Louise Marquis's Page

Meira Kumar has been elected Speaker of Lok Sabha, the lower house of Indian Parliament. She is not only the first female elected to that position, but she is Dalit, from a long oppressed segment of Indian populace. I say to India: Namaste.

The following report is from mid-2007. Has anything changed?

By Palestine Monitor staff writer Ramzi Choura:

Palestinian women, like all Palestinians, know a lot about suffering. Life for them during the nearly 41 years of Israeli military occupation has not been easy. Between settler violence, Israeli millitary incursions, and mass Israeli arrest campaigns, Palestinian women know that every time they say goodbye to a loved one, it could be their last.
But the women of the West Bank and Gaza s… Continue

The link below shows that there are some people trying to curb this "genDERcide", but they need a lot of help. It's difficult for outsiders to have any influence. Please read (scroll down):
http://www.nohonor.org/?cat=11

I just read a long and interesting blog post by a leading Alaska Native about the situation there. His people have been robbed of their land and homes and their traditional ways of surviving have been made illegal. And according to him, Gov. Palin maintains that Alaska Natives do not have the same rights as the tribes in the Continental U.S. to sovereignty and self-governance. See his blog post here: http://cherokees.wordpress.com/2008/09/10/alaskan-natives-speak-out-against-palin/

Sorry, this won't be very poetic. I'm not in a poetic mood. I've been reading up on the plight of the Falun Gong.

Falun Gong, aka Falun Dafa, was founded in 1992 in China by Li Hongzhi. It includes physical exercises from the ancient Chinese practice of Qigong. It also includes meditation and a moral philosophy with emphasis on Truth, Compassion and Tolerance. There are elements of Buddhism and Taoism as well as Qigong. Practitioners have no interest in political power and eschew violence.

In… Continue