hunger-strikes

Pussy Riot Member Hunger Striking Over Brutal Prison Conditions

Cord Jefferson · 09/23/13 01:32PM

Nadezhda Tolokonnikova, one of the two Pussy Riot members still in a Russian prison for the crime of "hooliganism motivated by religious hatred," is on hunger strike starting today in order to protest her living conditions. In a lengthy open letter to the Guardian explaining her strike, Tolokonnikova claims that the first year in her two-year sentence has been hellish, beginning with the head administrator of her penal colony telling her upon arrival: "You should know that when it comes to politics, I am a Stalinist."

Hamilton Nolan · 08/06/13 10:08AM

In one of the finest demonstrations of Orwellian language in recent memory, a hunger strike by cell-bound California prisoners is denounced as a "gang power play" by the government official who controls all of California's prisons.

NYer Story on Obsessive Stalker Sparks Obsessive, Stalker-y Protest

Hamilton Nolan · 05/26/11 08:30AM

Last August, Tad Friend wrote an excellent article in the New Yorker about the spectacularly bizarre life of downtown New York scenester John Lurie, focusing on his weird on-again, off-again friendship with an artist named John Perry, portrayed as a moody and dangerous figure who ended up stalking Lurie and making threats against his life.