out Now” upon it and one explaining the meaning of the upside down flag, a sign of distress.

The Kuhns, along with several neighbors and witnesses, assert that a sheriff’s deputy violently invaded their home at 68 Brevard Road. The sheriff’s office claims that the couple assaulted deputy Brian Scarborough and resisted arrest.

According to the report from the sheriff’s office, Scarborough arrived at the home at 8:45 a.m. in response to a complaint about the desecration of a flag.

Lt. Randy Sorrell says that while the address was in the city of Asheville, “when we receive a complaint that the law is being broken, we have to respond.”

Under a rarely enforced state statute, it is a misdemeanor to desecrate or trample a U.S. or North Carolina flag. The Kuhns said the flag was taken as evidence, though the sheriff’s department has no record of it.

After knocking on the door, the couple answered it and, after being shown the statute, said they complied and took the flag down. Scarborough then asked for their identification.

“The flag covered our whole front porch; he comes up with this printout about the law and tells us that we can’t attach things to the flag, that we’re desecrating it,” Deborah Kuhn said. “We tell him we’re not meaning to desecrate it — all we had was a picture of [President] Bush with ‘out now’ on it and a note saying this was not a sign of distress or disrespect. We did this because the country is in distress and we don’t know what to do.”

Read More »

Asheville

2 arrested as Rising Tide protests North Carolina power plant

Local residents braved the frigid cold this morning perched atop a billboard, to protest Progress Energy’s proposed oil fired plant.They unfurled an enormous banner reading, “Burning Oil Ain’t Progress – No New Power Plant in Woodfin!” The residents are part of Rising Tide North America, a group dedicated to fighting the root causes of climate change. The protest lasted over three hours until local police and fire department forced them down.

via

Reading The Names

Hello, friends.

Sunday March 18 starting at 1:00 pm, Touchstone Gallery at 318 N. Main St.
in Hendersonville, (outside of Asheville, NC) will host a Reading of the Names of American troops killed as part of it's on-going installation "Portrait Iraq Freedom"

Seating is limited, so bring a chair or cushion if you plan to stay for the
entire event which is estimated to take approximately 3 hours since there
will likely be nearly 3300 names to read at that time.