JASON PRAMAS, Author at BINJ

DISCIPLINE AND PUNISH (THE YEAR IN KRAMPUS)

Image by Tak Toyoshima December 21, 2015 BY JASON PRAMAS @JASONPRAMAS Popular culture always tells us a lot about the spirit of the time in which it was created. So when three movies get released featuring the same little-known supernatural character in the same year, it’s safe to say that

JASON PRAMAS December 21, 2015

GO BIG OR GO HOME: TOWARDS A MASS CLIMATE JUSTICE MOVEMENT

Image by Kent Buckley December 16, 2015 BY JASON PRAMAS @JASONPRAMAS On Saturday, one important global process ended and another began. The process that ended manifested in the form of the 2015 United Nations Climate Change Conference. The process that began—or more correctly, accelerated—manifested in cities all over the world.

JASON PRAMAS December 16, 2015

GROUNDED MONKEYS: MILLIONAIRES UNLIKELY TO FLEE COMMONWEALTH IF RAISE UP MASS WINS TAX ON 1 PERCENT

Image by Kent Buckley December 8, 2015 BY JASON PRAMAS @JASONPRAMAS Boston Business Journal’s Craig Douglas made an interesting criticism of Raise Up Massachusetts last week (“Excited about the proposed millionaires tax? Cut off your nose while you’re at it,” Dec. 4). For those who missed it, RUM is a

JASON PRAMAS December 8, 2015

BARGAINING AGAINST OURSELVES: MEANS TESTING MBTA FARES WILL DECREASE PUBLIC SUPPORT FOR MASS TRANSIT

Image by Kent Buckley November 30, 2015 BY JASON PRAMAS @JASONPRAMAS As the latest round of the ongoing neoliberal campaign to shift the cost of mass transit in Massachusetts from state government to individual riders gets in gear—a necessary step along the road to privatizing the MBTA—regular readers will be

JASON PRAMAS November 30, 2015

REMEMBRANCE AND PROTEST: THANKSGIVING THEN & NOW

November 23, 2015 BY JASON PRAMAS @JASONPRAMAS The following passage is excerpted from a piece I wrote in 2005. It recounts the story of King Philip’s War—which was fought across southern New England 340 years ago, and started not far from where I attended a Thanksgiving dinner that year at

JASON PRAMAS November 23, 2015

LEFT BEHIND: THE PARIS ATTACKS AND THE NEED TO FUND A MASS INDEPENDENT AMERICAN NEWS MEDIA

Image by Kent Buckley November 17, 2015 BY JASON PRAMAS @JASONPRAMAS Shortly after the Paris attacks on Friday, I flipped on the TV and saw that Fox 25 was feeding Fox News live during its normal evening entertainment slot. I was not surprised to find that News Corp HQ was

JASON PRAMAS November 17, 2015

MASS BAIL REFORM NOW

November 9, 2015 BY JASON PRAMAS @JASONPRAMAS Lots of innocent people are spending time in jail in Massachusetts. And unsurprisingly many of those people are poor and a disproportionate number are people of color. But they are not convicted criminals. They are people who are charged with a crime—often a

JASON PRAMAS November 9, 2015

BOSTON ARTISTS UNITE

Kenmore image by Henry Han via Wikimedia Commons November 2, 2015 BY JASON PRAMAS @JASONPRAMAS If you work in one of the creative professions, then you know how tough it has become to make a living in the Boston area in recent years. But there are a couple of upcoming

JASON PRAMAS November 2, 2015

SHUT PILGRIM NOW … AND SAVE MASS FROM NUCLEAR DISASTER

Image by Kent Buckley October 26, 2015 BY JASON PRAMAS @JASONPRAMAS About 50 people—most from the South Shore and Cape Cod—held a protest rally last Thursday at the Grand Staircase in the Massachusetts State House to demand the immediate closure of the Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station on a long list

JASON PRAMAS October 26, 2015

SANDERS SHRUGGED

Image by Kent Buckley October 20, 2015 BY JASON PRAMAS @JASONPRAMAS One of the marks of what scholars call hegemonic discourse is the assumption that a society’s ruling ideology is considered so “normal” that it does not even need to be named, let alone explained. So it is with the

JASON PRAMAS October 20, 2015