The police have been beating my sister in jail, she suffers from Schizoaffective bipolar disorder. Recently an officer kicked her so hard which resulted in a dislocated kneecap for the cop. My sister is facing charges for the cops wrongdoings in criminal court instead of mental health court. I’m asking everyone to please pray for my sister and for protection while she is in jail. My sister is a young black woman from Solano County and is being denied her rights under the American with Disabilities Act (ADA) as a black woman with mental disabilities. My sister is facing 7 years and the officers excuse for kicking her is that my sister was “moving to slow” coming from the jail elevator. Someone with a mental disability should not be handled with aggressive impatient treatment. My sisters life matters #blacklivesmatter This is Hevenly her life matters. Black women need protection now more than ever especially those who suffer from things out of their control. Her hearing is at 8:30am on October 16 in Solano County Crimal Court she is being charged unjustly from charges related to this event. If anybody out there has any referral resources or that hears this message & is willing to share in hopes of helping our family in this tragic situation please do! Even if it’s with words of encouragement. I know we aren’t the only family from Solano County that suffers from police brutality and from officers who strategically target those that are mentally disabled, black, and poor. #Blacklivesmatter 🖤🖤🖤

Americans consume almost 3 billion pounds of chocolate each year. We enjoy our favorite chocolate brands, like Hershey's, Snickers, Milky Way, and Twix, but most people do not know about the exploitative origin of these products. Shockingly, most of the chocolate products consumed in America are made using child slave labor. For too long, multinational chocolate producers have relied on child slave labor to harvest the millions of tons of cocoa beans needed for chocolate. In West Africa, tens of thousands of children are enslaved on cocoa plantations and forced to harvest cocoa beans in unsafe, exploitative working conditions, with little respite, and meager pay. We demand that this injustice must change. We cannot allow companies like Mars and Nestle to claim they value black lives when their supply chains are riddled with human rights violations and slave labor in West Africa. We need to join together and make our voices heard to stop this outrageous humans rights violation. Sign our petition to demand that companies like Mars and Nestle stop using child slave labor in their chocolate products! Image credit: Washington Post, "Cocoa's Child Laborers." June 5, 2019. Whoriskey, Peter and Siegel, Rachel. Photos by Salwan Georges.

This is important because the Sea Turtle species is quickly becoming extinct. Six out of the seven species are dying out because of human impacts. It is estimated that more than 100 million marine animals die each year as a result of getting tangled in plastic.

The 2020 general election represents a singular moment when voter enfranchisement is more important than ever. Considering our current national backdrop—a global pandemic, evident use of force against citizens, environmental disasters, and significant civil unrest—November 3rd, 2020 is an essential chance for Americans to recognize their civic responsibility. For these reasons, it is incumbent upon NYU to make an innovative adaptation to the normal academic calendar in order to encourage its students and employees to vote. While we believe that NYU should establish Election Day as a consistent academic holiday going forward, we hope that curricular tie-ins for this November 3rd can create an important culture around civic responsibility. In this vein, we stand with NYU Law School’s decision to make Election Day a holiday, as well as the work of GenVote@NYU and its partners, including the February 2020 resolution by the Student Government Assembly. NYU has had difficulty with voter turnout in the past. To quote the GenVote@NYU petition, “According to a 2016 Tufts University report, New York University's voter turnout rate lags behind the institutional average by 2.6% and behind all private research institutions by 5.3%.” Considering that NYU is one of the largest private universities in the country, it has a distinctive opportunity to model civic engagement in academe—especially at a moment when voting is so critical to the maintenance of American democracy. Our hope is to amplify the work already being done by university groups to secure Election Day as an academic holiday. Since we’re already in the academic year, making November 3rd an ongoing holiday is impossible at the moment, but we want to open conversation towards more fundamental change. Larger changes are necessary, but this proposal is doable, attainable, and with important implications. We want to remove as many roadblocks as possible: students should not be forced to choose between attending class and exercising their right to vote. This action would have an immediate impact on voting accessibility and prioritize civic engagement within the NYU community. To learn more, visit https://www.nyu.edu/students/student-information-and-resources/nyu-votes.html

At the end of September 2020 in Chicago 3,210 people have been shot and 551 have lost their lives to gun violence and we don't want to lose one more person but especially our children. Please use your voice to let city council that they need to prioritize saving lives and investing in healing. We can't wait for another 3 years before substantive change happens. The time to act is now and we have to pass the Peace Book ordinance. The Peace Book is the opposite of the Gang Book. The Peace Book is a regularly-published book (as well as a website and an app) that provides a resource directory identifying wraparound services and job opportunities with the purpose of reducing youth incarceration. The Peace Book suggests diversion programs and ways to further implement restorative justice practices inside schools, courts, and juvenile detention centers. It documents the inequality that contributes to intergenerational poverty and trauma and proposes solutions. It describes models and instructions regarding how to curate neighborhood-based peace treaties. It identifies Peace Keepers in each ward who have the experience and relationships required to conduct peace negotiation and violence interruption. And it proposes remedies to gun violence, including but not limited to free drug treatment centers, trauma centers, trauma-informed schools, mental health care clinics, standby psychiatrists or therapists, restorative justice, community centers, transformative justice, fair housing, food justice and economic justice.

This is important because we are living in dire times. Your weekly Dinner and a Movie has reminded us Phish phans of our connectedness during a time when we are often isolated from our phamily and phriends. Your music keeps us physically phit as well as providing us with spiritual nutrition. We Phish phans are in serious need of your musical soul food and phunky beats. Please have mercy on us!

It’s a great amenity and service offered to the neighborhood and has helped bring many neighbors together.

Columbus Day glorifies the colonization and genocide of indigenous people. Christopher Columbus is credited as the "discoverer" of the Americas even though he had mistakenly discovered them. On his expeditions to the Caribbean and South America he had enslaved the native people and even had some killed. Instead of being known for his mistreatment of the indigenous people, Columbus was given a holiday.

In a desperate attempt to disenfranchise everyday Americans, Donald Trump once again regurgitated his tired lies about vote-by-mail during the first presidential debate. It’s clear the president thinks that letting every eligible voter be heard isn't in his political interest. That’s despicable. And before November, we must make sure that our friends, family, and neighbors have the facts: Mail-in voting is a paper-based system that’s safe and accessible. It can easily be audited to ensure election results are correct -- and it has already been tested and proven secure in states across the country. That’s why many leading Republican and Democratic officials have long supported vote-by-mail. And even though mail-in ballots take a little longer to tally, so we may not get results on Election Night this year -- that’s okay. Because ensuring that every last vote is counted is far more important than getting results quickly. No matter what Trump says, our election officials must focus on ensuring that voters can safely make themselves heard this fall -- whether they want to vote early, by mail, or in-person on Election Day. If you agree, add your name now.

Following the first Presidential debate on September 29, 2020, I could not sleep. My mind was plagued with fears and insecurities about the integrity of our political system and our very democracy. The root of these concerns was the appalling behavior of President Trump during the debate. He must not be granted the opportunity to make his case for hatred, racism, voting fraud, and intolerance again. Very few people are still making up their minds, and many people have already cast their ballots. Rather than being the persuasive and informative forum that they are supposed to be, the debates are only serving to sew seeds of distrust in the American system and advance Donald Trump's dangerous agenda. They must not continue to go forward.

The electorate wants to hear fair debate over substantive issues. When candidates speak over one another, nothing of value is provided to the electorate.

This is important because it will help the non-binary students feel more safe and comfortable using the bathroom at school.