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“I’m Not Going Back To Work”: Indiana Residents Sue After Governor Nixes Unemployment Benefits

Via Zero Hedge

A group of Indiana residents have filed a lawsuit against state officials, challenging the state’s decision to end federal unemployment benefits by the end of the week.

The lawsuit, filed last Monday, seeks to preserve what was supposed to be temporary pandemic safety net of $300 per week on top of other state or federal benefits, after indiana Gov. Eric Holcomb announced last month that the state would pull out of the federal program before it’s official September end date in order to motivate unemployed people to help fill the state’s more than 116,000 open jobs.

Holcomb is joined by around two dozen mostly red states.

“It’s not black and white,” said Sharon Singer-Mann in a statement to IndyStar. “Everybody’s story is not the same. I’m not going back to work, not at the risk of my son’s life.”

“We’ll have to decide which utility bill to pay, which household items to let go of,” she added (despite the 116,000 open jobs), “… We’ll have to change what kind of shampoo we use, what kind of toilet paper we use.”

Without the federal pandemic unemployment benefits, many Indiana residents, like Singer-Mann, say they would have had to choose between finding a job and taking care of their children, face evictions, forgo medical care and grapple with devastating financial setbacks that could derail their lives.

Those stories from residents are outlined in a lawsuit filed against Indiana state officials Monday in Marion County Superior Court challenging the state’s decision to end federal benefits by the end of this week. -IndyStar

“Our community is dealing with enough stress and trauma,” said Rev. David Greene, president of the Concerned Clergy of Indianapolis and a plaintiff in the lawsuit against the state along with residents represented by the Indiana Legal Services nonprofit law firm which represents low-income residents.

When asked about the lawsuit, Holcomb’s office responded: “DWD has timely notified impacted claimants about the state’s withdrawal from the federal programs and continues to connect impacted people with the resources they need to gain skills and be matched with employment.” MORE.

Juneteenth Revelers Twerk on Ambulance Carting Away Victims of Celebratory Oakland Shooting, 1 Dead and 5 Wounded

Via The National File

Violence erupted across the country as people celebrated the newest federal holiday

After an ambulance attended a deadly shooting in Oakland, California, Juneteenth revellers proceeded to twerk on and jump on the vehicle, not stopping their party for anything.
As many black Americans celebrated Juneteenth, the newly-instituted federal holiday to commemorate the end of slavery in Texas, violence erupted across the country in many of these street parties. In Oakland, California, a deadly shooting killed a 22-year-old man and injured four other males between 16 and 27 and one woman in her 20s, close to the Lake Merritt Amphitheatre, where people had been partying all day. Two men ran from the scene and were arrested with guns on them, police say.

“Out of the corner of my eyes I saw a guy with a gun pointing at a car,” said Andrew Simpson, who was jogging close to the lake when the shooting happened. “Everyone started sprinting and screaming,” Simpson told the Bay Area News, with other witnesses claiming many had jumped into the water to escape the violence. In a statement, Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf said that the “joyous” Juneteenth celebrations were “marred by a senseless act of gun violence.”

However, the EMTs did not have an easy time responding to the shooting. As they arrived at the scene, the revellers continued to party, with no regard of the seriousness of the situation that just occurred. Video footage has gone viral on Twitter, showing Juneteenth partiers not only ignoring the Oakland shooting, but taking full advantage of the ambulance as a vehicle for their own fun. Multiple women can be seen twerking on the side of the ambulance, with the camera then panning to one man with a football dancing on top of it. Another woman even clambered up and twerked on the hood of the vehicle itself.

In New Jersey, local police warned people to avoid the area of Juneteenth celebrations, with store employees remaining trapped in their places of work as shopfronts were targeted for random acts of destruction, and police advising that “numerous fights” including attacks on officers had broken out in the streets. MORE.

Ikea Juneteenth menu with watermelon, fried chicken sparks outrage

Via The New York Post

An attempt to honor Juneteenth has backfired spectacularly for one Georgia Ikea.

An Atlanta branch of the Scandinavian furniture chain has sparked outrage with what employees are calling an intensely problematic menu curated to celebrate the holiday, which marks the emancipation of the very last enslaved Americans.

“To honor the perseverance of Black Americans and acknowledge the progress yet to be made, we observe Juneteenth on Saturday, June 19, 2021,” begins an email acquired by TMZ, which was sent to employees at the branch last week. “Look out for a special menu on Saturday which will include: fried chicken, watermelon, mac n cheese, potato salad, collard greens, candied yams.”

The selection, including items that have historically been used to demean African-Americans through stereotyping, resulted in multiple employees calling out of work in protest, according to a local news channel.

“You cannot say serving watermelon on Juneteenth is a soul food menu when you don’t even know the history. They used to feed slaves watermelon,” an anonymous employee told Atlanta’s CBS 46. “It caused a lot of people to be upset. People actually wanted to quit. People weren’t coming back to work.” MORE.

Coca-Cola Diversity Policy Risks Violating Anti-Discrimination Laws, Shareholders Warn

Via Zero Hedge

A group of Coca-Cola shareholders are warning that the company’s recent diversity policy would actually require contracted law firms to violate anti-discrimination laws.

In a letter dated June 11, the American Civil Rights Project (ACRP) noted that on Jan. 28, the general counsel of Coca-Cola demanded law firms seeking to keep the company as a client must commit that at least 30 percent of billed time would be from “diverse attorneys,” and at least half of that time would be from black attorneys.

The ACRP, speaking on behalf of “a set of concerned Coca-Cola Company shareholders,” demanded that the soft drink company either “publicly retract the discriminatory outside-counsel policies” or otherwise “provide access to the corporate records related to the decision of Coca-Cola’s officers and directors to adopt and retain those illegal policies.”

Coca-Cola’s race-specific contracting policy, according to the ACRP, has exposed the corporation and its shareholders to “material risk of liability” for potentially violating anti-discrimination laws, including Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, which prohibits employment discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex, and national origin.

The letter further alleged that all of Coca-Cola’s decision makers knew, or should have known, that the policy was potentially illegal. It said those who were not so aware of the legal risks either have failed their responsibility or “relied on the inexcusably flawed advice of counsel.”

The diversity plan was shelved following the resignation of Bradley Gayton as Coca-Cola’s general counsel, after less than a year on the leadership position.

Gayton wrote in January that it is a “crisis” that the legal profession is not “treating the issue of diversity and inclusion as a business imperative.”

“The Stockholders therefore demand that you immediately publicly retract the policies in their entirety,” the letter concluded, adding that they will be “forced to seek judicial relief” to protect their interests in the company if they do not receive a response to their demands within 30 business days.

Coca-Cola, one of the largest food and beverage companies in the world, came under fire in February, when its employees were allegedly instructed to be “less white” as part of a “Confronting Racism” training course featuring interviews with sociologist Robin DiAngelo, the author of a 2018 book called “White Fragility.”

“In the U.S. and other Western nations, white people are socialized to feel that they are inherently superior because they are white,” reads one of the slides, allegedly sent from an “internal whistleblower” and posted on Twitter by YouTube commentator Karlyn Borysenko. The post went viral. MORE.

Elite NYC School Apologizes For Showing Students Video Of White Women ‘Tarred And Feathered’

Via True Pundit

The headmaster of an elite Manhattan private school issued an apology on Wednesday after a parent alleged that students were shown a video of white women being “tarred and feathered,” the New York Post reported.

“This video is not part of the Spence curriculum. Our teacher and the School acknowledge that sharing a satirical video that made fun of white women was a significant mistake,’’ Spence School headmaster Bodie Brizendine said in an email obtained by the New York Post. The apology came after ex-trustee Gabriela Baron told the school she was pulling her daughter out following a “blatantly racist” video shown to students that demonized and ridiculed white women.

Brizendine called the incident a “significant mistake” and that “it’s never acceptable to ridicule anyone at any time,” the email said, the Post reported.

The video was an episode of comedian Ziwe Fumudoh’s new Showtime series, Ziwe, which “openly derides, humiliates and ridiculous white women,” Baron said in a letter to the school.

The video featured a conversation between Fumudoh and writer Fran Lebowitz, women’s rights activist Gloria Steinem, and 4 white women named Karen. “I believe that you are not concerned with how annoying white women can be,’’ Fumudoh told Lebowitz in the video.

Fumudoh asked the audience, “what percentage of white people do you hate? And there is a right answer.” She later defined the term ‘Karen’ as “obnoxious, angry and entitled, often racist white women.”

During the video, the white students “sat there in their graduation dresses while the white mothers of the white students – many of whom volunteer, donate, call, email and do whatever the school asks of them – were tarred and feathered in a video their teacher showed them. While their white female teachers were mocked,’’ Baron said. MORE.

Chicago Dyke March Flier Shows Woman in ACAB Undies Burning Israeli and American Flags

Via American Greatness

A radical LGBTQ group is under fire after distributing event materials that advertise a decidedly anti-Semitic, anti-American, and anti-police stance.

The group, known as the “Chicago Dyke March,” is planning to hold its annual march in Chicago’s Palmer Square Park, this Saturday.

The group’s flier for the event features an overweight woman squatting on the hood of a burning police car clad in underwear that says ACAB (All Cops Are Bastards), and holding two burning flags; an Israeli flag, and an American flag.

The ACAB phrase became a far-left rallying cry during last summer’s George Floyd riots. In the caption, the Chicago Dyke March lists several far-left themes: Abolish CPD (Chicago Police Department), Abolish ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement), and “Abolish the Isra*li Occupation Forces.” The organizers ask that participants wear masks for the outdoor event.

After some pushback on social media, ChiDykeMarch deleted the picture and replaced it with one in which the flags are completely covered in flames.

The group also posted onto social media a graphic explaining to potential participants the various roles they can play in this year’s march, from the “peaceful protesters” they put on the front lines, to the violent rioters who attack the police and do property damage later at night.

One group of violent protesters “who come prepared to set fire to barricades and throw flammable projectiles” are called “FIRE MAGE” in the poster.

The group also hopes to who enlist those who “use laser pointers to to obstruct surveillance cameras, drones, and police visors,” according to the image. A “range soldier” is said to be someone who throws “water bottles, umbrellas, and trash” at the police. MORE.

Be sure to stop by at Def-Con News to get our morning started off right.