Fight to Live, Live to Fight Veteran Activism after War

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Publisher : SUNY Press
ISBN 13 : 1438475195
Total Pages : 224 pages
Book Rating : 4.4/5 (384 download)

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Book Synopsis Fight to Live, Live to Fight Veteran Activism after War by : Benjamin Schrader

Download or read book Fight to Live, Live to Fight Veteran Activism after War written by Benjamin Schrader and published by SUNY Press. This book was released on 2019-07-01 with total page 224 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Examines US foreign and domestic policy through the narratives of post-9/11 US military veterans and the activism they are engaged in. While veterans are often cast as a “problem” for society, Fight to Live, Live to Fight challenges this view by focusing on the progressive, positive, and productive activism that veterans engage in. Benjamin Schrader weaves his own experiences as a former member of the American military and then as a member of the activist community with the stories of other veteran activists he has encountered across the United States. An accessible blend of political theory, international relations, and American politics, this book critically examines US foreign and domestic policy through the narratives of post-9/11 military veterans who have turned to activism after having exited the military. Veterans are involved in a wide array of activism, including but not limited to antiwar, economic justice, sexual violence prevention, immigration issues, and veteran healing through art. This is an accessible, captivating, and engaging work that may be read and appreciated not just by scholars, but also students and the wider public. “There is currently no book on the market that does what this book does (and could do) and I welcome it. There are books on veterans, of course, but there are none that focus in particular on veterans’ activism written by a veteran activist and academic. The book is in many ways a testament to our time and a kind of generational story that I am sure many veterans will relate to.” — Synne L. Dyvik, University of Sussex

Fighting for Democracy

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Publisher : Princeton University Press
ISBN 13 : 0691140049
Total Pages : 289 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (911 download)

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Book Synopsis Fighting for Democracy by : Christopher S. Parker

Download or read book Fighting for Democracy written by Christopher S. Parker and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2009-09-06 with total page 289 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How military service led black veterans to join the civil rights struggle Fighting for Democracy shows how the experiences of African American soldiers during World War II and the Korean War influenced many of them to challenge white supremacy in the South when they returned home. Focusing on the motivations of individual black veterans, this groundbreaking book explores the relationship between military service and political activism. Christopher Parker draws on unique sources of evidence, including interviews and survey data, to illustrate how and why black servicemen who fought for their country in wartime returned to America prepared to fight for their own equality. Parker discusses the history of African American military service and how the wartime experiences of black veterans inspired them to contest Jim Crow. Black veterans gained courage and confidence by fighting their nation's enemies on the battlefield and racism in the ranks. Viewing their military service as patriotic sacrifice in the defense of democracy, these veterans returned home with the determination and commitment to pursue equality and social reform in the South. Just as they had risked their lives to protect democratic rights while abroad, they risked their lives to demand those same rights on the domestic front. Providing a sophisticated understanding of how war abroad impacts efforts for social change at home, Fighting for Democracy recovers a vital story about black veterans and demonstrates their distinct contributions to the American political landscape.

Fighting for Democracy

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Publisher : Princeton University Press
ISBN 13 : 1400831024
Total Pages : 288 pages
Book Rating : 4.4/5 (8 download)

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Book Synopsis Fighting for Democracy by : Christopher S. Parker

Download or read book Fighting for Democracy written by Christopher S. Parker and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2009-08-17 with total page 288 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How military service led black veterans to join the civil rights struggle Fighting for Democracy shows how the experiences of African American soldiers during World War II and the Korean War influenced many of them to challenge white supremacy in the South when they returned home. Focusing on the motivations of individual black veterans, this groundbreaking book explores the relationship between military service and political activism. Christopher Parker draws on unique sources of evidence, including interviews and survey data, to illustrate how and why black servicemen who fought for their country in wartime returned to America prepared to fight for their own equality. Parker discusses the history of African American military service and how the wartime experiences of black veterans inspired them to contest Jim Crow. Black veterans gained courage and confidence by fighting their nation's enemies on the battlefield and racism in the ranks. Viewing their military service as patriotic sacrifice in the defense of democracy, these veterans returned home with the determination and commitment to pursue equality and social reform in the South. Just as they had risked their lives to protect democratic rights while abroad, they risked their lives to demand those same rights on the domestic front. Providing a sophisticated understanding of how war abroad impacts efforts for social change at home, Fighting for Democracy recovers a vital story about black veterans and demonstrates their distinct contributions to the American political landscape.

War & Homecoming

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Publisher : University Press of Kentucky
ISBN 13 : 0813195667
Total Pages : 224 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (131 download)

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Book Synopsis War & Homecoming by : Travis L. Martin

Download or read book War & Homecoming written by Travis L. Martin and published by University Press of Kentucky. This book was released on 2022-07-26 with total page 224 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In War & Homecoming: Veteran Identity and the Post-9/11 Generation, Travis L. Martin explores how a new generation of veterans is redefining what it means to come home. More than 2.7 million veterans served in Iraq and Afghanistan. Their homecomings didn't include parades or national celebrations. Instead, when the last US troops left Afghanistan, American veterans raised millions of dollars for the evacuation of Afghan refugees, especially those who'd served alongside them. This brand of selflessness is one reason civilians regard veterans with reverence and pride. The phrase "thank you for your service" is ubiquitous. Yet, one in ten post-9/11 veterans struggles with substance abuse. Fifteen to twenty veterans die by suicide every day. Veterans aged eighteen to thirty-four die at the highest rates, leading advocates to focus on concepts like moral injury and collective belonging when addressing psychic wounds. Martin argues that many veterans struggle due to decades of stereotyping and a lack of healthy models of veteran identity. In the American unconscious, veterans are treated as either the superficially praised "hero" or the victimized "wounded warrior," forever defined by past accomplishments. They are often appropriated as symbols in competing narratives of national identity. War & Homecoming critically examines representations of veterans in patriotic rhetoric, popular media, literature, and the lives of those who served. From this analysis, a new veteran identity emerges—veterans as storytellers who reject stereotypes, claim their symbolic authority, and define themselves through literature, art, and service. Their dynamic approach to life after military service allows for continued growth, agency, individuality, and inspiring examples of resilience for others.

Guys Like Me

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Publisher : Rutgers University Press
ISBN 13 : 1978802838
Total Pages : 292 pages
Book Rating : 4.9/5 (788 download)

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Book Synopsis Guys Like Me by : Michael A. Messner

Download or read book Guys Like Me written by Michael A. Messner and published by Rutgers University Press. This book was released on 2018-12-17 with total page 292 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Over the last few decades, as the United States has become embroiled in foreign war after foreign war, some of the most vocal activists for peace have been veterans. These veterans for peace come from all different races, classes, regions, and generations. What common motivations unite them and fuel their activism? Guys Like Me introduces us to five ordinary men who have done extraordinary work as peace activists: World War II veteran Ernie Sanchez, Korean War veteran Woody Powell, Vietnam veteran Gregory Ross, Gulf War veteran Daniel Craig, and Operation Iraqi Freedom veteran Jonathan Hutto. Acclaimed sociologist Michael Messner offers rich profiles of each man, recounting what led him to join the armed forces, what he experienced when fighting overseas, and the guilt and trauma he experienced upon returning home. He reveals how the pain and horror of the battlefront motivated these onetime warriors to reconcile with former enemies, get involved as political activists, and help younger generations of soldiers. Guys Like Me is an inspiring multigenerational saga of men who were physically or psychically wounded by war, but are committed to healing themselves and others, forging a path to justice, and replacing endless war with lasting peace

Fighting for Peace

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Publisher :
ISBN 13 : 9780816680450
Total Pages : 0 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (84 download)

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Book Synopsis Fighting for Peace by : Lisa Leitz

Download or read book Fighting for Peace written by Lisa Leitz and published by . This book was released on 2014 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Fighting for Peace brings to light an important yet neglected aspect of opposition to the Iraq War--the role of veterans and their families. Drawing on extensive participant observation and interviews, Lisa Leitz demonstrates how the harrowing war experiences of veterans and their families motivated a significant number of them to engage in peace activism. Married to a Navy pilot herself, Leitz documents how military peace activists created a movement that allowed them to merge two seemingly contradictory sides of their lives: an intimate relation to the military and antiwar activism. Members of the movement strategically deployed their combined military-peace activist identities to attract media attention, assert their authority about the military and war, and challenge dominant pro-war sentiment. By emphasizing the human costs of war, activists hoped to mobilize American citizens and leaders who were detached from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, bring the wars to an end, and build up programs to take care of returning veterans and their families. The stories in Fighting for Peace ultimately reveal that America's all-volunteer force is contributing to a civilian-military divide that leaves civilians with little connection to the sacrifices of the military. Increasingly, Leitz shows, veterans and their families are being left to not only fight America's wars but also to fight against them.

Green Card Soldier

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Publisher : MIT Press
ISBN 13 : 0262373653
Total Pages : 347 pages
Book Rating : 4.2/5 (623 download)

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Book Synopsis Green Card Soldier by : Sofya Aptekar

Download or read book Green Card Soldier written by Sofya Aptekar and published by MIT Press. This book was released on 2023-05-02 with total page 347 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An in-depth and troubling look at a little-known group of immigrants—non-citizen soldiers who enlist in the US military. While the popular image of the US military is one of citizen soldiers protecting their country, the reality is that nearly 5 percent of all first-time military recruits are noncitizens. Their reasons for enlisting are myriad, but many are motivated by the hope of gaining citizenship in return for their service. In Green Card Soldier, Sofya Aptekar talks to more than seventy noncitizen soldiers from twenty-three countries, including some who were displaced by conflict after the US military entered their homeland. She identifies a disturbing pattern: the US military’s intervention in foreign countries drives migration, which in turn supplies the military with a cheap and desperate labor pool—thereby perpetuating the cycle. As Aptekar discovers, serving in the US military is no guarantee against deportation, and yet the promise of citizenship and the threat of deportation are the carrot and stick used to discipline noncitizen soldiers. Viewed at various times as security threats and members of a model minority, immigrant soldiers sometimes face intense discrimination from their native-born colleagues and superiors. Their stories—stitched through with colonial legacies, white supremacy, exploitation, and patriarchy—show how the tensions between deservingness and suspicion shape their enlistment, service, and identities. Giving voice to this little-heard group of immigrants, Green Card Soldier shines a cold light on the complex workings of US empire, globalized militarism, and citizenship.

Tomas Young's War

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Publisher : Haymarket Books
ISBN 13 : 1608466515
Total Pages : 225 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (84 download)

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Book Synopsis Tomas Young's War by : Mark Wilkerson

Download or read book Tomas Young's War written by Mark Wilkerson and published by Haymarket Books. This book was released on 2016-05-14 with total page 225 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Tomas Young’s War is the tragic yet life affirming story of a paralyzed Iraq War veteran who spent his last ten years battling heroically with his injuries, while courageously speaking against America's wars. Based on hours of interviews with Young and those close to him, the book puts the reader alongside Young as he struggles with life as a paralyzed veteran, suffering frustration and humiliation as he attempts to reenter society and resume as normal an existence as possible. It shows his fight to balance his precarious health with his drive to speak out for veterans care and against the war, and the impact his catastrophic injuries had on his family and his relationships. This emotional and powerful book sheds light on many crucial but often overlooked issues such as veterans’ care, public attitudes toward the disabled, medical marijuana, and the terminally ill. Tomas Young’s War shares everything, as unflinchingly honest as Tomas himself: the depression, the pain, the love, and laughter . . . the life of this man whose world was turned upside down by an Iraqi bullet more than ten years ago. Throughout, it serves as a powerful testament to the true cost of war.

Support the Troops

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Publisher : Oxford University Press
ISBN 13 : 0197642330
Total Pages : 305 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (976 download)

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Book Synopsis Support the Troops by : Katharine M. Millar

Download or read book Support the Troops written by Katharine M. Millar and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2022-11-04 with total page 305 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In the past, it was assumed that men, as good citizens, would serve in the armed forces in wartime. In the present, however, liberal democratic states increasingly rely on small, all-volunteer militaries deployed in distant wars of choice. While few people now serve in the armed forces, our cultural myths and narratives of warfare continue to reproduce a strong connection between military service, citizenship, and normative masculinity. In Support the Troops, Katharine M. Millar provides an empirical overview of "support the troops" discourses in the US and UK during the early years of the global war on terror (2001-2010). As Millar argues, seemingly stable understandings of the relationship between military service, citizenship, and gender norms are being unsettled by changes in warfare. The effect is a sense of uneasiness about the meaning of what it means to be a "good" citizen, "good" person, and, crucially, a "good" man in a context where neither war nor military service easily align with existing cultural myths about wartime obligations and collective sacrifice. Instead we participate in the performance of supporting the troops, even when we oppose war--an act that appears not only patriotic and moral, but also apolitical. Failing to support the troops, either through active opposition or a lack of overt supportive actions, is perceived as not only offensive and inappropriately political, but disloyal and dangerous. Millar asserts that military support acts as a new form of military service, which serves to limit anti-war dissent, plays a crucial role in naturalizing the violence of the transnational liberal order, and recasts war as an internal issue of solidarity and loyalty. Rigorous and politically challenging, Millar provides the first work to systematically examine "support the troops" as a distinct social phenomenon and offers a novel reading of this discourse through a gendered lens that places it in historical and transnational context.

Fighting Sleep

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Publisher : Verso Books
ISBN 13 : 1786637812
Total Pages : 161 pages
Book Rating : 4.7/5 (866 download)

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Book Synopsis Fighting Sleep by : Franny Nudelman

Download or read book Fighting Sleep written by Franny Nudelman and published by Verso Books. This book was released on 2019-10-08 with total page 161 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How the military used sleep as a weapon—and how soldiers fought back On April 21, 1971, hundreds of Vietnam veterans fell asleep on the National Mall, wondering whether they would be arrested by daybreak. Veterans had fought the courts for the right to sleep in public while demonstrating against the war. When the Supreme Court denied their petition, they decided to break the law and turned sleep into a form of direct action. During and after the Second World War, military psychiatrists used sleep therapies to treat an epidemic of “combat fatigue.” Inducing deep and twilight sleep in clinical settings, they studied the effects of war violence on the mind and developed the techniques of brainwashing that would weaponize both memory and sleep. In the Vietnam era, radical veterans reclaimed the authority to interpret their own traumatic symptoms—nightmares, flashbacks, insomnia —and pioneered new methods of protest. In Fighting Sleep, Franny Nudelman recounts the struggle over sleep in the postwar world, revealing that the subject was instrumental to the development of military science, professional psychiatry, and antiwar activism.

Global Corpse Politics

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Publisher : Cambridge University Press
ISBN 13 : 1316511650
Total Pages : 209 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (165 download)

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Book Synopsis Global Corpse Politics by : Jessica Auchter

Download or read book Global Corpse Politics written by Jessica Auchter and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2021-10-07 with total page 209 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: What makes a photograph of a dead body obscene? Auchter's genealogy of obscenity argues that this process is highly political.

Home to War

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Publisher : Carroll & Graf Publishers
ISBN 13 : 9780786714032
Total Pages : 689 pages
Book Rating : 4.7/5 (14 download)

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Book Synopsis Home to War by : Gerald Nicosia

Download or read book Home to War written by Gerald Nicosia and published by Carroll & Graf Publishers. This book was released on 2004 with total page 689 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Details the struggles of those who served in Vietnam to deal with the negative reaction at home, their role in the anti-war movement, and their battle for medical help and compensation for Agent Orange and post-traumatic stress.

A case of Exploding Mangoes

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Publisher : Random House India
ISBN 13 : 8184002327
Total Pages : 384 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (84 download)

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Book Synopsis A case of Exploding Mangoes by : Mohammed Hanif

Download or read book A case of Exploding Mangoes written by Mohammed Hanif and published by Random House India. This book was released on 2011-10-01 with total page 384 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In August 1988, Zia gets into the presidential plane, Pak One, which explodes midway. Who killed him? The army generals growing old waiting for their promotions, the CIA, the ISI, RAW, or Ali Shigri, a junior officer at the military academy whose father, a whisky-swilling jihadi colonel, was murdered by the army? A Case of Exploding Mangoes is sharp, black, inventive, and utterly gripping. It marks the debut of a brilliant new writer.

Burdens of War

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Publisher : JHU Press
ISBN 13 : 1421422875
Total Pages : 368 pages
Book Rating : 4.4/5 (214 download)

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Book Synopsis Burdens of War by : Jessica L. Adler

Download or read book Burdens of War written by Jessica L. Adler and published by JHU Press. This book was released on 2017-07-19 with total page 368 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In the World War I era, veterans fought for a unique right: access to government-sponsored health care. In the process, they built a pillar of American social policy. Burdens of War explores how the establishment of the veterans’ health system marked a reimagining of modern veterans’ benefits and signaled a pathbreaking validation of the power of professionalized institutional medical care. Adler reveals that a veterans’ health system came about incrementally, amid skepticism from legislators, doctors, and army officials concerned about the burden of long-term obligations, monetary or otherwise, to ex-service members. She shows how veterans’ welfare shifted from centering on pension and domicile care programs rooted in the nineteenth century to direct access to health services. She also traces the way that fluctuating ideals about hospitals and medical care influenced policy at the dusk of the Progressive Era; how race, class, and gender affected the health-related experiences of soldiers, veterans, and caregivers; and how interest groups capitalized on a tense political and social climate to bring about change. The book moves from the 1910s—when service members requested better treatment, Congress approved new facilities and increased funding, and elected officials expressed misgivings about who should have access to care—to the 1930s, when the economic crash prompted veterans to increasingly turn to hospitals for support while bureaucrats, politicians, and doctors attempted to rein in the system. By the eve of World War II, the roots of what would become the country’s largest integrated health care system were firmly planted and primed for growth. Drawing readers into a critical debate about the level of responsibility America bears for wounded service members, Burdens of War is a unique and moving case study. -- Jennifer D. Keene, Chapman University, author of Doughboys, the Great War, and the Remaking of America

Hurricane Street

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Publisher : Akashic Books
ISBN 13 : 1617754528
Total Pages : 240 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (177 download)

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Book Synopsis Hurricane Street by : Ron Kovic

Download or read book Hurricane Street written by Ron Kovic and published by Akashic Books. This book was released on 2016-06-13 with total page 240 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The author of Born on the Fourth of July delivers “a harrowing, poignant telling of the American Veteran’s Movement and its members’ struggles” (Manhattan Book Review). In the spring of 1974, as the last American troops were being pulled out of Vietnam, Ron Kovic and a small group of other severely injured veterans in a California VA hospital launched the American Veterans Movement. In a phenomenal feat of political organizing, Kovic corralled his fellow AVM members into staging a sit-in, and then a hunger strike, in the Los Angeles office of Senator Alan Cranston, demanding better treatment of injured and disabled veterans. This was a short-lived and chaotic but ultimately successful movement to improve the deplorable conditions in VA hospitals across the country. Hurricane Street is their story—one that resonates deeply today—told by Kovic in the passionate and brutally honest style that led to over one million sales of Born on the Fourth of July. “Another raw exposé on the cost of war . . . The book is an unflinching anti-war declaration, written in blood and the sweat of too many haunted nights by a Vietnam Marine Corps sergeant who later opposed the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.” —Los Angeles Times “A deeply moving account of the struggle of Vietnam veterans to hold politicians accountable to the maimed warriors they sent into harm’s way and then abandoned.” —Robert Scheer, author of They Know Everything About You “An impassioned and timely memoir about the 1974 American Veterans Movement that will strike a chord with veterans and their families today.” —Publishers Weekly, Top 10 Pick for Spring 2016

Junk Raft

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Publisher : Beacon Press
ISBN 13 : 0807056413
Total Pages : 216 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (7 download)

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Book Synopsis Junk Raft by : Marcus Eriksen

Download or read book Junk Raft written by Marcus Eriksen and published by Beacon Press. This book was released on 2017-07-04 with total page 216 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An exciting account of a scientist’s expedition across the Pacific on a home-made “junk raft” in order to learn more about plastic marine pollution A scientist, activist, and inveterate adventurer, Eriksen and his co-navigator, Joel Paschal, construct a “junk raft” made of plastic trash and set themselves adrift from Los Angeles to Hawaii, with no motor or support vessel, confronting perilous cyclones, food shortages, and a fast decaying raft. As Eriksen recounts his struggles to keep afloat, he immerses readers in the deep history of the plastic pollution crisis and the movement that has arisen to combat it. The proliferation of cheap plastic products during the twentieth century has left the world awash in trash. Meanwhile, the plastics industry, with its lobbying muscle, fights tooth and nail against any changes that would affect its lucrative status quo, instead defending poorly designed products and deflecting responsibility for the harm they cause. But, as Eriksen shows, the tide is turning in the battle to save the world’s oceans. He recounts the successful efforts that he and many other activists are waging to fight corporate influence and demand that plastics producers be held accountable. Junk Raft provides concrete, actionable solutions and an empowering message: it’s within our power to change the throw-away culture for the sake of our planet.

Never Silent

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Publisher : Chicago Review Press
ISBN 13 : 1641601450
Total Pages : 292 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (416 download)

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Book Synopsis Never Silent by : Peter Staley

Download or read book Never Silent written by Peter Staley and published by Chicago Review Press. This book was released on 2021-10-12 with total page 292 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Never Silent is a gorgeous book . . . Peter Staley has written an electrifying primer for anyone who's thinking/worrying/wondering about how to change/save the world." —Tony Kushner, Pulitzer Prize–winning playwright of Angels in America 2022 Lambda Literary Award Finalist The previously untold stories of the life of the leading subject in David France's How To Survive A Plague, Peter Staley, including his continuing activism In 1987, somebody shoved a flyer into the hand of Peter Staley: massive AIDS demonstration, it announced. After four years on Wall Street as a closeted gay man, Staley was familiar with the homophobia common on trading floors. He also knew that he was not beyond the reach of HIV, having recently been diagnosed with AIDS-Related Complex. A week after the protest, Staley found his way to a packed meeting of the AIDS Coalition To Unleash Power—ACT UP—in the West Village. It would prove to be the best decision he ever made. ACT UP would change the course of AIDS, pressuring the National Institutes of Health, the FDA, and three administrations to finally respond with research that ultimately saved millions of lives. Staley, a shrewd strategist with nerves of steel, organized some of the group's most spectacular actions, from shutting down trading on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange to putting a giant condom over the house of Senator Jesse Helms. Never Silent is the inside story of what brought Staley to ACT UP and the explosive and sometimes painful years to follow—years filled with triumph, humiliation, joy, loss, and persistence. Never Silent is guaranteed to inspire the activist within all of us.