It was fun! Not a lot to tell, I was out on the street, there were many of us, two of "them" and it sounded like the rally itself was having a good ol' time but I had a hard time hearing it. I did see the beginning, where they did some smudging, which was awesome, I could smell the sage all the way at the back. And they did some drumming and then again at the end which was nice. We had two-spirit representatives as a part of that, which was pretty cool to me because it seems like transgender folks have gotten sort of elided in the fight. Overall it felt nice to be out with people, creating collective energy, and there was a LOT of honking for us. Honking from people of all ages AND ethnic backgrounds tyvm.
Oh, the sign I finally decided to go with! I got a poster board that was orange on one side and purple on the other. On the orange side I wrote "'Defending TRADITIONAL Marriage'?? Are you bringing back DOWRIES and MARITAL RAPE too?? No thanks!" On the purple side it said "Obama was AGAINST 8!" \o/ One of my favorite signs said "Don't you want Dumbledore to be happy? Let him marry!" I spent most of the time chatting with the two women standing next to me, one an obvious middle class Cali born white woman like me and the other an immigrant from Kenya who said after talking with her particular community after the voting she found a lot of them didn't really understand what they were voting for and said we really need to go into the community and educate to change that. They were both cool. The only thing that bothered me was this one older man of apparently Asian descent who kept yelling at the guys across the street "religion is the root of all evil!" That made me sad because I don't think it's true. The pronouncement did get me thinking about something I read at The Wild Hunt today though, something I think we forget in all this is that some religions are having THEIR beliefs trampled by other religions in this fight.
Overall though, good times.
*EDIT* I'm sharing pictures through my Tumblr: Rags'n'Bones as I find them!
hey whatshername! i found you on the Feministing blog, and was glad to hear feedback on the Oakland protest! i am one of the organizers, and i also thought it was a beautiful day, complete with the laughable "counter-protest" (i didn't even bother to mention them on my blog :)
ReplyDeletestop on by, i have links to more gorgeous pics too. btw, i love the pic on the Rag n' Bones link with the older Asian woman with the sign pointing at the counter-protester "<- in denial of being Gay" hilarious. and probably sadly true. sad because i wouldn't wish that level of internalized oppression on anyone. I guess it still is internalized oppression anyways....
great blog. hope you have enjoyed this sunny Oakland day.
~richard
http://fem-men-ist.blogspot.com
hey! i *loved* that sign! i've got a picture of it in my flickr set: http://flickr.com/photos/siriosa/3043816157/
ReplyDeleteThere's a few signs in that pic, which did you love? :D
ReplyDeletei loved lots of them, but specifically your "defending traditional marriage? dowries and marital rape? no thanks!!" right on!
ReplyDeleteYay! Thanks! I thought it was a good message, this isn't just about gays marrying, it's a really specific effort on these people's parts to get marriage "traditional" and I think most of us hetero's too prefer it the way it's become...About love!
ReplyDelete