Speaker 1: Hey, guys, ready or not, twenty twenty four is here,
Speaker 1: and we here at breaking points, are already thinking of
Speaker 1: ways we can up our game for this critical election.
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Speaker 2: But enough with that, let's get to the show.
Speaker 3: Is the news biased?
Speaker 4: Unbiased news?
Speaker 5: Unbiased news? Who just have so much biased news every day?
Speaker 6: Of course the news is biased, differentiate between obtainion and fact.
Speaker 1: We need more objective reporting overall across the board.
Speaker 3: If you are overwhelmed with fear about getting some of
Speaker 3: this and biased in pure news, there are services that
Speaker 3: will tell you what news is biased or unbiased, and
Speaker 3: there are outlets that claim to not be biased at all.
Speaker 3: Do you think the news is biased?
Speaker 7: Especially it depends like what network you're on, And I
Speaker 7: think like left wing right we.
Speaker 8: Twenty four hour news network should be illegal and they
Speaker 8: are biased, okay both sides.
Speaker 9: I think they should just state next exactly.
Speaker 10: Thank you.
Speaker 11: Fact based news outlets, I think we can call them.
Speaker 5: Mainstream fact based.
Speaker 11: News, responsible fact based news organization.
Speaker 3: I mean, yeah, just the facts. Why would you want
Speaker 3: anything else? But you know, it's funny. People are obviously
Speaker 3: quite aware that the news is biased, but not always
Speaker 3: so imaginative as to how where do you guys get
Speaker 3: your news?
Speaker 9: It's kind of sad by I get a lot of
Speaker 9: my news from social media.
Speaker 8: I normally get my news from Wow. I don't get
Speaker 8: a lot of news. I don't believe in it.
Speaker 5: I don't believe.
Speaker 12: I'm fascinated by this.
Speaker 8: I don't believe in the news now too much spend.
Speaker 3: There is a general notion that bias occurs when a
Speaker 3: position on the political spectrum is apparent, which is why
Speaker 3: if someone has to come up with examples of biased news,
Speaker 3: they might immediately point to Fox or MSNBC. But people
Speaker 3: tend to overlook many key ways media can exhibit bias,
Speaker 3: and so to explore this, I asked people to compare
Speaker 3: a handful of headlines. He has no shirt on that
Speaker 3: is psychotic.
Speaker 9: Un rejects resolution calling for immediate ceasefire in Gaza, US
Speaker 9: blocks resolution calling for seas fire and.
Speaker 10: Gaza so rejects versus blocks.
Speaker 7: Rejects versus blocks because blocks and rejects means the same thing.
Speaker 8: Right rejects is like, uh, we're not going to do that.
Speaker 8: Blocks is like we're stopping it.
Speaker 4: And un versuss I think this more comes down to
Speaker 4: your inherent feelings about the UN versus your inherent feelings
Speaker 4: about the US.
Speaker 7: Maybe like lots of different nations rejected this thing, but
Speaker 7: US blocks is like, no, it was America.
Speaker 9: Like the whole world doesn't want to come to peace
Speaker 9: or compromise, or this one makes it seem like it's
Speaker 9: just the US that doesn't.
Speaker 3: Want to compromise.
Speaker 4: I think you could look at this and the headline.
Speaker 4: People will post the headline and say like they don't
Speaker 4: want to cease fire, but the context is they don't
Speaker 4: want to cease fire given the term of the agreement.
Speaker 4: This makes it feel more antip from either the UN
Speaker 4: or the US perspectives.
Speaker 3: What about the added context that if the vast majority
Speaker 3: of you and nations supported the resolution.
Speaker 9: Yeah, I see, okay, yeah, that makes a big difference
Speaker 9: when most of them wanted to.
Speaker 7: You're right, they both leave out very important detail, which
Speaker 7: ten votes against the one hundred and forty five in favor.
Speaker 3: Right, you do not like the idea that you were
Speaker 3: being a tempted.
Speaker 13: To click at them.
Speaker 5: I don't like that at all.
Speaker 14: Like, if you're crafting a headline because you have a
Speaker 14: constuctor and the readers that largely agree with your ideas,
Speaker 14: then people probably like the idea of being you know,
Speaker 14: incentivised to click on a headline that canfirm their view.
Speaker 3: The headlines I was asking people to compare were both
Speaker 3: from Fox News and the recent headlines are so important
Speaker 3: is because more than half of people only read the headlines.
Speaker 3: But clearly two factual headlines can take you into different directions,
Speaker 3: which is why just the facts is. Let's say a
Speaker 3: bit naive, deadly airstrike hits area of Gaza that many
Speaker 3: have fled to, and historian as al Rod on Twitter
Speaker 3: offers this edit, deadly Israeli airstrike hits area of Gaza
Speaker 3: that Israel told Palestinians to move to. Do you feel
Speaker 3: like one is more accurate, one's less biased.
Speaker 9: The second one is more biased, yeah, the big ones
Speaker 9: more biased.
Speaker 10: Yeah.
Speaker 4: The second one is trying to convince you that Israel
Speaker 4: is killing people intentionally. The first one is more statement.
Speaker 12: In fact, yees, So I mean here you can easily
Speaker 12: see that in the second statement, they're trying to portray
Speaker 12: that this was like a very planned move by the
Speaker 12: Eni governments.
Speaker 7: Both are biased because one is like very specifically obviously
Speaker 7: implicating Israel and one is like avoiding the implication of Israel.
Speaker 5: Do you feel like the.
Speaker 3: Second one is just kind of sensational for me?
Speaker 12: This news is about the violence that is being spread
Speaker 12: in the world, So I don't care if it's Israel
Speaker 12: spading the violins or is the Palestinian spading the oilings.
Speaker 12: There could be some stages where some Palestinians would have
Speaker 12: done something bad, and it's not all of Israel doing
Speaker 12: the strike, and it's not all of Palestinians doing something
Speaker 12: which might offend is a way. It's just a group
Speaker 12: of people. So it's important that if you want to
Speaker 12: go into that news level of detail, then you should
Speaker 12: be specifying that who has always doing this thing?
Speaker 3: One headline is more appropriate than the other.
Speaker 10: Yeah, I think those are important, So.
Speaker 12: Like, I don't know if they actually did that or not.
Speaker 12: The second one seems to be having an agenda.
Speaker 8: The second one says that Israeli was trying to basically
Speaker 8: for our people and lead them into a trap and
Speaker 8: then drop a bomb on them. It's pretty terrific, right,
Speaker 8: I Mean, that's just a mess over there in Gaza.
Speaker 8: If both are completely correct, the second one is more appropriate.
Speaker 15: The fact that like Israel told Palestinians to move there,
Speaker 15: is that true?
Speaker 16: It is.
Speaker 17: Well.
Speaker 3: I would say that there is some confusion about what
Speaker 3: constitutes sensationalism, namely the difference between a needlessly graphic headline
Speaker 3: versus a set of facts that just happened to be
Speaker 3: kind of shocking. But the question of who gets sensational
Speaker 3: or graphic versus neutral headlines is where a lot of
Speaker 3: bias comes in. This from the intercept between the La Times,
Speaker 3: New York Times and Washington Post, the term slaughter was
Speaker 3: applied to Israelis versus Palestinians sixty to one, horrific thirty
Speaker 3: eight to four, massacre one hundred and twenty to four,
Speaker 3: also favoring Israelis. Here's when from the New York Times.
Speaker 3: The article was originally headlined what we know about Tyri
Speaker 3: Nichols lethal encounter with Memphis police, and then they changed
Speaker 3: it later to the questions that remain a year after
Speaker 3: Tyrie Nichols's death. Do you think they're both representative death
Speaker 3: is actually from the same article.
Speaker 14: Those are both pretty neutral, I would say both for me,
Speaker 14: but open ended trying to get you to click on it.
Speaker 4: They're all the relatively passive though. It's like not saying
Speaker 4: he was killed, it's saying lethal encounter and of death.
Speaker 4: So both of them are not like that aggressive in
Speaker 4: the headline.
Speaker 9: And then you mean like both of are both of
Speaker 9: them kind of like pretty fair, like not too biased way.
Speaker 7: Just framing it as a death versus a lethal encounter
Speaker 7: with police.
Speaker 8: You know, they're not trying to throw the police under
Speaker 8: the bus. But at the same time, there's definitely some
Speaker 8: questions that need to be answered.
Speaker 6: I think I can say, like, that's what happened.
Speaker 10: Yeah, both of them would say.
Speaker 3: The first one mentions that he was killed by the police,
Speaker 3: and the second one he says he.
Speaker 13: Oh okay.
Speaker 9: I think the first headline has stronger wording, like it
Speaker 9: makes you feel.
Speaker 18: Something more like get a stronger rise and reaction out
Speaker 18: of people.
Speaker 7: In terms of the feeling that you get as you're
Speaker 7: about to read it, totally different.
Speaker 8: I would say the questions that remain are probably a
Speaker 8: little more biased.
Speaker 3: The people I spoke with were basically a generally aware
Speaker 3: that everyone has biased. Obviously, the goal is for accuracy
Speaker 3: and to inveay a story faithfully, but to get rid
Speaker 3: of bias, for the most part, not entirely possible. However,
Speaker 3: a few people I spoke with did seem to be
Speaker 3: quite sensitive to the idea that a certain headline might
Speaker 3: be attempting to seduce them into clicking by eliciting emotion,
Speaker 3: or that a certain headline was sensational. But what certain
Speaker 3: people think they're looking for is actually the esthetic of neutrality,
Speaker 3: I would say, because writing a headline about crime but
Speaker 3: leaving out the perpetrator of the crime is not to
Speaker 3: achieve neutrality, and a piece of news has an emotional
Speaker 3: impact that doesn't preclude objectivity. Sometimes a story is just shocking,
Speaker 3: and if a story is shocking, there is no reason
Speaker 3: to neuter the details so to produce an emotionless headline.
Speaker 3: But that being said, I am biased and that will
Speaker 3: do it for me. My name is Spencer Snyder. If
Speaker 3: you've found this video interesting, make sure you are subscribed
Speaker 3: to Breaking Points. You can also check out my YouTube
Speaker 3: channel where I talk all about media and politics. Link
Speaker 3: in the description Liking and sharing always helps Thank you
Speaker 3: to Breaking Points. Thank you so much for watching it.
Speaker 3: I will see in the next one.
Speaker 18: I never found my people, I never found my place,
Speaker 18: and finally I landed and I found my friends, and
Speaker 18: being here in Israel is just a life changing experience
Speaker 18: to finally land where I was supposed to be.
Speaker 15: Always the people, the experiences, and just like the joy
Speaker 15: that we had on this trip, I'm gonna cry. It's
Speaker 15: like I've never had such a meaningful yet fun experience
Speaker 15: in my entire life.
Speaker 19: Founded in nineteen ninety four by Charles Bronfman and Michael
Speaker 19: Steinhardt in cooperation with the Israeli government, Birthright Israel or
Speaker 19: simply Birthright, is a free ten day heritage trip to Israel,
Speaker 19: Jerusalem and the Golden Heights for young adults of Jewish
Speaker 19: heritage between the ages of eighteen and twenty six. The
Speaker 19: purpose being to strengthen diaspora jes connection to Israel and
Speaker 19: increase a sense of Jewish identity. But can a free
Speaker 19: trip really be free?
Speaker 11: A ten day trip to Israel with flights, food, and
Speaker 11: a ton of instagrammable moments all for free, you may
Speaker 11: have heard of Birthright Israel, the all expense paid adventure
Speaker 11: to the Holy Land seems too good to be true, right,
Speaker 11: there has to be a catch, but there isn't one.
Speaker 11: You're not going to be roped into long boring religious
Speaker 11: seminars or be told what to think about the Israeli
Speaker 11: Palestinian conflict.
Speaker 7: And if not, now is targeting Birthright into campaign urging
Speaker 7: the group to and it's words, tell the truth about
Speaker 7: the Israeli occupation.
Speaker 10: Not to learn about Israel.
Speaker 17: You going to learn about Palestine.
Speaker 6: This is dr either Julian, this is Mike Dodgery, and
Speaker 6: I'm not leaving it anywhere.
Speaker 10: It's going to be away from Earth.
Speaker 3: They specifically banned trip organizers from planning trips that involve
Speaker 3: meeting with Israeli Arabs.
Speaker 17: There's both on this tripe, questions on trying to engage,
Speaker 17: and we have not been able to do that.
Speaker 20: And as a result by us, who can be based Birthright.
Speaker 21: And what it does by refusing to discuss show the
Speaker 21: occupation or even allows to hear from Palestinians, what it's
Speaker 21: really doing is hiding the occupation from young American Jews
Speaker 21: like myself.
Speaker 19: Birthright is funded in large part by the Israeli government,
Speaker 19: along with support from influential donors like the Adelson, Blavatnik,
Speaker 19: and Craft families of the world, and with such significant
Speaker 19: backing from Israel and organizations known for their deep ties
Speaker 19: to Zionism, one has to wonder whether the experiences of
Speaker 19: young Jewish adults on birthright trips are shaped more by
Speaker 19: the vision of these benefactors than by a neutral exploration
Speaker 19: of Israel and of the Jewish heritage and identity.
Speaker 13: So birthright and name alone is fucked like it's really problematic, right,
Speaker 13: because what it's essentially saying is these diaspora Jewish youth
Speaker 13: who have never been to Israel, who may have no
Speaker 13: family in Israel, have no genetic ancestral ties to Israel,
Speaker 13: can decide to go on a trip that says this
Speaker 13: place is your right by birth, you deserve to be here,
Speaker 13: you are welcome back. Meanwhile, Palestinians who have been displaced
Speaker 13: from the land that is currently occupied have no right
Speaker 13: of return.
Speaker 19: Joining us today to provide her insights and perspectives about
Speaker 19: birthright is Katie Bogan. She is a doctoral student in
Speaker 19: clinical psychology at the University of Nebraska and a prominent
Speaker 19: voice in the anti Zionist Jewish community.
Speaker 20: Welcome Katie thank you so much for having me. I'm
Speaker 20: really delighted to be here, all right.
Speaker 19: So I think the first place that I want to
Speaker 19: start is maybe your upbringing as it relates to Judaism Zionism.
Speaker 19: How are you raise? What ideas, values, beliefs did your
Speaker 19: parents try to instill in you just as a baseline.
Speaker 1: Yeah, absolutely so. I'm the granddaughter of a Holocauster. My
Speaker 1: grandfather Stash and his sisters Helen and Vella survived the Holocaust,
Speaker 1: but they were the only three people in their family
Speaker 1: to do so, and they were liberated in nineteen forty
Speaker 1: five and then spent several years in Germany before migrating
Speaker 1: to the United States in nineteen forty nine. And so
Speaker 1: even during that migration process, my grandfather and Helen were
Speaker 1: given the option to settle either in the United States
Speaker 1: or to receive a plot of land and a stipend
Speaker 1: and moved to Israel. And they chose the United States
Speaker 1: because they had community already here. So it is sort
Speaker 1: of by the flip of a coin and by a
Speaker 1: decision made you know in nineteen forty nine that I
Speaker 1: am here instead of in Israel. And when I was
Speaker 1: growing up, my family is an incredibly Zionist family. They
Speaker 1: really imagined the state of Israel as this land that
Speaker 1: offered salvation to my grandfather and his siblings after a deep,
Speaker 1: immense trauma. And so I grew up hearing, as many
Speaker 1: Jewish youth do in the United States, at every passover
Speaker 1: theaer next year in Israel. That really strengthened my tie
Speaker 1: to this like imagined savior space of Israel, this like
Speaker 1: glittering land where I would never have to face any
Speaker 1: anti Semitism. So Israel existed to me absent the construct
Speaker 1: of Palestine until I was about eighteen, and that is
Speaker 1: when my Zionist on learning process began and I started
Speaker 1: to build my more liberatory pro Palestine politic.
Speaker 19: So that leads to my next question, which is what
Speaker 19: did you know about Israel about Palestine prior to going
Speaker 19: on birth right? Sounds like you did some exploration beforehand.
Speaker 1: Oh.
Speaker 20: Absolutely.
Speaker 1: I had friends and family who had begun going on
Speaker 1: birth right when I was about sixteen or seventeen, and
Speaker 1: then I started college and learned about Palestine as an
Speaker 1: occupied land in an occupied state, and I started asking
Speaker 1: the question, folks who were returning from Birthright, what did
Speaker 1: you learn about Palestine while you were there. And I
Speaker 1: remember one of my close loved ones, who I know
Speaker 1: is sort of a solid progressive, came home and said, oh,
Speaker 1: do you mean the terrorists?
Speaker 20: And that gave me such pause.
Speaker 1: I had never heard her use language like that before,
Speaker 1: and I said, no, that's certainly not what I meant.
Speaker 1: So before I went on birth Right, I wanted to
Speaker 1: make sure that I had a solid foundational working knowledge,
Speaker 1: at least of the region. And I also wanted that
Speaker 1: learning to be balanced. So I took four different courses
Speaker 1: on you know, relevant topics suffering and evil in the
Speaker 1: Jewish experience, Jewish tradition, Middle East politics, and Arab Israeli conflict.
Speaker 1: And these were four university level courses. And I was
Speaker 1: also studying to get a BA in political science with
Speaker 1: a focus on comparative politics. So I took other coursework
Speaker 1: on apartheid systems and heard, you know, the comparisons between
Speaker 1: is in South Africa. And so by the time I
Speaker 1: finished my college coursework and was prepared to go on Birthright,
Speaker 1: I already was staunchly pro Palestine.
Speaker 20: I had been in.
Speaker 1: The human rights literature and the genocide and apartheid literature
Speaker 1: enough to know where my values stood on this topic.
Speaker 1: So I went on Birthright very prepared to rabble rouse
Speaker 1: and Row's rabble.
Speaker 10: I did.
Speaker 6: Right well.
Speaker 19: So what was your experience, like, what did you see there?
Speaker 19: What conversations were had. I have seen some reports testimonies
Speaker 19: of people who spoke out against their trip leaders, and
Speaker 19: sometimes they were dismissed kicked off the trip. So what
Speaker 19: did you do to try to challenge the endorsed narrative
Speaker 19: on your trip? It sounds like that's something that you did.
Speaker 1: Yes, I tried to approach with a lot of pointed curiosity.
Speaker 1: My tour guide was a veteran of the Second Lebanon
Speaker 1: War and claimed objectivity. And his name was Iol and
Speaker 1: he would always talk about how he was sort of
Speaker 1: an objective commentator on.
Speaker 20: The politics between Israel and Palestine, and.
Speaker 1: So I would ask, how does your role as a
Speaker 1: veteran impact that objectivity? Can you talk about the water crisis?
Speaker 1: Why is it that Israel has this world famous desalination
Speaker 1: technology and can access clean water and they're not sharing
Speaker 1: that technology with Kaza, who's isolated on this strip.
Speaker 20: Can you talk about settlements?
Speaker 1: How are Israelis justifying settlements in the West bank, when
Speaker 1: Palestinians live on so little land. And then even when
Speaker 1: we were on this trip, there were these kind of
Speaker 1: sleight of hand distraction tactics where it would be on
Speaker 1: the bus and they would say, if you look out
Speaker 1: the right side of the bus, you'll see these beautiful
Speaker 1: groves and orchards, and I would immediately go to the
Speaker 1: left side of the bus and see what they didn't
Speaker 1: want us to acknowledge. And those were essentially the shanty
Speaker 1: towns that Arab Israelis were forced to live in, these
Speaker 1: really impoverished regions that they just didn't want us to
Speaker 1: recognize because it was a visual representation of the inequity
Speaker 1: that is worked into Israeli society and sort of the
Speaker 1: way they treat Arab Israelis or non Jewish Israelis.
Speaker 19: I'm curious when you did bring some of these things
Speaker 19: up to the trip leaders, what would they say.
Speaker 20: I got a.
Speaker 1: Similar oh, you mean the terrorists or oh Hamas's response,
Speaker 1: And that's I think something that actually made me quite
Speaker 1: angry and frustrated. When I was on the trip and
Speaker 1: I said to AyL in front of some other people,
Speaker 1: you have a group of impressionable young adults eighteen to
Speaker 1: twenty six year old adults who are hearing you repeatedly
Speaker 1: make the comparison between Palestinian civilians and terrorists, Palestinian civilians
Speaker 1: and hamas, which is one small representative group, not.
Speaker 20: The whole of Palestine.
Speaker 1: And he would sort of get defensive and try to
Speaker 1: pivot or talk about something else and sort of wave
Speaker 1: me away as a rabble rouser, and tried to speak
Speaker 1: to me on the trip one on one several times
Speaker 1: about sort of where I had learned the information that
Speaker 1: I was sharing with other students, and I talked about
Speaker 1: my coursework with him, and afterwards he reached out to
Speaker 1: me trying to encourage me to make Aliad to become
Speaker 1: an Israeli citizen. It's like, you're a critical thinker, you
Speaker 1: clearly care very much about politics. Essentially, we could use
Speaker 1: you come join us and all of this more political discourse,
Speaker 1: it isn't even getting at the subtle eugenics and military mission.
Speaker 1: It seems to me of birthright trips. When we go
Speaker 1: on these trips, there are a group of Israeli soldiers
Speaker 1: who join us. They pick like the sexiest, most alluring,
Speaker 1: young hot soldiers to come on this trip. With you
Speaker 1: and then wind up having these machinations so that these
Speaker 1: Jewish diaspora youth can spend time alone with these sexy
Speaker 1: Israeli soldiers and they'll say, you know, maybe you all
Speaker 1: will fall in love on this trip, maybe you'll meet
Speaker 1: your soulmate. And I remember, even on the trip that
Speaker 1: I attended, there were two Israeli soldiers who clearly were
Speaker 1: into each other. Like they were they very much had
Speaker 1: a vibe. And someone made a joke on the trip,
Speaker 1: one of their one of their fellow soldiers, saying, you
Speaker 1: have to save yourselves for the Americans, basically clarifying that
Speaker 1: they were there to seduce us not only you know,
Speaker 1: literally physically emotionally, but seduce us into kind of the sexy,
Speaker 1: glittering promise of the state of Israel and of Zionism.
Speaker 19: That okay, that's I haven't heard of that situation. It
Speaker 19: didn't come up in the research I did or in
Speaker 19: the promo video for Birthright. So you're saying part of
Speaker 19: the mission, because I was one of the questions I
Speaker 19: was going to ask, is Birthright is in part funded
Speaker 19: by Israel, but it's also in large part funded by
Speaker 19: these Zionist organizations. And wealthy families in the US. So
Speaker 19: part of like, what do you think the true objectives
Speaker 19: are of the people who fund this trip? What are
Speaker 19: they trying to accomplish in addition to maybe what you
Speaker 19: alluded to, which is or encouraging Americans to move to Israel.
Speaker 1: Yeah, well, I think some of the goals of the
Speaker 1: trip are revealed by the age limits. The lower age
Speaker 1: limit for attending is eighteen and the upper age limit
Speaker 1: is twenty six. These are people who are likely reproductively viable,
Speaker 1: who would have plenty of time to fall in love
Speaker 1: with in ISRAELI, get married and have babies, who are
Speaker 1: likely of an age bracket where they are able to
Speaker 1: commit to conscripted service and will be able to serve
Speaker 1: with their bodies for the Israeli occupation.
Speaker 20: For uce, I will not call it the IDF. I'm sorry,
Speaker 20: I can't do that.
Speaker 1: And I really think if this were about sharing Jewish
Speaker 1: culture and just having people make ali yah on building
Speaker 1: the population of Israel, there wouldn't be this stringent age
Speaker 1: limit that there is. And there's a limit for going
Speaker 1: on birthright if you've been to Israel before for any
Speaker 1: longer than three months. So not only do They want
Speaker 1: these young people to go who could get married and
Speaker 1: make Jewish babies or who could you know, provide service
Speaker 1: to the IOF.
Speaker 20: But they want folks.
Speaker 1: To not have a significant background on the state of
Speaker 1: Israel or to have spent much time there before they attend,
Speaker 1: which I think also speaks to the potential brainwashing, like
Speaker 1: the socialization effort that is being made by these Zionist
Speaker 1: organizations and funders.
Speaker 19: Yeah, that's disturbing to hear, and I want to maybe
Speaker 19: try to give a balanced perspective. Was there positive? Were
Speaker 19: there positive parts of the of the trip?
Speaker 1: Absolutely, I think in terms of connecting me to my
Speaker 1: faith as a Jewish person and to my religion as
Speaker 1: a Jewish person, it was stunning. My father is a
Speaker 1: single father. My mom is Irish Catholic, but my dad
Speaker 1: is Jewish, and my dad raised.
Speaker 20: Me as Jewish from being a small child.
Speaker 1: But because I grew up in a Hassetic Kabbad and
Speaker 1: my lineage, my Jewish lineage is patrilineal, I wasn't able
Speaker 1: to convert. And the hbbad was fairly conservative in terms
Speaker 1: of its gender politics and didn't feel like a good
Speaker 1: match for me, So I didn't have a bot mizvah
Speaker 1: when I was growing up, and when I was on birthright.
Speaker 1: They provided everyone on the trip the opportunity to have
Speaker 1: a name Mitzvah. So I wound up being bought mitzvah
Speaker 1: at the wall in Jerusalem, having this beautiful spiritual experience
Speaker 1: and crying with other folks who were making their conversion
Speaker 1: process more official. And that was a profound, heady experience
Speaker 1: of just not like this is my transition to Jewish
Speaker 1: adulthood and now I have committed to being a Jewish
Speaker 1: woman for my life.
Speaker 19: Yeah, I think this is really important to discuss, and
Speaker 19: I do want to touch I know we've touched on
Speaker 19: a lightly anti Semitism that you brought up, because I
Speaker 19: think it is a very real thing, not only in
Speaker 19: the US but all of the world. Although I do
Speaker 19: think there is a little bit of danger in that
Speaker 19: that term is being thrown around I think a little
Speaker 19: too haphazardly right now to mean much of anything. It's
Speaker 19: in danger of kind of just meaning nothing. So I'm
Speaker 19: wondering what your personal I know you touch on it
Speaker 19: when you're a kid, but what has been your personal
Speaker 19: experience with anti Semitism and what do you think should
Speaker 19: actually be done to combat it.
Speaker 20: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Well, one example is when I was living in Rhode Island,
Speaker 1: I spent a lot of time as a grassroots organizer
Speaker 1: with the group Never Again Action, which is a Jewish
Speaker 1: youth group, community organizing group meant to prevent any kind
Speaker 1: of identity based violence, and so I was protesting ice
Speaker 1: detention facilities in Rhodeland. I was at counter protests against
Speaker 1: the Proud Boys when they came to Rhode Island, and
Speaker 1: the starkest experience of anti Semitism I ever had was
Speaker 1: members of the Proud Boys sharing my contact information on Stormfront,
Speaker 1: the White Pride worldwide website and dosing me. So they
Speaker 1: called my cell phone and told me that they were
Speaker 1: going to come to my home. They had my home address.
Speaker 1: I had to, you know, contact police and have a
Speaker 1: patrol car on my street for several days because the
Speaker 1: threats were legitimate and threats to safety. And I think
Speaker 1: there's a conflation happening here between the violence of language
Speaker 1: and actual threats to safety. I don't believe that the
Speaker 1: statement from the river to the Sea, Palestine will be
Speaker 1: free is inherently violent that to me implies a right
Speaker 1: of return full humanity and enfranchisement as political actors for
Speaker 1: Palestinians who choose to return to their homeland, a secular
Speaker 1: state where folks can exist with equal rights, regardless of
Speaker 1: their religion and regardless of their ethnic background, and a
Speaker 1: deconstruction of ethno nationalism in Israel Palestine. That to me
Speaker 1: is a beautiful mission. It is not a threat of violence.
Speaker 19: Yeah, before we go, I want to try to do
Speaker 19: maybe a little thought experiment if you can try to
Speaker 19: straw man for us the Israeli perspective specifically. I know
Speaker 19: that you're a huge advocate for the LGBTQ community. So
Speaker 19: one of the arguments that I've heard a lot is
Speaker 19: they meaning Hamas, or you could argue Palestine or the
Speaker 19: Arab world in general, their religious extremists. Israel, we're the
Speaker 19: ones that want peace, but every time we've offered peace,
Speaker 19: they refuse. We are the only liberal democracy in the
Speaker 19: Middle East. If you, as a queer person, try to
Speaker 19: go to Gaza or what was I guess? Once Gaza,
Speaker 19: you'd be persecuted. So despite all of these civilian deaths,
Speaker 19: you'd be a fool not to support Israel. What are
Speaker 19: your thoughts about this particular argument? Is there a case
Speaker 19: to be made here?
Speaker 20: Oh No, I think the argument is absurd.
Speaker 1: I so, first of all, that wholesale races the safe
Speaker 1: existence of queer Palestinians and queer housms. There are absolutely
Speaker 1: Palestinian organizers who are queer and who are advocating for
Speaker 1: the liberation of queer community. And if you are in
Speaker 1: a position where you are being mass murdered, where you
Speaker 1: are being exterminated, and you are fighting for your life,
Speaker 1: what space do you have cognitively, emotionally or literally to
Speaker 1: advocate for queer liberation. I also think Israel is not
Speaker 1: a liberal democracy. It's an ethno nationalist state. There are
Speaker 1: citizens there who do not have the same rights because
Speaker 1: of their race, ethnicity, in the way that they're born.
Speaker 1: There have been efforts eugenics efforts in Israel to stop,
Speaker 1: for example, Ethiopian Jews from reproducing, and this was admitted
Speaker 1: by the Israeli Minister of Health in twenty fourteen. Any
Speaker 1: of those behaviors stop Israel from really being considered a
Speaker 1: legitimate liberal democracy. And I do think this concern of
Speaker 1: if we allow Palestine as the right of return, or
Speaker 1: if we come to the table and try and negotiate,
Speaker 1: they're going to want to wipe all of us out.
Speaker 1: That is projection because we did that because Jews and
Speaker 1: Zionists and Israelis came to Palestine and exiled seven hundred
Speaker 1: thousand people and have slowly been enacting violence, and we
Speaker 1: are worried about retribution. People are concerned that they will
Speaker 1: do to us what we did to them. There's been
Speaker 1: this sort of post Holocaust embodied violence of do unto
Speaker 1: others what has been done to you, and that I
Speaker 1: think really takes Israel off the table as a liberal democracy.
Speaker 1: And this argument that that Palestine is the aggressor off
Speaker 1: the table as well.
Speaker 19: That's a I think a compelling argument. And I just
Speaker 19: want to thank you for sharing your perspective. I learned
Speaker 19: a lot in this short conversation. So for those who
Speaker 19: want are interested in hearing more of your perspective, where
Speaker 19: can people find you?
Speaker 1: Yes, absolutely so. I am on Instagram at k dot
Speaker 1: w dot bogan just first initial, middle initial, last name,
Speaker 1: and I'm on TikTok as at sexuality Scholar. My academic
Speaker 1: research is on sexual functioning outcomes among survivors of sexual
Speaker 1: abuse and trauma. So if you're interested in my work there,
Speaker 1: I would say follow me on sexuality scholar, but I
Speaker 1: talk about my from Palestine politic and being sort of
Speaker 1: zionis critical on both platforms.
Speaker 19: All right, everybody go follow Katie. Thank you so much
Speaker 19: for taking the time to share your perspectives with us today.
Speaker 20: Thank you so much. It was lovely to chatting with you.
Speaker 19: That is it for me this week. I hope this
Speaker 19: conversation was as helpful and informative for you as it
Speaker 19: has been for me. If you enjoyed it, I highly
Speaker 19: encourage you to check out and subscribe to my YouTube
Speaker 19: channel fifty one forty nine with James Lee. Of course,
Speaker 19: keep on tuning into Breaking Points, and as always, thank
Speaker 19: you so much for your time today.
Speaker 5: All Right, I'm Maximilian Alvarez. I'm the editor in chief
Speaker 5: of the Real News Network and host of the podcast
Speaker 5: Working People and This is the Art of Class War
Speaker 5: on Breaking Points. On Wednesday of this week, Sean Fame,
Speaker 5: the reform president of the United Auto Workers who led
Speaker 5: his union through last year's historic stand up strike at
Speaker 5: Ford General Motors and Stilantis, formerly endorsed Joe Biden for
Speaker 5: president in the twenty twenty four general elections. On behalf
Speaker 5: of the union, which represents three hundred and ninety one
Speaker 5: thousand active members and more than five hundred and eighty
Speaker 5: thousand retired members. Fame famously refused to endorse Biden or
Speaker 5: any other candidate last year, warning that the union's coveted
Speaker 5: endorsement would need to be earned, especially when it came
Speaker 5: to how candidates responded to the autoworkers' strike in September.
Speaker 5: In October, but Fein's endorsement of Biden and Biden's subsequent
Speaker 5: acceptance of that endorsement was greeted with defiance from a
Speaker 5: contingent of rank and file UAW members who argue that
Speaker 5: with this endorsement, the union is contradicting its own stated
Speaker 5: support for an immediate, permanent ceasefire in Gaza. Endorsing Joe
Speaker 5: Biden for president. Joe Biden, a self proclaimed Zionist whose
Speaker 5: administration has been the number one military, financial, and political
Speaker 5: supporter of Israel's genocidal assault on Gaza and its ethnic
Speaker 5: cleansing of Palestinians, is a clear and blatant contradiction that
Speaker 5: undercuts Fanes and the uaw stated commitment to quote standing
Speaker 5: for justice across the globe. And some UAW members took
Speaker 5: direct action to disrupt Biden's address to the union on
Speaker 5: Wednesday in order to hold the union leadership to their
Speaker 5: own words. Here is cell phone video from the action,
Speaker 5: which workers shared with us.
Speaker 19: No matter what that was, it should be.
Speaker 5: For this Breaking Points exclusive edition of the Art of
Speaker 5: Class War, I got to interview three of the union
Speaker 5: members who disrupted by the speech on Wednesday, less than
Speaker 5: one hour after they were dragged out of the event
Speaker 5: by secret service. I sat down and spoke with Shahinas Ganeed,
Speaker 5: Nicki Thomas, and Johanna King Slatski of UAW Local twenty
Speaker 5: seven to ten. Here's our conversation, which we recorded from
Speaker 5: the Real News studio here in Baltimore.
Speaker 10: My name is Shahuanas Ganea.
Speaker 9: I am with UAW Northeastern University, Organizing and Higher Education.
Speaker 9: I am a fourth year jd PhD student in criminology
Speaker 9: and criminal justice and we just want our election back
Speaker 9: in September.
Speaker 10: So we are new to the UAW.
Speaker 17: And hello.
Speaker 6: My name is Niki Thomas. I am also at Northeastern
Speaker 6: University with Jenny UAW as a higher ed organizer. I'm
Speaker 6: in the bioengineering department. If anybody cares.
Speaker 17: I'm Johannah. I am a fifth year PhD candidate and
Speaker 17: teach as well at Columbia University. I'm getting my degree
Speaker 17: in English and Comparative literature, and I'm a member of
Speaker 17: UAW Local twenty seven ten.
Speaker 13: Awesome.
Speaker 5: Well again, can't thank y'all enough for making it on
Speaker 5: this call. We are recording this on Wednesday, literally one
Speaker 5: hour after you know, the UAW President Sean Fain endorsed
Speaker 5: President Joe Biden in the twenty twenty four elections. On
Speaker 5: behalf of the ua W and y'all were there at
Speaker 5: the event in Washington, d C. Along with other union members,
Speaker 5: making a statement protesting demonstrating in the midst of this
Speaker 5: event calling for an immediate cease fire, demanding that the
Speaker 5: UAW you know, continued to hold President Biden in his
Speaker 5: administration accountable for their complicity in continuing to support the
Speaker 5: ongoing genocidal violence in Gaza. I wanted to just ask,
Speaker 5: since we are lucky enough to have the three of
Speaker 5: you on here, if we could just go back around
Speaker 5: the table and have y'all give our viewers and listeners
Speaker 5: a play by play of what happened today from start
Speaker 5: to finish yes.
Speaker 9: So I want to give the broader context first that
Speaker 9: a group of us within the UAW has formed called
Speaker 9: Labor for Palestine UAW Labor, UAW Labor for Palestine, and
Speaker 9: we have been organizing and particularly during this UAW conference,
Speaker 9: the CAP Conference, around more actions related to pushing our
Speaker 9: elected officials to support a ceasefire. So the UAW had
Speaker 9: already passed internal resolutions and we knew that the international
Speaker 9: Executive Board, including President Sean Fain, supported a cease fire
Speaker 9: in Palestine, and now it was time for us to
Speaker 9: really show that. We wanted to make sure that our
Speaker 9: political endorsements were going to align with that.
Speaker 10: So that's the context of the broader week.
Speaker 9: We got about one thousand signatures in the span of
Speaker 9: from Monday to now so three days from our members
Speaker 9: seven fifty at this conference, and then many members sent
Speaker 9: the link to the petition back to their own home
Speaker 9: units as well, and we got signatures that way and
Speaker 9: throughout the conference. We have been demonstrating every time that
Speaker 9: someone has gotten on the stage who doesn't want to
Speaker 9: talk about the issue, we've erupted in chance of ceasefire.
Speaker 9: Now we did this with Bernie, we did this quite
Speaker 9: a bit. We're lobbying on the hill as well to
Speaker 9: get our elected officials to support a permanent, not just
Speaker 9: a temporary ceasefire. And we spoke to the International Executive
Speaker 9: Board because there was a lot of rumors going around
Speaker 9: that were going to endorse Joe Biden even though he
Speaker 9: has still refused to align himself with the uaw's position
Speaker 9: on a permanent ceasefire, and we felt and the members
Speaker 9: who signed on to that.
Speaker 10: Petition felt that that was not okay.
Speaker 9: That the UAW really need to stick to our values
Speaker 9: and stick to the statements that we had made and
Speaker 9: that President Sean Fain had made that we weren't going
Speaker 9: to just hand out endorsements to politicians. They needed to
Speaker 9: get in line on the issues that labor cares about,
Speaker 9: and ceasefire is an issue that labor cares about. So
Speaker 9: we stood up today because the International Executive Board did
Speaker 9: not listen to us and did not listen to its
Speaker 9: membership and went ahead to endorse President Biden.
Speaker 10: Anyways, we stood up.
Speaker 9: We had a Palestinian flag that said UAW Labor for Palestine.
Speaker 9: We started to chance ceasefire now while having our fists
Speaker 9: up with a solidarity fist and we were immediately rushed
Speaker 9: by Secrets Service agents who grabbed us at some point,
Speaker 9: anywhere from between half a dozen to a dozen were
Speaker 9: surrounding us.
Speaker 10: And dragged us out in a line.
Speaker 9: As we were still holding onto the flag, trying to
Speaker 9: rip the flag out of our hands, they.
Speaker 10: Knocked two of our members over.
Speaker 9: They tried to knock me onto the two of them
Speaker 9: while they were on the floor. You can see that
Speaker 9: in the video with me trying to like push back
Speaker 9: against the person who was holding me and who was
Speaker 9: trying to push me onto the other two that are
Speaker 9: sitting here next to me, and we were ultimately dragged
Speaker 9: out of the conference hall and removed from the floor
Speaker 9: that it was happening on the in the conference hotel.
Speaker 6: Yeah, that was a pretty good summary of everything that happened.
Speaker 10: There's not much to add on.
Speaker 6: Though, I will say you will probably see like maybe
Speaker 6: different statements about how other UAW members chanted.
Speaker 9: Over us while we were chanting.
Speaker 6: And I definitely think we've talked to a lot of
Speaker 6: people actually at this conference over the last few days
Speaker 6: who have come up to us and have been supportive
Speaker 6: on a personal level, but when it comes to this,
Speaker 6: they seem not ready to publicly come out in support
Speaker 6: in the way that we did today, and I think
Speaker 6: a lot of it has to do I'm sure we'll
Speaker 6: get into this later, but I think a lot.
Speaker 10: Of it has to do with fear.
Speaker 6: Like our politics these days are all about fear. The
Speaker 6: Republican Party runs on fear, the Democratic Party runs on fear,
Speaker 6: and there's a big there's a lot of talk within
Speaker 6: the UAW about fear of losing their jobs, fear of
Speaker 6: what's coming next, and so I think this is a
Speaker 6: reflection of that. But I am extremely disappointed, especially since
Speaker 6: it's coming off of multiple speeches by President Sean Fain
Speaker 6: that seem to say the exact opposite of what happened
Speaker 6: today and what President Biden was saying today, And if
Speaker 6: I'm being quite frank, very disappointing considering this morning, Rashida
Speaker 6: Tulib came and spoke with us as well and spoke
Speaker 6: to our membership about what it meant to her.
Speaker 10: So that's all I had to add on that.
Speaker 17: Anyway, I think it's it's hard because being here, we
Speaker 17: just walk around with the Kafia and people come up
Speaker 17: to us and say like, thank you for doing this.
Speaker 17: Like so many people here are behind the ceasefire demand.
Speaker 17: It's like it's it's a really warm, amazing atmosphere and
Speaker 17: people are like fired up about this, and I think,
Speaker 17: you know, it's true, there's a kind of UAW members
Speaker 17: are known for being fearless, but there's a there's in moments,
Speaker 17: a culture of fear that we haven't gotten rid of yet.
Speaker 17: And so I think, I mean, I don't want to
Speaker 17: speak for all three of us, you guys can chime in,
Speaker 17: but I think that we're trying to show the that
Speaker 17: you don't need to be afraid to send up to
Speaker 17: power and kind of present another positive option, a positive
Speaker 17: vision that isn't rooted in just like being afraid of
Speaker 17: consequences and letting that determine everything. Of course you have
Speaker 17: to make a political calculus, but it doesn't have to
Speaker 17: be rooted only in fear. It can also be rooted
Speaker 17: in a promise of a better world. And that's what
Speaker 17: we're really to create.
Speaker 5: Yes, right, I mean, you know, as as we mentioned
Speaker 5: in the introduction to this segment, I mean, at the
Speaker 5: time that the United Auto Workers formally signed onto the
Speaker 5: call for a ceasefire in Palestine, they were the largest
Speaker 5: union to do so, only replaced this week by the
Speaker 5: Service International Employees Union SEIU Service Employees International Union, who
Speaker 5: have also put out a call for a permanent ceasefire.
Speaker 5: And as y'all mentioned, like Sean Fain himself, you know,
Speaker 5: has been you know, really at the forefront of the
Speaker 5: labor movement speaking out against the violence in Gaza, the
Speaker 5: US support of it, And yeah, how could it not
Speaker 5: undercut that message to then kind of turn around and
Speaker 5: endorse Joe Biden, the self proclaimed zionist President of the
Speaker 5: United States of America, who has shown no signs really
Speaker 5: at all of ending the US the continual US support
Speaker 5: for the very genocidal violence that the union was calling
Speaker 5: to end. So I wanted to sort of ask about that,
Speaker 5: right because I think one question folks will have, and
Speaker 5: especially given the fact that the United Auto Workers is
Speaker 5: not only you know, representing workers in the auto industry,
Speaker 5: but as you three are are living proof of UAW
Speaker 5: has expanded to a number of other industries, including higher education,
Speaker 5: where it has a strong foothold and a number of
Speaker 5: universities around the country, and that's an important part of
Speaker 5: the union's membership as well. And I can admit vision
Speaker 5: folks watching this and trying to sort of pit that
Speaker 5: side of the UAW against you know, the traditional blue
Speaker 5: collar you know, roughneck sort of industrial workers side in
Speaker 5: the auto manufacturing side of the union. So I wanted
Speaker 5: to ask if you could comment on that, if the
Speaker 5: folks who signed the petition who have been coming up
Speaker 5: to you represent the other sides of the UAW, and
Speaker 5: if you wanted to mention that for viewers and listeners,
Speaker 5: and also if we could just go back around the
Speaker 5: table one more time and sort of, yeah, talk about
Speaker 5: why this was so important to you all as union members,
Speaker 5: as workers, and what your message is to folks out
Speaker 5: there who are in a union or you know, who
Speaker 5: are not, about why they should get involved in this
Speaker 5: fight and what they can do to push for a
Speaker 5: cease fire and to end this madness in Gaza.
Speaker 9: Well, I think my answer will hopefully respond to both
Speaker 9: of your questions. I think to start off, we want
Speaker 9: to really fundamentally reject the idea that this is some
Speaker 9: sort of higher ed workers versus blue collar workers or
Speaker 9: versus auto workers.
Speaker 10: Type of dynamic.
Speaker 9: The people that have that are at this conference and
Speaker 9: that have been coming up to us and supporting US
Speaker 9: have covered all the industries that the UAW represents, including
Speaker 9: people who are on the assembly lines for defense companies
Speaker 9: and are making some of the weaponry that the US
Speaker 9: is sending to Palestine currently or to Israel actually.
Speaker 5: To sending to Israel to use.
Speaker 16: Only those workers are extremely interested and have been talking
Speaker 16: to us about ways that we can figure out a
Speaker 16: just transition for the defense industry in this country so
Speaker 16: that we can keep those good union jobs but stop
Speaker 16: using the US defense industry as a way to oppress and.
Speaker 9: Call and ize other countries or in this case, to
Speaker 9: help another country colonize another country. So I want to
Speaker 9: say that it's all parts of the UAW membership that
Speaker 9: are on board with this, and this is not a higher.
Speaker 10: Ed only issue. I'd also say that.
Speaker 9: A big part of why this is a labor issue
Speaker 9: is not just because of international solidarity. We've had calls
Speaker 9: from trade unionists in Palestine to stand up in solidarity
Speaker 9: with them, and I think people have heard that, but
Speaker 9: also because here in the US, workers, not just US,
Speaker 9: other industries as well, have been facing a lot of
Speaker 9: pushback from their employers when.
Speaker 10: They try to speak out.
Speaker 9: Even the most sort of mild level of support of Palestine,
Speaker 9: any even vaguely anti Israel statement is being used by
Speaker 9: employers at this point to suspend people, to fire people
Speaker 9: in various ways, not just at our campuses where we're employed,
Speaker 9: but in different industries as well.
Speaker 10: And so I think that part of.
Speaker 9: That fear, as my comrades were saying, is what is
Speaker 9: motivating people to really be concerned about voicing the support
Speaker 9: that they've privately shared with us out into the world.
Speaker 9: I'd also want to name respectability politics as one of
Speaker 9: the things that maybe had contributed to people shouting uawuaw
Speaker 9: in response to our calls for ceaspire now, because every
Speaker 9: other time we did it at this conference, people were
Speaker 9: in extreme amounts of support and we're coming up and
Speaker 9: congratulating us afterwards. But after this particular instance, we had
Speaker 9: the uawaw chance and then we had people coming up
Speaker 9: and say, did you know you just.
Speaker 10: Disrupted the president? Did you just know that you disrespected
Speaker 10: the president?
Speaker 9: I think this idea, even though we live in a democracy,
Speaker 9: even though we have free speech, some people still hold
Speaker 9: onto this idea of treating our politicians like they're almost
Speaker 9: like royalty, that we have to show this particular amount
Speaker 9: of deference to and we're rejecting that.
Speaker 10: We're saying the UAW has power.
Speaker 9: Right, Joe Biden would not have come to the UAW
Speaker 9: looking for an endorsement if workers did not have power
Speaker 9: in this country. We do not need to cow down
Speaker 9: in fear. We need to stand up together and show
Speaker 9: that workers across this country support a free Palestine and
Speaker 9: support a permanent ceasefire. Right.
Speaker 6: I definitely agree with everything that China has just said.
Speaker 6: And just to add on to that, because I know
Speaker 6: you also asked about like what can we do a
Speaker 6: lot of these conversations that we've been having actually all
Speaker 6: boiled down to.
Speaker 10: Just awareness and education.
Speaker 6: Like a lot of the conversations I've been having people
Speaker 6: they don't know all the information maybe that we know
Speaker 6: about what's happening in Palestine or even the history of
Speaker 6: the conflict, and so a lot of the conversations that
Speaker 6: we've been having have just been going over some of
Speaker 6: that basic information. And every single person I've talked to
Speaker 6: once i've done that, like go, wow, I didn't realize
Speaker 6: I didn't know. And so I think when it comes
Speaker 6: to other unionists trying to do similar kinds of movements
Speaker 6: in their unions getting their unions to caller seas fire.
Speaker 6: I think people really have to spend a good amount
Speaker 6: of time on speaking with their fellow union members and
Speaker 6: educating them on the truth because the only thing that
Speaker 6: they get to see is what American media shows them,
Speaker 6: and as we all know at this current time, it's
Speaker 6: full of propaganda and lies and they've never even.
Speaker 9: Heard the other side of the story.
Speaker 6: So I think that's going to be really important for
Speaker 6: us even moving forward, that educational aspect of it, because
Speaker 6: I think once people realize what's actually going on, that's
Speaker 6: when they really start standing behind us. Like there were
Speaker 6: people I talked to over multiple days who on this
Speaker 6: last day came up and said, hey, we just signed
Speaker 6: I just signed your petition. And just to clarify, the
Speaker 6: petition that we have specifically is asking for uaw CAP
Speaker 6: to not endorse or fund candidates.
Speaker 10: Who have not called for a ceasefire.
Speaker 6: So while what we saw there was like people chanting
Speaker 6: over us in the background, we are still actively working
Speaker 6: to make some kind of essentially BDS happen within our union.
Speaker 10: Yeah.
Speaker 17: I think that was all great, and I guess I
Speaker 17: want to add, like anybody who came here to this
Speaker 17: conference will know that there is no division in UAW
Speaker 17: between the different industries. This is such a space of
Speaker 17: warmth and solidarity, and people know what our views are
Speaker 17: because we've been walking around with the Kafias the entire time.
Speaker 17: We all have ceasefire badges on our stickers. We gave
Speaker 17: out stickers. People are wearing these all over the place,
Speaker 17: by the way, like all people are just it's like
Speaker 17: you just walk around and you hit five people with
Speaker 17: a ceasefire sticker. It's everywhere, right, And we've been chanting,
Speaker 17: getting up in speeches like there are a million opportunities
Speaker 17: and people people know.
Speaker 10: That we're in higher D too.
Speaker 17: There are a million opportunities for people to you know,
Speaker 17: say something untoured about us or to us. Doesn't happen.
Speaker 17: We're only getting thank you, thank you for doing that,
Speaker 17: Like how can I be part of it? We handed
Speaker 17: out flyers. We literally ran out like three or four
Speaker 17: times of people asking for links to the petition or
Speaker 17: our website. Joined the movement like this is a big
Speaker 17: grassroots movement and people here interested and excited about it.
Speaker 17: The only thing is you know, convincing people to move
Speaker 17: past this initial anxiety that they're still working through of
Speaker 17: like what can I do when I'm in a room
Speaker 17: with the President of the United States and he stands
Speaker 17: for something different. You know, we have to show people
Speaker 17: know it's safe to do this. You can you can
Speaker 17: take action to fulfill your vision for a better world.
Speaker 17: But they share that vision. And I really I see
Speaker 17: our movement growing every single day. The fact that we
Speaker 17: need to get like nearly a thousand signatures in the
Speaker 17: space of a couple days. When we're like all sleep
Speaker 17: deprived and barely coherent and we're writing a petition, that's like,
Speaker 17: that's incredible. That's a sign of people being like fired up.
Speaker 17: And I know there's gonna be some some change in
Speaker 17: UAW as long as the leadership follows through their values
Speaker 17: and listens to their members.
Speaker 10: Right.
Speaker 6: If I could add on really like likely to that,
Speaker 6: even because we've been chanting actually for the entire conference,
Speaker 6: even right before President Biden came out, people knew we
Speaker 6: were gonna, like our members now, we were gonna everybody knew. Yeah,
Speaker 6: we had, like I want to say, at least like
Speaker 6: seven different people approach us before to like thank us,
Speaker 6: offer us support.
Speaker 9: They knew they were like, if you get arrested.
Speaker 10: We're here for you. Like that all happened right before.
Speaker 6: So even though like it may seem like we have
Speaker 6: a division, I really don't think.
Speaker 10: I don't forceive it that way.
Speaker 9: We're holding up the solidarity fist.
Speaker 10: I don't know.
Speaker 17: It was hard to say, but because it got blocked
Speaker 17: by secrets, we were we.
Speaker 10: Were not alone.
Speaker 6: There was solidarity in the room, even if it was
Speaker 6: difficult to hear.
Speaker 17: If table was full of people from other industries, it
Speaker 17: was like, I'm gonna say, like seventy five twenty five
Speaker 17: percent of like these more conventional like factory type jobs,
Speaker 17: manufacturing jobs, and then the higher red books were all
Speaker 17: sitting at the same table.
Speaker 10: It's like they took a pic they asked for before
Speaker 10: because they knew.
Speaker 17: That there would happens, Like we're all on the same
Speaker 17: team here.
Speaker 9: Yeah, everyone offering, can we call a lawyer for you?
Speaker 9: Can we do anything?
Speaker 10: Yeah?
Speaker 9: Like are you concerned about getting a wrestler? You concerned
Speaker 9: about anything?
Speaker 6: Happened and we raise funds like jail buds, Like people
Speaker 6: were expecting us to do this because we've done it.
Speaker 9: I mean, we started chanting ceasefire out in the middle
Speaker 9: of one of Sean Fein's speech and.
Speaker 6: He's smiled, and I have it on my Twitter and on.
Speaker 10: The e UAW Twitter.
Speaker 12: Yeah.
Speaker 9: Actually, so like people knew and they were happy for us,
Speaker 9: and they were supportive going into it, and I really
Speaker 9: just do want to highlight that I don't think that
Speaker 9: there is division between higher ed and the rest of
Speaker 9: the UAW industries.
Speaker 6: What we did was in the very spirit of the
Speaker 6: UAW and in the spirit of unionists in generals.
Speaker 9: Yes, that's right, and we'll be doing it again until
Speaker 9: President Biden calls for a season. That's correct, that's right,
Speaker 9: Free palacetine, free palacetime.
Speaker 10: Hell yeah.
Speaker 5: So that was Shahina's Ganeid, Nikki Thomas, and Johanna King Slutsky,
Speaker 5: three union members and organizers with UAW Local twenty seven
Speaker 5: to ten. I want to thank our guests again for
Speaker 5: joining us, and I want to thank you all for
Speaker 5: watching this segment with breaking points, and be sure to
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Speaker 5: Take care of yourselves, take care of each other. Solidarity Forever.