Reclaim the Commons!
BASIC SCHEDULE FOR RECLAIM THE COMMONS IN CHICAGO:
Saturday, April 8th:
Joint International GMOpposition Day in 30 Countries!
altercampagne.free.fr
Morning: Puppet and banner making.
Afternoon: Festival! 2-5 pm at Federal Plaza (200 S.
Dearborn) Music, speakers, tabling, art making, food,
kids' games, street theatre. Please contact us at
reclaimthecommons@gmail.com about tabling, and ideas
for activities!
Evening: Panel on Genetic Engineering and Human Rights
– North and South. 6:30 at DePaul University, Lincoln
Park Campus, Schmidt Academic Ctr. 2320 N. Kenmore Ave
With Anuradha Mittal (Oakland Institute), Carmelo Ruiz
(Puerto Rico Project on Biosafety), Sarah Alexander
(White Earth Land Recovery Project), and John Kinsman
(National Family Farm Coalition and Via Campesina).
Moderated by Jeffrey Smith of Institute for
Responsible Technology.
Sunday, April 9th:
All day: Hands-on and educational workshops. Topics
include Bioremediation and Urban Sustainability, GMOs
in Latin America, Genetic Engineering and Indigenous
Rights, Bioweapons Labs in Chicago, Tapestry of the
Commons, Seed Saving, Starting an Intentional
Community, Food Sovereignty and more.
Evening: Concert with Broadcast Live (hip hop from
Albany NY) and others, with a presentation from the
Beehive Collective
Monday, April 10th:
Morning: Banner action! We'll be making banners before
and during the convergence, and on Monday morning
we'll take them out to busy spots around the city.
Please make a banner beforehand and bring it to
Chicago!
Afternoon: Parade downtown with big colorful puppets
and banners! Location and time TBA.
Tuesday, April 11th:
Community gardening service project.
HOW TO HELP WITH RTC!
Forward this update far and wide!
Please post, distribute and make copies of our
flyers! Downloadable versions available at
Reclaim the Commons
Organize a group from your area to come to Chicago
between April 8th and April 10th.
Donate:WE NEED MONEY FOR A CONVERGENCE SPACE! Also -
puppet and banner making supplies, printing costs,
food, and transportation for speakers.
Please send checks to
Reclaim The Commons, attn: Laurie Nannini at
652 Brian Ave.
Schaumburg, IL 60194,
and make checks
out to Laurie Nannini. You can also donate by credit
card on our website.
Read up on the issues: Seeds of Deception,
Sunshine Project, gmwatch, Indymedia, Chicago Indymedia
Oakland Institute, Carmel ORuiz blog, Save Wild Rice, Organic Consumers, Alter Campagne, Genetics and Society, nffc and Center for food safety.
Come and table at the festival on the 8th, or
organize crafts, games, theatre, you name it.
Let us know if you can help with translation at our
workshops, especially Spanish translation.
Bring seeds or plants to swap or give away at the
festival on April 8th.
Contribute: We're looking for the following:
-tables for the festival (donated or lent)
-Art Supplies: colorful acrylic house paint, staple
pliers, sheets to make banners, paint brushes,
permanent markers, tape, fabric, big pieces of
cardboard
-5 gallon buckets (for drums), steel cans and other
noisemakers
-Colorful paper for flyers
-Your own banners, puppets, antics, and plans for
street theatre
-bikes, locks, helmets
-literature to hand out
-cooking utensils and food donations
-medical and wellness supplies
-cars, driving service
-people: We need people who want to make puppets and
banners, put up fliers, make media, make music, face
paint, silk-screen, build bikes, cook food, help set
up, and most importantly- COME!
CHILDCARE AND HOUSING will be available in Chicago
during RTC. To request (or offer) housing, send email
to rtchousing@gmail.com. To request childcare, send
email to rtcchildcare@gmail.com.
CONSULTA for Reclaim The Commons is happening from
12-3 on Saturday, March 25th at Association House,
1116 N. Kedzie Ave, Chicago. Planning for the parade,
festival, and banner action will be on the agenda.
Please consider coming if you live nearby.
WHAT IS THE BIOTECH INDUSTRY ORGANIZATION?
The Biotech Industry Organization (BIO) is a group of
the world's largest agribusiness, pharmaceutical,
financial and biodefense corporations, along with
various representatives from governments and academia.
Each year they hold a convention in a different U.S.
city, and this year they picked Chicago. Some 15,000
BIO delegates will be descending on Chicago's
McCormack Place Convention Center from April 8th –
12th.
The BIO convention will bring to Chicago an
unprecedented public relations bonanza promoting
biotech and genetic engineering. But what BIO really
represents is a global system of agriculture that is
dominated by a few agribusiness corporations – from
genetically engineered seeds, to pesticides, to the
table. BIO will downplay the fact that so-called
'biodefense' research is equally applicable to
offensive bioweapons development, and that massive new
U.S. funding for bioweapons research may be spurring a
new biological weapons arms race. Pharmaceutical
corporations at BIO will continue to ignore the crisis
in healthcare access, and focus instead on futuristic
treatments designed to attract investors and, when
they succeed, provide mainly for the wealthy. Their
website is
bio.org.
WHY RECLAIM THE COMMONS?
The Commons are the universal heritage of people and
all living things. They are everything needed to
support healthy life on earth: air, water, food,
shelter, health care, seeds, and our genes. They are
what is needed to sustain culture: our multicultural
heritages, education, information and the means to
disseminate it, essential human services, public
spaces, and political space. They are equally the
land, its forests, the oceans, and all ecosystems. In
sum, the Commons are everything that we inherit
jointly and freely, and hold in trust for future
generations.
Reclaim The Commons 2006 will shed light on big
biotech's attempts to expropriate and claim hold to
vast areas of the Commons that belong to us all.
These include:
- Agricultural heritage: Since the beginning of
agriculture, farmers and gardeners have been saving,
developing, caretaking and replanting seeds from the
plants they grow. Genetic engineering threatens this
basic right for farmers worldwide, placing control and
ownership of seeds into the hands of corporations. RTC
opposes genetic engineering and corporate control of
agriculture, and supports sustainable local food
systems and local food sovereignty.
- Life Itself: Corporations are also attempting to
assert control over wild plants and animals by
recording and then patenting their genetic codes. In
fact, over 4000 patents of human genetic codes have
also been approved. RTC is dedicated to the
proposition that life cannot be patented.
- Food: Independent feeding studies have documented
underdeveloped organs, signs of cancer, allergies, and
high mortality in rats fed genetically engineered (GE)
feed. Government and industry have done little
substantive health research on GE products. Most
people don't know that over 70% of processed foods now
contain GE ingredients because there is no labeling
requirement. RTC calls for a stop to this
contamination of our food supply, and for universal
access to safe, affordable, healthy food.
- Healthcare: The largest pharmaceutical corporations in
BIO - Merck, Pfizer, AstraZeneca and others - can
boast some of the highest profit margins in the
corporate world, while basic medical care is
unaffordable for millions of people in the US and
billions elsewhere. The futuristic biotech research
promoted by BIO may attract investors, but it will not
solve this basic healthcare crisis. RTC advocates for
universal access to good healthcare.
- Biosafety: In the last few years the U.S. government
has dramatically increased funding for research on
biological weapons. New labs that create and handle
genetically engineered diseases are being built in and
near several urban areas, posing potentially
disastrous risks. The research is billed as
biodefense, but can easily translate to offensive
applications. RTC calls for a stop to the development
and testing of biological weapons.
- Ecosystems: By raising genetically engineered crops
and animals in the open, biotech corporations are
endangering the Earth's ecology and ecosystems.
Examples are genetically engineered trees, alfalfa,
grass and salmon – all of which can contaminate wild
populations through cross-pollination and
cross-breeding. Simulations have shown that this sort
of contamination could have devastating effects on
natural ecosystems. RTC opposes the release of
genetically engineered organisms into the environment.
- Science and Academia: Pharmaceutical and agribusiness
corporations largely control and often are the sole
beneficiaries of research done at public universities
in the U.S. When it comes to regulation of
biotechnology, the same people are found to rotate
between corporate and government positions, providing
corporate-friendly assessments when serving as
regulators. RTC calls for a stop to the revolving door
between industry and government, and for independent
research at public universities.
Reclaim The Commons supports and celebrates the
complex, diverse and wondrous ecosystems of our planet
that make life possible, as well as the gardeners,
farmers, farm workers, scientists, healthcare workers,
activists, indigenous people and all who are working
for a just, democratic and sustainable future.