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So the political world is buzzing right now about a photo of Obama’s chief speechwriter, the 27-year-old Jon Favreau.
In the photo, Favreau and another man are seen with a life-size cardboard cutout of Hillary Clinton. Favreau is leaning in toward Clinton and smiling for the camera, like you would if you were getting your photo taken with a celebrity, but with one big difference — he’s groping the cutout’s “breast” with one hand. The other guy is kissing Clinton on the cheek and tipping a beer bottle up to her mouth.
It appears that the photo, which surfaced on Facebook not long ago, probably isn’t going to derail Favreau’s career. He has reportedly called Clinton to apologize, and Clinton’s people have put out a light-hearted statement on the incident. But the sexism and disrespect for Clinton evidenced in the photo have a lot of people fuming.
I mention all this here at studentactivism.net not because of any campus angle to this story, but because the photo reminds me powerfully of another photo — one taken more than a hundred years ago.
Columbia Law School is hosting an Alliance of Youth Movements Summit right now, with all sessions being broadcast live on the net. As the summit website puts it:
Panels will discuss a variety of practical topics, including How To Build Transnational Social Movements Using New Technology, How To Use New Mobile Technologies and How To Preserve Group Safety And Security.
Summit participants will also be honored at a red-carpet event with entertainment celebrities, business leaders, and civil society figures at the former home of MTV’s Total Request Live (“TRL”) overlooking Times Square.
Howcast will use the field manual for youth empowerment developed at the Summit as the cornerstone of a much larger online “hub,” where emerging youth organizations can access and share “how-to” guides and tips on how to use social-networking and other technologies to promote freedom and justice and counter violence, extremism and oppression. The hub will include instructional videos and text guides, links to related online resources and discussion forums for sharing experiences, ideas and advice.
The schedule for the summit is available here, with links to streaming video from every session.
The student government of York University in Toronto has voted to deny recognition to pro-life clubs and organizations.
According to an article in the National Post, at least four other colleges — Capilano College, the University of British Columbia Okanagan, Lakehead University, and Carleton University — have taken similar action in recent months.
The Post also reports that the Canadian Federation of Students has passed a statement resolving that “member locals that refuse to allow anti-choice organizations access to their resources and space be supported.”
Last week we reported about Anna Minkinow, a Tulane student who brought a complaint against a fellow student for raping her in a dorm and then mounted a campus protest when he was found guilty of sexual misconduct, but neither expelled nor suspended.
This afternoon an anonymous commenter passed along word that Minkinow has started a blog. Here’s how she describes her project:
MY NAME IS ANNA, AND, AS OF JULY 2007, I BECAME A SEXUAL ASSAULT SURVIVOR. AFTER MY ATTACKER BEAT THE UNIVERSITY JUDICIAL SYSTEM AND A WHIRLWIND OF AGONIES, POLITICS, AND LOSSES FOLLOWED, I BECAME A NEW TYPE OF SURVIVOR. THIS IS THE PROCESS BY WHICH I AM BECOMING A DIFFERENT TYPE OF SURVIVOR THAN I WAS FOR THE NINE MONTHS IMMEDIATELY FOLLOWING THE ATTACK. THESE THOUGHTS, ACTIVISM PROJECTS, AND MOLTEN ENERGIES ARE HOW I WILL ENSURE THAT THERE WILL BE AN UNPRECEDENTED CHANGE NONE CAN IGNORE.
We’ll be following Anna’s blog, and we thank the commenter for passing along the link.
There’s a new addition to the “Resources” section of our blogroll this morning — SAFER Campus.
SAFER Campus is a non-profit organization that supports student campaigns to improve sexual assault prevention and response on their campuses. Founded at Columbia University in 1999 and incorporated the following year, SAFER Campus provides organizing trainings, mentoring, and publications to student activists throughout the United States.
On top of everything else, they’ve got a great blog. Check ’em out.
studentactivism.net 
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