The second annual United We Stand Festival is slated to take place at the Belasco Theater in Los Angeles on September 19 from 5-10 pm PST. This historic event marks the Free and Equal Elections Foundation’s kickoff for a series of open presidential debates for 2016—and will be broadcast worldwide by freeandequal.org.
However, the UWSF is much more than just a music festival.
As a platform for voices of every race, color, and creed, the 2015 UWSF is an educational event combining activism, information to challenge the two-party political duopoly, practical solutions for both political and non-political issues, and the arts. The UWSF focuses on “bringing positive and conscious artists together with political leaders and thinkers” with hopes of ending the divisiveness and partisan stalemate currently consuming the nation.
During such a tumultuous time of injustice and hostility as we’ve witnessed in Ferguson, Baltimore, and around the country, Free and Equal’s initiatives have sparked a peaceful, positive, and powerful movement for effective, potent solutions.
“The youth of America will carry the torch of American society well into the future and it is music that presents them with a unifying call towards life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. UWSF is an opportunity to make the world a better place through the universal vibration of art that speaks truth to power and brings about one love,” explained Free and Equal founder and chair Christina Tobin.
Free and Equal hopes the festival will help propel independent political thought and action far beyond the spectrum of Republican vs. Democrat.
The UWSF will feature Civil Rights leader Amelia Boynton Robinson as the keynote speaker, as well as Professor Griff from Public Enemy, conscious reggae artist Spragga Benz, journalist Amber Lyon, and a host of other musicians, artists, activists and thinkers from around the country. Free and Equal is expecting even more well-known artists to confirm their participation in the UWSF as we get closer to the event date on September 19th.
Tickets for the festival became available online today, but organizers are expecting tickets to the event to sell out quickly. Reserve yours here.
Claire Bernish writes for theAntiMedia.org. Anti-Media Radio airs weeknights at 11pm Eastern/8pm Pacific.
Claire Bernish joined Anti-Media as an independent journalist in May of 2015. Her topics of interest include social justice, police brutality, exposing the truth behind propaganda, and general government accountability. Born in North Carolina, she now lives in Ohio. Learn more about Bernish here!
The entire supposed left-right political divide we take for granted as being a meaningful description of reality is false. The real divide in political systems is between “extractive” and “inclusive”. Extractive systems run the gamut of other political labels — fascist, communist, oligarchy, or just thuggish dictatorship — but they all funnel the fruits of their population’s labor upward to a ruling elite through a variety of mechanisms. Inclusive systems have a rule of law that applies equally to all classes, hears the voices of all classes, is open to all classes to participate on an equal footing in the economy, and allows all classes to keep the fruits of their labor under laws that protect private property. Currently, neither mainstream political party believes or practices inclusiveness. I wish the UWSF much success.