DENVER, COLORADO- On May 8th 2015, the Tattered Cover Five returned to the scene of their heinous crime, feeding the poor and homeless. After being convicted in a kangaroo court hearing in City Court for disturbing the peace and being a general nuisance, the defendants once again returned on Friday to the Tattered Cover Book Store where they fed the poor on a rain soaked evening. When we as a society look past an act of compassion and charity in feeding the poor and homeless, to see our shame, to feel our discomfort and then to criminalize this act of kindness. Then we are a Broken and Sick Society. We can cure this sickness in our society; we must unite and come together; You need only commit one small act of kindness; skip one hour at your local pub; one hour at the mall; one TV show and then come and volunteer in front of the Tattered Cover book store on Friday night. The one hour you give will tell the city "We Do Care About The Poor and Homeless" I believe there are many good and kind people out there, we need only find them. Are you one of those kind and caring people? Let us come together and show the city of Denver, we do care.
Tag: Social Justice
Okay then, self-congratulations to you for thirty years of justice and peace!
How about those journeyman activists throwing their social justice experience around like it's inviolate because they've been at this longer than the whippersnappers trying to rock their slow boat to China. They know what works after thirty years of utter failure, and they'll admit to not a single inkling that their nonconfrontational passivism has only accelerated injustice and war. By what aggrandized blindness to irony can they congratulate themselves for their contribution to justice and peace? I don't care that they decorate themselves like the dumb soldiers above whom they hold themselves, but hear this: don't you dare coopt the enthusiasm of your youngers, or obstruct their path because their fresh directions offend you.
The only thing the rich ever wanted was everything. Occupy wants it back.
Was it Utah Philips or Michael Parenti who said it, "the only thing the rich have ever wanted was EVERYTHING"? Do you wonder why Occupy's demands have to be specific? To my mind, Occupy has a mandate that's equally self-evident: EVERYTHING BACK.
Emma Goldman on Direct Action
Yes it was Emma Goldman who said "If voting changed anything, they'd make it illegal." It was no mere quip. The turn of the last century activist was a fierce advocate of every social reform and was ultimately exiled to Europe for challenging forced conscription. Do you wonder what else Goldman had to say, about political violence, prisons, patriotism, puritanism, the traffic of women, suffrage, poverty, birth control, and the struggle of minorities? Far from being a cynic, Goldman offered an alternative to the false hope of the ballot box. What does the history of parliamentarism show? Nothing but failure and defeat, not even a single reform to ameliorate the economic and social stress of the people. Laws have been passed and enactments made for the improvement and protection of labor. Thus it was proven only last year that Illinois, with the most rigid laws for mine protection, had the greatest mine disasters. In States where child labor laws prevail, child exploitation is at its highest, and though with us the workers enjoy full political opportunities, capitalism has reached the most brazen zenith. ... It may be claimed that men of integrity would not become corrupt in the political grinding mill. Perhaps not; but such men would be absolutely helpless to exert the slightest influence in behalf of labor, as indeed has been shown in numerous instances. The State is the economic master of its servants. Good men, if such there be, would either remain true to their political faith and lose their economic support, or they would cling to their economic master and be utterly unable to do the slightest good. The political arena leaves one no alternative, one must either be a dunce or a rogue. The political superstition is still holding sway over the hearts and minds of the masses, but the true lovers of liberty will have no more to do with it. Instead, they believe with Stirner that man has as much liberty as he is willing to take. ... Universal suffrage itself owes its existence to direct action. If not for the spirit of rebellion, of the defiance on the part of the American revolutionary fathers, their posterity would still wear the King's coat. If not for the direct action of a John Brown and his comrades, America would still trade in the flesh of the black man. True, the trade in white flesh is still going on; but that, too, will have to be abolished by direct action. Trade-unionism, the economic arena of the modern gladiator, owes its existence to direct action. It is but recently that law and government have attempted to crush the trade-union movement, and condemned the exponents of man's right to organize to prison as conspirators. Had they sought to assert their cause through begging, pleading, and compromise, trade-unionism would today be a negligible quantity. In France, in Spain, in Italy, in Russia, nay even in England (witness the growing rebellion of English labor unions), direct, revolutionary, economic action has become so strong
When I get my gun
If I had a gun it would serve as my point of meditation. [Excerpt, Swimming Upstream, Eve Ensler editor] And I would look at it and re-remember Harriet Tubman's steely whisper and Nanny's ear-splitting yell, Ida B. Wells' unrelenting voice and Fannie Lou Hamer's unwavering glare. I'd remember Nat Turner's plot and Tony Morrison's advice. And when I shot my gun, my target would be well planned, my aim precise. I would know exactly who to shoot, and when and where to shoot them, and how many of their friends needed to be shot too. And when they were dead, when they were all dead, so would be oppression, globalism, neocolonialism, government, capitalism, enslavement, corporations, greed, hunger, hate, religion, war, poverty, cruelty. No no, it can't be too soon for me, the day I get my gun.
Nonviolence is the refuge of cowards
I say this with the full authority of my own personal experience: nonviolence is for cowards. When push has come to shove, I stepped to the sidewalk but I am so full of admiration for those who stayed in the line of fire. Today much of the world commemorates Bastille Day, France's unique independence day, because it launched the French Revolution. Not just a revolution for the masses of humanity, but their Enlightenment. Storming the Bastilles was no small transformative event, and the sans-culottes were not led by urgings to keep it nonviolent. The monarchy took heed, as it had for every historic concession, because the citizenry had it scared to death. Have you changed social inequity by voting in the polls? Have you found justice via protest? Sought, beseeched, was as far as you got. Violent uprising has not lately looking too effective either. But it's got the track record. I'm not saying I'm up to the task, but I assure you I have the courage to be nonviolent in spades. It is a most self-aggrandizing dishonesty that holds nonviolence to be brave. There is nothing easier than to take the path of least resistance. I don't mean to downplay the audacity to protest, as opposed to conforming, although isn't sticking to your principles squarly self-indulgent? I claim no credit for failing to bend on matters of principle. In fact, sometimes I feel positively anti-social. But taken the next step, what's easier than subjecting yourself to the authority of the sword? Again it's the principle of not becoming like your abuser, another no-brainer, but no-bravery required. Standing up for what you believe? Easy-peasy. To the death? Positively cowardly lion. This is you inner dialog, be honest: I defy your authority, but only so far. I reject your physical oppression, but just kidding. I call for the total destruction of your hierarchy, but only in words, I'm entitled, and you can't lay a finger on me because I'm playing by the rules. Hope of getting anywhere: dismal. Modern social movements have only Gandhi and Mandela as purported success stories. But I'll not insult the elders. The Gandhi and Mandela of our textbooks bear no resemblance to the reality, they are false role-models put forth by fascists who want to blunt every effort to rise against power. Oh, nonviolence is the higher ideal, sure. Lovely. Browny points for the afterlife. Trickle-up transcendence has as much potential for success as awaiting extraterrestrials or building playing fields for disgraced baseball reincarnates. Unless power wants to transcend the human experience, and lift all of us with it, mankind is not going anywhere. The only way you're going to levitate powerful heads is with a guillotine. Dreadfully eighteenth century, but check out the horrific bygone days from which they're reconstituting torture and feudalism. You can probably contrive a litany of rationalizations for why it would be beneath you, but imagine picking up a gun and having a go against the overwhelming power of the state. Now that's terrifying.
Pushing computers on school children
Colorado Springs D-11 is one of the worst examples of pushing computers onto children in a mindless and destructive manner. I have seen children that are forced onto the computers as supposedly a form of tutoring there, and the children often respond by just shutting the material out altogether from their minds. Nobody likes to be programed by computers it seems, but the D-11 Adminstrators haven't figured that out. Or is it that teachers work and get paid for it, but computers don't? Never mind the actual results here. Never mind the damage to children done. Computers are in, and teaching is not. There is big money in pushing these computers onto the kids, and the Alliance for Childhood does a good job of exposing that at their website. Also their film, Where do the choildren play? will be shown next week Thursday 11-13-2008 at 7pm locally at the Mountain Park Environmental Center in Beulah. Worth a watch if you have the time and can get out there? And here is another question? Where do the children play in Iraq?