Betita Martinez
/Overview
Elizabeth "Betita" Martínez born Washington, DC December 12, 1925. Radical Chicana leader and author; opposed US intervention in Central America; opposed "humanitarian" bombings of Kosovo and wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. One of the first UN employees, working under Ralph Bunche on the UN's successful decolonization, 1946-50. Headed New York office of Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC); took part in SNCC's Freedom Summer, Mississippi, 1964; first Chicana to visit North Vietnam. Peace and Freedom Party candidate for California governor, 1982; co-founded Institute for MultiRacial Justice, 1997; Nobel Peace Prize nominee, 2005.
Quotations
"[B]uilding a multi-racial, multi-national, multi-lingual, multi-class movement is our best hope...for preventing illegal and inhuman assaults on the world's most vulnerable people. For holding back the most powerful, most frightening empire ever seen. For transforming society into a world of peace with justice for all living creatures." ("Why 'Anti-War' has to be 'Anti-Racist' too," Z Magazine, in Colours of Resistance Archive; photo Latinopia.com)