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n 1 December 1955, Rosa Parks famously refused to give up her seat on the bus to a white passenger in Montgomery, Alabama, thus launching the modern-day civil rights movement. Monday 4 February is the 100th anniversary of her birth. After she died at the age of 92, in 2005, much of the media described her as a tired seamstress, no troublemaker.

But the media got it wrong. Rosa Parks was a first-class troublemaker.

Professor Jeanne Theoharis debunks the myth of the quiet seamstress in her new book The Rebellious Life of Mrs Rosa Parks. Theoharis told me:

"This is the story of a life history of activism, a life history that she would put it, as being 'rebellious,' that starts decades before her famous bus stand and ends decades after."

She was born in Tuskegee, Alabama, and raised to believe that she had a right to be respected, and to demand that respect. Jim Crow laws were entrenched then, and segregation was violently enforced. In Pine Level, where she lived, white children got a bus ride to school, while African American children walked. Rosa Parks recalled:

"But to me, that was a way of life; we had no choice but to accept what was the custom. The bus was among the first ways I realized there was a black world and a white world."

In her late teens, Rosa met Raymond Parks, and they married. Rosa described Raymond Parks as the first activist she had ever met. He was a member of the local Montgomery NAACP chapter, and, when she learned that women were welcome at the meetings, she attended. She was elected the chapter's secretary.

It was there that Rosa met and worked with ED Nixon, a radical labor organizer. Rosa Parks was able to attend the Highlander Folk School in Tennessee in 1955. The school was a gathering place for activists - black and white together - committed to overcoming segregation, and for developing strategies and tactics for nonviolent resistance to it. It was there that Pete Seeger and others wrote the song "We Shall Overcome" as the enduring anthem of the civil rights movement.

Parks returned to Montgomery and her job as a seamstress. On 1 December 1955, she left work and got on the bus to go home. "The driver said that if I refused to leave the seat, he would have to call the police. And I told him, 'Just call the police,'" Parks told Pacifica Radio in April 1956. "The time had just come when I had been pushed as far as I could stand to be pushed."

Her arrest that day sparked the Montgomery Bus Boycott, which would last more than a year. It was led by a young minister who had just moved into town: Dr Martin Luther King Jr. Rosa Parks helped to launch Dr King. Some 50,000 African Americans carpooled, used church vehicles, rode in African-American-owned taxis and walked. The boycott crippled white businesses and the public transit system. Parks and others mounted a court challenge to the segregation, and in June 1956, a federal court ruled segregation on buses as unconstitutional.

The Parks moved to Detroit. She continued her work, responding to the Detroit riots in 1967, conferring with members of the Black Power movement like Stokely Carmichael. She opposed the war in Vietnam. Historian Theoharis notes that Parks' biggest hero was Malcolm X. In the 1980s, Rosa Parks fought against apartheid, joining protests outside the South African embassy in Washington, DC.

When she met Nelson Mandela after his release from prison, he told her, "You sustained me while I was in prison all those years."

When Rosa Parks died, she was the first African-American woman to lie in state in the Capitol rotunda. I raced down to Washington, DC to cover her memorial service. I met a young college student and asked her why she was there standing outside with so many hundreds of people listening to the service on loudspeakers. She said proudly:

"I emailed my professors and said I won't be in class today; I'm going to get an education."

The US Post Service Rosa Parks forever stamp

Rosa Parks has much to teach us. In fact, she and other young women had refused to give up their seats on the bus before 1 December 1955. You never know when that magic moment will come. This 4 February, the US Postal Service will release a "Rosa Parks forever" stamp, a reminder of the enduring mark she made. Rosa Parks was no tired seamstress. As she said of that brave action she took:

"The only tired I was, was tired of giving in."

Denis Moynihan contributed research to this column

© 2013 Amy Goodman; distributed by King Features Syndicate

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Rosa Parks at 100: a great American rebel for racial justice | Amy Goodman

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n 1 December 1955, Rosa Parks famously refused to give up her seat on the bus to a white passenger in Montgomery, Alabama, thus launching the modern-day civil rights movement. Monday 4 February is the 100th anniversary of her birth.

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ALBANY - Eighteen-year-old Lauren Kexel doesn't view arming teachers as a deterrent to school shootings.

"Fighting fire with fire, it just doesn't work, and I don't think it will get anything done," said the Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts student about proposals that have been discussed as a way to deter or combat gun violence on school campuses. She was speaking following the massive 'March for Our Lives' demonstration that brought thousands to the streets around West Capitol park Saturday.

The Waterford-Halfmoon High School graduate, who is studying to be a teacher was among the throngs of people who packed the park and jammed the streets in protest afterward to call for an end to gun violence and stricter gun control legislation.

Local high school students, who were well-represented among Saturday's crowd, organized the Albany event in solidarity with similar actions taking place nationwide - the largest of which was in Washington, D.C.

They are organizing around the issue and are reminding politicians that many of them are old enough to vote or will be soon.

Crowd is taking to the streets of Albany after listening to speakers decry gun violence I schools and nation. pic.twitter.com/eeuS9WETyd
- Paul Nelson (@apaulnelson) March 24, 2018

Many in the raucous crowd, which Albany police estimated was from 3,000 to 5,000 people strong, brandished hand-written signs and cheered loudly as they listened to politicians and teens speak about how pervasive mass slayings at schools have become, their fears and hopes, and ways to make students and schools safer.

Chanting slogans like "Vote them out" and "Not one more," the marchers joined a chorus begun by students at Marjory Stoneman High School in Parkland, Fla., who survived a Valentine's Day gun massacre at their school that claimed the lives of 17 students and teachers.

Hundreds marching against gun violence in Albany. pic.twitter.com/WUn90vMhc9
- Paul Nelson (@apaulnelson) March 24, 2018

Kexel's friend, Caroline Purdy, also 18, believes she has a better solution to making classrooms safer.

"I think like having one public officer would be a good idea for protection, but I don't think that each individual classroom needs to be armed," said Purdy, who went to high school with Kexel and is now studying to be a teacher SUNY New Paltz. "I think having guns in your house isn't necessarily a bad idea but there needs to be more control on who we give them to, we need background checks."

Congressman Paul Tonko praised the student leaders and organizers, saying schools should be a "safe zone, not a zone of fear, a fear of violence, or gunshots."

He mentioned the massacres of students at Columbine, Virginia Tech, Sandy Hook and in Parkland, Fla.

"My friends, I think we've created a new political generation," said the Democrat to loud cheers."They have seen too much hurt, too much pain, too much suffering, too much death, and they say 'no, we can do better than that.' "

Tonko called for banning assault weapons, bump stocks, limiting ammunition in magazines, and better background checks and more funding mental health programs.

"Let's make certain that America listens, listens to her students, listens to the advocacy, and make sure that we respond in progressive format to policies that have long been due for the safety of not only students but all Americans across this country," said Tonko.

Tricia Pleau with 'Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America', told the crowd, " this is what a tipping point looks like."

"We believe that the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness comes before the right to own a gun," said the mother of four.

She urged attendees to "fight like hell" and to not be afraid to discuss the topic because "we are the majority, there are more of us than there are them. "

"There is much common ground on this issues and having these conversations will make it easier," Pleau added.

She and several speakers took aim at he National Rifle Association, exhorting the audience to vote out any any politician who accepts money from the group.

Ingrid Colafati said lock downs, where no one is allowed in and out of school buildings, take place about once a month at Hackett Middle School in Albany, where she is a student.

"I think it's terrible that we have to be afraid to go to school every single day," said the 13-year-old.

Students graduating from high school this year are among a generation who have grown up with lockdown and shelter-in-place drills at school due to the prevalence of gun violence on campuses.

It's made Colafati more wary of some of life's simple pleasures.

"When I go into restaurants and that sort of thing, I always am looking for a way out, now that after all these things have happened during my life time, I'm always looking for an escape in case something happens and that's just become part of my ritual," she said.

Her old sister, Amelia Colafati, 16, attends Albany High School.

'I think that's very scary for me to go into school everyday and not be sure if I'm going to come back home or if I'm going to be mortally wounded,' she said, adding that she is sometimes scared to go into the hallways.

Nicole Holloway, 13, a Scotia- Glenville middle school student recalled how students were crying in the auditorium earlier this month after a threat was posted on Facebook on the day of planned walk out against gun violence.

She said she was friends online with two of Marjory Stoneman High schoolers who died.

Her schoolmate, Kiernan Greeley, 12, said sometimes the fear and tension from all the craziness gets in the way of his education.

"It's really like going into a gamble at school," he said.

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Students lead Albany protest against gun violence in solidarity with national marches

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ALBANY -ALBANY - Eighteen-year-old Lauren Kexel doesn't view arming teachers is a deterrent to school shootings. "Fighting fire with fire, it just doesn't work, and I don't think it will get anything done," said the Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts student following the massive 'March for Our Lives' rally and march in the streets around West Capital park Saturday.

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"We must always take sides. Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented."

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"We must always take sides. Neutrality helps the oppressor, never the victim. Silence encourages the tormentor, never the tormented."

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Elie Wiesel

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Elie Wiesel is an advocate for human rights. This image shows him alongside people protesting against racism and other factors that affect their own human rights.

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Elie Wiesel is an advocate for human rights. This image shows him alongside people protesting against racism and other factors that affect their own human rights.

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It is with sadness that I heard of the death of Elie Wiesel on July 2 at the age of 87. I had the opportunity of meeting Wiesel, a Holocaust survivor, at the Jewish Community Center in Cherry Hill a number of years ago when he and Shimon Peres were speaking at an event. News of his death reinforced the fear that as survivors grow old and die, each day the memory of the horrific genocide may fade with their passing.

Because of that horrific experience, Elie Wiesel became a leading advocate for human rights throughout the world. His tireless advocacy for human rights and keeping the memory of the Holocaust alive won him a Nobel Peace Prize. He was honored by many in the church including the late Cardinal John O'Connor of New York and Cardinal Jean-Marie Lustiger of Paris.

He received honorary degrees from a number of Catholic universities, such as Georgetown, Notre Dame, Fordham and Marquette. Besides being a Nobel Laureate, he and his wife were the founders of the Elie Wiesel Foundation for Humanity. He was recognized by the U.S. Congress for his leadership and input as the head of the Holocaust Memorial Council in the United States. He also received the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

The death of his family and his own near death experience in the Holocaust spurred him on to work tirelessly as an advocate for human rights. In his book "Night," he described the horrors of the Auschwitz and Buchenwald concentration camps. This book has been translated into more than 30 languages and remains a pillar of Holocaust literature.

In "Night," he tells the story of a young Jewish man who, upon arriving at Auschwitz-Birkenau, was wrenched from his family as they were sent to the extermination center. Many believe it was his own story cloaked in the tale of Eliezer.

That moment was described as, "Men to the left! Women to the right! Eight words spoken quietly, indifferently, without emotion. Eight short, simple words... For a part of a second I glimpsed my mother and my sisters moving away to the right. Tzipora held Mother's hand. I saw them disappear into the distance; my mother was stroking my sister's fair hair. ... and I did not know that in that place, at that moment, I was parting from my mother and Tzipora forever."

His life as an activist and author grew exponentially after his publication of "Night" in 1958. This book led to his writings on genocide and its aftermath, influencing generations and leading him to champion Soviet Jews, Nicaraguan Miskoto Indians, South African victims of apartheid and other human rights issues throughout his life, through the auspices of the Elie Wiesel Foundation for Humanity. He was instrumental in the establishment of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, which opened in 1993 in Washington, D.C. The museum tells the dark story of the Holocaust, not only for the Jews, but for all who were victims of the Nazi regime, including persons with disabilities, Gypsies, homosexuals, Jehovah's Witness and Catholics. Etched in stone above the main entrance of the museum are the words of Elie Wiesel: "For the dead and the living, we must bear witness."

At the opening of another Holocaust Museum in Illinois, Rick Hirschhaut, the executive director, said of Wiesel, "It's fair to say that there is not a single individual on this Earth today who better embodies the pain, the humanity, the hope and the unwavering belief in the power of good over evil than Elie Wiesel. There's no one who challenges the conscience of humanity more than Elie Wiesel. By so doing, he has personally transformed the history and legacy of the Holocaust into a mandate for all of humanity to recognize and respond to contemporary atrocities and human rights (abuses)."

With the death of Elie Wiesel a major voice to help the world remember the atrocities of the Holocaust is silenced. Michael Zank, the director of the Elie Wiesel Center for Jewish Studies at Boston University, who was mentored by Wiesel, said, "The number of eloquent survivors is few and far between. It puts the responsibility on us, the next generation, the children of survivors, the grandchildren of survivors, to become as articulate as we can be in maintaining this memory and the mandate that comes with it."

The youngest survivors today are around 71 years old. The torch will soon be passed to tell the story of the Holocaust, so that the world will never forget.
Father Joseph D. Wallace is director, Ecumenical and Inter-religious Affairs, Diocese of Camden.

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It is with sadness that I heard of the death of Elie Wiesel on July 2 at the age of 87. I had the opportunity of meeting Wiesel, a Holocaust survivor, at the Jewish Community Center in Cherry Hill a number of years ago when he and Shimon Peres were speaking at an event.

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"I refuse to accept the view that mankind is so tragically bound to the starless midnight of racism and war that the bright daybreak of peace and brotherhood can never become a reality... I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word."

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"I refuse to accept the view that mankind is so tragically bound to the starless midnight of racism and war that the bright daybreak of peace and brotherhood can never become a reality... I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word."

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Martin Luther King Jr.

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Mlk Jr. strives to bring all races together. To do so, he motivates others to join him so that change can be made and so that it starts now. 

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Mlk Jr. strives to bring all races together. To do so, he motivates others to join him so that change can be made and so that it starts now. 