This FREE 4-session course is informative and fascinating!

Sign up now to take it during February and March beginning TUE, February 23 thru March 16th or SAT, the 27th thru March 20thth (your choice). We use Zoom video, so people everywhere take our course.

Please share this opportunity with your friends.

The Cold War ended three decades ago, but nuclear weapons remain a threat to the world. Many recent and current actions by the U.S. government have sharply increased the danger of nuclear war in the “new cold war,” so now the “Doomsday Clock” is the closest to midnight it has ever been, since it was devised in 1953. Also, the U.S. is spending more on nuclear weapons than ever before – even more than at the peak of the Cold War!

However, most Americans do not want to think about nuclear weapons. This course provides necessary information for people who are new to the issue – and people whose knowledge is out-of-date. Much has changed recently, and dangers are increasing in several ways, but politicians and mainstream news media are failing to inform the public about what people need to know.

This 4-session course presents the serious information in a supportive environment and also lifts up some positive ways people can solve the problems. We go far beyond “doom and gloom” to actually empower people to support the solutions.

Four well informed people designed this course and trade off during the sessions so you’ll enjoy a mix of voices and areas of expertise. We designed this course of four two-hour sessions to help people regardless of how much they have known about nuclear weapons. This course is being offered with the support of Antioch University.

Topics include:

the evolution of science that led to nuclear weapons
how nuclear weapons – and the policies for using them – have changed over the years
new dangers since the 2016 election
impacts of nuclear weapons testing on innocent people
decades of grassroots organizing to stop the arms race and abolish nuclear weapons
international efforts to make nuclear weapons illegal, including the very exciting treaty which will soon come into force
our own feelings and values related to nuclear weapons
the power of nonviolent resistance
Nuclear weapons are frightening, but ordinary people can learn what they need to know and can take smart actions to reduce the dangers. Instead of feeling overwhelmed by hard, scary realities, this course helps people learn and also empower themselves to support the positive efforts that are happening at the global, national and local levels.

The course is presented by four well-informed persons from the Olympia WA area:

Glen Anderson is chair of the Olympia Coalition to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (OCANW)
Mark Fleming is the secretary of the Rachel Corrie Chapter #109 of the Veterans for Peace in Olympia
James Manista is a peace activist who recently faced federal charges for resisting the Trident nuclear submarine
Joanne Dufour has experience with disarmament issues including nuclear weapons, international humanitarian law, et. al.
We are volunteers who offer this course for FREE.

Here is how to sign up:

The presenters are offering the same course twice a week during January 2021, so you may choose whichever one is better for you. If you have a scheduling conflict in any week, you may catch that session on that week’s other day.

Choose either:

Tuesdays: Eastern Time 8:00 (sharp) to 10:00 pm February 23 thru March 16th . (If you’re in another time zone, please adjust for your local time.)
Saturdays: Eastern Time 1:00 (sharp) to 3:00 p.m. February 27th thru March 20th. (If you’re in another time zone, please adjust for your local time.)

Send Joanne Dufour an e-mail to jdufourhc@msn.com with this subject line: OCANW course on Nuclear Weapons. Or you may phone Joanne at (206) 550-1841.

Please provide your name, email address, home mailing address, and phone number. Specify whether you want Tuesdays or Saturdays.

She will e-mail you the access for the Zoom video link so you can join our course.

Also, we will e-mail each participant a number of readings and videosr We that flesh out the topics of each of the four class sessions. These are not mandatory (like school assignments were), but we do encourage participants to read at least some of the readings and watch at least some of the videos, because they do provide important information and insights.

We hope you will join us!

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Every Saturday from 10-11 a.m. on the Greenfield Common, at least through December. According to a member of RJR’s coordinating committee, “Back in the last week of May 2020 when George Floyd was killed, Racial Justice Rising vigiled 5 times.  It was clear that this was not going to be pushed under the rug and […]

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A Webinar with Joseph Gerson

The “Doomsday Clock” was set on Jan. 27 to 100 seconds to midnight, meaning that some of the most knowledgeable of the world’s scientists believe that we are perilously close to a world-destroying nuclear holocaust. But we can prevent this from happening! Join our Webinar and find out how.

Register to attend.

On Jan. 22, a new treaty came into effect that outlaws nuclear weapons. Called the “Ban Treaty” by its promoters, the U.N. Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons has been ignored by the mainstream media and undercut by the U.S. government. So, is it vitally important, as its adherents say, or is it a “nothing-burger”?

The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists on Jan. 27 set the hands of their iconic “Doomsday Clock,” a universally recognized indicator of the world’s vulnerability to catastrophe from nuclear weapons, to 100 seconds to midnight, the closest it has ever been. This means that these scientists, which include 13 Nobel laureates, consider that we are perilously close to annihilation. Can the “Ban Treaty” help us survive?

Come find out! For our Webinar, we have a world-class speaker, Joseph Gerson, who has worked for decades on ending nuclear weapons. He will help us understand the implications of this treaty, including what we can do to help ensure that nuclear weapons are never used.

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Joseph Gerson
Joseph Gerson
The Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW), popularly known as the Ban Treaty, which went into force on January 22, 2020, is the culmination of decades of education and organizing by nuclear weapons survivors, civil society and conscientious diplomats from Brazil and Egypt to Ireland and Austria. Most immediately, the Treaty emerged from a series of intergovernmental/civil society conferences that sought to transform the paradigm under which arms control and disarmament negotiations war held, focusing on the humanitarian consequences of nuclear weapons, rather than “national security” rationales.

The Treaty grows out of disappointment and in some cases rage that the nuclear weapons states, led by the United States have consistently refused to implement their fifty year-old Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty Article VI obligation to engage in “good faith” negotiations for the complete elimination of their nuclear arsenals. With the Treaty opposed by the nuclear weapons states, which remain engaged in increasingly dangerous arms races, among the TPNW’s most important provisions is for the parties to the Treaty (now 51 governments) to engage with the nuclear powers to join the treaty in order to move “toward” a nuclear weapons-free world.

While it is unlikely that any of the nuclear weapons states will soon sign or ratify the treaty, the most important venues in the struggle for its implementation lie in the so-called nuclear umbrella states, U.S. and Russian allies whose military doctrines rely on the superpowers nuclear arsenals and threats. Should any of these nations break ranks with their masters and sign and ratify the treaty, it would begin to unravel the fabric of the nuclear disorder, providing new opportunities.

Here in the United States, among other things, the Treaty illuminates the urgent call of the non-nuclear world for complete nuclear disarmament and provides encouragement to our movements. In the coming months our priorities will need to be renewal of the New START treaty with Russia and JCPOA agreement with Iran and cutting spending for the replacement of the nuclear arsenal and its delivery systems, which will also provide essential funding to address human needs, including stanching the pandemic and reversing the climate emergency.

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Come shop at our Winter Farmer's Market on the 1st and 3rd Saturdays of the month at the Holyoke War Memorial (310 Appleton st, across from McDonalds) from 11am - 2pm, starting on December 19th. There will be an abundance of local vegetables, fruits, meats and eggs from Atlas Farm, Red Fire Farm, Apex Orchards […]

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Northampton Abolition Now, Western Mass Showing Up for Racial Justice, Sunrise Western MA, and The Resistance Center for Peace and Justice are hosting a Zoom party where we’ll be creating art and signs on the theme of “invest in communities, divest from policing”. Join us for art making, connection, music, and conversation to get your […]

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Join us on Saturday February 27th at 4PM for a fundraising event to support and learn more about the Trans Asylum Seeker Support Network (TASSN). TASSN is an border abolitionist mutual aid network that supports trans and genderqueer asylum seekers from Central America fleeing police, gang, transphobic, and domestic violence, as well as climate change […]

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