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Screening of Outlawed:
On March 8, Amnesty International of MHC and the ACLU of MHC hosted a movie screening of Outlawed, a documentary about torture and disappearances in the “War on Terror." Professor Jon Western spoke briefly before the film.
Outlawed: Extraordinary Rendition, Torture and Disappearances in the "War on Terror" tells the stories of Khaled El-Masri and Binyam Mohamed, two men who have survived extraordinary rendition, secret detention, and torture by the U.S. government working with various other governments worldwide.
Outlawed features relevant commentary from Louise Arbour, the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, U.S. President George W. Bush, Michael Scheuer, the chief architect of the rendition program and former head of the Osama Bin Laden unit at the CIA, and Condoleezza Rice, the U.S. Secretary of State. Outlawed places the post-9/11 phenomenon of renditions and the "War on Terror" in a human rights context and calls for action to endthese human rights abuses.
Taser Education Campaign:
At an SGA meeting in the fall of 2006, the Mount Holyoke College Department of Public Safety announced their intention to pursue plans to arm DPS officers with tasers.
Some talking points about taser guns and their risks (PDF file)|
Read MH News op-ed by MHC ACLU member Charlene Van Dijk, Tasers Are Too Dangerous for On-Campus Use.
Read our letter to President Creighton explaining the two main reasons we opposed taser guns on campus, which we delivered along with a petition from 803 MHC community members encouraging President Creighton to vote no on Public Safety's proposal.
Here you can view some of the main sources we used in compiling our information about tasers.
Links on the taser incident at UCLA:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W3CdNgoC0cE
http://dailybruin.com/news/articles.asp?id=38960
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15752233/
Video Conference with Moazzam Begg:
On November 12th, 2006, together the Odyssey Book Shop, we hosted a video conference with Moazzam Begg, author of "Enemy Combatant: A British Muslim's Journey To Guantanamo and Back."
Watch the video (please note that parts 2-5 of the video are listed on side of screen)
Northeast Civil Liberties Conference: "Is This Your America?"
September 30 - October 1, 2006 at Mount Holyoke College
We hosted a
conference in the fall to increase connections between ACLU groups
throughout New England. The goal of the conference was to mobilize
students as well as give them the tools
and connections to advocate for civil liberties. We
focused on the issues of the Constitutional crisis, women's rights,
GLBTQ rights,
racial
justice,
and immigrants'
rights. Registration required to attend workshops. The main speakers were open to the general public.
Featured conference speaker:
(click on schedule for entire conference agenda)
"A Conversation with Nadine Strossen, President of the ACLU"- September 30th, 4:30pm Hooker Auditorium
Speakers
Schedule
Educational Campaign on the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" Policy:
In response to military recruitment on campus and related propaganda,
we created displays to demonstrate opposition and educate the campus on their policies.
We successfully appealed for the removal of Marine Corps business
cards in the Student Center. Additionally, we published an op/ed
piece on the suppression of an anti-recruitment
protest
at
Holyoke
Community
College.
"Don't
Ask, Don't Tell" Policy Text
Text of the Soloman Amendment
SGA
Resolution Affirming the Principles of Mount Holyoke College in Light
of Military Recruitment on Our Campus:
We passed a resolution through the Student Government Association condemning the discriminatory "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" law held by the U.S. Military. The resolution is in response to the current recruiting on campus and seeks to uphold Mount Holyoke's values, traditions and beliefs as are stated in the College's anti-discrimination policies.
The resolution included a clause to present the college's non-descrimination policy to all recruiters of all organizations that come to table in Blanchard. As a result of this, there are now laminated copies of the non-descrimination act on every table that is reservable. The CDC has agreed to make the college's non-discrimination statement more visible on its web page, and the College Registrar has agreed to no longer provide email addresses to recruiters. Furthermore, the Registrar will henceforth supply all recruiters asking for contact information with a copy of the college's non-discrimination statement and the resolution
Resolution
Powerpoint Presentation
Op/ed
Piece in the MH News
Recruitment
Press Release
Educational
Campaign on Civil Liberties:
We
co-sponsored an educational campaign on constitutional rights
with the College
Democrats. We had informational displays in the library
and Blanchard Student Center from Thursday, April 27th to Wednesday,
May 3rd.
MHC
Featured on CSPAN:
On Thursday, March 2nd, Senator Feingold from Wisconsin made a speech to the Senate expressing concern over the new version of the USA PATRIOT Act and civil liberties. In this speech, his discusses how colleges are passing resolutions against the USA PATRIOT Act including "Mount Holyoke College, a small liberal arts school in South Hadley, MA." He then reads our entire resolution that we passed through the SGA last year! Below is a link to an audio file of the speech. Though he mentions us earlier, he begins to read our resolution at about 20 mins.
Audio
File of Senator Feingold's Speech
Anti-Torture
Campaign:
Last semester we arranged a "Torture: Where's the Outrage?" campaign to raise awareness on our campus of prisoner abuse and to solicit signatures in favor of John McCain's Anti-Torture Amendment to the Defense Spending Bill. We put a display in our library of enlarged images of torture victims from Guantanamo along with the petition. Also, a group member stood in busy sections of the campus dressed as a torture victim while a partner asked people passing by to sign the petition. Overall, the campaign was very successful in making people take notice of the issue and we also gained 642 signatures in support of the Anti-Torture Amendment.
Legal
Observer Training:
We held a training session for MHC students on the tools and methods needed to monitor protests and possible civil liberties violations.
ACLU
of MHC's Resolution Against the USA PATRIOT Act Passed through SGA:
The Student Government Association passed the resolution with a vote of 31 yeas, two nays, and eight abstentions on February 15, 2005. This was the end of a two semester campaign involving extensive education of the campus and presentations to the Student Senate.
This site is maintained by Sarah Owocki. She can be contacted at owock20s@mtholyoke.edu