Category Archives: Miscellaneous

Fox Valley Citizens for Peace and Justice

 

Welcome to the Fox Valley Citizens for Peace and Justice Website/Blog

Mission Statement of

Fox Valley Citizens for Peace and Justice

Fox Valley Citizens for Peace and Justice strives to promote a culture of peace, a stronger democracy, a healthy environment, and social and economic justice through education, dialogue, and action. We believe growing global corporate domination is the main obstacle to achieving these goals

Principles of Fox Valley Citizens for Peace and Justice

  1. We support popular uprisings of people in the US and across the globe who seek to create democracy and a people-first economy.
  2. We work for the United States to step back from its posture of global military dominance, and to relinquish its empire of 800-plus military bases stretched across the globe. We call for a transformation of US policy and culture away from militarism and towards international co-operation and equality among nations.
  3. We work for an end to US overseas wars. We oppose any military attack on Iran. We oppose the use of mercenary forces by the US and drone attacks.
  4. We work for an end to the bloated military/corporate complex which now consumes more than half of the US discretionary budget.
  5. We support equality among nations. We stand with those people around the world who are oppressed by the global corporate elites as organized in the World Trade Organization, IMF, World Bank, and so-called “free trade agreements.”
  6. We call for the restoration of our civil liberties, including freedom of speech and association, privacy, and the right to be presumed innocent until proven guilty. We oppose torture and the death penalty and call for accountability for torturers. We oppose government spying on the civilian
  7. We oppose US military and economic aid to Israel until Israel dismantles its settlements in the West Bank, ends the siege of Gaza, and Israel and Palestine together arrive at a just peace.
  8. We support racial and gender justice and equity.  We call for the eradication of all forms of oppression, including violence, abuse and discrimination based upon color, class, nationality, religion, gender, or sexual orientation.
  9. We embrace the principles of the UN Declaration on Human Rights and the Earth Charter.
  10. We call for the US to take the lead in efforts to stop climate change by sharply cutting our use of fossil fuels, and by entering into new international agreements which mandate such policies. We call for expanded and enforced regulations to protect the quality of our air, water and soil.
  11. We support the rights of working people everywhere to organize and to bargain collectively for living wages and decent working conditions. We reject all exploitation of labor, especially the dehumanization implied by the term: cheap labor. We oppose human trafficking, sweatshop labor, and slavery.
  12. We oppose plutocracy, corporate power, and crony capitalism.  We contend that the “rights” of for-profit corporations must be subordinate to the rights of actual human beings of any country, including the rights of labor, the rights of consumers, and the protection of the natural environment. We support Move to Amend and insist that “Corporations are not People and Money is not Speech.”
  13. We call for an end to the War on Drugs and the Prison-Industrial complex. We call for an end to the incarceration of non-violent offenders and the mentally ill. We call for profound prison reform with efforts toward rehabilitation and the humane treatment of all prisoners.
  14. We call for the restoration of the public sector, and an end to the privatization of our public assets and civic institutions, such as roads, bridges, parks, schools, prisons, water, etc.
  15. We oppose ICE harassment, deportations and imprisonment of immigrants. We hold that no human being is illegal.
  16. We support healthcare as a human right, not as a commodity. We call for a National Single Payer Health Care System i.e. Medicare for All with protections for the individual patient’s choice of health options.

Our Meetings

Fox Valley Citizens for Peace and Justice meets the first Saturday of the month.  We are currently meeting via Zoom calls.  Contact us to become involved! read more

Fossil Fuels Are Destroying us!

 

Coal, Oil, and Gas brought us the Industrial Revolution.  They brought us mass production, factories, automobiles, air flight,  warmth in the winter, air conditioning in the summer, and the amazing array of consumer goods that fill our homes and make us comfortable, or at least  keep us occupied.  It has been the foundation of our economy and our way of life.

But we are now paying a terrible price for all that abundance.  The burning of fossil fuels is destroying the biosphere upon which we all depend.  It is causing wildfires, not just on our West Coast, but all across the world, even inside the Arctic Circle.  Paradoxically, it is bringing  us both floods and droughts, both  heat domes and the polar vortex.   read more

Application for Our Scholarship

                  FOX VALLEY CITIZENS FOR PEACE & JUSTICE SCHOLARSHIP

 To be considered for this $750 scholarship, you must meet the following criteria.

  • Be a senior in a District U-46 high school
  • Be enrolled in or have an application pending at an accredited college

The following items must be mailed no later than April 9, 2021, to Fox Valley Citizens for Peace and Justice, PO #3, Geneva, IL 60134.                             

  • A recommendation from a teacher and/or supervisor
  • An essay of no more than 1,000 words, typed
  • The application form below, completed and stapled to the essay

The essay:  Many of the issues that Fox Valley Citizens for Peace and Justice addresses are on the back of this page. After reviewing them, select one or an aspect of one and explain in your own words why you believe it to be important. Include any volunteer work or social action you have participated in to advance this and/or any other of these issues. read more

We oppose any new fossil fuel infrastructure

Fox Valley Citizens for Peace and Justice opposes any new fossil fuel infrastructure or fossil fuel expansion.  We especially oppose new  oil pipelines or the expansion of the volume of oil transported through existing oil pipelines.  In particular, we oppose  Enbridge’s Line 3 in Minnesota,   which already brings tar sands oil down from Canada, through Wisconsin and Illinois  to refineries in Patoka, Illinois, and ultimately to the Gulf Coast.  

Enbridge wants to replace  it’s existing Line 3 in Minnesota.  If they succeed in getting the permits to do that, they will certainly expand the operation of their Line 66 in Wisconsin. And then they will almost certainly want to expand their existing Line 61 in Illinois, by building a “twin” to Line 61 or by simply increasing the volume of oil they transport through  Line 61.    Every step along the way, these changes would increase the risk of leaks and spills of tar sands oil, the dirtiest, most polluting form of petroleum on the planet.  And every step along the way, they would  make the climate crisis more catastrophic than it already is.  read more