We Ain't Buying It

 From Indivisible:

With the holiday season approaching, let’s make our dollars count.  

We have power as consumers and we can leverage that power to protect our democracy and send a powerful message to companies: When you support Trump, we don’t support you.

Join the We Ain’t Buying It* campaign and take action over Thanksgiving to pressure companies to stop colluding with the Trump administration and enabling their authoritarian overreach.

*My antivirus identifies the campaign site as malicious, so I am not linking to it.

Our Targets:

We’re focused on companies that are capitulating to the Trump administration and going along with their harmful, authoritarian policies. 

• Target caved to Trump and rolled back their diversity, equity, and inclusion policies.
• Home Depot has done nothing to protect immigrants in their stores as ICE continues to conduct violent raids on their property.
• Amazon has funded the Trump administration through donations and discounted government contracts (including for ICE), all in exchange for massive corporate tax breaks. 

These corporations think that they profit when they go along with Trump’s attacks on our democracy. But we can make it clear that there is a price to pay for enabling authoritarianism.

Our Ask:

Our ask is simple: Target, Home Depot, and Amazon must stop undermining our democracy by collaborating with, and enabling, the Trump administration. Reinstate their DEI policies, refuse to cooperate with ICE, and withhold funding to Trump’s authoritarian regime. 

Read more about how to participate at https://indivisible.org/campaign/we-aint-buying-it

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From 50501:

Thus, Nov 27th | Thanksgiving

Don’t Spend a Dime; Spend Family Time

Fri, Nov 28th | Blackout Black Friday

Sat, Nov 29th | Shop Small Saturday

Focusing on shopping small, immigrant, and BIPOC businesses.

Sun, Nov 30th | Circulate the Dollar

Focus on mutual aid and supporting one another!

Mon, Dec 1st | Cyber Shutdown

A day for digital blackout

Google & AI & You

Reports are circulating that Google has updated its policies to allow it to scrape your emails and attachments and other Google spaces to train its AI. 

Here's one report:  Gmail might be harvesting your emails to train AI—here's how to opt out, along with instructions for turning "Smart Features" off. If you turn it off, you will also lose some features like spell check. 

Apparently, Google says it does not look through your emails for its AI. 

However, this is just one front in the war against our AI overlords. The Electronic Frontier Foundation is suing the Trump regime of its use of AI to surveille social media. "The lawsuit alleges that the Trump administration’s program violates the First Amendment and the Administrative Procedure Act by using artificial intelligence to monitor and penalize lawful speech on social media platforms. The plaintiffs in the case include the United Automobile Workers (UAW), the Communications Workers of America (CWA), and the American Federation of Teachers (AFT), labor organizations representing millions of American workers, many of whom are visa holders or lawful permanent residents. These unions report a significant chilling effect on their members' participation in speech and organizing activities due to fear of immigration consequences tied to their online posts."

And, there are concerns that DOGE-harvested data is being used to train Elon Musk's AI. "Most critically, government databases track entire populations over time, not just digitally active users. They include people who never use social media, don’t shop online, or actively avoid digital services. For an AI company, this would mean training systems on the actual diversity of human experience rather than just the digital reflections people cast online."

There are certainly other concerns about AI including its use among health insurance corporations to deny claims (soon coming, per the Kaiser Family Foundation, to Medicare) and the rise of data centers which are driving up electricity costs and using millions of gallons of water, and the misunderstanding of what "Artificial Intelligence" actually does. 

On the other hand, Cory Doctorow, author of the new book Enshittification, says AI is a Bubble. We'll see.

Anyway, turn off the AI training if you want.  

Free Films - Native Cinema

 

Native Cinema Showcase Shorts 2025

November 21–28, 2025

All shorts are available to stream free November 21 (5 PM ET) to November 28, 2025 (5 PM ET).

The National Museum of the American Indian’s Native Cinema Showcase is an annual celebration of the best in Native film. This year, the museum highlights an array of film shorts featuring a diverse range of Indigenous stories and perspectives.

STREAM HERE.

Friday Food Drive

This Friday, 11/21 from 9 am to 2 pm, Habitat for Humanity + Planned Parenthood of Western Wisconsin are hosting a food drive at Hogan Admin Center, 807 East Ave S. 

All donations will support WAFER and School District pantries.

Habitat for Humanity's ReClaim team is currently salvaging material from Hogan before it's demolished. When you come to donate food, you'll receive a ReStore discount coupon as well as a first glance at some treasures from Hogan! We are able to sell select items onsite, like original brass door pulls. 

Please help spread the word! 

Hope to see you there. 

Natalie 

Natalie Heneghan (she/her)

Community Outreach Director

Habitat for Humanity of the Greater La Crosse Region

Day of Remembrance

 

Each year on November 20th, The Center hosts a gathering of those who wish to recognize Trans Day of Remembrance. It takes place in honor of all our transgender sisters, brothers, and siblings who have lost their lives to transphobic violence. We conduct a roll call of lives lost that year and observe a moment of silence for those who lost their lives.

Thursday, Nov. 20, 5 to 8 p.m.

Pump House Regional Arts Center

119 King St.

and

Remembrance Walk at 3 p.m., UWL Clock Tower