Activism

COMMENTARY: Beijing’s Winter Olympics? An African American Diplomat Speaks Out for the Uyghurs in China

Probably not “mass killing,” of an estimated 1 million like Pol Pot in Cambodia in the 1970s. But considering China’s restrictions on Uyghurs having children, and taking children away from families, it all falls within the conventional definition of the term, according to Naomi Kikoler, director of the Simon-Skjodt Center for the Prevention of Genocide at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in the latest Smithsonian Magazine.

Published

1 year ago

February 14, 2022

Oakland Post

Emil Guillermo is a journalist and commentator. He does a talk show on www.amok.com

By Emil Guillermo

Elana Meyers Taylor, an African American and four-time Olympic bobsledder, missed out on the honor of being the U.S. flag-bearer at the Winter Olympics opening ceremony in Beijing last week.

After testing positive for COVID-19, she was forced into isolation. But by Monday she was cleared to compete in her events.

COVID-19 hangs over these games in China like a dense cloud. But it’s not the only cloud.

The other involves China’s treatment of the Uyghurs.

Pronounced “Wee-ger,” they are a centuries-old Turkic people of Central Asia, but has been annexed as part of western China for a fraction of that time. Uyghurs are often referred to as Uyghur Muslims, and that should be your clue.

In a country viewed as homogenous as China, there are actually more than 50 ethnic minorities. The ones that stick out are the Uyghur Muslims.

Uyghurs’ movements in their home area, the Chinese province of Xinjiang, are restricted. What they do. What they say. How they pray.

The Chinese have subjected them to a forced assimilation into the Chinese mainstream. It’s really the systematic erasure of Uyghur culture.

Human rights advocates would say it earns China the gold medal in oppression.

It’s the reason U.S. President Joe Biden isn’t attending the Olympics. The U.S. has joined other countries in declaring a diplomatic boycott.

And the leading voice in defense of the Uyghurs’ human rights? An African American, Linda Thomas-Greenfield, U.S. Ambassador to the U.N.

“Uyghurs are being tortured,” Thomas-Greenfield said recently on CNN. “And Uyghurs are the victims of human rights violations by the Chinese, and we have to keep that front and center.”

Mind you, as harsh and direct as those words were, Thomas-Greenfield from Louisiana, is being diplomatic. Makes you wonder just how bad it is for the Uyghurs.

The term ‘genocide’ is often used.

The Journal of Genocide Research in 2020 said many at first doubted the word should be used at all. But as British scholar Jo Smith Finley said, “More have shifted closer to this position, and others beyond our discipline have joined in.”

Genocide.

Since 2017, China has placed up to 3 million Uyghurs caught praying or practicing their Muslim religion in re-education camps. It qualifies as the largest mass internment of an ethnic-religious minority since World War II.

China calls the camps vocational training. But survivors of the detentions say they were prisoners, some subjected to torture, rape, and beatings.

And then when people “graduate” from their indoctrination, they are sent to forced labor assignments with Western companies like Adidas, Amazon, Apple, and Google.

Some are calling it a form of slavery.

The lucky ones have fled the country in the Uyghur diaspora. In the U.S., there are about 250,000 Uyghur Americans who are able to keep their language and culture intact. But many haven’t been able to contact family and friends for years.

China is using the 2022 games as a propaganda tool of Olympic proportions. It even had the lone Uyghur athlete, Dinigeer Yilamujiang, a cross-country skier, light the torch. But then wouldn’t let her speak to the media.

So, all is good in China? We should know better.

And all this because the Uyghurs are Muslim and seen by China as terrorist threats to the state.

Nothing sporting about any of that. Enjoy athletes like Elana Meyers Taylor. But heed the words of Linda Thomas-Greenfield.

She can see through Beijing’s Olympic rings. She’s fighting for the Uyghers.

Emil Guillermo is a journalist and commentator. He does a talk show on www.amok.com

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Oakland Post: Week of March 15 – 21, 2023

The printed Weekly Edition of the Oakland Post: Week of March 15 – 21, 2023

Published

3 days ago

March 17, 2023

Oakland Post

The printed Weekly Edition of the Oakland Post: Week of March 15 - 21, 2023

To enlarge your view of this issue, use the slider, magnifying glass icon or full page icon in the lower right corner of the browser window.

Activism

Richmond Promise Scholarship Application Deadline Closes March 17

Qualifying applicants can receive up to $1,500 annually for four years toward their post-secondary educational goals at a two-year or four-year college and/or while pursuing a Career Technical Education Certificate at any not-for-profit institution in the U.S.

Published

5 days ago

March 15, 2023

Oakland Post

Scholarships are available for high school graduates who want to go to a two-year or four-year college or a nonprofit vocational/technical school. Photo courtesy of Richmond Promise.

Calling all high school seniors from Richmond and North Richmond: The Richmond Promise Scholarship Application period for the 2022-2023 school year closes on Friday, March 17.

High school seniors and GED students under the age of 24 who reside in Richmond and North Richmond and attend public, private, or charter schools in West Contra Costa County are eligible to apply for the scholarship.

Students can also petition for an additional two years of extra funding. Throughout the process, the program provides supportive services to participating scholars from high school through college graduation, including support with identifying and applying for financial aid.

Richmond Promise launched in 2016 with a $35 million, 10-year investment by Chevron Richmond. The funds are part of a $90 million community benefits agreement between the City of Richmond and Chevron connected to the $1 billion Refinery Modernization Project.

To apply for the Richmond Promise Scholarship, go to https://richmondpromise.tfaforms.net/81. Need some help? Reach out to Richmond Promise at scholarships@richmondpromise.org. Learn more about the organization https://richmondpromise.org/

Kathy Chouteau contributed to this report

Activism

Bay Area Native Dr. Terri Jett Honored by Indiana’s Butler University

Terri Jett arrived at Butler University in 1999 to begin her teaching career as an assistant professor of Political Science and Peace and Conflict Studies after earning her Ph.D. in Public Policy and Public Administration from Auburn University. Originally from California, Jett was unfamiliar with the Hoosier state, but was drawn to the energy of the faculty and students she met at Butler and the opportunity she saw for connecting her teaching and research with the broader Indianapolis community.

Published

6 days ago

March 14, 2023

Oakland Post

Dr. Terri Jett poses with Butler Blue, the mascot of Butler University. Photo courtesy of Butler University Stories.

By Jennifer Gunnels
Butler University Stories

Bay Area native Terri Jett was received a Distinguished Faculty Award at Indiana’s Butler University.

Originally from California, Jett was unfamiliar with the Hoosier state, but was drawn to the energy of the faculty and students she met at Butler and the opportunity she saw for connecting her teaching and research with the broader Indianapolis community.

More than 20 years later, Jett has excelled at the work she set out to do. Last year, she was named a 2021-22 Distinguished Faculty Award recipient for her profound contributions to Butler University over the course of her career.

In many ways, Jett has been a trailblazer at Butler, including becoming the first Black female to earn tenure, and in 2020 becoming the first Black female to be promoted to full professor. Along with her teaching responsibilities as a member of the faculty, Jett has taken on numerous additional roles over the years including faculty director of the Hub for Black Affairs and Community Engagement (the Hub), member of the Steering Committee of the Race, Gender, Sexuality Studies Program (RGSS), faculty senator, and Faculty Fellow at the Desmond Tutu Peace Lab Think Tank. She also served as Department Chair from 2007-2014, a role she has currently resumed as interim while the current Chair is on sabbatical.

Jett has developed almost two dozen courses — core, departmental, honors, and even taught in our Washington D.C. Semester Program — and is always eager to seize on opportunities to take her students beyond the borders of campus. She has led students on numerous occasions to Selma, Alabama with the Honors course Voting Rights in Black and White: The Case of the Selma to Montgomery Voting Rights March. She says walking across the Edmund Pettus Bridge is always a moving and eye-opening experience for her students that brings the Civil Rights Movement to life in new ways.

Of the many courses she has taught, Jett says one of her favorites to teach is the Politics of Alice Walker, which she teaches nearly every summer. Prior to the pandemic, Jett also offered the course several times at the Indiana Women’s Prison and was able to bring some of her Butler students to visit her class in prison.

Jett is committed to doing good things in the world herself and is known in the Indianapolis community for her service and activism. She currently serves on the board of Indiana Humanities and is appointed by Mayor Joe Hogsett to the Indianapolis Land Improvement Bond Bank Board. She also moderates a series on local PBS station WFYI called Simple Civics, which provides short civics lessons and was nominated for a Great Lakes Region Emmy in 2020 and again in 2021.

Jett says her community activism is inspired in part by a desire to demonstrate how to be an engaged citizen for her students as well as a desire to connect her teaching and research to issues happening within the community.

“And I do it because it’s fulfilling,” she said.

Though Jett has various roles within and outside of Butler, she finds satisfaction in discovering ways to integrate her teaching, research, and service. For instance, her research focuses on agriculture and food justice, and last year she leveraged her area of academic expertise and her role as Faculty Director of the Hub to partner with Indy Women in Food in hosting the organization’s first conference on Butler’s campus focused on food insecurity in the city.

“I’m thrilled when I’m able to do that,” Jett said. “All of the hats that I wear are sort of constantly engaged at the same time, and I like that I get to work like that. I’m not running from one thing to the next, I feel like my work is layered with multiple connection points.”

This article is part of a series honoring the 2021-22 recipients of the Butler University Distinguished Faculty Award. Printed with permission.