Flag on my Backpack

Alaina Giordano was diagnosed with breast cancer three and half years ago. That was bad. 

This is worse: On April 25th, a judge in North Carolina used Alaina’s cancer as a key reason to transfer custody of her 5-year-old son and 11-year-old daughter to her ex-husband (a man Alaina describes as “abusive” and who lives more than 700 miles away). 

This is happening even though Alaina says her kids “know that I have cancer, they know that I go for treatment once a month now, they know that it’s stable. They know me as mom, and it doesn’t affect our daily life.”

She has just two weeks to appeal, and her hope is that a huge outcry from the public and local elected officials can help reverse the decision. 

Thankfully, that outcry is growing quickly. A petition started by Alaina’s sister Lauren has more than 7,000 signatures, Alaina was interviewed on Good Morning America and the Today Show, and media throughout North Carolina and the U.S. are now covering the injustice. 

But time is short, and the wrong outcome here sets a dangerous precedent for mothers and fathers with cancer or other serious diseases. Please sign Lauren’s petition asking that Alaina Giordano’s breast cancer not be used as a reason to take away her kids: 

http://www.change.org/petitions/do-not-allow-nc-judge-to-take-alaina-giordanos-children-just-because-she-has-cancer

Hate crime at McDonald’s caught on video: Hold employees and assailants accountable

On Friday, Adrian Leigh Cowan of Baltimore started a petition on Change.org, speaking out in response to a shocking online video of a transgender woman being brutally beaten at a local McDonald’s.

As Adrian told our team of organizers, “I was moved to start this petition because when I first viewed the video, I was brought to tears. How anyone could stand by and allow this to happen is unfathomable to me.” More than 30,000 Change.org members had the same reaction, and joined Adrian in signing the petition.  

If you haven’t watched the horrifying video of this hate crime, please click this link (WARNING: Video contains extremely graphic violence). Then add your name to Adrian’s petition calling on McDonald’s and Maryland authorities to hold those involved accountable.

If you would prefer not to watch the video posted by Adrian, you should know what it documents: A 22-year-old transgender woman is pulled out of a McDonald’s bathroom and viciously beaten by two customers. She is punched, knocked to the ground, dragged across the floor by her hair, and kicked in the face until she appears to experience a seizure.

Instead of coming to this woman’s assistance, one McDonald’s employee filmed the assault while others can be heard cheering the assailants on as they attack the victim. After the brutal incident, the video was posted to the Internet, where an employee bragged that the assault was OK because the victim “was a man dressed like a woman.”

Sadly, this attack is a reminder of the rampant harassment and discrimination that transgender people face every day. Nationwide, more than half of all transgender people experience verbal or physical abuse when trying to access public accommodations like restrooms. Brutal acts of violence are all too common — and authorities often fail to prosecute these crimes to the fullest extent of the law.

Not surprisingly, McDonald’s lacks standard policies for protecting transgender individuals, despite a decent record of workplace discrimination protections for gays and lesbians. And while the company has pledged to “take appropriate action” against all employees involved in this heinous event, just one has been punished.

Please join Adrian Leigh Cowan in demanding that McDonald’s and Maryland authorities hold accountable both the assailants in this beating and the employees who cheered it on — and to make sure that an attack like this never happens again:

http://www.change.org/petitions/demand-that-the-employees-on-duty-at-mcdonalds-be-held-responsible-in-the-beating-of-a-trans-woman

We can’t let this brutal hate crime in Maryland go unpunished. Thank you for taking action today.

- Eden and the Change.org team

Change.org member Evgenia Chirkova is a mom in Khimki, a town on the outskirts of Moscow. The agents showed up at her house without warning. They accused her of beating and starving her children and threatened to take her kids away, even though they later admitted they had no evidence. 

Why? Because Evgenia is a leader of a courageous fight to save the Khimki forest from a league of corrupt forces, including the Russian government. She’s been harassed and threatened. Some of her fellow protesters have been arrested and beaten –– one journalist was brutalized so badly that he now has to use a wheelchair. He can no longer speak.

All because they want to stop the destruction of one of the few protected old-growth forests in all of Russia — a forest critical to the entire ecosystem around Moscow.

It’s an incredible story, one that starts with a corrupt deal to build a $1 billion highway from Moscow to St. Petersburg right through the Khimki forest, even though other routes were easily available.  

Tell Vinci, the French company about to begin construction, not to destroy an old-growth forest and support a corrupt system. Add your name to Evgenia’s petition. 

After she discovered the proposed plan, Evgenia and others started the “Save Khimki Forest” movement. In a country fed up with rampant corruption, human rights abuses and environmental degradation, their movement struck a nerve. 

Last summer, thousands of people demonstrated in Moscow’s center, leading to President Medvedev’s unprecedented action of holding a public discussion on the proposed highway. The Associated Press has labeled their movement “Russia’s broadest protest movement in years.”

But now President Medvedev has said that the government won’t budge. And while Evgenia and her fellow protesters risk their personal safety to keep on fighting, Vinci’s bulldozers may start taking down the Khimki forest within weeks, or even days.

But Evgenia is not done fighting yet –– and neither are we. Please sign her petition to tell Vinci not to destroy the Khimki forest:

http://www.change.org/petitions/save-khimki-forest-stand-with-russias-human-rights-and-environmental-activists?alert_id=YDSFUqweUn_oSjDasKYLD&me=aa

Ai Weiwei is the most famous artist in China, best known for his iconic “Bird’s Nest” stadium that was the focal point of the Beijing Olympics. 

Ai has always pushed the envelope, both with his internationally-acclaimed art and with his outspoken criticism of the Chinese government. 

But these past weeks have brought Beijing’s harshest crackdown on dissidents in more than a decade. And on April 3rd, government agents arrested Ai at the Beijing airport and seized papers and computers from his studio.

We don’t know where Ai is now. The Chinese government is holding him on flimsy charges of “economic crimes” — an allegation often used to silence dissenters. 

Twelve leading figures in the international arts world, including the directors of the Guggenheim, Metropolitan Museum of Modern Art, and Tate Museum, have started a petition on Change.org demanding that the Chinese government free Ai Weiwei.

The regime in Beijing has proven largely resistant to pressure from foreign governments. But they’ve made a huge push to raise China’s profile in the arts — the government just finished building the world’s largest art museum. Widespread condemnation, led by the arts community, may be our best chance to save his life. 

Please sign the petition to free Ai Weiwei as soon as possible:

http://www.change.org/petitions/call-for-the-release-of-ai-weiwei?alert_id=ZntTBqdKpo_khEsYzPNYV&me=aa

In 1994, Hutu state radio played a massive role in the Rwandan genocide, inciting violence and giving direction on how and where to kill Tutsis. 

Right now in Libya, Gaddafi is using state television much the same way. As a weapon. On his three state-run stations, supporters are urged to hunt the opposition “alley by alley, house by house, room by room.” It’s been reported that state programming is used to send coded instructions to loyalists and hired mercenaries.  

It’s not too late to shut down Libyan state television and save the lives of innocent civilians. But we must act quickly.

Here’s how we can help: Libya uses four international satellite providers (ArabSat, EutelSat, AsiaSat, and NileSat) to broadcast. If these companies drop Libyan state television, the propaganda will stop. 

Please sign the petition started by Change.org member Carol Hillson demanding that these satellite companies stop broadcasting Gaddafi’s incitements to violence.

Satellite providers like these four companies aren’t typically involved in the world of activism. It’s possible that they’ve never been petitioned before.

That’s why we believe a global outcry for them to cease their broadcasts in Libya could work. And the faster we can produce such an outcry, the more lives we can potentially save.

Please ask CEOs Amin Basyouni, Michel de Rosen, William Wade, and Khalid Balkheyour — four men who have the power to save countless civilians — to stop broadcasting Libyan state television: 

http://www.change.org/petitions/shut-down-gaddafi-state-tv?alert_id=VGNJeZvfMV_WQZsAAMdTm&me=aa

We’ve won dozens of victories in the past few weeks, but none would save so many lives as this. Please add your name, then forward this email to friends and family. 

- Weldon and the Change.org team

Nearly 70 years ago, in the small town of Abbeville, Alabama, a young woman named Recy Taylor experienced the worst of living under Jim Crow law. In 1944, Recy was gang raped by a group of men –– her neighbors. 

Rosa Parks and the NAACP fought on Recy’s behalf to send her attackers to prison. But because Recy was black and the assailants were white, her rapists never even faced trial, let alone jail time, even though they confessed to raping her.

Yesterday, after emails from over 6,000 Change.org members, Abbeville Mayor Ryan Blalock and Alabama State Rep. Dexter Grimsley made personal apologies to Recy and her family for the failure to prosecute her attackers. Now it’s time for the city of Abbeville and state of Alabama to follow suit.

Recy is now 91 years old, and all she wants is for her story to be recognized. For the state that denied her justice to admit that it did wrong. ”The sheriff never even said he was sorry it happened. I think more people should know about it … but ain’t nobody saying nothing,” Recy said.

Recy’s brother, Robert Corbitt, has spent the last decade of his retirement searching for the facts of the case and seeking justice for Recy. He started a petition on Change.org requesting an apology to his sister from the city of Abbeville and the state of Alabama. 

Rep. Grimsley –– an Abbeville native himself –– has vowed to introduce a resolution in the House calling for Alabama to apologize to Recy and all the black women like her whose stories were hushed and names were slandered. 

Tell the Alabama state legislature to support Rep. Grimsley’s apology resolution — it’s time for us to stand up for Recy and for Alabama to apologize for letting her down.

http://www.change.org/petitions/demand-alabama-publicly-apologize-for-failure-to-address-jim-crow-era-gang-rape?alert_id=PzeXmFhwdH_IRKJMWJcvu&me=aa

“Curing” gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people? Yep, there’s an app for that — unless we can convince Apple to get rid of it. A controversy is erupting around a new application for the iPhone that claims gay people can be “cured,” and that gay kids should be put through therapy to “fix” their sexual orientation. Believe it or not, Apple is providing Exodus International — an organization that promotes “conversion therapy” to try to brainwash gay people into turning straight — a platform on iTunes for their homophobic iPhone app. This, despite the fact that Exodus believes that LGBT people should be confronted with “spiritual warfare,” and that “freedom from homosexuality” should be a societal goal. Worse, Apple has given the Exodus app a 4+ rating on iTunes, labeling the app “non-offensive,” even though the group tells gay kids that their sexual orientation is “immoral,” “satanic,” and in need of a cure — factors that contribute to teen suicide. The grassroots group Truth Wins Out has started a petition on Change.org, asking Apple to follow their own editorial standards — and remove this dangerous “ex-gay” app from iTunes now. The more signatures they deliver, the more likely Apple executives — like Steve Jobs — will do the right thing. Click here to add your name. Apple has been a strong ally to the LGBT community for years, even donating $100,000 to defeat California’s Proposition 8, the state’s ban on marriage equality. Just a few months ago, Apple actually removed another app from iTunes that labeled same-sex couples “immoral sexual partnerships” following pressure from Change.org members and others. Exodus International’s “ex-gay” app deserves to be pulled from iTunes as well. “Conversion therapy” has been universally condemned by every major medical and scientific organization around the world. The American Psychological Association, American Medical Association, and American Counseling Association have all rejected “ex-gay” therapy, saying that it results in catastrophic damage to the mental health of its victims. Please click here to sign the petition to Apple executives, asking them to stand up for equality and remove this dangerous iPhone app from iTunes now: http://www.change.org/petitions/demand-that-apple-remove-ex-gay-iphone-app?alert_id=QJGtBBlHFV_TjSVcOlneH&me=aa Thanks for joining us — and sharing this petition with your friends on Facebook and Twitter. With your support, we know Apple will do the right thing.

A small group of lesbian activists from the poverty-stricken townships of Cape Town walked into South African parliament on Monday and convinced their government to finally start fighting the country’s decades-old scourge of “corrective rape” — where men rape lesbian women to “turn” them straight. You made that moment possible. 

Late last year, these activists called on the world to help them pressure their leaders to take action on corrective rape. We answered their call, and more than 170,000 Change.org members from 163 countries joined with them, making this the largest campaign of all time on Change.org.

Three and a half months later, they succeeded. Teaming up with 23 major South African organizations, they got some of the most powerful officials in the country to agree to bring together various government arms and civil society groups to develop and implement a national action plan to combat corrective rape.

The ministry officials asked for details of specific cases in need of immediate attention, committed to a series of meetings beginning in six weeks, and promised to present concrete proposals to prevent corrective rape by the next meeting.

It’s an astounding victory, far beyond what we ever could have imagined when we set out late last year. Now these activists need your help holding the government accountable for its commitments.

If there was any question about the effect you had, the chief of staff himself confirmed it: At one point in the session he explicitly said, in a pleading voice, “Please don’t petition us again.”

But that’s exactly what we need to do. The government is making a series of urgent decisions on sexual violence legislation in the next few weeks, and South African activists need your help in pressuring them to follow up their words with tangible action:

http://www.change.org/petitions/south-africa-follow-words-with-action-against-rape?alert_id=aDwQnnErnm_HzFbCNmuFS&me=aa

Your work led to overwhelming international press coverage of the campaign, taking corrective rape from an unspoken epidemic to a prominent international issue. In the last two weeks alone, the campaign against corrective rape has been covered by Time Magazine, the Washington Post, USA Today, Houston Chronicle, San Francisco Chronicle, Philadelphia Inquirer, Boston Globe, Miami Herald, Seattle Times, ABC News, CBS News, NBC News, Fox News, MSNBC, Dan Rather, Forbes, Yahoo! News, Salon, and dozens of global outlets from Taiwan, Indonesia, Australia, Canada, Spain, and even a Finnish tabloid.

An elated Luleki Sizwe Founder Ndumie Funda (pictured to the right, alongside the chief of staff from the Ministry of Justice) called it “an incredible achievement…I humble myself to the 170,000 people from all over the world who made this possible. It was about time this happened.”

There is still much to be done, but every Change.org member should be proud about what has been accomplished here. In just 100 days, a tiny group of township activists have managed to mobilize more than 170,000 people from 163 countries and engaged the highest levels of government to address their demands. That’s incredible.

As Japan struggles to overcome a disastrous string of events — including a possible nuclear catastrophe — millions of us have sought to help, often by donating money to urgent relief efforts. 

But if you donate via text message, your donations may take up to 90 days to reach aid organizations that need the money as soon as possible. 

Even though they’re getting large amounts of free media attention for their text-to-donate programs, companies like AT&T and Verizon have chosen not to release the donation money right away. Many customers assume that they’re sending funds straight to disaster zones in the crucial days after the earthquake, but donations are transferred after the end of your next billing cycle, a process that can take up to three months. 

Masaya Uchino, a law student in San Francisco with family in Japan, started a petition on Change.org to demand that AT&T, Verizon, and other major phone service providers stop delaying much needed donations from reaching organizations doing relief work in Japan. Please add your name to the petition now: 

http://www.change.org/petitions/stop-the-delay-on-donations-to-japan-2?alert_id=QXeUWkuBQr_rZIREoXxkp&me=aa

After the earthquake in Haiti, Change.org members and others asked phone companies to provide donations immediately — and the phone companies came through. But so far they’ve refused to take the same step, and it’s up to us to join Masaya in speaking out. 

Thanks for taking action,

- Weldon and the Change.org team

P.S. If you want to donate immediately to relief efforts, join the Change.org staff in contributing to one or more of these great organizations: 

Oxfam America: http://chn.ge/hd3n4C
International Medical Corps: http://chn.ge/hhkQhT
Habitat for Humanity: http://chn.ge/e8OX7r
UN Foundation: http://chn.ge/hVZ5uu
American Red Cross: http://chn.ge/eWtkti
UNICEF: http://chn.ge/hDASyY

Last November, an 11-year-old girl was gang raped in an abandoned trailer home on the outskirts of Cleveland, Texas.

A total of eighteen boys and men have been arrested in conjunction with this brutal rape, ranging in age from middle schoolers to a 27-year-old.

Obviously, any attack this vicious is shocking. It leaves us with questions. How could this happen? What made these boys and men think their behavior was acceptable?

But those weren’t the questions asked by James McKinley of the New York Times when he wrote about this attack on March 8th. Instead, he asked some offensive and irrelevant questions.

How did the 11-year-old rape victim dress? According to Mr. McKinley, “Residents in the neighborhood … said she dressed older than her age, wearing makeup and fashions more appropriate to a woman in her 20s.”

Did the victim have any seedy friends? Mr. McKinley reminds us, “She would hang out with teenage boys at a playground, some said.”

This is a poor excuse for reporting, and the New York Times should apologize for printing this dangerous “blame the victim” rhetoric.

It’s hard to imagine living in a world where eighteen boys and men could gang rape an 11-year-old girl, then pass around videos they shot of the attack. Maybe it’s easier for some to assume this little girl somehow brought this savagery on herself. But she didn’t.

And the New York Times has no business perpetuating the myth that she did. Add your name to the petition demanding a public apology: 

http://www.change.org/petitions/tell-the-new-york-times-to-apologize-for-blaming-a-child-for-her-gang-rape?alert_id=EQXghPHLfm_mIPPgkuYFv&me=aa

Thanks for taking action,

- Shelby and the Change.org team

P.S. I’m Shelby, writing to you from the virtual front lines of the fight for gender equality. I just started as the Director of Organizing for Women’s Rights to help Change.org members win important campaigns like this one. I look forward to working together with you to change the world for women and therefore for all people. If you’d like to reach me, send me an email at: Shelby.Knox@change.org