Ava Duvernay secretly filmed a documentary about systematic racism… ‘The 13th’ was selected as the first documentary to ever open the New York Film Festival, and makes Duvernay the first black woman to open the festival. READ HERE
The movie takes its name from the 13th Amendment to the Constitution, which abolished slavery but included a loophole that exempted those guilty of crimes from freedom. The 13th, which will debut in theaters and on Netflix on October 7, uses archival images from before emancipation through the Jim Crow era and the civil-rights movement, as well as contemporary footage of police brutality against black men, and is threaded with interviews with scholars, lawmakers, prison-reform activists, and the formerly incarcerated. READ
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Finks: I had not heard that word in a million years! Now this!
When news broke that the CIA had colluded with literary magazines to produce cultural propaganda throughout the Cold War, a debate began that has never been resolved. The story continues to unfold, with the reputations of some of America’s best-loved literary figures—including Peter Matthiessen, George Plimpton, and Richard Wright—tarnished as their work for the intelligence agency has come to light.
Finks is a tale of two CIAs, and how they blurred the line between propaganda and literature. One CIA created literary magazines that promoted American and European writers and cultural freedom, while the other toppled governments, using assassination and censorship as political tools. Defenders of the “cultural” CIA argue that it should have been lauded for boosting interest in the arts and freedom of thought, but the two CIAs had the same undercover goals, and shared many of the same methods: deception, subterfuge and intimidation.
Finks demonstrates how the good-versus-bad CIA is a false divide, and that the cultural Cold Warriors again and again used anti-Communism as a lever to spy relentlessly on leftists, and indeed writers of all political inclinations, and thereby pushed U.S. democracy a little closer to the Soviet model of the surveillance state.
**** US Private Prison Complex (an earlier post)
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SOUND CLOUD INTERVIEW WITH ANA:
#93 – Ava DuVernay / Jamal Joseph by The Close-Up on SoundCloud talks about 13th a documentary on mass criminalization and the prison industry. Oct 7th on Netflix.
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By Lara Trace
How do we change everything? We can’t; we don’t. We can only change ourselves. If we’re lucky, whatever we learn might be shared with other “like souls” around us.
We create our own world and daily rituals. Create. Smile. Laugh. Invent. Dream. Write. Teach. (even BLOG) (I also recommend put down that g*ddamn cellphone. OMG!)
If you feel joy that joy is like a light and spreads. It’s kinda magical.
There is an amazing writer who is writing in depth about the 60s Scoop. I spoke to her about the anthology Stolen Generations a few weeks ago. Read about her coverage here. If we don’t learn about this child trafficking, we are doomed to repeat it. Horrific history is always a cycle. It’s evident when we see the greed over oil and other resources and those lands (even children) are wanted then taken/stolen. Bear witness to the uprising at the Standing Rock protector camp. Bear Witness to the 60s Scoop and Indian Adoption Projects. Bear witness to the Prison Pipeline, racism and modern day slavery.
U.S. Reaches Settlements with 17 Tribes
Now is the right time for us to be here. We acknowledge we’ve been told lies and deceived too long (see Finks). Humans can demand more honesty, transparency and truth by going to look for it. The world wide web is that place now.
What is real, true, even horrific, is better than a lie. Then I will accept that what happened in the past is still affecting us, including adoptees’ and American Indians lives and journeys. Then I can make my world change.
*** Here is “How the Legacy of Native Americans’ Forced Assimilation Lingers Today,” featuring the documentary “Little Dream Catchers.”
“When you’re told for 500 years your ways are evil, that damages your self esteem,” says the writer Gyassi Ross at the start of the film. “Showing the beauty of the language is a small dent in reclaiming that self-esteem.” [White Earth was the first tribe to call home its adoptees/Lost Birds in 2007. We are called the Stolen Generations and 60s Scoop for a reason.]
Native worldview: “We thank therefore we are.”
Western worldview: “I think therefore I am.”
And now the rest of their story where some things never change.
The Indian must, therefore, be taught how to labor; and, that labor may be made necessary to his well-being, he must be taken out of the reservation through the door of the General Allotment Act. And he must be imbued with the exalting egotism of American civilization, so that he will say “I” instead of “We,” and “This is mine, “ instead of “This is ours.” But if he will not learn! If he shall continue to persist in saying, “I am content; let me alone!” Then the Guardian must act for the Ward, and do for him the good service he protests shall not be done—the good service that he denounces as a bad service. The Government [domination] must then, in duty to the public [Americans], compel the Indian to come out of his isolation into the civilized way that he does not desire to enter—into citizenship—into assimilation with the masses of the Republic—into the path of national duty; and in passing along that path he will find not only pleasure in personal independence and delight in individual effort in his own interest, but also the consummation of that patriotic enjoyment which is always to be found in the exercise of the high privilege of contributing to the general welfare.
Very respectfully, your obedient servant,
John H. Oberly, Commissioner [of Indian Affairs] (1888-89)
To the Secretary of the Interior
12798—IND 88—VII
[PS… I deleted my author page on Facebook or what I call The FBI-book. I am not happy about surveillance.]
Coming in November, all month: posts by me and other ADOPTION WARRIORS – those who write/blog to change the way the world sees adoption.
Lara Trace Hentz 
Excellent post, lara!
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Thank you Tubularsock for inspiring me all the time!
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I’m going to check if the documentry is available in Canada on Netflix, we don’t get the same movies and documentaries as the USA. I was going to get Netlix for the winter, this has me going to check and see if it’s available and if it is, I’ll sign up for the winter.
“Cowspiracy” is fantastic, it’s on Netlix, on Vimeo too — but the Netlix version is updated and is in high def.
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We do have netlix now but are just getting started with all the movies and documentaries. Will check this movie Cowspiracy out asap! Thanks Genie!
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This documentary is a must-see!
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I plan to tonite Jay! Thank you!
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I watched the 13th, unbelievable.. have you seen the “prison profiteering ” piece on National Geographic EXPLORER? Charging for email, 200$ a month? Stopping person on person visitation in lieu of video calls that are expensive. Thank you for your diligence
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