This is my love aura according to the same site. Cool, huh?
Posted by Picasa
Monday, April 24, 2006
Standing up for immigration reform
Standing up for immigration reform
In struggling for a way to move forward on the issue of immigrant rights, the African-American community should reflect on the compassionate words of civil rights pioneer Bayard Rustin, who was both black and gay
By the Reverend Irene Monroe
An Advocate.com exclusive posted, April 24, 2006
As the country now finds itself in a battle over immigration reform, one particular disenfranchised community—African-Americans—has displayed troubling feelings on the issue, ranging from a disquieting silence to unabashed xenophobia. And although the struggles of being black, immigrant, and LGBT are not mutually exclusive, many African-American organizations and individuals, however, have veered off the road on this issue.
For example, where the NAACP has been outspoken in their advocacy for immigrant rights, the National Urban League, the Congressional Black Caucus, and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, which aided in spearheading the civil rights movement of the 1960s, have not.
And while the Book of Leviticus is continuously misused by black ministers in their attacks on LGBT people, one passage illustrates how clerics should employ the text to guide them on the issue of immigration rights: “Don’t mistreat any foreigners who live in your land. Instead, treat them as well as you treat citizens and love them as much as you love yourself. Remember that you were once foreigners in a strange land.”
The struggle for liberation is mired when any activist ignores the interconnections between citizenship status, LGBT rights, and the rights of immigrants, as Jasmyne A. Cannick did in a column published earlier this month on Advocate.com entitled “Gays First, Then Illegals.” In it, she wrote, ”Immigration reform needs to get in line behind the gay civil rights movement, which has not yet been resolved.… I didn’t break the law to come into this country. The country broke the law by not recognizing and bestowing upon me my full rights as a citizen, and I find it hard as a black lesbian to jump on the immigration reform bandwagon when my own bandwagon hasn’t even left the barn.”
If the African-American community is looking at how to move forward on the issue of immigration rights, let us remember Bayard Rustin.
While Rustin is most noted as the strategist and chief architect of the 1963 March on Washington that catapulted the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King onto the world stage, he also played a key role in helping King develop the strategy of nonviolence in the Montgomery bus boycott (1955-1956), which successfully dismantled the long-standing Jim Crow ordinance of segregated seating on public transportation in Alabama.
Rustin was not a one-issue man, because as the quintessential outsider—a black man, a Quaker, a one-time pacifist, a political dissident, and a gay man—he connected to the plight of all disenfranchised people around the world. And if he were among us today, Rustin would no doubt be in the forefront of tearing down the borders of HIV/AIDS.
During his lifetime, he did, however, tear down many borders—and one was speaking out against prohibiting immigrants displaced by the Vietnam War from entering the U.S.
In collecting signatures from prominent black leaders in support of Vietnamese immigrants, Rustin wrote a New York Times op-ed published on March 19, 1979, entitled, “Black Americans Urge Admission of the Indo-Chinese Refugees.” In it he stated, “If our government lacks compassion for these dispossessed human beings, it is difficult to believe that the same government can have much compassion for America’s black minority, or for America’s poor.”
Like Rustin, I too stand up for immigration reform. My hair-braider, for one, was trained in the Ivory Coast as a nurse and her husband was trained as a computer scientist, but they take menial jobs here in Boston to feed their baby.
And I stand up for immigration reform because the issue is about a friend—a student at the University of the West Indies in Kingston, Jamaica—who was recently gang-raped because she is a lesbian. She tells me that the day before the incident one of the assailants read an article from the March 29 issue of the Jamaica Gleaner that stated, “If Jamaica is a Christian county and calls itself a Christian country, then gay and lesbian lifestyles must be deemed absolutely immoral and unacceptable.”
And I stand up for immigration reform because it is about AIDS and the current ban prohibiting HIV-positive immigrants from entering the country.
Rustin teaches us that we pay the debt of justice we owe to immigrants and all marginalized people everywhere through our individual and collective acts of humanity in making a more democratic society.
The African-American community, the LGBT community, and indeed, all Americans should heed Rustin’s teachings as the country moves forward on immigration rights.
In struggling for a way to move forward on the issue of immigrant rights, the African-American community should reflect on the compassionate words of civil rights pioneer Bayard Rustin, who was both black and gay
By the Reverend Irene Monroe
An Advocate.com exclusive posted, April 24, 2006
As the country now finds itself in a battle over immigration reform, one particular disenfranchised community—African-Americans—has displayed troubling feelings on the issue, ranging from a disquieting silence to unabashed xenophobia. And although the struggles of being black, immigrant, and LGBT are not mutually exclusive, many African-American organizations and individuals, however, have veered off the road on this issue.
For example, where the NAACP has been outspoken in their advocacy for immigrant rights, the National Urban League, the Congressional Black Caucus, and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, which aided in spearheading the civil rights movement of the 1960s, have not.
And while the Book of Leviticus is continuously misused by black ministers in their attacks on LGBT people, one passage illustrates how clerics should employ the text to guide them on the issue of immigration rights: “Don’t mistreat any foreigners who live in your land. Instead, treat them as well as you treat citizens and love them as much as you love yourself. Remember that you were once foreigners in a strange land.”
The struggle for liberation is mired when any activist ignores the interconnections between citizenship status, LGBT rights, and the rights of immigrants, as Jasmyne A. Cannick did in a column published earlier this month on Advocate.com entitled “Gays First, Then Illegals.” In it, she wrote, ”Immigration reform needs to get in line behind the gay civil rights movement, which has not yet been resolved.… I didn’t break the law to come into this country. The country broke the law by not recognizing and bestowing upon me my full rights as a citizen, and I find it hard as a black lesbian to jump on the immigration reform bandwagon when my own bandwagon hasn’t even left the barn.”
If the African-American community is looking at how to move forward on the issue of immigration rights, let us remember Bayard Rustin.
While Rustin is most noted as the strategist and chief architect of the 1963 March on Washington that catapulted the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King onto the world stage, he also played a key role in helping King develop the strategy of nonviolence in the Montgomery bus boycott (1955-1956), which successfully dismantled the long-standing Jim Crow ordinance of segregated seating on public transportation in Alabama.
Rustin was not a one-issue man, because as the quintessential outsider—a black man, a Quaker, a one-time pacifist, a political dissident, and a gay man—he connected to the plight of all disenfranchised people around the world. And if he were among us today, Rustin would no doubt be in the forefront of tearing down the borders of HIV/AIDS.
During his lifetime, he did, however, tear down many borders—and one was speaking out against prohibiting immigrants displaced by the Vietnam War from entering the U.S.
In collecting signatures from prominent black leaders in support of Vietnamese immigrants, Rustin wrote a New York Times op-ed published on March 19, 1979, entitled, “Black Americans Urge Admission of the Indo-Chinese Refugees.” In it he stated, “If our government lacks compassion for these dispossessed human beings, it is difficult to believe that the same government can have much compassion for America’s black minority, or for America’s poor.”
Like Rustin, I too stand up for immigration reform. My hair-braider, for one, was trained in the Ivory Coast as a nurse and her husband was trained as a computer scientist, but they take menial jobs here in Boston to feed their baby.
And I stand up for immigration reform because the issue is about a friend—a student at the University of the West Indies in Kingston, Jamaica—who was recently gang-raped because she is a lesbian. She tells me that the day before the incident one of the assailants read an article from the March 29 issue of the Jamaica Gleaner that stated, “If Jamaica is a Christian county and calls itself a Christian country, then gay and lesbian lifestyles must be deemed absolutely immoral and unacceptable.”
And I stand up for immigration reform because it is about AIDS and the current ban prohibiting HIV-positive immigrants from entering the country.
Rustin teaches us that we pay the debt of justice we owe to immigrants and all marginalized people everywhere through our individual and collective acts of humanity in making a more democratic society.
The African-American community, the LGBT community, and indeed, all Americans should heed Rustin’s teachings as the country moves forward on immigration rights.
Sunday, April 23, 2006
The 100 unsexiest men in the world
The 100 unsexiest men in the world
Who would Scarlett least like to be with?By: BILL JENSEN & RYAN STEWART
4/18/2006 6:34:51 PM
Welcome to the first installment of ThePhoenix.com's 100 Unsexiest Men in the World. After pouring through thousands of photographs, millions of frames of movies and TV shows, the staff at thephoenix.com has compiled a list of the least sexy males on the planet.
1. Gilbert Gottfried: Rumor has it that Gilbert is the heir apparent to Uncle Milty when it comes to what he's packing, but that still can't save him. The parrot-voiced, pickled-face comic is to sexy what Kryptonite is to Superman.
2. Randy Johnson: If he couldn't throw a ball 100 miles per hour, Johnson would be wearing a wife beater and getting hauled into a squad car on Cops. Could you imagine the nights when he pitched to Otis Nixon?
3. Roger Ebert: Yes, he lost all that weight. Yes, you still wouldn't fuck him.
4. Dr. Phil: Being a know-it-all is never sexy. Being a know-it-all who is also a bald-headed prick is downright horrid.
ADVERTISEMENT
DisplayAds ("Middle", "", "");
5. Alan Colmes: Not really fair, since he's got to sit next to brown shirt-stud Hannity each night. But Colmes - lazy eye, unkept hair, droopy features - has a face made for radio. Pirate radio. Garr!!
6. Chad Kroeger: It's not just the massive head, weird face, and bad hair. It's also the fact that he's in Nickelback, the worst band since the dawn of music.
7. Mike Mills: You'd want to talk music with the bassist from REM. Sleep with? Not unless you're trying to get to Pete Buck.
8. Osama Bin Laden: Power is sexy (notice how Dick Cheney isn't on the list). But a 6'5", no-vertical-leap mass murdering douche bag is not getting any style points.
9. Jay Leno: "It would be like having sex with a banana, but not in a good way," was what one of our staffers remarked about the fruit-headed comic.
10. Don Imus: "It would be like having sex with an old leather bag, but not in a good way," was what the same staffer remarked about the bag of skin and bones.
11. Michael Jackson: What happens when an ugly JC Penny manequin has sex with Pogo, the clown identity of serial killer John Wayne Gacy.
12. Wallace Shawn: Even if you're attracted to his rounded dome, how can anyone get past that nasally lisp?
13. Mike D. of the Beastie Boys: We hate to do this. But the sickly looking Beastie "did it like this, did it like that, did it with a wiffle ball bat . . . because no one would want to get within three feet of him naked.
14. Richard Simmons: Words don't do it justice.
15. Jon Lovitz: Bald, annoying, unfunny, and hair in the all the wrong places. For all we know, he was running through the cast of League of Their Own. But we doubt it.
16. Carrot Top: Sheer obnoxiousness necessitates his placement on this list.
17. Jerry Seinfeld: This is for everyone who has ever yelled at the TV when Jerry brought home another model on Seinfeld.
18. Malcolm Gladwell: The Tipping Point.
19. Chevy Chase: He got unfunny with age. Then he got ugly.
20. Raffi: Maybe it's his proffession. But no one surveyed, man or woman, could think of any situation in which they would bed down with him.
21. Ron Howard: He was cute as Opie, passable as Richie, but now as Ron Howard, he's just plain weird-looking. Especially with a beard.
22. Clint Howard: Ron's younger, balder, and weirder-looking brother. Yes, weirder looking than Ron Howard.
23. Bill Gates: To quote Dana Carvey: "Gates apparently made a deal with the devil: 'You can have $60 billion, but you have to go through life looking like a turtle.'"
24. Paul Shaffer: The bic'd look does not work for everyone, plus he makes all those crazy faces while he plays.
25. Axl Rose: I mean . . . did you see the 2003 VMAs?
26. Tim Burton: He's got the Robert Smith hair coupled with a mighty hunch. Yet he's dating Helena Bonham Carter.
27. Edward James Olmos: Remember season one of South Park? When Kenny was a zombie, everyone assumed it was an Edward James Olmos costume. Wonder why.
28. Gerard Way (from My Chemical Romance): Luckiest dude since Ringo. Or at the very least, since D12.
29. Don Zimmer: The gerbil's got a massive, ivory-white noggin' that never did much thinking to begin with. Ask any Red Sox fan over 35.
30. Tony Kornheiser: Yes, calling sportswriters unattractive is like shooting fish in a barrel. But come on, he looks like your uncle.
31. Chris Kattan
32. Otis Nixon
33. Julian Tavarez
34. Christopher Lloyd
35. Willie McGee
36. Pat Cummings
3 7. Scottie Pippen
38. Larry David
39. Michael Moore
40. Al Franken: Too arrogant
41. Paris Latsis: Maybe not the worst-looking guy in the world, but, well, think about who was there first.
42. Rush Limbaugh: No doubt he will claim his placement on this list as a result of a media bias and not the fact that he's just butt-ugly
43. David Gest
44. Garey Busey: Those teeth would give anyone nightmares.
45. Nick Nolte: Busey's oddball partner in crime, but at least he had a career once.
46. Leif Garrett
47. Andy Dick: It's a trap!
48. Scott Stapp
49. Lyle Lovett
50. Ric Ocasek: Yes, we know who his wife is. And no, we don't care.
51. Bill Wyman
52. Danny DeVito
53. Peter Jackson
54. Drew Carey
55. Newt Gingrich
56. Rob Schneider
57. Ed O'Neil: We love ya, Ed, but sorry. There was a reason you never waited on any really hot girls at that shoe store.
58. Bill O'Reilly
59. Clay Aiken: This feels like a cheap shot, but even leaving aside the rumors about his personal life, he still looks like someone's bratty little brother.
60. Joe Lieberman
61. Jim Gaffigan: Pasty, goofy-looking comedians abound on this list.
62. Bill Maher: . . . Especially ones with poodle hair.
63. John Popper
64. Dennis Miller
65. John Madden: Those massive hands seem more frightening than anything. Boom!
66. Robert Englund: Seriously, try lying in bed next to him without thinking about Freddy Krueger.
67. Robert Patrick: Seriously, try lying in bed next to him without thinking about the T-1000
68. John Ashcroft
69. Joe Gannascolli
70. Kevin James: His TV marriage to Leah Remini on King of Queens is less believable than anything on Lost.
71. George Steinbrenner: Come on, we live in Boston, you knew it was coming.
72. Grady Little: Come on, we live in Boston, you knew it was coming.
73. Harvey Pekar
74. DJ Qualls: What's he weigh, like, 70 pounds? How much of that is grease?
75. Joey Buttafuoco
76. Garry Shandling
77. Meat Loaf Aday
78. Joe Walsh
79. Tom from Myspace: As a friend of mine said, why does he have to be everyone's friend? Isn't that a little needy? Not hot at all.
80. Art Garfunkel
81. Brian Posehn
82. Howie Mandel
83. Barry Bonds €“ If what his mistress told the authors of Game of Shadows is true, then no, you don't want any part of that
84. Dick Vitale €“ Call it a hunch, but we have a feeling that sex with Dickie V. would be anything but "awesome, baby."
85. Richie "La Bamba" Rosenberg
86. Jeff Van Gundy
87. Jimmy Johnson: It's the hair
88. John Clayton: How is this ESPN's top football guy?
89. Don Vito: I suppose we were never really supposed to know what Bam Margera's uncle looks like, but since we do, he has to be included.
90. Lemmy Kilmister: Sadly, the ravages of time have not been kind to him.
91. Hideki Matsui
91. Jose Canseco: "Every time I have tried to help a woman, I've been incarcerated," he famously said on The Surreal Life. You old charmer, you.
92. Bill Parcells: Especially when you see the photos of him in shorts at training camp
93. Ric Flair: To be the man €“ WOO! €“ you got to . . . do something about those man boobs!
94. Ralph NaderÂ
95. Dennis Kucinich: Something about those progressives.
96. Horatio Sanz: Laughing at your own jokes is not sexy
97. Dom DeLuise
98. Emeril Lagasse
99. Kevin Federline: Mooching hicks aren't so hot these days.
100.Brad Pitt: He may look good, but if the rumors about his hygiene and BO issues are true, then he's probably not worth it.
mep1='&article=7852&author=BILL JENSEN & RYAN STEWART';
---------------
Is it just me, or do they attack too many liberal democrats on this unsexy list with Lieberman, Moore, Franken (Franken is "too arrogant") and Kucinich? Oh, that's right, it's me! :-D
Who would Scarlett least like to be with?By: BILL JENSEN & RYAN STEWART
4/18/2006 6:34:51 PM
Welcome to the first installment of ThePhoenix.com's 100 Unsexiest Men in the World. After pouring through thousands of photographs, millions of frames of movies and TV shows, the staff at thephoenix.com has compiled a list of the least sexy males on the planet.
1. Gilbert Gottfried: Rumor has it that Gilbert is the heir apparent to Uncle Milty when it comes to what he's packing, but that still can't save him. The parrot-voiced, pickled-face comic is to sexy what Kryptonite is to Superman.
2. Randy Johnson: If he couldn't throw a ball 100 miles per hour, Johnson would be wearing a wife beater and getting hauled into a squad car on Cops. Could you imagine the nights when he pitched to Otis Nixon?
3. Roger Ebert: Yes, he lost all that weight. Yes, you still wouldn't fuck him.
4. Dr. Phil: Being a know-it-all is never sexy. Being a know-it-all who is also a bald-headed prick is downright horrid.
ADVERTISEMENT
DisplayAds ("Middle", "", "");
5. Alan Colmes: Not really fair, since he's got to sit next to brown shirt-stud Hannity each night. But Colmes - lazy eye, unkept hair, droopy features - has a face made for radio. Pirate radio. Garr!!
6. Chad Kroeger: It's not just the massive head, weird face, and bad hair. It's also the fact that he's in Nickelback, the worst band since the dawn of music.
7. Mike Mills: You'd want to talk music with the bassist from REM. Sleep with? Not unless you're trying to get to Pete Buck.
8. Osama Bin Laden: Power is sexy (notice how Dick Cheney isn't on the list). But a 6'5", no-vertical-leap mass murdering douche bag is not getting any style points.
9. Jay Leno: "It would be like having sex with a banana, but not in a good way," was what one of our staffers remarked about the fruit-headed comic.
10. Don Imus: "It would be like having sex with an old leather bag, but not in a good way," was what the same staffer remarked about the bag of skin and bones.
11. Michael Jackson: What happens when an ugly JC Penny manequin has sex with Pogo, the clown identity of serial killer John Wayne Gacy.
12. Wallace Shawn: Even if you're attracted to his rounded dome, how can anyone get past that nasally lisp?
13. Mike D. of the Beastie Boys: We hate to do this. But the sickly looking Beastie "did it like this, did it like that, did it with a wiffle ball bat . . . because no one would want to get within three feet of him naked.
14. Richard Simmons: Words don't do it justice.
15. Jon Lovitz: Bald, annoying, unfunny, and hair in the all the wrong places. For all we know, he was running through the cast of League of Their Own. But we doubt it.
16. Carrot Top: Sheer obnoxiousness necessitates his placement on this list.
17. Jerry Seinfeld: This is for everyone who has ever yelled at the TV when Jerry brought home another model on Seinfeld.
18. Malcolm Gladwell: The Tipping Point.
19. Chevy Chase: He got unfunny with age. Then he got ugly.
20. Raffi: Maybe it's his proffession. But no one surveyed, man or woman, could think of any situation in which they would bed down with him.
21. Ron Howard: He was cute as Opie, passable as Richie, but now as Ron Howard, he's just plain weird-looking. Especially with a beard.
22. Clint Howard: Ron's younger, balder, and weirder-looking brother. Yes, weirder looking than Ron Howard.
23. Bill Gates: To quote Dana Carvey: "Gates apparently made a deal with the devil: 'You can have $60 billion, but you have to go through life looking like a turtle.'"
24. Paul Shaffer: The bic'd look does not work for everyone, plus he makes all those crazy faces while he plays.
25. Axl Rose: I mean . . . did you see the 2003 VMAs?
26. Tim Burton: He's got the Robert Smith hair coupled with a mighty hunch. Yet he's dating Helena Bonham Carter.
27. Edward James Olmos: Remember season one of South Park? When Kenny was a zombie, everyone assumed it was an Edward James Olmos costume. Wonder why.
28. Gerard Way (from My Chemical Romance): Luckiest dude since Ringo. Or at the very least, since D12.
29. Don Zimmer: The gerbil's got a massive, ivory-white noggin' that never did much thinking to begin with. Ask any Red Sox fan over 35.
30. Tony Kornheiser: Yes, calling sportswriters unattractive is like shooting fish in a barrel. But come on, he looks like your uncle.
31. Chris Kattan
32. Otis Nixon
33. Julian Tavarez
34. Christopher Lloyd
35. Willie McGee
36. Pat Cummings
3 7. Scottie Pippen
38. Larry David
39. Michael Moore
40. Al Franken: Too arrogant
41. Paris Latsis: Maybe not the worst-looking guy in the world, but, well, think about who was there first.
42. Rush Limbaugh: No doubt he will claim his placement on this list as a result of a media bias and not the fact that he's just butt-ugly
43. David Gest
44. Garey Busey: Those teeth would give anyone nightmares.
45. Nick Nolte: Busey's oddball partner in crime, but at least he had a career once.
46. Leif Garrett
47. Andy Dick: It's a trap!
48. Scott Stapp
49. Lyle Lovett
50. Ric Ocasek: Yes, we know who his wife is. And no, we don't care.
51. Bill Wyman
52. Danny DeVito
53. Peter Jackson
54. Drew Carey
55. Newt Gingrich
56. Rob Schneider
57. Ed O'Neil: We love ya, Ed, but sorry. There was a reason you never waited on any really hot girls at that shoe store.
58. Bill O'Reilly
59. Clay Aiken: This feels like a cheap shot, but even leaving aside the rumors about his personal life, he still looks like someone's bratty little brother.
60. Joe Lieberman
61. Jim Gaffigan: Pasty, goofy-looking comedians abound on this list.
62. Bill Maher: . . . Especially ones with poodle hair.
63. John Popper
64. Dennis Miller
65. John Madden: Those massive hands seem more frightening than anything. Boom!
66. Robert Englund: Seriously, try lying in bed next to him without thinking about Freddy Krueger.
67. Robert Patrick: Seriously, try lying in bed next to him without thinking about the T-1000
68. John Ashcroft
69. Joe Gannascolli
70. Kevin James: His TV marriage to Leah Remini on King of Queens is less believable than anything on Lost.
71. George Steinbrenner: Come on, we live in Boston, you knew it was coming.
72. Grady Little: Come on, we live in Boston, you knew it was coming.
73. Harvey Pekar
74. DJ Qualls: What's he weigh, like, 70 pounds? How much of that is grease?
75. Joey Buttafuoco
76. Garry Shandling
77. Meat Loaf Aday
78. Joe Walsh
79. Tom from Myspace: As a friend of mine said, why does he have to be everyone's friend? Isn't that a little needy? Not hot at all.
80. Art Garfunkel
81. Brian Posehn
82. Howie Mandel
83. Barry Bonds €“ If what his mistress told the authors of Game of Shadows is true, then no, you don't want any part of that
84. Dick Vitale €“ Call it a hunch, but we have a feeling that sex with Dickie V. would be anything but "awesome, baby."
85. Richie "La Bamba" Rosenberg
86. Jeff Van Gundy
87. Jimmy Johnson: It's the hair
88. John Clayton: How is this ESPN's top football guy?
89. Don Vito: I suppose we were never really supposed to know what Bam Margera's uncle looks like, but since we do, he has to be included.
90. Lemmy Kilmister: Sadly, the ravages of time have not been kind to him.
91. Hideki Matsui
91. Jose Canseco: "Every time I have tried to help a woman, I've been incarcerated," he famously said on The Surreal Life. You old charmer, you.
92. Bill Parcells: Especially when you see the photos of him in shorts at training camp
93. Ric Flair: To be the man €“ WOO! €“ you got to . . . do something about those man boobs!
94. Ralph NaderÂ
95. Dennis Kucinich: Something about those progressives.
96. Horatio Sanz: Laughing at your own jokes is not sexy
97. Dom DeLuise
98. Emeril Lagasse
99. Kevin Federline: Mooching hicks aren't so hot these days.
100.Brad Pitt: He may look good, but if the rumors about his hygiene and BO issues are true, then he's probably not worth it.
mep1='&article=7852&author=BILL JENSEN & RYAN STEWART';
---------------
Is it just me, or do they attack too many liberal democrats on this unsexy list with Lieberman, Moore, Franken (Franken is "too arrogant") and Kucinich? Oh, that's right, it's me! :-D
For some, E.T. stands for extreme terror
For some, E.T. stands for extreme terror
By Holly Miyasaki is a reporter with the Penticton Western
NewApr 23 2006
My biggest fear is a friendly alien from the 1980s.When Steven Spielberg’s E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial was released in 1982 I was not yet born, but I was around when it was on VHS.My parents, thinking it would be a nice family night to eat pizza and watch this terrifying film, rented it.
My first glimpse of the small, oblong-headed, long-fingered beast drove a stake of fear into my soul that still lingers today.As the events of young Drew Barrymore, that monstrous alien with his glowing heart and her co-stars unfolded on the television screen, I tried to hide my face, but my mom thought I was being silly and told me to stop.I can’t remember if I endured the whole film — I must have blocked out the memory — but whatever I did see had an everlasting effect on me.That night I cried, threw up and had a nightmare; my parents must have felt so guilty. I can still remember that dream as clear as if it happened last night — it wasn’t even that scary, but I’ll never forget it. E.T. had me pinned down and was sitting on my chest. All around us were multi-coloured bunnies hopping around. That was the extent of it.
After that night I couldn’t allow my hands or feet to hang off the bed because I was worried E.T. would be hiding under my bed and grab me.I looked up some pictures of E.T. on the Internet while writing this column and just seeing him again sent chills down my spine that I still can’t shake. I’m not kidding.
When my sister got an E.T. doll for her birthday we had to get rid of it because it frightened me to have it in the house.When we went to Universal Studios I couldn’t go near the E.T. bicycle attraction.If I was planning to have a scary movie night E.T. would definitely be on the list.
And don’t think I’m alone in my fear. I have met quite a few others in my generation that were frightened by this blood-curdling film. I’m thinking what was so scary about it was it was our first exposure to aliens and the thought of life outside planet Earth. Children shouldn’t be exposed to that!I know, I know. The movie was supposed to be a touching portrayal of family, friendship and ... making friends with petrifying little creatures from outer space. Today, I’m pretty sure I could take E.T. I’m not tall, but I’m quick and can scream really loud. Although if I was actually confronted with him I would probably freeze like a deer in the headlights and be at his mercy.I just hope they don’t make that sequel to the movie. I heard Spielberg was thinking about it.Whether there’s a critically acclaimed addition to E.T. or not, I don’t plan on seeing it again or ever making any children I might one day have watch it. By the way, I still make sure my hands and feet don’t hang over the edge of the bed when I go to sleep at night.
-------
What the duce?! Lady, what movie were you watching? This flick wasn't supposed to be 'Signs'! Geez, this woman was probably afraid of the Easter Bunny, baby chicks and white, fluffy clouds!
"I’m thinking what was so scary about it was it was our first exposure to aliens and the thought of life outside planet Earth. Children shouldn’t be exposed to that!"
And what sort of movies do you suppose they should be exposed to? White bread, vanillia, Bing Crosby, flag waving, ultra conservative, let's-never-look-beyond-our-own-backyard-to-dream movies? That only leaves movies made before 1946! Some film library!
Hey, kids--don't go watching movies at Holly Miyasaki's house! She's no fun!
Thursday, April 20, 2006
Geez, I'm my mother...
| What Completely and Utterly Random Object Are You? AAAE Accreditation Module You are an AAAE accreditation preparation handbook. Wow, you're one ambitious (and ambiguous) soul. We admire your dedication to work, but you might consider getting out more often.
|
| Click Here to Take This Quiz Brought to you by YouThink.com quizzes and personality tests. |
Wednesday, April 19, 2006
Tennessee hints at what's to come on adoption front
Tennessee hints at what's to come on adoption front
By Lisa Keen
Originally printed 4/20/2006 (Issue 1416 - Between The Lines News)
Before Scott Hines and his partner Jon Hines adopted nine-year-old Louis, the young boy was being given 13 pills a day to control behavior problems. He had been abused by his biological parents and the foster care system in Tennessee.
"Louis was angry, and rightfully so," said Scott Hines, in a statement to reporters prior to a Tennessee legislative hearing on gay adoptions this month. "No one else wanted Louis and, without an adoptive home, he would have been sentenced to a life of neglect and heart break."
Scott and Jon Hines felt they had the parenting skills to help Louis, so they adopted him.
Scott Hines' relatives have now asked the couple to adopt another child, a girl, born to a drug-addicted relative of Scott's. But Tennessee legislators are considering bills to ban such adoptions.
The legislature considered such bills before and they have failed. But this year, the strategy of gay civil rights opponents has changed. Instead of introducing explicitly anti-gay bills concerning adoption, foster care, and guardianship, the legislators have introduced "stealth" bills, says Chris Sanders, a spokesperson for Tennessee Equality Project, a statewide LGBT organization.
The bills this year, he said, are worded such that they appear on the surface to be addressing some general matter of the state code concerning adoption, guardianship, and foster care.
"But when they think no one is watching," said Sanders, "they want to amend the bills in committee to ban adoption by gays and lesbians."
For example, one bill, introduced by State Rep. Paul Stanley, said Sanders, purports to address issues concerning information sharing rights of permanent guardians.
"Our concern is not with the bill as filed," said Sanders, "but it opens up a section of the Tennessee code related to guardianship and all kinds of things can happen in committee."
Plus, Paul Stanley was a sponsor of one of the explicitly anti-gay bills last year, noted Sanders.
Sanders acknowledged that it was hard, at first, to get the LGBT community's sense of urgency up around the bills.
"You say, 'Tennessee code' and people's eyes glaze over," he said. But two things helped: One, the organization has a professional lobbyist watching for potentially dangerous legislation, and two, one of the state legislators ignited a political bonfire.
Republican State Rep. Debra Maggart told a constituent that research shows that "most homosexual couples have numerous emotional dysfunctions and psychological issues that may not be healthy for children."
The comment was made in an e-mail response to a constituent in February who asked her to oppose the bills.
While she acknowledged in her e-mail that "emotional dysfunction can be found in heterosexual couples homes," Maggart, who is herself divorced, claimed to "have seen evidence that homosexual couples prey on young males and have in some instances adopted them in order to have unfretted access to subject them to a life of molestation and sexual abuse."
"Some of the evidence we were presented," said Maggart, "showed that lesbian and gay couples have a higher rate of breaking up than heterosexual coupes as well as higher rates of promiscuity outside of their relationships."
The e-mail got out to the media, and when it did, said Sanders, "we didn't have to go through a long explanation about opening up the Tennessee code."
"When Maggart made her comment," said Sanders, "it became very clear there was a threat. The threat became palpable. It electrified the GLBT community in Tennessee."
Jennifer Chrisler, executive director of Family Pride, points to statements from numerous professional organizations supporting the adoption of children by gay couples.
The American Academy of Pediatrics issued a statement in 2002 saying that "a considerable body of professional literature provides evidence" that children with same-sex parents "can have the same advantages and the same expectations for health, adjustment, and development as can children whose parents are heterosexual."
Numerous other professional organizations have made similar declarations, including the North American Council on Adoptable Children, which says, "Children should not be denied a permanent family because of the sexual orientation of potential parents."
Currently, only one state (Florida) bans gay couples from adopting. Twenty-five states allow gay couples to co-adopt children. (A judge in Michigan ruled in 2002 that adoptions by gay couples could no longer be allowed due to a state law which stipulates that only married couples and single individuals can adopt.)
In other recent adoption news:
* An Indiana appeals court ruled April 14 that a county court judge could not overturn the adoption of an infant because the adopting couple was gay.
* A Missouri circuit court ruled in February that the state's denial of a foster care application by a lesbian amounted to "unreasonable" discrimination.
* Massachusetts's Department of Early Education has said it will not take action to stop Catholic adoption agencies from barring gay couples from adoptions. The state's human rights law prohibits discrimination based on sexual orientation, but Republican Governor Mitt Romney is seeking passage of a bill that would allow some groups to discriminate against gays by saying that equal treatment of gays violates their religious beliefs.
By Lisa Keen
Originally printed 4/20/2006 (Issue 1416 - Between The Lines News)
Before Scott Hines and his partner Jon Hines adopted nine-year-old Louis, the young boy was being given 13 pills a day to control behavior problems. He had been abused by his biological parents and the foster care system in Tennessee.
"Louis was angry, and rightfully so," said Scott Hines, in a statement to reporters prior to a Tennessee legislative hearing on gay adoptions this month. "No one else wanted Louis and, without an adoptive home, he would have been sentenced to a life of neglect and heart break."
Scott and Jon Hines felt they had the parenting skills to help Louis, so they adopted him.
Scott Hines' relatives have now asked the couple to adopt another child, a girl, born to a drug-addicted relative of Scott's. But Tennessee legislators are considering bills to ban such adoptions.
The legislature considered such bills before and they have failed. But this year, the strategy of gay civil rights opponents has changed. Instead of introducing explicitly anti-gay bills concerning adoption, foster care, and guardianship, the legislators have introduced "stealth" bills, says Chris Sanders, a spokesperson for Tennessee Equality Project, a statewide LGBT organization.
The bills this year, he said, are worded such that they appear on the surface to be addressing some general matter of the state code concerning adoption, guardianship, and foster care.
"But when they think no one is watching," said Sanders, "they want to amend the bills in committee to ban adoption by gays and lesbians."
For example, one bill, introduced by State Rep. Paul Stanley, said Sanders, purports to address issues concerning information sharing rights of permanent guardians.
"Our concern is not with the bill as filed," said Sanders, "but it opens up a section of the Tennessee code related to guardianship and all kinds of things can happen in committee."
Plus, Paul Stanley was a sponsor of one of the explicitly anti-gay bills last year, noted Sanders.
Sanders acknowledged that it was hard, at first, to get the LGBT community's sense of urgency up around the bills.
"You say, 'Tennessee code' and people's eyes glaze over," he said. But two things helped: One, the organization has a professional lobbyist watching for potentially dangerous legislation, and two, one of the state legislators ignited a political bonfire.
Republican State Rep. Debra Maggart told a constituent that research shows that "most homosexual couples have numerous emotional dysfunctions and psychological issues that may not be healthy for children."
The comment was made in an e-mail response to a constituent in February who asked her to oppose the bills.
While she acknowledged in her e-mail that "emotional dysfunction can be found in heterosexual couples homes," Maggart, who is herself divorced, claimed to "have seen evidence that homosexual couples prey on young males and have in some instances adopted them in order to have unfretted access to subject them to a life of molestation and sexual abuse."
"Some of the evidence we were presented," said Maggart, "showed that lesbian and gay couples have a higher rate of breaking up than heterosexual coupes as well as higher rates of promiscuity outside of their relationships."
The e-mail got out to the media, and when it did, said Sanders, "we didn't have to go through a long explanation about opening up the Tennessee code."
"When Maggart made her comment," said Sanders, "it became very clear there was a threat. The threat became palpable. It electrified the GLBT community in Tennessee."
Jennifer Chrisler, executive director of Family Pride, points to statements from numerous professional organizations supporting the adoption of children by gay couples.
The American Academy of Pediatrics issued a statement in 2002 saying that "a considerable body of professional literature provides evidence" that children with same-sex parents "can have the same advantages and the same expectations for health, adjustment, and development as can children whose parents are heterosexual."
Numerous other professional organizations have made similar declarations, including the North American Council on Adoptable Children, which says, "Children should not be denied a permanent family because of the sexual orientation of potential parents."
Currently, only one state (Florida) bans gay couples from adopting. Twenty-five states allow gay couples to co-adopt children. (A judge in Michigan ruled in 2002 that adoptions by gay couples could no longer be allowed due to a state law which stipulates that only married couples and single individuals can adopt.)
In other recent adoption news:
* An Indiana appeals court ruled April 14 that a county court judge could not overturn the adoption of an infant because the adopting couple was gay.
* A Missouri circuit court ruled in February that the state's denial of a foster care application by a lesbian amounted to "unreasonable" discrimination.
* Massachusetts's Department of Early Education has said it will not take action to stop Catholic adoption agencies from barring gay couples from adoptions. The state's human rights law prohibits discrimination based on sexual orientation, but Republican Governor Mitt Romney is seeking passage of a bill that would allow some groups to discriminate against gays by saying that equal treatment of gays violates their religious beliefs.
Marriage equality threatened in Canada
Marriage equality threatened in Canada
By Lisa Keen
Originally printed 4/20/2006 (Issue 1416 - Between The Lines News)
Same-sex marriages have been legal in parts of Canada for almost five years now. But if the country's new conservative Prime Minister, Stephen Harper, has his way, they won't be available for much longer.
It was probably a financial scandal and not his party's support for same-sex marriage that caused former Canadian Prime Minister Paul Martin to lose his seat to Harper. The Conservative Party leader who defeated Martin by a narrow margin three months ago used his opposition to same-sex marriage as a campaign issue during the fall election.
This month, as the new parliament convened, Harper told reporters he intends to follow through on his promise to overturn the Civil Marriage Act, shepherded through the parliament last summer by the Liberal Party.
It was not the Civil Marriage Act that made same-sex marriages legal throughout Canada. Most provinces began issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples after courts ruled that bans on same-sex marriage violated the country's Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
The first province to issue licenses was Ontario, which spans the Great Lakes region and attracts numerous visitors from the United States. Toronto, the first city in Ontario to issue licenses, issued 3,194 licenses to same-sex couples between June 10, 2003 and April 4, 2006. Thirty-eight percent of those licenses were issued to gay couples from the United States.
USA Today reported in February that the number of same-sex couples seeking marriage licenses in Toronto was up - from 60 in January 2005 to 90 in January 2006. But that does not necessarily reflect a surge in couples seeking licenses because of the Conservative Party victory in January. The average number of marriage licenses issued to same-sex couples by Toronto since 2003 has been about 94 per month; between January and April of 2006, it has been about 75 per month.
According to Canadians for Equal Marriage, in order for the parliament to overturn the Civil Marriage Act, it must first vote on whether to revisit the same-sex marriage legislation currently in force. Should that resolution pass, it can then take up a bill to repeal the legislation.
But gay civil rights supporters are hopeful that, even if parliament repeals the law, Canadian courts will again rule that a ban on same-sex marriages violates the country's constitution.
With the passage of the Civil Marriage Act last July, Canada became the fourth nation to legalize same-sex marriages - behind The Netherlands (2001), Belgium (2003), and Spain (June 2005).
Even as the bill passed last summer, Conservative leader Harper said he would seek to overturn the law, should his Conservative Party win control of the parliament. Harper also promised, however, that, should the parliament reverse itself, his administration would continue to honor marriages already licensed. And according to CBC News, Harper does support civil unions for same-sex couples.
Harper has indicated he will call on parliament to vote on a resolution to take up the same-sex marriage issue this year - probably this fall, according to various news reports. A national poll by The Environics Group, a market and social values research company, asked Canadians in late January whether they wanted the newly elected Conservative Party government to bring up the same-sex marriage issue in parliament. Of the 2,034 polled, 66 percent said "No," 30 percent said "Yes," and four percent were undecided.
By Lisa Keen
Originally printed 4/20/2006 (Issue 1416 - Between The Lines News)
Same-sex marriages have been legal in parts of Canada for almost five years now. But if the country's new conservative Prime Minister, Stephen Harper, has his way, they won't be available for much longer.
It was probably a financial scandal and not his party's support for same-sex marriage that caused former Canadian Prime Minister Paul Martin to lose his seat to Harper. The Conservative Party leader who defeated Martin by a narrow margin three months ago used his opposition to same-sex marriage as a campaign issue during the fall election.
This month, as the new parliament convened, Harper told reporters he intends to follow through on his promise to overturn the Civil Marriage Act, shepherded through the parliament last summer by the Liberal Party.
It was not the Civil Marriage Act that made same-sex marriages legal throughout Canada. Most provinces began issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples after courts ruled that bans on same-sex marriage violated the country's Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
The first province to issue licenses was Ontario, which spans the Great Lakes region and attracts numerous visitors from the United States. Toronto, the first city in Ontario to issue licenses, issued 3,194 licenses to same-sex couples between June 10, 2003 and April 4, 2006. Thirty-eight percent of those licenses were issued to gay couples from the United States.
USA Today reported in February that the number of same-sex couples seeking marriage licenses in Toronto was up - from 60 in January 2005 to 90 in January 2006. But that does not necessarily reflect a surge in couples seeking licenses because of the Conservative Party victory in January. The average number of marriage licenses issued to same-sex couples by Toronto since 2003 has been about 94 per month; between January and April of 2006, it has been about 75 per month.
According to Canadians for Equal Marriage, in order for the parliament to overturn the Civil Marriage Act, it must first vote on whether to revisit the same-sex marriage legislation currently in force. Should that resolution pass, it can then take up a bill to repeal the legislation.
But gay civil rights supporters are hopeful that, even if parliament repeals the law, Canadian courts will again rule that a ban on same-sex marriages violates the country's constitution.
With the passage of the Civil Marriage Act last July, Canada became the fourth nation to legalize same-sex marriages - behind The Netherlands (2001), Belgium (2003), and Spain (June 2005).
Even as the bill passed last summer, Conservative leader Harper said he would seek to overturn the law, should his Conservative Party win control of the parliament. Harper also promised, however, that, should the parliament reverse itself, his administration would continue to honor marriages already licensed. And according to CBC News, Harper does support civil unions for same-sex couples.
Harper has indicated he will call on parliament to vote on a resolution to take up the same-sex marriage issue this year - probably this fall, according to various news reports. A national poll by The Environics Group, a market and social values research company, asked Canadians in late January whether they wanted the newly elected Conservative Party government to bring up the same-sex marriage issue in parliament. Of the 2,034 polled, 66 percent said "No," 30 percent said "Yes," and four percent were undecided.
Thursday, April 06, 2006
'Brokeback Mountain' banned in anti-gay move
'Brokeback Mountain' banned in anti-gay moveThu Apr 6, 2006 2:53 PM ET
By John Marquis
NASSAU, Bahamas (Reuters) - The Bahamas has banned the gay cowboy movie "Brokeback Mountain," triggering a new controversy over the island chain's reputation for homophobia.
Gay rights groups and other critics called on the Plays and Films Control Board to think again, so far to no avail.
"I cannot understand denying people the right to make their own choices," said theater director Phillip Burrows.
The award-winning 2005 film about two cowboys who fall in love got the thumbs-down from the control board after a request for it to be banned from the Bahamas Christian Council, which has been involved in previous anti-gay action.
The ban does not come as a surprise to Bahamians.
Last September, Miss Teen Bahamas was stripped of her title after she admitted to being a lesbian.
Four years ago, employees walked off the job at an isolated resort cay in the Bahamas after a shipload of gays arrived. The disgusted workers described carnal scenes on the beach as "like Sodom and Gomorrah" and refused to work until they had gone.
In 2004, Christian groups led a protest against the Norwegian Dawn cruise ship, which had docked with 1,600 gay passengers.
Rallied by the Save the Bahamas Initiative, which maintains that family values are undermined by gay couples, hundreds of demonstrators waved banners saying, "If you're gay, stay away," and "Even animals have more sense than homosexuals."
The 2004 protest did not repeat the violence of 1998, when lesbian couples were chased off Bay Street, Nassau's main shopping thoroughfare, by furious protesters and the mooring ropes of a visiting gay cruise ship were tossed into the sea.
In its 2005 Country Report, the State Department criticized the Bahamas government for actively promoting opposition to homosexuality.
"Although homosexual relations between consenting adults are legal, there was no legislation to address the human rights concerns of homosexuals, lesbians, bisexuals or trans-gendered persons," said the report, released last month.
A gay rights organization, the Rainbow Alliance, has called for tolerance and last year opened an office in Nassau.
"We hope this will become a center for social change," said member Helen Klonaris.
--------------
So, uh, let , me get this straight...you can have a gay time in the Bahamas and take as many drinks and do as many drugs as you want to...but you just can't BE gay YOURSELF...oh, NOW that makes sense! Let's just ban all movies with "gay" themes...um, let see, My Best Friend's Wedding, Philedelphia, every musical ever made and every movie with Judy Garland in it! (rolls eyes) Boycott the Bahamas for your next vacation--we have enough anti-human being problems here at home!
>>"Even animals have more sense than homosexuals."
WHAT?! Animals cannot love and live the way people can, and homosexuals are people. They're saying that gays are lower than animals...so does that make them on the same level as viruses, bacteria and scum? Being gay isn't a disease anymore than Cerebral Palsy is a disease--both are equally as contagious. There's NOTHING worse than people with social diseases that they CHOOSE to have, like these folks in the Bahamas. Ranting anymore about this will just waste my time...(sigh)
By John Marquis
NASSAU, Bahamas (Reuters) - The Bahamas has banned the gay cowboy movie "Brokeback Mountain," triggering a new controversy over the island chain's reputation for homophobia.
Gay rights groups and other critics called on the Plays and Films Control Board to think again, so far to no avail.
"I cannot understand denying people the right to make their own choices," said theater director Phillip Burrows.
The award-winning 2005 film about two cowboys who fall in love got the thumbs-down from the control board after a request for it to be banned from the Bahamas Christian Council, which has been involved in previous anti-gay action.
The ban does not come as a surprise to Bahamians.
Last September, Miss Teen Bahamas was stripped of her title after she admitted to being a lesbian.
Four years ago, employees walked off the job at an isolated resort cay in the Bahamas after a shipload of gays arrived. The disgusted workers described carnal scenes on the beach as "like Sodom and Gomorrah" and refused to work until they had gone.
In 2004, Christian groups led a protest against the Norwegian Dawn cruise ship, which had docked with 1,600 gay passengers.
Rallied by the Save the Bahamas Initiative, which maintains that family values are undermined by gay couples, hundreds of demonstrators waved banners saying, "If you're gay, stay away," and "Even animals have more sense than homosexuals."
The 2004 protest did not repeat the violence of 1998, when lesbian couples were chased off Bay Street, Nassau's main shopping thoroughfare, by furious protesters and the mooring ropes of a visiting gay cruise ship were tossed into the sea.
In its 2005 Country Report, the State Department criticized the Bahamas government for actively promoting opposition to homosexuality.
"Although homosexual relations between consenting adults are legal, there was no legislation to address the human rights concerns of homosexuals, lesbians, bisexuals or trans-gendered persons," said the report, released last month.
A gay rights organization, the Rainbow Alliance, has called for tolerance and last year opened an office in Nassau.
"We hope this will become a center for social change," said member Helen Klonaris.
--------------
So, uh, let , me get this straight...you can have a gay time in the Bahamas and take as many drinks and do as many drugs as you want to...but you just can't BE gay YOURSELF...oh, NOW that makes sense! Let's just ban all movies with "gay" themes...um, let see, My Best Friend's Wedding, Philedelphia, every musical ever made and every movie with Judy Garland in it! (rolls eyes) Boycott the Bahamas for your next vacation--we have enough anti-human being problems here at home!
>>"Even animals have more sense than homosexuals."
WHAT?! Animals cannot love and live the way people can, and homosexuals are people. They're saying that gays are lower than animals...so does that make them on the same level as viruses, bacteria and scum? Being gay isn't a disease anymore than Cerebral Palsy is a disease--both are equally as contagious. There's NOTHING worse than people with social diseases that they CHOOSE to have, like these folks in the Bahamas. Ranting anymore about this will just waste my time...(sigh)
Wednesday, April 05, 2006
Tuesday, April 04, 2006
The 'Sleeping Giant' Awakens (Again)
The 'Sleeping Giant' Awakens (Again)
-->
Eastern Group Publications, Opinion, Jorge Mariscal, Apr 04, 2006
In the 1950s, when anthropologists referred to Mexican Americans as the sleeping giant and the media stereotype of choice was a man sleeping under a cactus, the thought that Latinos in the United States might organize to demand equal opportunity seemed far-fetched. One noted social scientist wrote: “The masses of Mexican Americans in the large cities of the Southwest are politically inert. The very model of Mexican leadership has been the 'quiet fighter' who does not create any public difficulties.” It was not until Cesar Chavez, Dolores Huerta, and California farm workers burst into the national consciousness in 1966 that pundits began to detect a major tremor in the political landscape. In 1968 in Los Angeles, Chicano high school students demonstrated for educational reform, a movement captured in the new HBO film “Walkout!” In 1970, Chicanos and Chicanas organized major rallies against the U.S. war in Southeast Asia. What we now call the Chicano Movement was a grass-roots mobilization composed of diverse organizations and agendas. It gave a generation of Mexican Americans a new identity premised upon cultural pride, a thirst for justice, and an insistence that U.S. democracy deliver on its promises. The recent demonstrations in support of humane immigration reform that does not exploit hard-working families dwarf the demonstrations of the Chicano Movement era--4, 000 in Dallas, 5,000 in San Francisco, 20,000 in Phoenix, 50,000 in Detroit, 50,000 in Denver, 300,000 in Chicago, and more than 500,000 in Los Angeles. In Atlanta, an estimated 80,000 Latinos protested by not going to work. On Atlanta streets, marchers carried signs that read “Nosotros también tenemos un sueño” (“We too have a dream”). Dr. King and Cesar Chavez would have been proud. Whereas the movement of the Vietnam War era was limited to young Mexican Americans in the Southwest, today's movement includes people of every age with a variety of connections to the immigrant experience and with origins in many different Spanish-speaking countries. Marching side by side with the thousands of legal immigrants who arrived in the decade of the 1990s (more than any previous decade in U.S. history) were those whose parents or grandparents came to this country years ago. Newly arrived Salvadorans, fifth-generation Chicanas with family members who fought in World War II, Vietnam, and Iraq, and everyone in between said in one voice “We will not be criminalized; we will not be intimidated.” The shockwaves of these massive demonstrations will be dramatic. Like the aftermath of California's Proposition 187 in 1994 that would have removed the social safety net for undocumented workers, we can expect that the new mobilizations will produce a huge spike in Latino voter registration. As it did in the 1960s, the “sleeping giant” has once again risen from its slumber. Comedian Carlos Mencia finds it amusing to drop epithets like “beaner” and “wetback.” In the politically correct 1990s, we might have chastised him for being too ignorant to realize what a far greater comedian named Richard Pryor learned on his first trip to Africa. “I didn't see any n*****s there,” Pryor said.
This week, immigrants, their children, the grandchildren and great grandchildren of immigrants, and those with Spanish surnames who trace their roots to the Southwest before there was a United States took to the streets to demand dignity and respect. Someone tell Carlos Mencia, the Minutemen, and Senators Sensenbrenner and Frist that there was not a single beaner or wetback among them. Jorge Mariscal is Director of the Chicano/Latino/a Arts and Humanities Program at the University of California, San Diego.
----
I'm part "them", you know. Whatever happens to them will also affect what will happen to my family in some way. Even a the highest king has the lowly peasent blood in his veins.
-->
Eastern Group Publications, Opinion, Jorge Mariscal, Apr 04, 2006
In the 1950s, when anthropologists referred to Mexican Americans as the sleeping giant and the media stereotype of choice was a man sleeping under a cactus, the thought that Latinos in the United States might organize to demand equal opportunity seemed far-fetched. One noted social scientist wrote: “The masses of Mexican Americans in the large cities of the Southwest are politically inert. The very model of Mexican leadership has been the 'quiet fighter' who does not create any public difficulties.” It was not until Cesar Chavez, Dolores Huerta, and California farm workers burst into the national consciousness in 1966 that pundits began to detect a major tremor in the political landscape. In 1968 in Los Angeles, Chicano high school students demonstrated for educational reform, a movement captured in the new HBO film “Walkout!” In 1970, Chicanos and Chicanas organized major rallies against the U.S. war in Southeast Asia. What we now call the Chicano Movement was a grass-roots mobilization composed of diverse organizations and agendas. It gave a generation of Mexican Americans a new identity premised upon cultural pride, a thirst for justice, and an insistence that U.S. democracy deliver on its promises. The recent demonstrations in support of humane immigration reform that does not exploit hard-working families dwarf the demonstrations of the Chicano Movement era--4, 000 in Dallas, 5,000 in San Francisco, 20,000 in Phoenix, 50,000 in Detroit, 50,000 in Denver, 300,000 in Chicago, and more than 500,000 in Los Angeles. In Atlanta, an estimated 80,000 Latinos protested by not going to work. On Atlanta streets, marchers carried signs that read “Nosotros también tenemos un sueño” (“We too have a dream”). Dr. King and Cesar Chavez would have been proud. Whereas the movement of the Vietnam War era was limited to young Mexican Americans in the Southwest, today's movement includes people of every age with a variety of connections to the immigrant experience and with origins in many different Spanish-speaking countries. Marching side by side with the thousands of legal immigrants who arrived in the decade of the 1990s (more than any previous decade in U.S. history) were those whose parents or grandparents came to this country years ago. Newly arrived Salvadorans, fifth-generation Chicanas with family members who fought in World War II, Vietnam, and Iraq, and everyone in between said in one voice “We will not be criminalized; we will not be intimidated.” The shockwaves of these massive demonstrations will be dramatic. Like the aftermath of California's Proposition 187 in 1994 that would have removed the social safety net for undocumented workers, we can expect that the new mobilizations will produce a huge spike in Latino voter registration. As it did in the 1960s, the “sleeping giant” has once again risen from its slumber. Comedian Carlos Mencia finds it amusing to drop epithets like “beaner” and “wetback.” In the politically correct 1990s, we might have chastised him for being too ignorant to realize what a far greater comedian named Richard Pryor learned on his first trip to Africa. “I didn't see any n*****s there,” Pryor said.
This week, immigrants, their children, the grandchildren and great grandchildren of immigrants, and those with Spanish surnames who trace their roots to the Southwest before there was a United States took to the streets to demand dignity and respect. Someone tell Carlos Mencia, the Minutemen, and Senators Sensenbrenner and Frist that there was not a single beaner or wetback among them. Jorge Mariscal is Director of the Chicano/Latino/a Arts and Humanities Program at the University of California, San Diego.
----
I'm part "them", you know. Whatever happens to them will also affect what will happen to my family in some way. Even a the highest king has the lowly peasent blood in his veins.
A Nation That Demands Unkindness
Something to really think about here...
A Nation That Demands Unkindness
-->
La Prensa San Diego, Commentary, Pedro Celis, Apr 03, 2006
REDMOND, Wash. – “Once we secure our borders and the American people are confident that we have control of the south, in particular, I believe that we will be able to have a rational national debate about what to do with the 8 million to 10 million souls [undocumented immigrants] that are here,” said Congressman Mike Pence (R-Indiana) recently, while explaining his opposition to the guest worker program proposal endorsed by President Bush.Yet Congressman Pence voted in favor of a law (HR 4437), approved last December by the House of Representatives, that turns those 10 million souls into criminals. It turns illegal presence in this country from a civil violation into a federal crime — subject to an entirely different kind of policing and punishable by much stiffer penalties. Those 10 million people would:
• Be declared felons, barred from ever being eligible to become legal immigrants.
• Even their children would be declared felons, subject to jail time and subsequent deportation
• Any person or any organization who “assists” an individual without documentation “to reside in or remain” in the United States knowingly or with “reckless disregard” as to the individual’s legal status would be liable for criminal penalties and five years in prison.
• Church personnel who provide shelter or other basic needs assistance to an undocumented individual would also be liable.
• Property used in this act would be subject to seizure and forfeiture.Hence, all manner of people would become criminally liable and subject to fines, property forfeiture and imprisonment: the daycare provider who cares for her neighbor’s children; the landscaper who gives a ride to his co-worker; the church program volunteer who teaches English as a second language. In essence, being a Good Samaritan could land you in jail.
State and local law enforcement are authorized to enforce federal immigration laws. State and local governments that refuse to participate would be subject to the loss of federal funding. Millions of people would now be abused and taken advantage of with the knowledge that they could not avail themselves to any of the protections offered by our laws.All of this in the name of national security.It is naïve to argue that this bill would increase our security while leaving the question of “what to do with the 8 or 10 millions souls” for a subsequent rational national debate.The provisions in this bill that deal with these souls are mean-spirited and vindictive. Turning all these individuals, who are part and parcel of our communities, into criminals is detrimental to our own security.Not that enforcement or legality are unimportant. But we need to replace illegal immigration with increased legal immigration. We need to provide avenues for honest, hard-working individuals to come or remain in our country in a way that satisfies our national security and our economic self-interest.Whoever thinks that passing a law like HR 4437 will solve our illegal immigration problem is sticking his head in the sand. It will not make these 10 million souls disappear.There is a better way to get control of our borders. A way that recognizes both the importance of enforcing the rule of law and the contributions that immigrants bring to our society and economy. That is the comprehensive immigration reform approach being discussed now in the Senate.Under the leadership of Senator Allen Specter, the Senate Judiciary Committee, has been crafting a more realistic legislation that will send to the full Senate this week. That legislation addresses some of the most glaring deficiencies of HR 4437.
Namely:
• It provides avenues to increase legal immigration.
• It deals more realistically with the 10 million undocumented souls by allowing them to register, receive background checks, and work while they apply for permanent legal immigration. It does so in a way that rejects amnesty, where someone who has violated the law would have an advantage in the process of becoming a legal immigrant over someone who did not.
• It removes most of the criminalization provisions against Good Samaritans.We agree with President Bush statement at the most recent state of the union that: “Keeping America competitive requires an immigration system that upholds our laws, reflects our values, and serves the interests of our economy.
Our Nation needs orderly and secure borders. To meet this goal, we must have stronger immigration enforcement and border protection. And we must have a rational, humane guest worker program that rejects amnesty … allows temporary jobs for people who seek them legally … and reduces smuggling and crime at the border.”Dr. Pedro Celis is a Distinguished Engineer at Microsoft Corporation in Redmond, Washington and the National Chairman of the Republican National Hispanic Assembly.
A Nation That Demands Unkindness
-->
La Prensa San Diego, Commentary, Pedro Celis, Apr 03, 2006
REDMOND, Wash. – “Once we secure our borders and the American people are confident that we have control of the south, in particular, I believe that we will be able to have a rational national debate about what to do with the 8 million to 10 million souls [undocumented immigrants] that are here,” said Congressman Mike Pence (R-Indiana) recently, while explaining his opposition to the guest worker program proposal endorsed by President Bush.Yet Congressman Pence voted in favor of a law (HR 4437), approved last December by the House of Representatives, that turns those 10 million souls into criminals. It turns illegal presence in this country from a civil violation into a federal crime — subject to an entirely different kind of policing and punishable by much stiffer penalties. Those 10 million people would:
• Be declared felons, barred from ever being eligible to become legal immigrants.
• Even their children would be declared felons, subject to jail time and subsequent deportation
• Any person or any organization who “assists” an individual without documentation “to reside in or remain” in the United States knowingly or with “reckless disregard” as to the individual’s legal status would be liable for criminal penalties and five years in prison.
• Church personnel who provide shelter or other basic needs assistance to an undocumented individual would also be liable.
• Property used in this act would be subject to seizure and forfeiture.Hence, all manner of people would become criminally liable and subject to fines, property forfeiture and imprisonment: the daycare provider who cares for her neighbor’s children; the landscaper who gives a ride to his co-worker; the church program volunteer who teaches English as a second language. In essence, being a Good Samaritan could land you in jail.
State and local law enforcement are authorized to enforce federal immigration laws. State and local governments that refuse to participate would be subject to the loss of federal funding. Millions of people would now be abused and taken advantage of with the knowledge that they could not avail themselves to any of the protections offered by our laws.All of this in the name of national security.It is naïve to argue that this bill would increase our security while leaving the question of “what to do with the 8 or 10 millions souls” for a subsequent rational national debate.The provisions in this bill that deal with these souls are mean-spirited and vindictive. Turning all these individuals, who are part and parcel of our communities, into criminals is detrimental to our own security.Not that enforcement or legality are unimportant. But we need to replace illegal immigration with increased legal immigration. We need to provide avenues for honest, hard-working individuals to come or remain in our country in a way that satisfies our national security and our economic self-interest.Whoever thinks that passing a law like HR 4437 will solve our illegal immigration problem is sticking his head in the sand. It will not make these 10 million souls disappear.There is a better way to get control of our borders. A way that recognizes both the importance of enforcing the rule of law and the contributions that immigrants bring to our society and economy. That is the comprehensive immigration reform approach being discussed now in the Senate.Under the leadership of Senator Allen Specter, the Senate Judiciary Committee, has been crafting a more realistic legislation that will send to the full Senate this week. That legislation addresses some of the most glaring deficiencies of HR 4437.
Namely:
• It provides avenues to increase legal immigration.
• It deals more realistically with the 10 million undocumented souls by allowing them to register, receive background checks, and work while they apply for permanent legal immigration. It does so in a way that rejects amnesty, where someone who has violated the law would have an advantage in the process of becoming a legal immigrant over someone who did not.
• It removes most of the criminalization provisions against Good Samaritans.We agree with President Bush statement at the most recent state of the union that: “Keeping America competitive requires an immigration system that upholds our laws, reflects our values, and serves the interests of our economy.
Our Nation needs orderly and secure borders. To meet this goal, we must have stronger immigration enforcement and border protection. And we must have a rational, humane guest worker program that rejects amnesty … allows temporary jobs for people who seek them legally … and reduces smuggling and crime at the border.”Dr. Pedro Celis is a Distinguished Engineer at Microsoft Corporation in Redmond, Washington and the National Chairman of the Republican National Hispanic Assembly.
Secure Gay Rights Before Extending Rights of the Undocumented
Secure Gay Rights Before Extending Rights of the Undocumented
-->
New America Media, Commentary, Jasmyne Cannick, Apr 04, 2006
Editor's Note: When American citizens, particularly lesbians and gays, haven't received their full civil rights, why is Congress considering extending more rights to illegal immigrants? Jasmyne Cannick is a member of the National Association of Black Journalists. She can be reached via her Web site, www.jasmynecannick.com.LOS ANGELES--Immigration reform is an important issue, but it's not the next civil rights movement. We haven't even finished with our current civil rights movement.Sen. Edward Kennedy of Massachusetts got it right when he said, "There is no moving to the front of the line."Immigration reform needs to get in line behind the gay civil rights movement. Discrimination and unequal treatment of gay Americans has not yet been resolved.I recognize the plight of illegal immigrants. However, I didn't break the law to come into this country. The country has broken its own laws by not recognizing and bestowing upon me my full rights as a citizen. I find it hard as a black lesbian to jump on the immigration reform bandwagon when my own bandwagon hasn't even left the barn.Legal American citizens continue to be denied the right to marry because of their sexual orientation, while their families are deprived of access to the more than 1,138 federal rights, protections and responsibilities automatically granted to married heterosexual couples.If we're going to hold 24-hour Senate sessions using taxpayer dollars, let those sessions be used to come up with a comprehensive plan that allows America's same-gender loving stakeholders to have the opportunity to have the right to make decisions on a partner's behalf in a medical emergency, or the right to receive family-related Social Security benefits.But immigration reform dominates in Washington. President Bush wants a comprehensive guest worker program for undocumented laborers.With all due respect, Mr. President, there should be no guest worker program until we ensure that all lesbian and gay American citizens have the right to take up to 12 weeks of leave to care for a seriously ill partner or parent of a partner, and the right to purchase continued health coverage for a domestic partner after the loss of a job.Both Sen. Kennedy and Sen. John Cornyn of Texas backed away from requiring that guest workers leave the United States after their initial two-year visa expired. The congressmen wanted to keep immigrant families from being separated.Well, what about making sure that the children of same-sex couples are protected and not separated from the parent they know and love in the event of an untimely death? Same-sex couples make commitments and form families just like heterosexual couples, and they need the same protections.Lesbians and gays are not second-class citizens. Our issues should not get bumped to the back of the line in favor of extending rights to people who have entered this country illegally.Author and poet Audre Lorde once said, "I have come to believe over and over again, that what is most important to me must be spoken, made verbal and shared, even at the risk of having it bruised or misunderstood."While I know no one wants to be viewed as a racist when it comes to immigration reform, as a lesbian I don't want to move to the back of the bus to accommodate those who broke the law to be here. Immigrants aren't the only ones who want a shot at the American dream.
-------
Point well taken. My sweet grandparents were illegal immigrants until 1968. They crossed the Mexico/Texas border unlawfully all the time before then. They were children of simple farmers and ranchers, raised especially hard in sometimes unspeakable conditions in 1930's-1940's Mexico, a nation that at the time resembled 1900's America.
What does this mean for immigrants and gays? Their plights can no longer be simply ignored. But the hard truth is that immigrants will surely be dealt with much sooner than gays. The government does not want to deal with something as difficult to call as those with "diviant sexual preferences". It isn't clear cut. Gays are hard to tell apart from straights. Perhaps this is why they are viewed as difficult to deal with and why they are "easy targets" for hatred. It's easy to shun something that isn't clear cut or absolute, something that isn't black and white or "pure". As much as humanity loves to think of themselves as belonging to one race or religion or ethnicity, no one is pure anything. Nothing really separates us from anyone else in the human race. Sure, there is skin color, language, political beliefs, etc., but all attempt in their own way some kind of peace and harmony. In the end, are we really so different that we cannot give our fellow man his most basic right to live as he chooses? As long as he does not harm anyone or himself, he should have this. Why must it be always fought for, to be delcared something that these people were already born as: human beings?
-->
New America Media, Commentary, Jasmyne Cannick, Apr 04, 2006
Editor's Note: When American citizens, particularly lesbians and gays, haven't received their full civil rights, why is Congress considering extending more rights to illegal immigrants? Jasmyne Cannick is a member of the National Association of Black Journalists. She can be reached via her Web site, www.jasmynecannick.com.LOS ANGELES--Immigration reform is an important issue, but it's not the next civil rights movement. We haven't even finished with our current civil rights movement.Sen. Edward Kennedy of Massachusetts got it right when he said, "There is no moving to the front of the line."Immigration reform needs to get in line behind the gay civil rights movement. Discrimination and unequal treatment of gay Americans has not yet been resolved.I recognize the plight of illegal immigrants. However, I didn't break the law to come into this country. The country has broken its own laws by not recognizing and bestowing upon me my full rights as a citizen. I find it hard as a black lesbian to jump on the immigration reform bandwagon when my own bandwagon hasn't even left the barn.Legal American citizens continue to be denied the right to marry because of their sexual orientation, while their families are deprived of access to the more than 1,138 federal rights, protections and responsibilities automatically granted to married heterosexual couples.If we're going to hold 24-hour Senate sessions using taxpayer dollars, let those sessions be used to come up with a comprehensive plan that allows America's same-gender loving stakeholders to have the opportunity to have the right to make decisions on a partner's behalf in a medical emergency, or the right to receive family-related Social Security benefits.But immigration reform dominates in Washington. President Bush wants a comprehensive guest worker program for undocumented laborers.With all due respect, Mr. President, there should be no guest worker program until we ensure that all lesbian and gay American citizens have the right to take up to 12 weeks of leave to care for a seriously ill partner or parent of a partner, and the right to purchase continued health coverage for a domestic partner after the loss of a job.Both Sen. Kennedy and Sen. John Cornyn of Texas backed away from requiring that guest workers leave the United States after their initial two-year visa expired. The congressmen wanted to keep immigrant families from being separated.Well, what about making sure that the children of same-sex couples are protected and not separated from the parent they know and love in the event of an untimely death? Same-sex couples make commitments and form families just like heterosexual couples, and they need the same protections.Lesbians and gays are not second-class citizens. Our issues should not get bumped to the back of the line in favor of extending rights to people who have entered this country illegally.Author and poet Audre Lorde once said, "I have come to believe over and over again, that what is most important to me must be spoken, made verbal and shared, even at the risk of having it bruised or misunderstood."While I know no one wants to be viewed as a racist when it comes to immigration reform, as a lesbian I don't want to move to the back of the bus to accommodate those who broke the law to be here. Immigrants aren't the only ones who want a shot at the American dream.
-------
Point well taken. My sweet grandparents were illegal immigrants until 1968. They crossed the Mexico/Texas border unlawfully all the time before then. They were children of simple farmers and ranchers, raised especially hard in sometimes unspeakable conditions in 1930's-1940's Mexico, a nation that at the time resembled 1900's America.
What does this mean for immigrants and gays? Their plights can no longer be simply ignored. But the hard truth is that immigrants will surely be dealt with much sooner than gays. The government does not want to deal with something as difficult to call as those with "diviant sexual preferences". It isn't clear cut. Gays are hard to tell apart from straights. Perhaps this is why they are viewed as difficult to deal with and why they are "easy targets" for hatred. It's easy to shun something that isn't clear cut or absolute, something that isn't black and white or "pure". As much as humanity loves to think of themselves as belonging to one race or religion or ethnicity, no one is pure anything. Nothing really separates us from anyone else in the human race. Sure, there is skin color, language, political beliefs, etc., but all attempt in their own way some kind of peace and harmony. In the end, are we really so different that we cannot give our fellow man his most basic right to live as he chooses? As long as he does not harm anyone or himself, he should have this. Why must it be always fought for, to be delcared something that these people were already born as: human beings?
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
