Showing posts with label social justice. Show all posts

Thursday, January 19, 2012

On Mullen and the Black Spot

I've been working on my opinion of this whole Mullen mess for a while now. I've been hesitant to post something condemning the administration, but I guess the time for the higher path of reason has passed. Last night, in a meeting at Mullen, the administrators alleged that recruiting violations occurred at Mullen during Logan's tenure as coach and asserted that those alleged violations were the reason they fired him. In reading that, I made up my mind.
Why would you wait until last night night to make as-yet-unsubstantiated allegations public after releasing statements a week prior that gave no indication of foul play but instead focused on the need for a full-time coach?
I'm sorry, but that looks pathetic. It looks like a weak attempt to divert some of the attention away from the people who are calling for the resignation of the administrators and the board. It looks like the worst possible PR move to have made. They're running scared and they're desperate to find a way out.
There have been whispers of recruiting violations at Mullen for years. YEARS. I started there in the fall of 2003, and even then, there was talk of our heavy recruiting. And yet, I don't believe for a single second that these alleged violations were solely practiced by Logan and that the administrators and board were blind. I think that the whispers of Clement wanting the QB coaching job carry more weight than he wants to admit.
Honestly, I don't care if there were recruiting violations. I will wait for proof. I will wait to see what CHSAA has to say about it. As far as I know, most schools do it. Both Regis and Valor have been found to have committed minor infractions.
This goes so much deeper than just Dave Logan. In speaking to some of my friends from high school about it, they say that they stopped caring about Mullen after one of our English teachers was fired for saying the N-word (in was in the context of a story they were reading in class). That teacher never should have been fired; he was a brilliant educator. He approached as us though we were adults (which, when you're 14 and desperate to be seen as an adult - or at the very least, a young adult, is a wonderful thing) and enabled us to view the material through a more focused lens. It was the foundation for critical thinking. It was about expanding your boundaries and coming face-to-face with material that you might not have otherwise examined. While I have no idea what happened to the kid involved with that, I will posit that he was immature and unable to separate the fictive world of literature with the realities of our modern society.
Since I left Mullen in 2006 - with 9 college credits stemming from my time in Advanced Placement classes, no less, I have heard very little good news. I'd be hard-pressed to find a good piece of press about them that's not football-related (and now, just a good piece of press in general). I'm saddened to see that attempts to bring the school back to its former glory have all but destroyed its reputation in the Denver community. I'm disgusted to hear about some of the changes that have gone on. For further proof, look to the teachers. Mullen has lost more good teachers than it can replace.
The petition that I mentioned earlier this week now has nearly 1300 signatures. I signed, not just because I think that firing Dave Logan was an epic show of idiocy but because I think that Mullen is not the place that it once was. I learned to read good and do other stuff good too, but I also learned a hell of a lot more. I learned about faith - I am not a practicing Catholic due to criticisms relating to the hypocrisy of the Pope and the church structure, but I believe that my time at Mullen taught me how to live a life full of the truest values of any religion: respect, tolerance, kindness, giving, knowledge. Social justice as a principle is something that has been a constant throughout my education and I value that immensely.
These people, both the administration and the board, are preaching Christian values but are acting exactly the opposite. It's a shame to see Christ so misrepresented. I hate to see that lying, deceit, and a complete lack of transparency can be offered up as examples of pure LaSallian values. I'm disappointed, but more than that, I'm embarrassed.

By the way, if and when Logan takes the open coaching job at Creek, they're going to crush our team. And it's sad to see the football players and other students used as pawns in some power grab. They lost more than a coach - a few probably lost their futures. Way to go, Gmelich and Clement. Way to take a good thing and shit all over it. This is not something that will blow over any time soon. You're looking at a black spot.

Edited at 12:04pm: Speaking to someone who was at the meeting, I am becoming more and more nervous about my own graduate school application. My source tells me that a girl going through the interview process at Duke spent most of her interview defending her decision to go to Mullen. Great news for me, especially since I'm applying to a local school. I certainly hope that I don't have to spend my interview wishing I'd gone to Thomas Jefferson or George Washington instead. (That was something I never thought I'd say.)

POST PREPS

Mullen High reveals recruiting violations in football program

POSTED: 01/19/2012 01:00:00 AM MST
UPDATED: 01/19/2012 08:17:22 AM MST

By Eric Gorski and Neil H. Devlin
The Denver Post

Mullen High School parents wait for the start of a 90-minute meeting Wednesday where the recruiting violations were announced. The meeting at times turned tense, with some audience members shouting and interrupting school officials. Karl Gehring, The Denver Post

In a tense meeting Wednesday night, the chief executive of Mullen High School announced the school had notified the Colorado High School Activities Association of recruiting violations committed by the staff of former football coach Dave Logan, who was fired last week.

"This is a Mullen failure, top to bottom," Ryan Clement, the Catholic school's president and CEO, told a packed room on campus. "And we need to fix it. ... We are Mullen. The standard is different."

Mullen stunned the Colorado sports community by firing Logan after a nine-year tenure during which he won four state championships. Not until Wednesday did school officials mention recruiting violations.

Logan said Wednesday night that in his 19 years of

EXTRAS

Read a statement from Mullen president and CEO Ryan Clement.

coaching football, he has never been sanctioned.

"I would just say that I find the timing of this a bit curious," said Logan, a former star prep quarterback who played in the NFL for the Cleveland Browns and Denver Broncos before embarking on a successful coaching and broadcasting career. "We'll find out what the allegations are, then I'll stand up and deal with it head-on.

"I've conducted myself for 19 years as a head football coach with integrity and have not deviated from that," he said. "I've never deviated from that."

A source familiar with the report of violations said it stems from an Oct. 21 game against Arapahoe High School in which eighth-graders were on the Mullen sideline during the game.

The practice is barred because it could give schools an unfair advantage in recruiting students. The students were later asked to sit in the stands, the source said.

Clement said last week that Logan was fired because the school wanted its football coach to be a full-time faculty member who can "be engaged in every facet" of the school.

Clement elaborated on that Wednesday, saying that in their final conversation with Logan last week, he and principal Jim Gmelich expressed concern that the school's compliance with state rules suffered because there wasn't a full-time commitment to the job.

"This is not the first time these conversations were had," Clement said.

He said that after Logan made his firing public, Mullen leadership has worked "to get to the bottom of the most obvious violations" and reported them to the CHSAA on Wednesday.

He said there also was evidence of other violations. He said the school leadership will develop a "comprehensive and independent" process to determine other possible violations and also create a "more rigorous protocol" to ensure the infractions are not repeated.

"This will be a difficult process but it is necessary — in fact, there is little doubt it is past due," he said.

Clement did not go into detail about the violations, and both he and Gmelich declined interview requests after the meeting.

Jeff Braun, a defensive coordinator last season at Mullen, said the accusations "are just false. I just think they are coming up with an excuse to try to get rid of a good staff."

Paul Angelico, Colorado High School Activities Association commissioner, said the association hasn't had time to review the material from Mullen.

Under CHSAA rules, Mullen is required to give notice of any infractions and lay out a corrective action plan, Clement said. If CHSAA accepts the school's efforts at self-enforcement, no additional penalties will be imposed, he said. Mullen has not faced any previous sanctions for recruiting violations.

Both public and private schools have occasionally been slapped on the wrist for recruiting violations by CHSAA. In a recent series, The Denver Post discovered that numerous schools, including Valor Christian and Regis Jesuit, have broken CHSAA rules regarding recruiting, most of them minor.

Mullen board chairman Kurt Caulson told the standing-room-only crowd that the board was 100 percent behind Clement's decision to fire Logan.

Gmelich, who took over as Mullen principal this year after a stint at Regis, said "systemic issues" exist at Mullen.

Logan's firing has caused turmoil in the tight-knit Mullen community. Clement acknowledged it was "a difficult hour" for the college-preparatory school, which has a rich tradition of academic and athletic success and of helping subsidize the educations of less-fortunate students.

Speaker after speaker Wednesday complained about the administration's lack of transparency and failure to communicate.

When Clement said being football coach can't be a part-time job, one man in the back yelled, "It can't be? It has been!"

"We absolutely love this place," said Jim Healy, a parent of Mullen graduates. "What we have right now is an absolute lack and vacuum of leadership and no trust at all."

Not everyone was critical, however. Some backed the administration, and one speaker expressed dismay at the "lynch mob mentality" in the room.

Clement, a former quarterback at Mullen, also refuted reports that he was angling to coach at the school.

He said the search for a new coach would begin next week and be "open, inclusive and transparent." He also praised Logan for his hard work, commitment to results and success.

However, he said, "we believe it is time for a new start."

Eric Gorski: 303-954-1971 oregorski@denverpost.com

Read more:Mullen High reveals recruiting violations in football program - The Denver Post http://www.denverpost.com/preps/ci_19771784#ixzz1jvIXqkP0
Read The Denver Post's Terms of Use of its content: http://www.denverpost.com/termsofuse

Source: The Denver Post online (article linked here)

Thursday, October 06, 2011

"Shame on all of you."

Yesterday's post got me thinking.

Racism blows. We can reiterate that until we're blue in the face.

And qualifying my perspective as being that of a white person isn't nearly enough.
I need to qualify myself as educated, white, woman, and liberal.
That changes things.

I compared it to being gay. (Why? I don't know - it was the easiest [not the best] way to make my point during our lunch discussion.) I spend so much time around my gay friends that I don't see them as gay. It's normalized for me. It's not a thing. There's no need to draw a line, to point out the distinctions, to separate.

I want my kids to be so exposed to people that they stop seeing lines and start seeing people.

It's the same as being _____. [Insert "other" there.]

The more we talk about "other," the more we emphasize it. The more we dwell.

Then I started thinking about the real world. (Sighing as I type this. Oh, real world.) There's not as much integration, not as much teamwork, community building, respect, tolerance....my list could go on.... as there could be. Certain solutions to "other"-ism or "other"-phobia aren't going to work for people with different mindsets - I forget that. The solution remains elusive.

But I would like to point out that even as we evolve to tolerate and eventually accept one "other," we replace it with another "other."

Division based on class differences, social differences, education differences: we're all guilty of it. I think part of being human is forming bonds with people who share similarities to you and then ostracizing people who don't have those interests, features, or characteristics. It's up to us to transcend that.

It's hard, though. I judge stupid people for doing stupid things. I'm sure people judge me for doing stupid shit all the time. I judge girls who wear Ugg boots, yet I get judged for my "if you can't wear it with black flats, why are you wearing it at all?" mentality (I do consider that judgement entirely deserved, for the record. I've grown out of Birkenstock mode...at least until I find my other black clog). I really try to promote a sense of solidarity among women, yet I know a few women I'd like to punch in the face. So here I am, being just as much of a hypocrite as the rest of us. At least I'm thinking about it, though.

Granted, we all aren't going to get along. It's not possible. But we should at least strive to respect and understand. Also, not possible. But ideal. And beautiful.

I was going to post last week about the suicide of a gay teen on the East Coast. I didn't. I was too disgusted (not by him, by his tormentors). After his death, the people who taunted him continued to do so. They said they were glad he was dead. That the world was a better place. For him, it didn't get better. That's one reason we need to stop spreading hate.

That night I was watching the Big Bang Theory at home. And this clip really put it all into perspective for me. Please watch it.

A girl brings home a rather unintelligent date, and her neighbors (all science geeks) make fun of him mercilessly.

Zach (date): "Oh, I see. You guys are inferring that I'm stupid."

Sheldon (one of the neighbors): "That's not correct. We were implying it. You then inferred it."

...

Penny (girl): "You know, for a group of guys who claim they spent most of their lives being bullied, you can be real jerks. Shame on all of you."

Truth.

Thursday, September 29, 2011

On #OccupyDenver, #OccupyWallSt

It started here yesterday, a show of solidarity with those who have been gathered in New York for 12 days, protesting nearly everything, but agreeing on only one thing: We are the 99% vs the 1%.

(Read this for more information:

https://occupywallst.org/

and read this just because:

http://wearethe99percent.tumblr.com/ )

I love the idea of protests. I think that we haven't done enough of them in last twenty years. I think that a lot of hope can be fostered, and a lot of information can be spread.

That said, I agree that protesters are often ill-informed and easily distracted away from their original purpose.

I haven't decided where I stand on these protests - I'm not sure that they're focused enough to actually be making specific demands, but it seems like they've gotten only more organized since they started. I like that they've got the resolve to stick it out, and I fully support a more vocal movement from the citizens of the US. So I guess I'm behind it.

If you're on twitter, check out #occupydenver or #occupywallst for up to date information on what's going on.

And as always, if you're protesting, write a lawyer's number somewhere on your body, drink plenty of water, and do nothing to disrespect or disrupt the marches/protests. Be respectful, peaceful, and wise.

Occupy Wall Street Protest: 12 Days and Little Sign of Slowing Down

By: NATE RAWLINGS

Topics: NATION, NEW YORK, OCCUPY WALL STREET, POLITICS, PROTEST, U.S.,WALL STREET

A protestor looks in his bag in Zuccotti Park, where demonstrators against the economic system have been gathering since September 17

Michael Nagle / Getty Images

Nearly two weeks ago, an estimated 3,000 people assembled at Battery Park with the intention of occupying Wall Street. They were an eclectic group, mostly young, some with beards and tattoos, other dressed in shorts and sneakers; a few even wore suits for the occasion. But nearly everyone was angry at what they saw as a culture of out-of-control greed. They didn't succeed — at least not geographically, forgoing Wall Street for nearby Zuccotti Park, just around the corner from Ground Zero.

News outlets put the crowd there at several thousand, but that seemed to overestimate its true numbers. When I visited the park on Sept. 17, I counted backpacks and sleeping bags, trying to differentiate the tourists and casual marchers from those who were in it for the long haul. I came up with about 200 people.

(MORE: Police Use Pepper Spray on Wall Street Protesters)

Over the past 12 days, however, those numbers have grown. On a late-night visit to Zuccotti Park on Tuesday, the fecklessness and disorganization reported earlier in the New York Times seemed largely absent. A protest that began in utter dysfunction has given way to a fairly organized movement with a base camp for its most stalwart members, now numbering more than 300 people, who have slept in the park for 12 nights straight–and who say they intend to stay.

Perhaps no incident galvanized the protesters more than their march north to Union Square on Sept. 24. Police arrested nearly 80 people whom they say were blocking traffic, and video of a penned-in female protester being pepper sprayed by a police officer went viral on the web. The protesters have posted the video on their website and a picture of the woman adorns the board at the entrance to the park, at what's now become the groups quasi-official information booth. At small table, posterboards lay out the schedule for the day, which includes marches down to Wall Street for the stock exchange's opening and closing bells, each followed by a "General Assembly" where the various groups gather to discuss their goals, their current status and what might come next.

The park has become a semi-permanent home, complete with a medical station and a distribution point for food and water. The protesters have organized themselves into committees to remove the garbage, roam the camp to enforce a ban on open flames (an evictable offense in the eyes of the NYPD) and engage with the people in the area. A couple of pizza joints, a Burger King and a deli have let the protesters use their bathrooms; some have even donated food. In the middle of the park is a media center where protesters send out Twitter updates and live-stream the latest news on their website. At 1 am Wednesday, more than 3,000 people were sending in questions while a young woman in a yellow poncho answered them on a live feed.

But while "Occupy Wall Street" has become more organized, its demands haven't coalesced into a coherent message. The only thing its various constituent groups appear to have in common is a deep-seated anger at inequality in this country. For them Wall Street symbolizes that unfairness, but the groups have other concerns as well. Many want to redistribute wealth; others want to enlarge government social programs. Some are protesting against the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Daniel Levine, a journalism student from upstate New York, said he was taking a stand against the controversial method of natural gas extraction known as hydrofracking in his hometown – but also noted that the practice can bring jobs to economically disadvantaged regions.

Just as it lacks a single message, the "Occupy Wall Street" movement has been defined by the absence of a clear leader. Participants say that is by design, and point to the committees that have sprung up to tend to the daily needs of those camped in Zuccotti Park. It isn't clear that they want a single leader, and many think the movement is better of without one. “It's kind of cool how it's growing organically,” one said. “People just need to give it time and it'll come together.”

Assuming organizers can keep the protest on the good side of the law, all indications are that it will continue for a long time. A sign by the information booth held a wish list: hats, gloves, tarps, and warm clothing. On live streams on the website, organizers answered questions about what supporters could bring or send. If last weekend is any indication, the numbers could swell this Saturday as supporters come in from out of town. For those who eventually leave again, Levine hopes that they take the skills they've learned back to their communities to continue to protest for whatever cause they support. "Every person who's been here more than three days can completely organize a protest in their hometowns," Levine says. "This is the most productive homelessness I've ever seen."

Friday, September 16, 2011

On Suburban Segregation

Not necessary reading material (because it's just an infograph), but something worth looking at to prove that I'm not entirely insane: Suburbanization of Poverty

Wet and cold (at least I was), we headed home from last Monday night's Bronco game via public transportation. Mike and I found ourselves at Colfax and Broadway at half past midnight, seated on a wet and cold park bench.

That bus stop is always busy, and half past midnight on an early Tuesday morning is no different. As we sat, people surrounded us, all talking about the game. But what caught my attention was the fact that they hadn't gone to the game as spectators, they had gone as employees. Kettle corn, beer, other food-service.
The commonality was football statistics; the man behind me knows more about football than I ever will; the crazy man pacing knows much less.

I felt guilty, shamed by my spectator-status as they discussed what had gone on behind the scenes and counted out their tips. One guy had a fistful of one-dollar bills. I was tempted to tell him to shove them back in his pocket, lest someone steal them. (Cape Town really got that in my brain. Last Saturday when I was out, I found that I had stashed $42 in my bra, just in case.)

The bus was not coming. I was grumpy.

I listened to the girl a few seats down start talking about where she was staying (Mississippi and Sable) and how long it was going to take her to get home (forever) - but then I got the impression that she was still in high school. And possibly homeless.
The guy next to her was also headed out to Aurora.

To my great relief, the bus finally came and we squished on. (For the record, people in Denver have no idea what a crowded bus is - they were balking at the prospect of having to move back and squeeze in, claiming that the bus was "full." Not full at all, but I wasn't in the mood to get stern.)

As the bus lumbered up Colfax, it stopped at nearly every stop to add more people. You'd think, perhaps, that as the bus left the city center, it would slowly empty rather than filling. No. It seemed that everyone was headed east. What's east? First of all, the Colorado Blvd connection (and the #40 bus), but second, and more importantly, Aurora.

Whenever I bemoan my situation (as I so love to do), I'm absolutely overlooking the fact that I have a support system. That I have transportation, that I have Simon.

I'm overlooking the fact that, like the girl seated a few seats away, there are varying degrees of homelessness in our city. Not everyone who's technically homeless has a cardboard sign and wants your money. They're sleeping on people's couches; they're crashing at a friend's place; they're staying awake all night; they're riding the bus around until they get somewhere. That's how people manage not to freeze during winters in Chicago - they ride the train until the end of the line and then turn around and do it all over again.

I'm overlooking the fact that I don't have an hour-long commute each way. I don't have to be dependent on the bus, something that can add hours to any commute, anywhere. I don't have to get on the bus with my arms loaded with groceries.

Unlike the woman with at least three, possibly four, kids and two strollers, I don't have to rely on the kindness of others to get my family safely off the bus. The kids reminded us of the township creches. They were cute, polite, but desperately needed clean clothes and baths. And a decent bedtime.

In Cape Town, the suburbs hold populations that fall into varying classifications of income levels, from the rich (Camps Bay) to the poor (Steenberg) to the poorer (Lavender Hill) to the townships (Vrygrond) to the informal settlements (Village Heights). As you go further down the income ladder, you find that the population density increases exponentially, as does the crime rate. But what falls at an equal rate is access to transportation.

Poorer neighborhoods are further from access to trains. Instead, they have to take a minibus from their neighborhood, probably to another minibus, then eventually to the train. This adds to their commute and can be a determining factor in their employment status.

Vrygrond was strategically placed away from train lines. The white Cape Townians didn't want the colored and black populations to have access to the transportation, but instead, wanted them to remain in their designated neighborhoods.

Minibuses, the other transportation alternative to trains, are dangerous. I've never been so harassed as I was on the trains and minibuses in Cape Town. It's the touching that really gets you. You're either about to be groped or robbed, and neither are pleasant. But people have to do that every day. Sitting on top of strangers, next to strangers, pushed up against them.

It's funny because just as the transportation effectively cuts off the poorest, it also secludes the richest. You can't take public transportation to Camps Bay, the wealthy, white side of Table Mountain. You have to take a cab.

In Cape Town, when I was finding jobs for the unemployed, many of the ads stipulated that people be from certain areas only. For a country that has come so far from Apartheid, it's disheartening to see such blatant discrimination.

Is that what we want here? A segregated workforce? But more importantly than that, is that what we're eventually going to have? Are we becoming a more diverse population or a more segregated one as time passes?

As someone who usually has access to transportation, it's a wake-up call to realize how much your life can be affected by the inability to commute. Mobility is a key to success. By continuing to eliminate entire populations of workers by simply making it difficult for them to access transportation, we're effectively ensuring that only a select portion of people will be able to apply for, and eventually obtain, those jobs.

We need to focus on building effective transportation systems that are easily accessible, by everyone. We need more trains. We need more bus-only lanes. We need a swifter boarding process. We need to be able to get to the Denver airport via train. We need to be quick about it.

Wednesday, August 10, 2011

On "The Help"

I have not had time to really read a book from start to finish in a long time.

Instead, I do what I normally do: start a book, read about a hundred and fifty pages, and set it down. I'll start another book, then pick up that first book and finish it, or at least get a little further, and then repeat the cycle.

Pretty soon I'm halfway through about five books and finished with none.

One of my co-workers lent me the book "The Help."

And so, with recently atypical abandon, I went to town on that book. Literally devoured it. I read nearly three hundred pages the first night.

The movie comes out today, and the blogosphere is up in arms about the racist-ness of the movie.

I'm rolling my eyes. Not because I'm a white bitch, but because I read something totally different in the book. Of course, it might be that I'm always wearing my feminism lenses.

Here's the article that basically sums up a lot of the backlash: Why I'm Just Saying No to The Help

Before I begin, let me note that I don't think the author of the article read the book.

Her refusal to see the movie is based on a whole bunch of other things - like people's opinions and their reviews of the movie.

That's all fine, but it strikes me as interesting that people are so quick to label this movie as one of those white-people-reinforcing sort of deals. Like, "oh, let's take pity on the blacks. Those poor blacks, where would they be without us whites?"

Bullshit.

We're so over-critical these days. We're hot on the lawsuits, quick to jump to a conclusion, way less forgiving, and super focused on political correctness.

This book was not like the "Blind Side," as some are claiming. By the way, how would the story of Michael Oher have been a different one had it not been framed by his race?

(Don't get me wrong, there are serious race issues still in play today. And there are still a disproportionate number of under-educated, underemployed blacks. Expectations and cultural disparities exist. The prevailing attitudes and undercurrents are still not about equality. But that's not always the case. And we can't always revert to that rule - in my opinion, that sort of thinking helps perpetuate the oppression, self-inflicted or not.)

This book was about women. It was narrated by three women, two black and one white. They each had a ton of shit to deal with. The white one is college-educated but unmarried. That's sort of a problem, since all of her upper-crust friends are married and having kids left and right. There is an educational disconnect here - Skeeter, the unmarried one, is more ambitious as a result of having finished college.

Her two friends are more obsessed with social standing that social justice.

That's not to say that Skeeter herself is interested in social justice, she happens to stumble upon it and then grow into it as the story progresses. Her interests in writing the book about the black experience stem from her desire to attain legitimacy in the eyes of Ms. Stein, a New York-based editor.

The black women are so badass. There's a woman who's got five kids, a serious attitude, and an abusive husband. At the end of the book (SPOILER ALERT) - she's leaving her husband. She's more secure in her position than ever - granted, she's still a maid, so there was really no upward mobility, but at least she has the gratitude and respect of the people she's working for.

The other one has lost a son, is constantly fretting about money (who isn't?), and is deeply attached to the white babies she's raising. And it's so fulfilling when the white child colors herself black in school, starts to identify the black woman as her mother, and then starts to play Rosa Parks with her younger brother and then lies to her father about who taught her all of those things. The maid has been telling them stories about Martian Luther King, the alien who didn't fit in with the humans because he was green.

Aww, heartwarming as that all is, it's also heartbreaking. There is violence directed at people in the movie, stories of horrible things done by the whites, stories of how hard life is for the blacks.

I guess for the first time, it really hit me that my grandparents were adults by the time that the Civil Rights Movement rolled around. That my mom was entering adolescence.

But that's not my point:

This book is about women.

The men play supporting roles. They manage to dominate their women while at the same time being absolutely dominated. Leroy beats his wife. Johnny supports his even though she'll never be able to carry a baby. The Senator's son dumps Skeeter for her progressive views, god forbid. The socialite queen of the town runs her husband and supports his going-to-fail campaign for government.

It's about being over-dependent on a husband. It's about not having a future without one. It's about upper-class misery, dependency on popularity, isolation.

It's about women on their own. In the end, there are no love matches for the three. Skeeter's lost her fiance, Minny's dumped her good-for-nothing abusive drunk husband, and Aibileen hasn't had one in a long time - her husband left her when their child was no more than a baby. They are independent, strong, driven women.

They are united in that.

They each have different goals to reach. It's not one of those, "all the ends are so neatly tied up" sort of deals.

The book highlights the struggles faced by single women, shows the oppression of marriage - the social pressures and expectations from parents, children, family, friends. It also shows the power of community.

While it may not paint the most accurate picture of life in 1960s Jackson, Mississippi, I think it does a damn good job at reminding us that we've come a long way. We've still got a ways to go with both racism and feminism, but the battle is moving forward.

So read the book and get back to me. I'm going to go see the movie and let you know.

Wednesday, July 27, 2011

Race and Stuff...

I've been meaning to blog about racism for awhile now, but I found this article today, and until I get around to finally actually blogging about it, I think this will do:

Vintage Racism: The "We Don't Want Trouble" Defense Makes a Comeback

NONA WILLIS ARONOWITZ

Back in the Jim Crow days, there were two basic approaches to racism in the segregated South. You were an aggressor—a lawmaker wedded to segregation, a member of a lynch mob, a scientist trying to prove non-white people were inferior, or your garden variety white person who might use a racial epithet. Or you were a bystander—someone who maintained the status quo by saying, "We don't want any trouble."
Nowadays, being racist in public is less acceptable, so people come up with all kinds of excuses for prejudice. Like, "Just kidding!" Or, "I'm not racist, I'm just honest. (Variation: I'm just exercising my First Amendment Rights.)" "I have black friends." "Posting on Facebook can't be racist." And so on. Even amid claims that America is now post-racial, one of the tried-and-true ways to be racist has endured: the argument that fighting against bigotry is more trouble than it's worth.
Take, for instance, what happened recently at an Arkansas graduation: A black teen mom named Kymberly Wimberly was the top student at McGehee Secondary School in Little Rock. Despite these accomplishments, a white co-valedictorian was named along with her. Was it because this white student had the same GPA? Nope, it was because school officials worried that making Wimberly valedictorian would result in a "big mess" at the majority-white school.
This response may seem antiquated, but it's not uncommon—and neither is the old-school racism it defends. When Prescott, Arizona, residents shouted racial epiphets at non-white students while they were painting a school mural, the administration's first thought wasn't to speak out against racism. It was to lighten the skin of the Hispanic boy depicted on the mural. Why? They wanted to avoid "a controversy."
As late as last year, schools in states like Georgia, Mississippi, and Alabama have held segregated proms for black and white (and sometimes Hispanic) students. Overt racism still exists—one parent in Charleston, Mississippi reportedly said in 2008, "I'm not going to have any of those niggers rubbing up against my daughter"—but others prefer these divided dances because they want to side-step "racial flareups, a fight."
In this case, fear of violence is code for fear of change. And that's not much different from the Jim Crow era. A student named Chasidy Buckley, ensnared in the Mississippi prom fight, didn't mince words when she described what was at the heart of the segregation: "The [school] said, 'why change now? Let's just keep going.' That's the whole thing with our town. Everybody's afraid of change. It's just horrible."

I'm embarrassed for America.

We have so much hate. It's not just directed at Blacks, or Latinos, or Asians. It's directed at everyone - gays, lesbians, women, minorities. (I apologize for any missteps in capitalization - I'm not hip to the politically correct shit these days.)

I remember my high school English teacher Mr. H drawing boxes on the whiteboard and explaining that people need to think in categories.

I'll give him that.

I personally put myself in many boxes, all at once. The two that stand out are White and Woman. I was so excited to receive a book I ordered just before I went to Chicago about the modern definition of feminism written by two girls about my age.

The one thing that struck me as I was reading the book was how many women said that they never really explored feminism proper because they thought it was for white women. The term "feminism" was too academic, too Ivory Tower, too haughty for the regular woman's vernacular. And so they avoided it. It didn't mean that they weren't living it, engaging in it, defining it for themselves. It just meant they weren't calling it that.

But they had a hard time seeing themselves as both Black (or Latina, or whatever they were) and as a woman. It was like they didn't think it was possible to be two things at once. (It's hard, especially when one or more of the boxes you've put yourself in - or are put in - are minorities.)

I'll give Americans the opportunity to think in categories. Race, gender, economic standing - those things are all categories. You're free to make observations. But you're forgetting to observe other important stuff to.

Instead of: "Hey I bet that Black kid is going to steal that lady's purse. Look at his baggy pants; the kids these days." It should be: "How nice of that young man to help that lady across the street. Look as his baggy pants; the kids these days." (You're still an ageist ass, but better that than a racist, right? I'm just kidding, I've got an ageism rant you're probably dying to hear. - I just made myself laugh.)

But we've failed at educating people how to stop it all at observation. Instead, we've let our categorical thinking invade our lifestyles, our habits, our daily lives.

We categorize, we lump people together, we judge.

We don't embrace all of our categories, our weirdness, our faults. We push them away and instead pick the thing we like the best.

I'm a marketer.

I'm a doctor.

Well, what else are you?

It's a hard habit to break, I know.

There are a lot of pieces that make each of us a whole person - color, gender, passions. I wish we as Americans could try to look for the whole person.

We're too sensitive to race. Let's stop focusing on it because we're creating the "other." We're providing the boxes to put people in. Let's focus on humanity.

Fuck the statistics, we just keep living up to them. You tell someone what they will be and they'll be it. You're going to end up in prison. You're going to end up the President. You're going to get pulled over if you keep speeding.

I am sad to say that I'm ashamed of how we act like we stand up for rights, and the American dream, and advancement, and equality, and education, and morality - and really, we display very little of that to the world.

We are not a nation of equal people. We are not a nation of prosperity. One in seven of our citizens is on food stamps. (To qualify for food stamps, you have to make 130% of the poverty level or less.) We are a nation of hatred, of bigots, of uneducated, arrogant fools. And until we learn to accept and tolerate, we will get nowhere.

Let's get together and create a better future.

For everyone.

Monday, July 11, 2011

America

I'm disappointed in myself, a little bit.
Lately, I've really been struggling to understand other people's political viewpoints.
I pride myself on being really open-minded. But with this political-viewpoint problem, I can't wrap my mind around how someone could think some of the things that I disagree with.
I spend a lot of time trying, too. I sit there. I get the pro-life thing (to a certain extent). I get the death penalty thing (again, to a certain extent). I get the religious thing (don't know why - definitely disagree, but I at least understand). But most of it - I guess it's the whole package, seems absolutely absurd to me.

But what I'm going to talk about today sort of goes past the politics (but not far), and delves into what I think of as a human rights problem.

I read an article today about a man who has been detained for 6 months with no charges filed against him in Switzerland (WikiLeaks related).
So I sent out a little tweet about it:
katiemarybarry

"In civilized places, you don't hold people without evidence and without charges" - says US lawyer. What about Gitmo? newsandinsight.thomsonreuters.com/Legal/News/201…

In my mind, that's totally true. We hold ourselves up to be these virtuous, saintly Americans, and yet we engage in the very acts that we condemn.

Here's the response I received:

mjgranger1

@KatieMaryBarry GItmo is used for unlawful combatants in our struggle with Islamist extremists who want to kill us. We don't need "charges."

Who defines them as "unlawful combatants" or as "Islamist extremists" or that they "want to kill us"? We do. And that's the part that's messed up.

mjgranger has written a book about how Guantanamo Bay has saved our lives and blah blah blah, so he's probably just trolling twitter trying to find people to engage in arguments with so the book can be labeled controversial.

But it's still super lame. and super hypocritical.

I always think of that Ghandi quote, the one that resonates with me more and more every single day of my life: “I like your Christ, I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ.”

Here we are proclaiming the greatness of the United States through our worldly posturing, military aggression, and good-samaritan pretenses, yet we fail to act like the free and brave we claim to be. And there's certainly no hint of justice.

Thursday, June 16, 2011

Gay

Gay is many things, but mostly homosexual. (It still always makes me think of the Village People, so that probably needs to change.)

This post is inspired by Pride Week, during which people of all sexual orientations celebrate the movement toward equality, recognition, and respect.

This week is Pride in Denver. From the Denver PrideFest website: "The mission of Denver PrideFest is to create a fun, safe and empowering space to celebrate and promote the heritage and culture of the LGBT and allied community in Colorado."

I'm an ally. I have gay and lesbian friends, straight friends, and bisexual friends. I love them all equally.

I don't really care how you stand on homosexuality. Because really, there is only one way to stand. And I'm not saying this because I want you all to share my thoughts, my political leanings, or my social theories. I'm saying this because every single human deserves the same rights.

Who cares if they get married?

Imagine not being able to visit your spouse in the hospital because you're not considered family. That's seriously fucked up.

It's like that commercial with Justin Long that ends with "...make them get married. Like the rest of us."

People of different races have fought for equal treatment, been awarded it by law, and yet are still persecuted for something they cannot change. Throughout the world, they are profiled, brutalized, enslaved, mocked, underpaid, overworked, disrespected, stereotyped, marginalized, and undermined. Laws are made to question their legitimacy, even in a nation built on the backs of and with the blood of immigrants from all over.

Women have struggled for the rights to their bodies, for the respect of men, for education, for freedom from familial obligations, for equal pay, for the rights to work and make the same as their male counterparts. They, too, have had to fight against all types of social injustice. Our work remains undone.

Change has happened, slowly. Perceptions have changed, slowly. But it's not finished. It never will be. In a world where victims of rape are criticized for their clothing choices and where poverty is more prevalent among people who aren't white, it's obvious that some of our well-intentioned policies are nothing but fluff, a big talk meant to quiet the outspoken yet leave the status quo unchanged.

Gay isn't something that just happened overnight. The gays didn't just materialize from thin air. They've been here all along. They've shared your drinks, eaten at your dinner parties, managed large companies, created and maintained traditional families. You work with them. You sit next to them on the bus. They've been a part of your world since you were born.

Gay makes some people uncomfortable.

It's understandable. Gay people do weird sex stuff, right? Well, newsflash, the straights are doing weird stuff, too.

Gay people will touch my children, you say.

Wrong. I mean, maybe a few. But so do your priests. So do teachers. So do people meant to protect our children. It happens, but it's not directly linked to gay.

Gay people have the HIV.

Actually, they're not the ones with the highest prevalence of new HIV infections these days. That heroin needle you're holding is probably more dangerous. Besides, you can't get HIV/AIDS from being near an infected person. Didn't we all see "Philadelphia"?

Last night, I was out with two of my dear friends, one gay, and one Katie. After having dinner with Mike, we met up with a new friend of mine and went to a Denver gay bar. Wednesday is drag queen bingo, and we caught the tail end of it.

My new friend was uncomfortable.

I understand that men particularly are afraid of gay bars. He told me that he didn't want any of his clients to see him and think he was gay.

What's wrong with that? I thought. I was annoyed by his behavior. He didn't want to get hit on. He didn't want anyone to think he was gay. He didn't want this, or that. He kept looking around nervously.

He never got comfortable.

Maybe it was the rainbow banners decorating the place? Maybe it was the drag queen standing by the door? Maybe it was the loud, shrill bingo announcer?

We ended up leaving.

It hurt my friends' feelings and I was rude to them because I wanted to placate the new friend.

What I should have done is smacked him and told him to man up, politely.

This behavior is typical. It reminds me that even the most educated people with degrees from liberal institutions of higher learning can come out of those hallowed halls without having learned anything about what it's like to be a human being.

It reminds me that people think that "the gays" are all sex-crazed monsters who will fuck anything that moves and is a man.

Not true!

Walking into a gay bar is just like walking into a straight bar (which is basically every bar) except there is more hair gel and better muscles, if you're into that sort of thing.

But there's also personal melodramas, bar snacks, shots of vodka, relationships being made and dismantled, laughter, tears, pictures being taken. Basically, it's like every damn bar you've ever been to.

Later, new friend was telling me he was struck by my intelligence. (I was drunk at this point, and drunk me loves compliments.) I was flattered and completely blind to my opportunity to remind him that perhaps intelligence includes willingness to adapt to unfamiliar situations. An open mind, humor, and humility. He reminded me that intelligence isn't something you can only get from As and good grades, that 4.0 and long-winded papers. I should have reminded him that intelligence is a continual real-life process, something you can only have if you're willing to think about and experience emotionally challenging things.

I am ashamed that I said nothing to him. "The gays" are a very important part of my life. My friendships mean more to me than anything else.

Part of living in a diverse and beautiful society is understanding differences. Part of it is realizing that people are born the way they are and embracing that. And who cares? I have a weird elf nose and people still hang out with me.

I didn't choose to be born a woman (although I'm glad that's the way I came out - thanks Mom!). And no one chooses to be gay. There's been a lot of discussion about this, and recently, a lot of suicides because of how hard it is to be gay.

While I generally hold that our children aren't getting the social support they need, and consequently are taking drastic action that's really stupid, I completely disagree about our discourse on taboo subjects needs to change. There's not enough of it! We wait until someone dies, or something kills someone else, and then we say, "oh, we could've, should've, wait, next tragedy." Nothing changes! Let's dialogue until we're blue in the face with our kids about a whole bunch of topics. Let's show them that it's okay to ask questions. Let's show them that families come in all different styles.

No one chooses to be part of a marginalized subset of society. No one chooses to be gay. It's a difficult life. It's also really fun, too. There are cheap drinks at X Bar on Tuesdays. It's normal. It's natural. It's really lovely. Just because that's not how you roll doesn't mean you have to hate on it.

Having gay friends doesn't make you gay. Trust me on this one. Still a hetero here. People won't think any less of you if you hang out with gay people; you won't be any less of a man. So get over it! Stop freaking out about gay and start embracing it.

Or, if you're still uncomfortable, start with baby steps. Gay is not always the stereotype. Remember that.

Gay makes good parents. Gay makes good teachers. Gay makes good thinkers, good bus drivers, good politicians, good postmen, good database administrators. But mostly, gay makes great dancers.

This week, reach out to your gay, lesbian, queer, questioning, and straight friends and remind them how much they mean to you.

And if you've got the time, head downtown this weekend and be a part of the celebration.