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Say NO to Pinkwashing at Creating Change conference in Chicago

The United States Palestinian Community Network (USPCN)-Chicago chapter calls on its members and supporters to send a united message to the National LGBTQ Task Force, the organizers of the Creating Change conference, calling on it to reject pinkwashing and the normalization of Israeli Apartheid.

The Task Force originally cancelled a conference reception on “LGBTQ life in Israel,” hosted by Zionist organization A Wider Bridge, after a campaign led by Tarab-NYC. USPCN-Chicago is a signatory to Tarab’s statement, which called on the Task Force to endorse BDS and explain clearly that the reception was cancelled because it was a pinkwashing event.

Instead, on January 19th, the Task Force released a statement that the reception was reinstated. The National LGBTQ Task Force is clearly allowing the pinkwashing of Israeli Apartheid, and sanitizing Israeli ethnic cleansing, colonization, and occupation against all Palestinian people.

Call, email, and tweet Mark Daley (Chief Communications and Marketing Officer of the National LGBTQ Task Force) today until the end of the conference on January 24th:

Mark Daley
mdaley@thetaskforce.org
Phone: 202.639.6325
@thetaskforce (use #CC16 and #cancelpinkwashing)

Demand that:

1. The Creating Change conference re-cancel the reception, and release a public statement attesting to why the reception hosted by A Wider Bridge should be cancelled (specifically, as a move to counter pinkwashing and Zionist efforts in solidarity with the Palestinian people).

2. The Creating Change conference commit to opposing future efforts that promote Zionism and pinkwashing of the illegal occupation of Palestine--whether those efforts appear in workshops, caucuses, plenaries, organizational sponsorships, and more.

3. The National LGBTQ Task Force publicly endorse the Palestinian right of return and the boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) movement.

Creating Change has already been riddled with controversy, with the current move to allow pinkwashing coming on the heels of a public effort by the Not 1 More campaign to force conference organizers to cancel the participation of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).

We reject pinkwashing just as we reject militarized detention of immigrants and militarized policing in our neighborhoods. USPCN is a grassroots, community-based organization committed not only to the liberation of the Palestinian people but also to the liberation of all oppressed people within and outside the U.S.

Until Liberation & Return,

USPCN-Chicago
January 20, 2016