Philippine journalist Raissa Robles joins Oct 21st Centershift Conference

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NEW YORK—Practicing journalism in a country ranked second in the number of media people assassinated and which still holds the record for the most media persons killed in a single event is a challenge the likes of which few experience. However, Raissa Robles, who reports both on her own website and for newspapers like the South China Morning Post, death threats and vilification are but a daily fare. She recently came out with the book Marcos Martial Law: Never Again in which she called the imposition of the one-man-rule on the Philippines “a one-stop butcher shop for human rights violations.”

Ms. Robles will bring her more than two decades of experience in defying and surviving neo-fascism to AF3IRM’s Center Shift Conference, joining the panel “Constellations of History”, and adding her wisdom to the paths women must take in this era of intensifying suppression.

Ms. Robles has been writing about the Philippine government and its presidents since the 1980s, first as a writer of history and later, as a media person covering presidential decisions and actuations. Recently, she has taken on the government of Rodrigo Duterte, now famous for its claimed “war on drugs” which has resulted in some 13,000 people killed. The “war” is still on-going and has spurred its own politics – from attempts to dismantle the country’s Commission on Human Rights, threats to declare martial law once again and the latest, an on-going campaign to enact auto-golpe – i.e., replace the Constitution with one that would enable sitting officials to extend their terms of office.

Into this highly charged political atmosphere, Ms. Robles’s book Never Again was released, becoming a best seller virtually overnight. Although the book is about the long-ousted Marcos Dictatorship, it was released just as the Duterte Regime was about to approve a hero’s burial for the dead dictator. A limited number of copies will be available at the Conference and Ms. Robles will be available to sign them for buyers.

The AF3IRM CenterShift Conference II: Roots and Routes is held every third year. It brings together as many diverse histories and perspectives of the global women’s struggle as the organization can manage. It aims to bring forward a holistic understanding of the women’s movement which is often unremarked in the world today. The main plenary panel is of five women representing points of view acknowledged even in the US women’s movement and is an expression of AF3IRM’S commitment to transnational sisterhood and feminism.

The Conference will also feature the Tuscarora singer and musician, Pura Fe, who continuously brings eight generations of tribal music to the cause of environmentalism and the fight against oil and fracking.

CenterShift will take place at the Center for Social Innovation, 601 West 25th Street, New York, NY 10001 and starts at 9 am. Registration can be done via EventBrite.Com at http://bit.ly/af3rr17. For additional inquiries, please contact [email protected] . — ##