Nelson Mandela died. That seems a lot more important than the rest of this stuff, which I compiled first and am now vaguely embarrassed by.
Mandela spent twenty-seven years in prison, including eighteen years on Robben Island, an infamous penitentiary near Cape Town. He was forced to work for years in a lime quarry without sunglasses, which permanently damaged his eyesight. He later contracted tuberculosis from a damp cell. For companionship, he had most of the A.N.C.’s senior leadership, including Sisulu and Mbeki. An influx of new political prisoners arrived after the uprisings of 1976. Most of them had grown up with little knowledge of Mandela or the A.N.C., whose words, ideas, and even images were banned in South Africa. Robben Island became known as Nelson Mandela University. The confluence of activists of different generations, and the lively debates between them, created new alliances and, with the eventual release of some of the younger leaders, reinvigorated A.N.C. networks. In 1985, the regime offered to release Mandela if he would renounce violence as a political instrument. He replied that it was the government that needed to renounce violence, and he declined the offer, issuing a statement through his daughter Zindzi, saying, “Only free men can negotiate. prisoners cannot enter into contracts.”
Mother Jones, on the 1964 speech he thought would be his last:
“My Lord, I am the First Accused.” Those were Nelson Mandela’s opening words as he stood in the dock in the Palace of Justice in Pretoria, South Africa, on the morning of April 20, 1964—nearly half a century before his death December 5 at the age of 95. Mandela and eight other defendants had been charged with violating the Sabotage Act and the Suppression of Communism Act, accused of plotting violence against the apartheid government with the aim of overthrowing it. By fomenting “chaos, turmoil, and disorder,” the prosecutor explained, the accused hoped to achieve “liberation from the so-called yoke of the white man’s domination.” Mandela, who was already serving a five-year sentence for organizing a strike and leaving the country without a passport, assumed that they would be sent to the gallows.
“The US killed my brother with a drone. I want to know why.”
This compilation of historic photographs is genuinely moving.
What Phish sounds like to people who don’t like Phish.
You should read Ian Parker’s really long thing in The New Yorker about how hard it is to make a damn pill that will make you fall asleep without turning you into a firemonster.
Here is a video montage of Katniss Everdeen killing many, many people (she’s even at the Red Wedding! AVOID IF YOU ARE NOT GAME OF THRONES CURRENT) to “Hit Me With Your Best Shot.”
Haley Mlotek on the David Cronenberg exhibition at TIFF.
I’m a big fan of WAM! (Women, Action & The Media) despite their contempt for the Oxford Comma, and here is their holiday auction, complete with some really great stuff. Original art from Alison Bechdel! Meet and greet for W. Kamau Bell’s live show in LA! VIP tix to Colbert! Oh, my God: a cross-stitched version of your favourite Feminist Ryan Gosling pic.
