Janis, Little Girl Blue
Directed by Amy J. Berg
https://youtu.be/YodSfezlpeQ
Janis Joplin, the gravel-voiced Queen of the San Francisco psychedelic music scene, may seem a bit dated to today鈥檚 listeners.聽But this documentary shows just how important she is.
Born into a conservative family in a Texas back-water, she discovered early that she was different.聽Her sexual feelings towards other girls cut her apart from the rest of the KKK-drenched society.
Five Orang Asli (indigenous) activists from Gua Musang in Malaysia who were blockading forests from illegal logging operations were arrested on January 23.
Forestry officials from the state of Kelantan 鈥 which is governed by the opposition Islamic Party (PAS) 鈥 destroyed several Orang Asli blockades. This was despite the fact that on January 17 a magistrate court had cancelled the application by the logging company concerned and declared that Orang Asli have rights over their customary native land.
Thirty-four students of the Cavite State University (CvSU) in Silang, in the Filipino province of Cavite, have been sued for libel by school administrators. In response, the start of the second semester was met with a mass protest against harassment, irregularities and the deterioration of the educational system.
The new US administration of President Donald Trump publicly declared it will seek regime change in Venezuela. The call, disguised in 鈥渢ransition to democracy鈥 rhetoric, was made by Trump鈥檚 proposed Secretary of State Rex Tillerson.
鈥淚f confirmed,鈥 the ex-Exxonmobil CEO told Latin America Goes Global, 鈥淚 would urge close cooperation with our friends in the hemisphere, particularly Venezuela鈥檚 neighbours Brazil and Colombia, as well as multilateral bodies such as the OAS, to seek a negotiated transition to democratic rule in Venezuela.鈥
Printing plant workers in Buenos Aires showed up for their 6am shift as usual on January 16, only to find locked doors, police, and private security blocking their way. Grupo Clar铆n, the biggest media group in Argentina, had locked them out.
The 380 workers were sacked, with management planning to replace well-paid union workers with cheaper, non-union replacements.
Sidi Ahmed Eddia, secretary-general of the Confederated Union of Saharawi Workers (CSTS) was born in El Aaiun in 1948 and died there on January 3, aged 68.
He was well known for his activism, not only for workers鈥 rights, but also for many other causes supporting Saharawi rights in general. Western Sahara, a former Spanish colony, has largely been occupied by Morocco since the 1970s, and many Saharawis live in refugee camps in Algeria.
Alex Nunns鈥 new book, , charts the improbable rise of the socialist Jeremy Corbyn from a long-time backbencher to the leader of the Labour Party.
Protesters have gathered at airports in New York, Washington DC, Chicago, Dallas and other cities as immigration authorities begin to block entry to all refugees and immigrants from seven Muslim-majority nations, has reported on January 28.
In his first week as president Donald Trump has imposed a large number of attacks, from the unbearably cruel (restricting abortion access, closing the borders to migrants聽and refugees from seven nations) to the destructive (restarting the Keystone and DAPL pilelines) to the absurdly聽petty (deleting the White House's Spanish language home page) .
In Bilbao鈥檚 hyper-modern Euskalduna Conference Centre on January 21, the Basque left pro-independence party Sortu concluded its refoundation congress by finalising the election of its 29-strong national council.
The congress brought together Sortu members from all parts of the divided Basque Country: its four southern districts in the Spanish state, presently covered by the regional administrations of Navarra and the Basque Autonomous Community (Euskadi), and its three northern districts in the French coastal department of Pyrenees-Atlantiques.
The Women鈥檚 March Guiding Vision and Definition of Principles was released by the organisers of the Women鈥檚 March on Washington, which drew 500,000 people onto the streets.
Donald Trump鈥檚 move to revive the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines sparked a number of emergency protests on January 24 in Washington, New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Seattle, Philadelphia and other cities, Democracy Now! reported the next day.
On January 24, Trump issued executive orders that revived the two mega-pipeline projects, which the Obama administration had blocked in the face of huge protests.