Feature Archives

California residents have been ordered to "stay at home" to suppress the spread of COVID-19. Stringent mitigation measures mean millions are without an income. Students face the possibility of going hungry. Curbside communities and incarcerated persons are especially at risk for contracting the virus. The stress and isolation of the pandemic take a toll on mental health. Not waiting for government action, people are stepping up with mutual aid efforts to assist those most in need.

On March 5, UC Berkeley graduate student workers, undergraduates and faculty joined together for a work stoppage. The strike was organized by CAL COLA, an autonomous group of workers and students that began to organize in December 2019 in solidarity with the striking graduate workers at UC Santa Cruz. CAL COLA states, "If teaching is truly at the core of the UC's mission, it is high time that they start paying graduate students — who do the vast majority of teaching within the UC system — a living wage."

On March 5, graduate student workers at UC Santa Cruz and their undergraduate allies participated in a UC system wide day of action in solidarity with their fellow workers whom university administration fired. Large demonstrations took place simultaneously at other UC campuses, including UC Berkeley, UC Santa Barbara, UC Irvine and UC Riverside. Striking graduate students explain, "The strike began because there was a crisis that demanded to be acknowledged, that had been swept under the rug for too long."

At least eighty-two graduate student teaching assistants at UC Santa Cruz withheld Fall grades in protest of low pay. As of February 28, they are out of a job next quarter. Fifty-four who had already received Spring appointments were dismissed by the university in retaliation for the strike. But the movement has declared that the fight isn't over, and "Together, we win!" Graduate students are calling for the cancellation of classes on Monday, March 2, and for everyone to join them on the picket line for a press conference.

Over 150 demonstrators marched to the Market Street JP Morgan Chase branch to demand that the bank stop the worst of all pipelines, the money pipeline to the fossil fuel industry. Chase is not only the largest financier in all aspects of fossil fuel extraction but is also the top financier for expanding fossil fuel production. The demonstration took place in three coordinated phases. First, there was a "die in" inside the branch. Then about a hundred people with large signs, banners and megaphones rallied outside. After that, women dressed bright red rags and shreds of cloth did a surreal slow march down Market and into the bank.

The Anti Police-Terror Project again joined with multiple organizations to lift up the radical legacy of Martin Luther King all weekend long, culminating in the 6th Annual Rally and March on Monday, January 20. The Oakland MLK march demands were: Housing as a Human Right, Close the Camps, No School Closures, End Police Repression, Climate Justice, No More War. Cities that held Martin Luther King Jr weekend events around the Bay Area included San Francisco, San José, Santa Rosa, El Cerrito, and Hayward.

On November 20, more than a thousand UC Berkeley students chanted “Berkeley is a sanctuary, no Coulter, no ICE" and similar slogans as they protested right-wing mouthpiece Ann Coulter. They formed a mass demonstration at the front door and blocked the back doors to Wheeler Auditorium, where the conservative media pundit addressed a group of 350 students. One student who interrupted Coulter's speech was arrested and held overnight in jail. Six other protesters arrested at the demonstration were quickly released.