[act-ma] Report on our May Day car rally against sanctions

Charlie Welch cwelch at tecschange.org
Sun May 3 03:30:35 PDT 2020


To see pictures check out...

https://digboston.com/end-sanctions-save-lives-may-day-caravan-rolls-past-state-house/ 



  “END SANCTIONS, SAVE LIVES”: MAY DAY CARAVAN ROLLS PAST STATE HOUSE

WRITTEN BY DIG STAFF <https://digboston.com/author/dig-staff/>POSTED MAY 
1, 2020FILED UNDER: COVID 
<https://digboston.com/category/coronavirus-boston/>, NEWS 
<https://digboston.com/category/news/>, NEWS TO US 
<https://digboston.com/category/news-to-us/>

covid protestEileen Kurkoski/ Mass. Peace Action

The ongoing pandemic has put lots of annual events on pause, but 
activists from Massachusetts <https://digboston.com/> Peace Action still 
hit the concrete to make noise on May Day. This year, though, they 
hollered from their vehicles and gave each other space while briefly 
spilling out on Boston <https://digboston.com/> Common.

After meeting up near Herter Park in Allston early Friday afternoon, 
protesters from Mass Peace Action along with more than a dozen other 
organizations rolled out for what organizers billed the Boston May Day 
Car Rally: Global Solidarity in the time of COVID-19 
<https://digboston.com/category/coronavirus-boston/>. Their 
demonstration came in a newfangled formation, but their messaging was 
consistent with pre-coronavirus 
<https://digboston.com/category/coronavirus-boston/> priorities: “End 
Sanctions, Save Lives”; “Bailout People Not Corporations”;

“Fund Medicare for All, Not Wars and Militarism.”

“The impact of the [COVID-19] pandemic has been overwhelming in our 
country,” Mass Peace Action wrote in a May Day statement. “It has been 
especially devastating for the poor and for Black, Brown, and Indigenous 
communities. At the same time, wealthy elites value their profits more 
than lives.”

massachusetts coronavirus protestCole Harrison / Mass. Peace Action

Yoav Elinevsky, a Mass Peace Action board member and organizer, added: 
“Now is the time to imagine and act together for reorganizing society 
around the needs of all the people, especially of the poor and working 
people, while protecting nature. … We invite the public to join us and 
magnify the potential impact of this message by distributing it and 
acting similarly locally and globally. This is the time for solidarity 
not exclusion. Let us remember that we are only as strong as the weakest 
health system in our interconnected world.”

“US sanctions are devastating in ordinary times,” the group’s statement 
continued. “But collectively punishing entire populations during a 
global pandemic is an even more ruthless form of barbarism.”

In addition to noting the aforementioned issues, protest signs—some of 
which were waved outside car windows, others which were taped on doors 
and trunks—specifically: “End US sanctions on Venezuela, Cuba, Iran, 
North Korea and Syria”; “Fund the Green New Deal”; “No subsidies to oil 
and gas corporations”; “End the blockade of Gaza, the largest open-air 
prison in the world”; “Support immigrants and refugees – ‘No’ to 
detentions, deportation, and walls.”

The protest was endorsed by “Friends Meeting at Cambridge; Campaign for 
Peace, Disarmament, and Common Security; New Democracy Coalition; Jewish 
Voice for Peace Boston; Our Revolution Massachusetts; Resistance Center 
for Peace & Justice; Witness for Peace New England; Latin America 
Solidarity Coalition of Western Massachusetts; Codepink of Western 
Massachusetts; Traprock Center for Peace and Justice; American Friends 
Service Committee; Boston Democratic Socialists of America – 
Internationalism Working Group; and the Veterans for Peace – Chapter 9 – 
Smedley D. Butler Brigade; Unitarian-Universalists for Justice in the 
Middle East; Massachusetts Jobs with Justice; Boston May Day Coalition.”






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