Online Activism for LaVena Johnson Gaining Momentum

Momentum is building in our efforts to gain Justice for LaVena Johnson!

The love and persistence of her family in the three years since LaVena was killed has been remarkable. The online activism of Philip Barron of Wave Flux, Shakesville has been equally remarkable. In fact, it was Bro. Barron's LaVena Johnson Petition that created the first call to action as he collected 12,000 signatures to be delivered to the Armed Services Committee.

'Original Villager' Danielle Vyas created an online petition calling on Congress and the President to re-open her case. She plans to close out her online petition when it reaches 3000 signatures. Currently, 1837 signatures have been collected. Have you signed it yet?

The brothers and sisters from Color of Change created the newest petition calling for answers in this case directed to Congressman Waxman, chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform. Gabriel Rey-Goodlatte and his crew at Color of Change are well-known for their work on Jena Six. It is a good sign that they are on board with this fight to re-open LaVena Johnson's case.

LaVena's family conducted an interview on Amy Goodman’s radio and television show Democracy Now! I encourage all villagers to check out video coverage of the story.

You can help the momentum. I encourage you to contact your representatives directly on behalf of Justice for LaVena Johnson. This additional step may make all the difference.

I'm interested in hearing your take on the efforts to re-open the LaVena Johnson case. What say u?

Arte y Pico Award

A Slant Truth, Hagar's Daughters and Regina's Family Seasons presented 'The Arte y Pico Award' to the Electronic Village. It humbles me to know that this blog is seen in such a positive light by such powerful sisters as Regina and Hagar's Daughters!
Regina noted that our blog "...is definitely doing great things in and for the community."

Hagar's Daughter wrote, "Villager blends the seriousness of the day with inspirational stories, political cartoons, and musical interludes on Old School Friday."

We will do our best on the Electronic Village to continue uplifting the African American community with our blog commentary over the coming weeks and months.

Rules of the Arte y Pico Award:

• You have to pick 5 blogs that deserve this award for their creativity, design, interesting material, and also for contributing to the blogging community, no matter what language
• Each awardee has to have the name of the author and also a link to his or her blog to be visited by everyone.
• Each award winner has to show the award and put the name and link to the blog that has given her or him the award itself.
• Each award winner should provide a link to the Arte y Pico blog, so everyone will know the origin of this award.

Here are five (5) blogs that I think show Creativity, Fabulous Design, Interesting Material or Contribute to the blogging community:

1. Black Women Vote - Let me warn you! This blog is not for the faint of heart. SheCodes comes hard and she comes correct in her strategic approach to Sister power. Her weekly podcasts and her ability to play chess while most of us are playing checkers is something that is quite remarkable. Her blog should be on the RSS-feed for any female villager!
2. Blogging While Brown Conference - This blog is contributing in a major way to the blogging community. Visit this blog created by Gina McCauley to learn more about the first international conference for bloggers of color. I will be there! I hope you can make it on July 25-27, 2008 in Atlanta, GA.
3. MartyBLOGS - Martin Lindsey is the creator of this blog. Marty is one of the first bloggers that I met when I came into the afrosphere. I have watched him evolve his blog over the past year so that it reflects his 'actionist' world view. He summarizes his blogging style as follows: "Handle business, take care of things, then move on."
4. Now That's What I'm Talking About - Theo Johnson operates this blog. Theo is another blogger that I met when I first entered the blogging game. Not only does he have an interesting blog, Theo is also a regular podcaster. It is for those reasons that I encourage villagers to check out this creative blog and blogger!
5. Roots of Humanity - This is a blog that strives to uplift the quantity and quality of information flowing to the blogging community about human rights abuses around the world, especially in Darfur and Tibet. Danielle Vyas, Eddie Griffin and Purple Zoe provide the creative energy behind this blog..

I encourage all villagers to check out these creative blogs. Let me know what you think about my five selections. What say u?

In Solidarity: Global Day for Darfur

Have you been listening to the noise surrounding the Olympic torch over in Europe. Protests from people that are upset about China disregard for human rights took it out on the eternal Olympic flame. Many villagers recall that PurpleZoe led us on a Blogging Day of Action for Darfur last year. Well, villagers ... let's do it again!

This time our lead is coming from Danielle. My blog will join Danielle (ModernMusings.com) on April 13th for the In Solidarity: Global Day for Darfur campaign. I am hopeful that other bloggers who read this post will join in this effort. The Strategy is to Educate, Motivate and Activate toward ending the genocide in Darfur.

• Educate through analysis of reports and news materials, compilations of facts through viral multimedia like podcasts and videos posted on YouTube and linking to articles, blog posts, and viral media to expand public knowledge of the Darfuri genocide. Any and all aspects can be focused on; such as the root causes of the murder, who is behind it, and what the international community has done to promote the murder and to end it.


• Motivate through the capacity within humanity for empathy. Motivate through love. Pull at heart strings, communicate the sameness of Darfuri families and your own, and share the simple, common fact that we are all the same and the suffering of the Darfuri people is felt within our hearts. Motivate through the anger for the greed, the murder, and the lack of action.


• Activate through petitions, open letters, letters to all our elected officials as well as U.N., Sudanese and Chinese officials, and speaking out to the corporate sponsors of the Beijing Olympics as China plays a key role.

Please reach out to Danielle if you want to add your blog to this unified effort on April 13.