Cynthia McKinney and Mairead Maguire from Israeli Prison

Happy 4th!

@thedrun: Happy 4th! Let's all remember that this country was founded by secular leftist radicals who wanted to be free from oppression!

@bintalshamsa: The founders of our country were actually vicious colonizers who simply wanted to be on top.

-Twitter

We were founded on a very basic double standard. This country was founded by slave owners who wanted to be free. Am I right? A group of slave owners who wanted to be free. So they killed a lot of white English people in order to continue owning their black African people, so they could wipe out the rest of the red Indian people and move west and steal the rest of the land from the brown Mexican people, giving them a place to take off and drop their nuclear weapons on the yellow Japanese people.

- George Carlin
via stuff white people do

Is it weird that I hold these perspectives in my head as all pieces of truth at the same time?

Update on NOWHC

It's worse than we thought and not in the way we thought either.

Someone from the clinic got back to Queen Emily personally and allowed her to post the response. And it turns out, no one is getting medical care from the clinic.

We agree that the questions and concerns you raise are very important. The priorities we hold in providing safe, accessible, and unbiased care to women regardless of their race, income, sexuality, gender identity, body type, citizenship status, work sector, legal history, ability, age, language, and family size and status are often regarded as a “risk” and “liability” by many medical professionals. This reality has delayed our efforts to hire a new Medical Director and created many barriers for many members of our community, including you, in seeking safe, quality, and respectful services.

In making the statements “we are currently not able to provide care to trans people who were male assigned at birth or who have had genital sex reassignment surgery. Please call for referrals,” we were referencing the lack of experience and training that our former medical staff had in providing trans affirmative care to all women regardless of their body types, and gender identities and expressions. We recognize that the current language on our website marginalizes trans women in particular, even though it says elsewhere that we provide services to “all women.” Although “services” provided at the Clinic are not restricted to our medical programs, we recognize that the way it is written implies that we offer no services at all to trans women, which is marginalizing and confusing. It would be more accurate to say that our goal is to provide medical services to all women, though we are having a difficult time reaching it.

Thankfully, this means Incite! and the NOWHC are in fact the people we thought they were, and are working towards meeting the needs of the women in their communities. Sadly, what we've unearthed are a number of pieces to the puzzle of just how hard it is to do that. That care for trans women is seen as a liability to many. That the clinic is still not getting the support it needs to achieve it's absolutely vital mission.

Better and yet so much worse than I was hoping for.

As for the shit that was thrown about over this in the blogosphere, there's not a lot I feel ok saying much about. Being an ally and not actually sharing in an identity from which people were speaking (trans woman, twoc or woc), I don't really think it's my place to say "you're doing it right/wrong". But I do want to say this, that is that I see some serious creative energy being channeled towards a new project coming directly out of this. That, at least, I feel very confident saying is a really good thing. The rest of it, I really hope to see learning and growth come out of as well. I have nothing but love and respect for everyone involved, all doing their best to deal with a life and death issue for people they care about and/or are allied with or one of.

I will keep you updated on the situation for the NOWHC as it develops. It appears, from their response at Questioning Transphobia, that they are re-evaluating their goals and how they plan to work in the community. If I come across any way for us to help in that, I will absolutely let you all know.

Round up of the week!

Family of woman killed in crash getting hate calls, apparently people are assuming she might be an illegal immigrant because, well, you know, her last name is "Hispanic" sounding.

stuff white people do: think of asians in terms of faceless hordes

Rape In Prison Should Not Be Part Of The Punishment

Whom Can We Touch

Dear Andrea Dworkin

The Burkha Rapper

forced sterilization in africa

Salud, Michael Jackson.

Michael Jackson: Speak A Good Word

Michael Jackson, Celebrity, Empathy, and the Culture of Silence

Another Trans Woman Joins the Remembering Our Dead List

The Matthew Sheppard Foundation Does Not Want Perez Hiltons Money

People why are you sitting idly by, Iran has become Palestine

Plea For Homebirth

Alleged serial rapist of prostitutes caught

A Note On The Food

So I've been eating rancid food all week. I'll admit it's more than little strange that it took be about five days to figure it out, but if you listen to the story Dear Reader, you'll probably agree that I'm not entirely at fault.

consummation

In an instant an entire childhood with full cupboards changed, and I was a nineteen-year-old girl whose parents cut off her food supply, who couldn’t even get a job washing dishes, and at the same time as they started refusing to tell me they loved me without qualifiers and started with “you can never have a family,” I learned that the garbage is a pretty decent place to get a bite to eat.

Scooters and Road Rage

Cis is hostile terminology? Really?

On rape and men (Oh yes, I'm going there)

The Fear of Feminism

The tag attached to the book was from the US Department of Homeland Security

Renga

Pink Saturday: party or police state?

Seattle: Cops Bust Massive Anti-Corporate Pride Criminal Dance Party

Pregnancy As a Sign of Intimate Partner Abuse

Black, Paranoid and Absolutely Right

Professor returns from Chiapas to write life story about Mexican woman

Latino’s born to midwives will no longer be denied passports

Can't Stop the Serenity!

That's where I'll be for most of the day. Watching these awesome peoples:

And these big damn heroes:


No Tweeting, no blogging. Have fun today y'all, tell you about it when I get back!

BART Cop Thought Oscar Grant was a "Bitch-ass Nigger"

This case gets better and better.

BART cop Anthony Pirone called Oscar Grant a "Bitch-ass Nigger," just before fellow BART cop Johannes Mehserle shot Grant to death as he lay face down on the ground, according to the Chron. Pirone was caught hurling the racial epithet on tape, and the bombshell revelation may further help explain how a routine arrest suddenly turned deadly. Pirone, however, maintains that he was merely repeating what Grant had said to him moments before. There is only one problem: Grant can't be heard on the tapes, while Pirone can. Moreover, Pirone has a history of not telling the truth.

via the East Bay Express

Supreme Court Rules for the White Firefighters

*sigh*

We analyzed The New York Times' coverage of this story a couple months ago, well the verdict is in from the SCOTUS and it's about as white privileged as one might have feared.

[Justice Kennedy] concluded that city officials had no "strong basis" for believing the test was flawed and unfair, and therefore, they had no legal basis for setting aside the results.

No strong basis like the city being something like 70% Black and yet not a single Black person passed the test. Nope, the huge disparity isn't good enough.

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, speaking for the liberal dissenters, said it was understandable the white firefighters would "attract the court's empathy. But they had no vested right to a promotion, and no person has received a promotion in preference to them."

Ginsburg said the court's conservative majority ignored the history of discrimination against blacks and Latinos in the New Haven Fire Department.

LOL, the "liberal dissenters," thanks for showing us just where YOUR loyalties lie LA Times! Right, they're "liberal dissenters" not just dissenters, and they're dissenting because they're liberal, because liberals really enjoy participating in "reverse discrimination", right LA Times?

Oy.

That's not to let the city off the hook though. They've largely framed this as "we're afraid of lawsuits!" Why? Why couldn't they frame it as "this test clearly shows a racial bias and we're not ok with that"? Because the SCOTUS decision clearly hinges on the way they presented their case. And in the meantime they tried not to support racism in hiring but did just that by reinforcing stereotypes of people of color as irrational, "reverse racist" and sue happy.

Just seems like a lot of failing all around.

Except for Justice Ginsburg, because she's awesome.

And on that note, the people using this as some sort of "omg a ruling Sotomayor was a part of got over turned she must suck!" hey guess what, the guy she'll be replacing voted with Ginsburg and dissented. Being on the losing side of a 5-4 decision is hardly some catastrophic black mark.

Update on NOWHC and Trans Women

@ Questioning Transphobia

Just wanted to let y’all to know that New Orleans Women’s Health Clinic have gotten back to me. I’m not sure what I can really make public right now (an email is not a press release yeah?), but we are talking.

And on a completely related note, voz is working on a media project.

Relationships with Celebrities and Social Justice Burn-out

A largely self-reflective post...

The thing is: celebrities, they belong to you...to be a writer, an artist, a musician, or any sort of entertainer, is to give people little shreds of yourself - over, and over, and over again...even if you're putting on an act that has a lot of creators, it's still a document of you, what you said or did or how you moved or how you sounded at a certain time; it doesn't exist without you.

If it works - this process of giving yourself to people - it works only because those pieces of you speak to people: they allow people to project their own meanings, or feelings, or needs, or actual or desired identities, onto you. Every single person who takes up that little shred of your life will end up putting more of themselves than of you into it (because they don't know you, obviously) but what they end up with, in the end, is a version of you: a mental construct, maybe (generously) 5% actual You-the-Person and 95% You-as-Composed-of-Associations-and-Projections, some chimerical weird imaginary friend who somehow carries all of the feelings of solace or joy or excitement that they got from your work, and toward whom they feel all the kinship or gratitude or friendliness anyone would naturally feel toward someone who gave them all this, who gave it over and over, saying, implicitly: for you, for you, this is all for you, I love you. Of course, of course, they care about you. You, the Celebrity; You, the Imaginary Friend. Even if you might not actually be able to stand them. Even if they might not actually be able to stand you. Even if you are nothing like what they imagine.

This is a portion of a piece by Tiger Beatdown in reflection on Michael Jackson's passing. And it's a really good piece, and I highly recommend you read it, but the portion I highlighted is what got me thinking, and it got me thinking on an MJ unrelated note.

I guess I have no way to know if my relationship with celebrity is the same or different from other people's. Judging from the outpouring of fans to 'Cons, the proliferation of fan websites, "Fuck Yeah So-and-So" Tumblrs, etc. I'd say it's the same as others. But I'd forgotten for a bit what the fan obsession was like. I remember now, thanks to Joss Whedon's actors. And that is especially appropriate cuz I think my first ones all revolved around sci-fi (Star Trek: TNG and The X-Files) unless they revolved around music (my longest standing, for well over a decade now; Green Day).

What I'd forgotten is how liberating and yet consuming celebrity obsessions are. Sady calls them an "imaginary friend" and yes, yes, that's exactly what you are. You end up feeling like you have a relationship to these people. You see them on interviews and think well "that's really them, they're not acting". But of course they are. I've known actors. I was a drama geek in high school (backstage techie mostly, but I've acted and sung for audiences too).

There are, in my experience, two kinds of performers. The ones who act with their hearts on their sleeves and are very genuine, and the ones who are people you might never really know. Of course the trick to maintaining a fan base is to seem like you're an open book, even if you're not. And the tricksy ones are very, very, good at that, as a general rule. Still, I think you can pick the more genuine ones out. Going back to Joss Whedon, his works are huge at 'Cons, thus his actors go to them. But not all his actors. I don't think Sarah Michelle Geller ever stepped foot in one. But the ones that are MY imaginary friends, they did and still do go.

Not only that but MY imaginary friends do crazy shit like Tweet their exact location or the name of the bar they're at and the city they're in while at it. There's something reciprocal there. They thrive off of us as much as we do them. Of course, we are a mass of faces to them, they are a singular person to us, and there's a certain amount of dehumanization in that, from a fan perspective. But there's definitely something reciprocal. It's obvious at concerts. The energy that flows back and forth at a good concert, gathering in the crowd, projected to the band, gathered by the band, projected back to the crowd...that's what keeps you dancing long after you want to sit back down, and the same must be true for the people on stage.

OK where the hell am I going with these observations... This work that I do, it's fucking exhausting. And let's be perfectly frank, my aunt's death was fucking exhausting in it's own right, and the circumstances surrounding it are right in line with the fucking darkness we're always wading in.

Renee at Womanist Musings, among MANY others but I recall her post off the top of my head, have talked about allies walking away before... Yeah. At some point in the last two weeks I have hit that wall. I can see how it happens. Like many of the WOC I've read about this sort of thing from though, I don't have a choice, really, whether I keep going or not.

I mean, I guess I do... I could lose myself in the rules of the Kyriarchy again (hell; white and beauty privilege!). I play that game OK. Good enough to get by... But not really. Something always outs me as the deviant I am. But I could melt into the background and try. (And full disclosure, I OF COURSE deserve no fucking cookies for NOT doing so.)

This burn out hit right at the time Can't Stop the Serenity was coming around. Perfect time to take a step back, watch some Firefly and gear up for geek convos galore and sing-a-longs. And this converges with Renee pestering me to take up Twitter (thanks again btw) and my knowing Felicia Day has one and adding her and, hold on, very soon after she tells us Nathan Fillion has joined! And really, rather suddenly I find myself in my first full on celebrity crush in quite a while.

And it's so much more...you know...LIGHT (in more than one way) than delving into the darkness of people's souls (which, let's be honest, is what us social justice types are doing, isn't it? we see some ugly shit, in each other and ourselves and the world at large, and on a regular basis, like EVERY DAY). And it's weirdly fulfilling to indulge in this because...there's that reciprocity. That weird give and take. Because they do, like Sady says, they, these celebrities, give and give and give of themselves, for us, for me. Not just their success rides on them doing so, but, I think, from those I know with the drive to perform, a very primal need compels them too.

Of course, they disappoint us too. I wouldn't have two already in a series of posts on "People I love Who Do Shit I Hate" otherwise. Hell, Nate is in that first post! But it's still a refreshing break. Because you can retreat into your little brain, into your imagination, because, like Sady said, 95% of what these people are to us are our own projections anyway, they are what we want them to be. And our brains are so awesome that it can SEEM very real, like the utter infatuation of falling in love before you REALLY know a person. Similar dynamics at work, I think. And like with falling in love, the more you indulge, the more you WANT to indulge...

So, anyway...I might be in a cycle of re-centering right now, and didn't want to just let myself fade away without saying a thing (if that is in fact what happens which I'm not at all sure of). There has been so much going on in the world, blogging and outside, that I've been putting up a lot of links lately and letting them speak for themselves. I do believe in spreading the good words and works of others. It's a function of ally-hood, imo, to ring to your audience what they might not otherwise see. But things might slow down a bit as I center myself again and perhaps cultivate my specific point of view for this blog a bit more. What I won't do, is clutter this blog with frivolous posts because that's how I'm feeling atm, that's just not what I'm doing here. But if random pictures of art and cool quotes and good looking celebrity men sound entertaining, check out my Tumblr; Rags 'N' Bones.

But you know, probably I just need to come up for breath for a minute, and will be right back to it tomorrow...

Well, Some Good News!

The Jena 6 Are Free!

Oakland, CA- The organization that led the online mobilization in support of the Jena Six today applauded news that five of the young men have pleaded no contest to greatly reduced charges—a development the group called a just resolution to the racially-charged case. Though the defendants had initially been charged with attempted murder and conspiracy, they ultimately pleaded no contest to simple battery, and will serve a sentence of just 7 days of probation.

ColorOfChange.org said Friday that the plea deal marked an acknowledgement by officials that the Louisiana justice system initially treated the then-teenage boys too harshly, privileging white students’ accounts of a schoolyard fight over those of black students in the largely segregated town of Jena.

“Today’s plea deal shows that the original charges in the case were unfair and vastly overblown,” said James Rucker, ColorOfChange.org’s executive director. “The story of the Jena 6 was an extreme example of what can happen when a justice system biased against black boys operates unchecked. But it’s also an example of what can happen when hundreds of thousands of people across the country stand up to challenge unequal justice. Together, we drew the country’s attention to this case and raised the money necessary to fund a strong legal defense.”

More at the link! w00t!

Suspects in Dragging Freed

h/t Renee

“A Black man’s life is still not worth a white man’s life in Paris, Texas,” said activist Anthony Bond. “I am 55 years old and I know racism when I see it. Paris, Texas, is eaten up with racism.”

Bond was among 300 people who protested June 8 at the courthouse in Paris after the special prosecutor suddenly dropped murder charges against two white men accused of murdering a Black youth last September.

Jacqueline McClelland, mother of the dragging
victim, speaks to rally. She is surrounded by
members of the New Black Panther Party,
Nation of Islam, Tarrant County Local
Organizing Committee and the NAACP.

The New Black Panther Party, the Nation of Islam and Concerned Citizens for Racial Equality organized the rally.

Brandon McClelland’s mangled body was found on Sept. 16, 2008, on a country road. Authorities estimated that it had been dragged more than 70 feet.

McClelland’s family and members of the Black community who attended the protest stressed that the dismissals were the real injustice, and another example of racial inequality in Paris, a town with a long history of violent racism.

Shannon Finley and Charles Crostley, the two white men who had been arrested for McClelland’s murder, walked out of jail on June 4 with no restrictions.

At the courthouse rally, where a monument to the Confederacy dominates the lawn, McClelland’s mother and father spoke to the crowd through tears. Jackie McClelland said the dropped charges show that the justice system treats Blacks and whites in Paris unequally.

“I said from the start they were going to sweep this under the rug,” she said. “And nine months later, that’s exactly what happened. This was a hate crime. We couldn’t even have an open casket for my son.”

“What if it was your son? Would you fight for your kid?” said Bobby McCleary, McClelland’s father. “I miss that one word my son used to say: Pops. He didn’t call me Dad. He called me Pops.”

Rock Banks, who said he was a “grand titan” in the East Texas Ku Klux Klan, angered the crowd during the rally. He held up a small patch displaying a Nazi-era Iron Cross. After a near confrontation, he was forced to leave.

Activists vowed to get the Department of Justice to take an interest in the case. They have begun writing letters to the White House and Attorney General Eric Holder. “It’s going to be a huge campaign to get the attorney general involved,” said Deric Muhammad of the Nation of Islam in Houston. “They released two killers on a maybe. They released two killers on a might be. They released two killers on an if.”

The district attorney released Finley and Crostley after defense attorneys suddenly produced a truck driver who said he may have accidentally hit McClelland. The district attorney had given the truck driver immunity for his statement.

Protesters carried signs saying, “We Want Justice,” and “Where is the Justice for Brandon?” Using a bullhorn, organizers led chants of “Black Power,” and “No Justice, No Peace.”

A national rally to protest the dragging death of McClelland is planned for July 21, the day that the murder trial had been scheduled to begin.

Paris also made national news in 2007 when an African-American student, Shaquanda Cotton, was sentenced to seven years in a Texas Youth Commission jail for pushing a teacher’s aide. Months earlier, the same judge had given a white teen probation for burning her family’s house down.

Cotton was finally freed after a national campaign on her behalf.

Paris is located in East Texas, known for its long history of racism and Ku Klux Klan activities. In 1998 another Black man, James Byrd Jr., was dragged to death in Jasper, 200 miles south of Paris.

According to the Dallas Morning News, Paris was the site of one of the country’s most notorious “spectacle” lynchings in 1893, when 10,000 people gathered to watch the torture and burning of Henry Smith, a Black man who was accused of killing the 3-year-old daughter of a white policeman.

Smith had fled to a small town near Hope, Ark., but was caught and brought back to Paris by train. Word traveled that he had been brought back and spectators came from miles around, using “special excursion trains” to travel from Dallas.

Smith was placed on top of a wagon and paraded around the town square, then taken to a prairie south of the Texas & Pacific railroad depot, where scaffolding had been built for the occasion.

Ida B. Wells cited this case in “The Red Record: Tabulated Statistics and Alleged Causes of Lynching in the United States,” printed in 1895, which documented her research on and campaign against lynching.

Three decades later, in 1920, a Paris mob killed brothers Herman and Irving Arthur, Black sharecroppers, who were accused of killing their white landlords.

The brothers, who claimed self-defense, were taken from the Lamar County Jail to the fairgrounds where, according to the Dallas Morning News, they were chained to a flagpole and burned. The mob then dragged their bodies through the Black neighborhood of Paris.

New Black Panther Party organizer Sister Krystal Muhammad told Workers World the group is getting endorsers and organizing around the state for the demonstration on July 21. “We will not stop organizing until there is justice for Brandon. Racist murderers cannot be allowed to kill with impunity!”

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Articles copyright 1995-2009 Workers World. Verbatim copying and distribution of this entire article is permitted in any medium without royalty provided this notice is preserved.

Trans Inclusive ENDA Introduced

Link!

Yesterday the Trans inclusive version of ENDA (Employment Non-Discrimination Act) was put forward once again in the House of Representatives by Barney Frank (and with bi-partisan support).

Last time we rode this train, trans people got thrown under it to get the bill passed for the LGB communities.

Hopefully, this time will not be a repeat.

Links!

My weekly Round up of interesting links from the last week!

ICE to Receive Expanded Powers in Drug Offenses

The Obamas: Just like us!

Salon Says Your Disabling Pain is Imaginary

Immigrant woman’s baby taken away because she couldn’t communicate with hospital staff

Venezuela, in 2002, Pioneered the Events in Iran in 2009

Test That Found Widespread Unconscious Racial Bias Validated

But We’re Not Talking About Blacks

What Are The Yogyakarta Principles?

Bad Apples in A Decaying Orchard

Court Sticks Mom of 4 with 2 Million Dollar Fine for File-sharing

64 Word For Aung San Suu Kyi

fluency and coalition

We as a society give so much more credit to a white person who is fluent in a third world or people of color language, cultural style and lifestyle than we give to a person of color or third world person who learns intimately a white person’s language and cultural style.

as far as the world is concerned, its almost like it didnt happen. for gazans, its like it never ended

Invisible People

Immigrant Narratives : Choose Your Mother or Your Child

non-violence, palestine, and land

Banning the Burqa in France

Feminism: The White Women Are Chatting

WOC erasure at Civil Rights game

some posts about the iranian protests

Publishing from the Margins

excerpts from cynthia mckinney

simple health care

No Country for Men and Fathers?

Unauthorized Youth Rise Against Oppression Nationwide

Incite!, New Orleans Womens Health Clinic and the Exclusion of Trans-Women

Well this isn't a post I ever thought I'd write... And I'll be honest, I'm hesitant to even write it. I feel like I'm on the wrong side of the fence, of ALL the fences, for this discussion. But an ally has to put her money where her mouth is when asked to, right? Right.

So. There's a bunch of shit going on right now. Many of you have probably heard about it already. Certainly if you're on my Twitter feed you have. But for those who haven't, a bit of background: the New Orleans Womens Health Clinic came into being in the wake of hurricane Katrina (and I asked for donations for them here, as well as donated myself, as hurricane Gustav looked to make a repeat of that disaster).

In their mission statement it says: "NOWHC provides sexual and reproductive health services to all women regardless of their race, ethnicity, sexual preference, gender identity and expression, ability, faith, income level, citizenship status, work sector, or age – in a caring, respectful, and confidential environment."

Sounds, like, perfect, right?

But then: "We are currently not able to provide care to trans people who were male assigned at birth or who have had genital sex reassignment surgery. Please call for referrals."

This discrepancy was brought to light by Queen Emily, a trans woman of color who lives in New Orleans and was looking for health services.

Naturally, there was an outcry. An outcry which has taken several forms. The first reaction of some has been to want to defend Incite! and NOWHC, others have called for accountability via AMC which is happening very soon, and others have asked for those with connections to Incite! to help them get a meeting with those organizers. I strongly support those last two proposals, and I also want to stress that this is a discussion that really needs to center trans women of color. Because a lot of the conversations I have been reading, honestly? just haven't done that. This is also part of the reason I was hesitant to post, I'm not sure if another cis (especially white and cis) woman's voice is what this discussion needs, but voz_latina asked me to help spread the word about her proposal and so...here I am.

And, because as bfp reminded me on Twitter, there are serious and real life *consequences* for NO trans and cis women of color because of what actually happens at NOWHC from here on out. And yes, there really, really, are. And I think both the AMC proposal as well at the NY meeting proposal actually propel us forward, so that the NOWHC and Incite! understand that despite best intentions they are being exclusionary, and that exclusion could cost twoc their lives. That part really can't be forgotten in all the rest of the stuff that has been brought up around this issue.

‘Dollhouse’ Star Eliza Dushku Reveals Gay Storylines, Possible Cameo By Nathan Fillion

First Alan Tudyk, then Felicia Day, now Nathan Fillion? Could it be?

Eliza wouldn’t give any huge plot points away about the second season of “Dollhouse,” but she did say that there would definitely be some storylines following gay and lesbian characters, and some storylines that would follow her own “adventures” she’s had traveling to Uganda assisting the rehabilitation of child soldiers.

“Last season we already had an idea for a Liberian child soldiers story and it just didn’t make it into the first 13. Now with the second season, we have a lot of stories that we’re looking forward to telling,” she says. “I sort of do my crazy adventures and come up and share them with him and they pop up in the scripts.… We aim to be socially and politically relevant.”

News has already broke that “Firefly” alum Alan Tudyk will reprise his role as Alpha next season, but Dushku did tease that “Castle” star and “Firefly” alum Nathan Fillion might be the next to join the team.

“We didn’t get Fills on [season one],” she said, “but you know, never say never.”