HO, BIANCA; DOYLE, KIERAN

From the document: "Pro-Palestine demonstrations involving students in the United States have nearly tripled from 1 to 26 April compared with all of March, ACLED [ [Armed Conflict Location and Event Data]] data show [...]. New York has been one of the main student protest battlegrounds since the Israel-Palestine conflict flared up in and around Gaza last October, and the arrest of more than 100 students at Columbia University in New York around 18 April heralded a new wave of campus demonstrations."

ARMED CONFLICT LOCATION & EVENT DATA PROJECT. 2 MAY, 2024. 5p.

by Jennifer Tilton

How do you tell the difference between a “good kid” and a “potential thug”? In Dangerous or Endangered?, Jennifer Tilton considers the ways in which children are increasingly viewed as dangerous and yet, simultaneously, as endangered and in need of protection by the state.
Tilton draws on three years of ethnographic research in Oakland, California, one of the nation’s most racially diverse cities, to examine how debates over the nature and needs of young people have fundamentally reshaped politics, transforming ideas of citizenship and the state in contemporary America. As parents and neighborhood activists have worked to save and discipline young people, they have often inadvertently reinforced privatized models of childhood and urban space, clearing the streets of children, who are encouraged to stay at home or in supervised after-school programs. Youth activists protest these attempts, demanding a right to the city and expanded rights of citizenship.
Dangerous or Endangered? pays careful attention to the intricate connections between fears of other people’s kids and fears for our own kids in order to explore the complex racial, class, and gender divides in contemporary American cities.

New York; London: NYU Press, 2010; 203p.

By Paul Harris

In 1971, Paul Harris pioneered the modern version of the black rage defense when he successfully defended a young black man charged with armed bank robbery. Dubbed one of the most novel criminal defenses in American history by Vanity Fair, the black rage defense is enormously controversial, frequently dismissed as irresponsible, nothing less than a harbinger of anarchy. Consider the firestorm of protest that resulted when the defense for Colin Ferguson, the gunman who murdered numerous passengers on a New York commuter train, claimed it was considering a black rage defense.

In this thought-provoking book, Harris traces the origins of the black rage defense back through American history, recreating numerous dramatic trials along the way. For example, he recounts in vivid detail how Clarence Darrow, defense attorney in the famous Scopes Monkey trial, first introduced the notion of an environmental hardship defense in 1925 while defending a black family who shot into a drunken white mob that had encircled their home.

Emphasizing that the black rage defense must be enlisted responsibly and selectively, Harris skillfully distinguishes between applying an environmental defense and simply blaming society, in the abstract, for individual crimes. If Ferguson had invoked such a defense, in Harris's words, it would have sent a superficial, wrong-headed, blame-everything-on-racism message. Careful not to succumb to easy generalizations, Harris also addresses the possibilities of a white rage defense and the more recent phenomenon of cultural defenses. He illustrates how a person's environment can, and does, affect his or her life and actions, how even the most rational person can become criminally deranged, when bludgeoned into hopelessness by exploitation, racism, and relentless poverty.

New York; London: NYU Press, 1996. 306p.

By Elise Thomas

Drag Queen Story Hours (DQSH) and similar drag events for child audiences have been held in libraries across Australia for several years. In previous years these events were mostly uncontroversial and the response to them positive, despite some critical commentary from right-wing media and politicians. In late 2022 and over the course of 2023, however, the situation changed.  

Inspired by increasing transphobic and anti-drag rhetoric and conspiracy theories about drag performers emanating from the US, a loose network began to mobilise to disrupt all-ages drag events in Australia. At least a dozen events across the country were targeted with online harassment and/or offline protest between September 2022 and February 2024, and likely more which were not publicly reported on. This is occurring in the context of broader anti-LGBTQ+ hate and mobilisation, including incidents during WorldPride celebrations in Sydney, which ran from 17 February to 5 March 2023; a violent mass attack on pro-LGBTQ+ protesters on 21 March; and the attendance of neo-Nazis at an anti-trans rally in Melbourne on 18 March.  

This country profile uses analysis of open sources including social media content (primarily from Facebook and Telegram), protest footage and media interviews to examine the growth of anti-drag hate and harassment in Australia. It breaks down the groups and influencers involved into four broad categories: fringe politicians and far right media; conspiracy theory groups left over from the anti-lockdown movement; neo-Nazis; and Christian groups active in anti-LGBTQ+ demonstrations.  

Amman; Berlin; London;Paris; Washington, DC : Institute for Strategic Dialogue. 2024, 22pg