Feature Archives

On January 24th, the "March For Life" took place in San Francisco. Tens of thousands of people who oppose abortion and gay rights converged on San Francisco for a march down the Embarcadero. Several hundred counter-protesters showed up to denounce the right-wing message of the marchers. The Bay Area Coalition for Reproductive Rights (BACORR) had called on supporters of human rights to protest the “Walk for Life," which was led by religious conservatives.

A controversy began in 2007 when a young mother's profile photo of her nursing her infant suddenly disappeared from the social networking website Facebook. There was no explanation as to why the photo was removed, and Facebook has not responded to her inquiries. Despite queries from other women who have found similar family photos removed over the last year, Facebook still hasn’t changed its policy. On December 27th, women of all ages gathered in front of Facebook's headquarters in Palo Alto to protest discrimination against nursing mothers.

Sarah Palin flew into San Francisco to attend a GOP fundraiser on October 5. Several hundred angry protesters gathered in front of the Hyatt-Regency Hotel in Burlingame, adjacent to the San Francisco airport, to demonstrate their displeasure with the GOP platform. Following the vice-presidential candidate's recent debate with Democratic candidate Joe Biden and her attacks on Obama's character made at a speech in Carson, California on October 4th, many protesters' signs referred to Palin as an outright liar.

The indynewswire show airs weekly on Free Radio Santa Cruz 101.1 FM, Friday mornings 10-12 noon, broadcasting news and opinion from independent media worldwide, focused on indymedia sites but also drawing from other websites. The October 3rd episode features discussion of sexual violence, patriarchy, and militarism across Mexico. This show is dedicated to Sali (Marcella Grace Eiler), found dead September 24th in San Jose del Pacifico, Oaxaca, Mexico.

In August 2006, seven African American lesbians were walking down the street in the West Village, when a male bystander assaulted them with sexist and homophobic comments. The women tried to defend themselves, and a fight broke out. The women were arrested and three of them accepted plea offers while the other four received sentences of up to 11 years in prison.

On Monday, June 23, 2008, Terrain Dandridge’s case was overturned, all her charges were dropped and her record was cleared. Terrain Dandridge and her mother meet with Angela Davis at the San Francisco Women’s Building for a public event Tuesday, June 24th to discuss the experiences of violence faced by queer people of color.

On June 6, a Santa Clara County Superior Court Judge voided a demolition permit for the historic Juana Briones home. Juana Briones de Miranda was a Latina businesswoman, humanitarian, and landowner who built a rare earthen-walled house in the 1840s in what later became Palo Alto.

As the longest running festival of its kind, the UCSC Women of Color Film and Video Festival has sparked dialogue across communities – locally, nationally, and trans-nationally – by providing a platform for critical explorations at the intersections of race, nation, class, gender, ethnicity, and sexuality. The festival took place March 14th and 15th at UC Santa Cruz along with spoken word and hip-hop on Friday night at the Hide Gallery in Santa Cruz.