Identity

You all know why I hate the word "Hispanic". So when Marisa from Latina Lista sent this around the other day, I couldn't stop myself from bashing them for using that most detested word.

As a Latinoamericanista by training, Latin American and by extension, Latino, means to include non-Spanish speaking countries like Brazil and Haiti. Hispanic doesn't.

Also, when we speak Latino, we don't speak of people who are only of Castillian Spanish ascendancy. They could be descendants of Persian Jews, Lebanese Christians, Tagalog Filipinos or simple any of the hundreds of Native South American and Caribbean tribes that populate our countries.

If universities across the country can make a distinction between Hispanic and Latino studies, it would behoove the political elites to make those distinctions, no? It's why I've never understood the insistence of advocacy and organizations to use the anachronistic term "Hispanic".

Any organization that doesn't embrace the diversity of the Latino community, with all our languages, ethnicities, cultures and races, is bound to always be political weak. Especially in these times when mobile and internet technologies, along with transnational economies, are breaking down the barriers of racial, ethnic and linguistic identity while fortifying those of class.

Anyhow, thanks Marisa. Am pulling a lazyweb on this one and just cutting and pasting on the blog.

H/T To Duke over at Migra Matters.

Ricardo Lovato is the go-to-guy for anything having to do with the current trends towards militarization of all immigration and migrant workers issues in the United States. He is also a very good friend of mine; which is why you should read his blog on a daily basis.

Are you gung-ho Marine Corps dog-face for Memorial Day, or just hangdog, as in depressed and demoralized? Favorite Daughter has been thinking about this in her drought-parched Hammock of Death:

"Of (Puppy) Dogs and Marines" by Favorite Daughter

There's a little girl who lives next door to me, about 5, and fully capable of walking and talking and waving to me on occasion, which is always mind-blowing because I remember her family moving in prior to her existence.

The family is, I guess, a good one, at least in the traditional American sense. They have a yard with nice grass and a back deck, an easy southern drawl on the rare occasions I hear them speak. They play country music on the radio on the weekend, host some sort of church get-together on Wednesday nights. They possess a comfortable façade of Americana, which I'm sure I could peel back quite easily, revealing a healthy amount of sordidness, but I won't.

They also have the meanest dog I've ever met.

He's a Boston Terrier, a breed second only to the pug in its tenacious ugliness. He despises me even more than he despises the rest of the world; whenever we're outside together, he runs to the edge of his yard and threatens me in every way he can. He once chased a garbage man up a brick mailbox.

Image found at Wikipedia

I have always been baffled by the inclusiveness and diversity of the Bush administration. I could have never fathomed a black woman Secretary of State under any Democratic presidency, yet thanks to George Bush, Condoleeza Rice is not just that, but she's also one of the most powerful women in the world.

The same goes with the concept of a latino working as U. S. Attorney General, but here I am watching Alberto Gonzales trying to weasel his way out of the Judiciary Commitee hearing on the recent firing of eight U.S. Attorneys.

Gonzales ...

Rice ...

It's amazing what people will do for power.

It's kind of taboo for a minority to denounce another one. We're not supposed to that. We're supposed to present a united front against oppression. You know, because we're all supposed to be one consciousness and not act out of free agency and will.

Yahhh. Riiiiight.

It makes a difference who you are -- and whoever gets to create your character.

Favorite Daughter defines herself as her own reflection, says she has a "Disney Princess Complex."

But I don't think this fake news videoclip of "Frog Princess" is quite what she had in mind, guess homeschool princesses better be careful what we wish for and who gets to grant it.

(Sorry, can't get fancy video screen to appear but the link above will take you to it at Comedy Central site)
Anybody for popcorn? --

[UPDATE: There is an update to this diary here]

I had not intended to post so much Jewish-oriented material recently and don't want to start being a one-issue diarist. But this item is pretty important. Seems the Lithuanian government is slating the ancient Jewish cemetary in Vilnius for destruction.

Choral synagogue in Vilnius

There once was a thriving and highly respected Jewish population in Lithuania. Vilnius was called the "Jerusalem of Europe" by Napoleon, so great was the fame of its Jewish scholars. One of the greatest Orthodox Jewish sages, Elijah ben Solomon (called the Vilna Gaon) came from Vilnus and had a profound effect on yeshiva teaching. During the period of Lithuanian independence (1918-1940) Jews served loyally and bravely in the Lithuanian army.

An old photo of the Jewish quarter.

Now there are only about 4000 Jews left in Lithuania. And the cemetary where generations of Jews of Vilnius are buried is now threatened.

The cemetary.

From Guysen Israël News:

The ancient Jewish cemetery of Vilna is threatened with destruction. The Lithuanian authorities have undertaken to destroy the old Jewish cemetery in the capital to build a commercial center on the site, to the great consternation of the Jewish community. The orthodox MK Avraham Ravitz warned the Knesset and has mobilized the dispatch of an Israeli delegation to the site to stop the desecration. (Guysen.Israël.News)

So I was blogging for Thinking Parents today at Snook, about individualism versus institutionalism:

I pretty much hate "versus" applied to any two things. I choose the -ism suffix to mean anything (not just religion) that becomes dominant dogma, elevating some system of belief or aspect of being to an all-purpose imperative, too much of one good thing to the exclusion of others. The one tool that makes every problem look like it needs a good hammering.

In this sense, individual-ism and institutional-ism are indeed opposing mindsets pitted against each other. Ugh!
. . . So today I'm remembering Mortimer Adler's oxymoronic definition of education as the freeing discipline of wonder, and wondering myself where learning without schooling can catch the most light without throwing off too much heat, across the full spectrum of individual and institution?

Two books came to mind in this context --
"The Hedgehog, The Fox, and the Magister's Pox" by Stephen Jay Gould is about reconciling science with the humanities, or how to understand them as an integrated whole, and "The Ant and the Peacock" is about reconciling this seeming paradox in nature: are individuals or collectives favored?

This is unbelievable. Captain's Quarters has published a response to BlogActive's outing of Senator Larry Craig by saying, and I quote "the left hates gays".

Uneffingbelievable.

Once again, the Left shows its obsession with sexuality, but it's really more than that. The Left obsesses over identity politics in all forms, and that obsession comes out in pathological terms. Rogers reveals this in his blog post, demanding that gay staffers on the Hill identify their orientation publicly, or else he will do it for them. Sexual identity is everything to him, and the concept of sexual privacy has no value to him at all. He wants to humiliate gays who prefer to keep their sexual activity private, forcing them to wear the virtual pink triangle against their will to experience obloquy and castigation.

I love this. Captain Ed is basically acknowledging the senator is gay but saying that because he is being outed, Rogers gay activism is wrong and proof the left hates gays.

Cognitive disassociation, anyone?

Which political party has been hijacked by extremist theocrats and pushed legislation against gay marriage?

Which political party has been hijacked by extremist theocrats and has run this country on vilifying gays and feminists as the moral opposites of the "family values" people?

I'm no genetic scientist or any kind of scientist at all, so don't ask me how to define or explain any of this as genetics! But without vouching for the truth of the science or even the truth of this story and its reporters and commenters, I'm fully qualified to see this as part of a shift in understanding reality that is culturally significant, and to imagine (hope? Work to insure?) that we will digest it properly in time, like the one-big-extended-family meal it seems likely to be. . .

Can you tell if you're black or white?

Category: Genetics
September 27, 2006

Last winter a story surfaced about "black" and "white" twins.

As you can see by the picture the main difference is in skin color, though genetically full sisters (fraternal twins), one twin has the complexion typical of a northern European, while the other is darker skinned.

Contrary to the news reports the darker skinned twin does not seem to exhibit the modal complexion of sub-Saharan Africans, rather, she is several shades lighter. In fact, the photo suggests that she is about the same color as her parents, who are both genetically 1/2 European and 1/2 black. . .

Or why it ain't easy standing with the colored folks

Having waded head-on into the politics of race in this lovely country of ours by taking a rather active role in New York's Eleventh District Democratic Primary, I really am ready to leave that entire discussion behind and move on to greener pastures. There is, after all, a midterm election coming up, and there are republicans awaiting our unkind attention.

That sentiment dried up, however, when people began tossing about rather unsubtle variants of "uppity nigger". Witness this:

So, Liza, dear, before you go assailing your betters [...], maybe you should head back to eighth grade English and, you know, learn to spell and to write in a linear fashion. Although judging from your other posts that I read, mediocrity may be a chronic condition for you.

This anguished screed (missing a how or two) is a response, of sorts, to two endeavors by our worthy Liza: one, calling Jane Hamscher an idiot over a caricature of Lieberman in blackface she published on FireDogLake – I should add that this evaluation of Jane is reasonably widely shared among political professionals – and two, the recent fracas over a group of bloggers invited to lunch with President Clinton in Harlem. That lunch, as Liza pointed out, did not include any people of color despite being held in Harlem, where the former President maintains his offices.

I have been away from Culture Kitchen for awhile. I have been so immersed in a local primary that I haven't had time to post here. But near the end of the primary season and now that it is over, I began to realize that a rather disturbing underbelly was being revealed right in my very liberal, very white neighborhood. I posted on this at Daily Gotham and got pretty seriously attacked by people who thought I was showing "reverse racism." I am hoping I can explain myself better here because the issue is one that is important for Democrats to face up to.

The Democratic Primary in the NY-11 Congressional district was a hotly contested one. The candidate I originally liked was my City Councilman, David Yassky. Eventually I grew to prefer another man, Chris Owens, who impressed me as being the ideal, intelligent and articulate voice for the progressive movement. Months of hard work, soul searching, arguing and a whole lot more ensued. Ultimately, neither won. My new Congresswoman is Yvette Clarke, someone who overall I like, though she has had some problems with telling the truth.

What makes it hard for me to lay aside this primary is the racial issues that it brought up. You see, the retiring Congressman is black in a predominantly black district. David Yassky, who is white, moved three blocks to enter the district specifically to run because he was relying on a split black vote (originally split among four black candidates, ultimately split among three) and a unified white vote to win. Those who objected to this racial calculation on Yassky's part were called racist.

This is adapted from a talk I gave to the Latvia Special Interest Group luncheon at the Jewish Genealigical Conference in NYC this week. I don't know how much it will resonate with a general readership, but it means something to me and to those who heard it. It's adapted from a Powerpoint presentation, so the format is different than what I normally do.

1. SEARCHING FOR JEWISH IDENTITY: Preserving our Heritage; Preserving our Identity

Today I don’t just want to talk about my efforts to save a small, sad synagogue in a corner of Eastern Latvia. I also want to talk about why I am trying to save that synagogue. It is a story that, for me, looks at the thorny question of Jewish identity and Jewish heritage and the value of preserving that identity and heritage.

2. “Your origin and your birth are of the Canaanites; your father was an Amorite, you’re your mother a Hittite.” (Ezekiel 16:3)

Genetic evidence confirms the belief that most Jews are closely related and that ultimately we all have roots in the land of Israel or at least its general region. Even an isolated black South African tribe that claims Jewish descent, the Lemba, have genetic traits that point to a common Jewish ancestry. Archaeology shows that the original Jews, if I can use that term for people living so long ago, lived in a small group of poor and isolated villages from around 1200 BCE in what is now the West Bank whose only unique characteristic we can detect archaeologically is that they didn’t eat pork. In all other ways these original Jews were typical Canaanites archaeologically. But they gave up pork. In those tiny, pork-shunning villages we all probably have distant ancestors.

Today I gave a talk to the Latvia Special Interest Group of the Jewish Genealogical Society. In it I had cause to quote a local Brooklyn politician, Bill Batson who has served on Community Board 8 and who is running for Assembly. More about that talk in another diary when I get the chance to adapt it to the blog format. The connection with Bill Batson wasn't political, but cultural, regarding the preservation of heritage and the importance of heritage.

Coincidentally, today I received Bill Batson's campaign newsletter, and in it he has a success story of preserving Brooklyn's heritage...in fact preserving AMERICA'S heritage. From the Batson campaign:

We are learning more about our ancestors' role in building New York city, especially through the African Burial Ground and the Historical Society's recent exhibit on Slavery In New York.

We were thrilled to discover an Underground Railroad Station on Duffield St. in Downtown Brooklyn. Escaping Slaves used the station as a safe house. Instead of celebrating this wonderful opportunity to teach our children about Black History in Brooklyn, the City used Eminent Domain to try and seize the URR site, knock it down, and turn it into an Underground Parking Lot for a new mall.

There is a diary over at My Left Wing that is well worth reading. It describes an attempt by a thoughtful teenager to redo the "Doll Test" from the 1940s and 50s. In the original test researchers showed that when black children were shown two dolls that were identical except for "skin" color, the children would overwhelmingly choose the white doll as the "nice" one and the black doll as the "bad" one. This was used to show the effects that institutional racism had on children's self image and was used as evidence in Brown vs. Board.

The new "study" can't be called scientific, but it is still very interesting. Kiri Davis, a 17-year old filmmaker, wanted to see The Doll Test repeated today. With help from my neighborhood YMCA in Brooklyn, she did her best to do just that. The results were essentially the same as the original, pre-Civil Rights era study. Read the diary for more details.

I think this is something of a condmenation of our society. Our society teaches children as young as 5 years old to consider black skin "bad" and white skin "nice." The MLW diary's author links this to the complete abandonment of black Americans after Katrina hit, which at the time I felt showed quite starkly that the Bush Administration cared not one whit for blacks. Together, these two snapshots of blacks in America really show that our society has not escaped racism. I have always felt that until our society can face up to our slave past we will have a hard time overcoming racism in America. You can take the racism out of the laws, but you can't get rid of the racism unless you face the fact that America was founded with a legal definition of blacks as property and as 5/8 of a person. Even today, history books that cater to Southern markets refer to slavery as not that bad, say that blacks were better off as slaves, and paint the post-Civil War reconstruction government as corrupt carpetbaggers, a myth that was never as true as our history books portray. Isn't it time we admit that as a nation we committed a sin in slavery, admit that our society is still far from fair racially and try to find solutions. The denial of American racism is widespread. Claims that all is equal ignores the reality on the ground. Blacks were left behind after Katrina. It is black skin that is reviled. In NYC our mayor declared victory over unemployment at a time when 50% of black males were without work. It is mostly black district polling places that seem to have problems on election day. Even life expectancy is lower for blacks than whites...a fair amount lower.

Without even assigning blame here, can't we at least admit that there is something deeply wrong in a society with discrepancies like that?

In America today, torture is considered acceptable. Detention without due process is considered acceptable. Republican politicians are calling America a "Christian Nation." Mainstream media talk show hosts are telling Jews to "move to Israel" if they don't consider America a Christian nation. In Indiana Republican politicians are telling Jews they don't matter because they only make up 2% of the population. In Seattle a man shoots up the Jewish Federation because he is "mad at Israel." In Delaware a town considers Jews and Muslims unimportant because they are a small minority and when Jews and Muslims complain about (un-Constitutional) Christian prayer in schools and government meetings they are forced to flee the town by threats of mob violence.

Forget Mel Gibson's drunken, anti-Semitic rants. Throughout America anti-Semitism is rampant. In fact, hate crimes against Jews, Muslims, homosexuals, Hispanics, etc. are rampant. Mix this new Culture of Intolerance, routinely fed and encouraged by the Republican Party and its media lapdogs, with the acceptance of torture and detention without due process and you get an America that is walking the path that Germany walked in the 1930's.

Get the Pope, the President and the Prime Minister on the phone, quick! I've had an epiphany, a flash of understanding about the nature of the divine that should literally SAVE THE WORLD.

It's revolutionary, you ready?
Come closer.
Here it is --

Every person on earth is a nonbeliever. That's it.

Every person on earth is a nonbeliever. Even the most devout believers in each religious tradition are therefore nonbelievers of everything else, no matter what doctrine or denomination they claim as their own, or whether they claim any religion at all.

Every person on earth is a nonbeliever. Of someone's else's religion. Of someone's else's truth, and lies.

Every person on earth is a nonbeliever because in order to believe one thing, you must disbelieve everything else.

For any one given religious belief, most of us will be in its nonbelief camp.

Every person on earth is a nonbeliever.
The recent post from Thomas Jefferson 198 years ago, got me pondering all this:

"Because religious belief, or non-belief, is such an important part of every person's life, freedom of religion affects every individual. State churches that use government power to support themselves and force their views on persons of other faiths undermine all our civil rights. Moreover, state support of the church tends to make the clergy unresponsive to the people and leads to corruption within religion.

The Jewish Genealogical Society (New York) is proud to host the 26th IAJGS International Conference on Jewish Genealogy, August 13-18, 2006 at the New York Marriott Marquis Hotel (45th and Broadway). Learn how to discover your Jewish roots (assuming you have any, of course) and meet others whose ancestors came from the same place you did. Click here for more info.

I will be speaking at the Latvian Special Interest Group Luncheon on Monday, August 14, 12:30 PM - 1:45 PM (the lunch lasts that long...hopefully not my talk!) I will talk about my efforts to restore one of the last wooden synagogues in Eastern Europe: the Green Synagogue of Rezekne. I was very honored to be invited to speak and look forward to the conference.

I wonder how Joe Lieberman is feeling about his Right Wing Christian extremist buddies these days? And how will this play in Crown Heights where Hassids love the Right Wing Republicans?

Hate Crimes have been on the rise in America since 9/11, and, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center, hate groups in America have increased by 33% in the past five years. A peak in attacks on Muslims after 9/11 was rapidly followed by an increase in anti-Semitism in the US and worldwide. There was a slight decline in anti-Semetic incidents in 2005, but incidents are still at disturbingly high levels.

Back in February I reported an incident that, while not a hate crime, was certainly a frightening trend. In Indiana, a prominant politician told a group of Jews that their opinion on the recitation of Christian prayers at legislative sessions didn't matter because they only made up 2% of the population. This is a further sign of the rise of Republican, Christian Taliban in the US.

But now it is pogroms. I use that word carefully. In Delaware, two families, one Jewish the other as yet anonymous, were forced to flee the town due to threatened violence by right wing Christian fanatics who were pushing Christian prayer in school.

Studies into the "causes of homosexuality" are extremely controversial. They should not be controversial because people don't like what they imply. Rejecting science because you don't like what it tells you is similar to believing in creationism. But, scientific studies of the sort that show a "cause" of a complex behavior are always suspect. Many have later been discredited or found to be flawed. But, as a scientist I do find it surprising how complex behavior DOES seem to be linked to physical aspects of our selves, including to brain structure and genetics.

Some studies claim that homosexual men have a tiny part of their brain that looks more like the equivalent brain region in women than the male version. This work was done quite some time ago and I know that back then people considered it suggestive but flawed.

More recently, studies have linked homosexuality to having older male siblings. On the one hand such studies are very hard to do well and should always be considered with skepticism. On the other hand, a more recent study not only confirms that correlation, but also suggests that the mechainism for it is in mom.

From BBC News:

or should I say, a multilingual pirate lover? -
I put CK's website through the Pirate Speak translator and got back this Mission statement:

[quote]

Voyage

culturekitchen be a community blog aimed at cultural creatives who believe progressive activism starts in th' galley, th' bunkroom, th' homeport, th' wallet. 'Tis open fer all who believe th' decline o' progressive an' libertarian values be havin' set us aft as a democratic nation.

culturekitchen be published by Liza Sabater.

'T one o' th' top progressive an' feminist blogs in th' United States.

Use our private messagin' system t' contact th' lass' or send th' lass' an email . . .[/quote]

My essays came back with fun titles too,
the best of the bunch perhaps,
being how PirateSpeak translated "Stupid Girls" into "lily-livered lasses."

So what do you think?
Be we wan'ing that homeport maidenhead as booty
for our cursed crew of swabbie wenches who sail th' high-tech high seas?

I've been thinking a lot about Friedrich Nietzsche and two of his books, Beyond Good and Evil and Gay Science.

I've always thought of Beyond Good and Evil as the best critique of the hypocrisy involved in the concept of sin and righteousness.

Aphorism #138: What we do in dreams we also do when we are awake: we invent and fabricate the person with whom we associate - and immediately forget we have done so.

Nietzsche has always been critized for being some sort of a brutal philosopher but I've never in all the years I have been reading his books thought about him as being brutal to be cruel. On the contrary, with this particular book I have always thought of it as a book about the power of love and compassion through the understanding of perspective.

Aphorism #153 : What is done out of love takes place beyond good and evil.

The Gay Science is a book written way before the word gay became synonymous with homosexuality; yet I've always found it interesting that Nietzsche used the term as synonymous to queer. And queerness in this books is what's he describes as being at the heart of all creative people.

#116 : Morality is herd instinct in the individual.

# 275 : What is the seal of liberation? — No longer being ashamed in front of oneself.

# 283 : For believe me: the secret for harvesting from existence the greatest fruitfulness and greatest enjoyment is — to live dangerously.

# 299 : We want to be poets of our life — first of all in the smallest most everyday matters.

# 381 : I would not know what the spirit of a philosopher might wish more to be than a good dancer.

To which I must add, it is the book where he first wrote about the Madman who screamed to the crowds in Aphorism #125, God is dead and you killed him.

Why all of this?

When I read the following article about how Muslim gay men are seeking to marry Muslim lesbian women --and are using the internet to find their partners-- I couldn't help but wonder.

On the one hand, it's a testament of how the internet is not just a technology but a means for communication and community. On the other hand, since these gay men are using the net to stay in the closet and protect themselves while remaining within the strictures of theocratic cultures that would rather have them dead than gay, I could not but shake my head and say, But god is dead, now it's time to dance as philosophers.

At first this was going to be about some local, NY stuff. Then Armando's outing got added on. Now some of the tiffs at My Left Wing are thrown into the mix.

I am not much on Meta-tation. To me the internet is a tool like a screwdriver, and I don't spend too much time considering the workings of a screwdriver when I use it. But events are happening that remind me that the internet is NOT just like a screwdriver so much as a telephone or megaphone and that issues that one would think we had learned long ago seem suddenly to be sweeping through the blogsphere.

Rabbi Shmuley Boteach is an orthodox (modern) Rabbi who has a new show on The Learning Channel called “Shalom in the Home”. It is a cute show where, inspired by his own childhood loneliness due to his parents’ divorce, he travels around the country trying to help families find “Shalom” (peace).

My wife and I have watched a few shows and find it endearing and a cut above the average voyeur show. Reb Boteach is compassionate and insightful and is able to cut through bullshit without angering the people he is counseling.

Last night’s show the Rabbi dove wholeheartedly and intentionally into controversy raising the quality of his show from “cute and endearing” to pretty damned cool.

What we had was an orthodox Rabbi counseling a lesbian couple on how to raise their two daughters in what looked like Park Slope Brooklyn. Rabbi Boteach used this as an opportunity to COMPLETELY demolish the morality of religious attacks on homosexuality.

He came right out and said that they knew this show would be controversial and that was one reason why they wanted to show it. They even had an unusual segment where the crew and the lesbian couple discussed whether the show should even air of if it might be misinterpreted as criticism of the ability of a lesbian couple to raise children. Again, the Rabbi made the point that the message is the exact opposite—that he is helping one of the most compassionate, deep and caring families he has known.

Muslim WakeUp! seeks to bring together Muslims and non-Muslims in America and around the globe in efforts that celebrate cultural and spiritual diversity, tolerance, and understanding. Through online and offline media, events, and community activities, Muslim WakeUp! champions an interpretation of Islam that celebrates the Oneness of God and the Unity of God’s creation through the encouragement of the human creative spirit and the free exchange of ideas, in an atmosphere that is filled with compassion and free of intimidation, authoritarianism, and dogmatism. In all its activities, Muslim WakeUp! attempts to reflect a deep belief in justice and against all forms of oppression, bigotry, sexism, and racism.

Who is hysterical blackness? She is a black, queer, feminist academic who lives, writes, and teaches in the US northeast.

My English is always gonna run laps around my ability to speak Spanish, tho it's gettin better, and honestly, that's a huge part of why this blog is English-dominant. However, I also quiero demostrar that spanglish es más que una amenaza contra el español. It's a means of resistencia, or, in sunshiney terms, an opportunity for cultural contact, mutual understanding, and peaceable mingling. In short, I ain't gonna sit idly by and see only Spanish altered por el espanglish.

America’s latest anti-immigration fad is nothing new. Nor is the denial many people have in America of the irony of this anti-immigration history in America. We have a long history as the anti-immigrant nation of immigrants.

When did your ancestors come to America? Personally, my great-grandparents and at least one grandparent were immigrants. Native Americans are the only non-immigrants to America. Otherwise we ALL are descendents of immigrants. So why the self-hatred?

Most of us had ancestors who faced similar hatred when they first came over. Italians, Irish, Jews, Catholics, Chinese, Japanese, etc. etc. all faced legal obstacles to immigration and faced sometimes armed and dangerous opposition from anti-immigrant groups. All of these groups have been viewed with the same disdain and fear as their descendents now pour upon more recent immigrants.

We have become what our ancestors had to overcome.

Politics, media, culture and life from a queer boricua in Brooklyn.

From a blog, it's gone on to be a full-fledge magazine about Chicano culture : "We are Xispas Magazine, an online journal of Xicano culture, art, and politics from Aztlan - Anahuac. We present books, opinions, social critiques, history, and indigenous traditions."

Black. Gay. Father. Vegetarian. Buddhist. Liberal.

Wandering anthropologist from Mexico

Ratner supporters are very passionate about his Atlantic Yards Project. They often brook no criticism whatsoever of his plan, always coming back to the promised benefits of the project. Bruce Ratner’s development schemes could indeed address real development needs of Brooklyn. The problem is that for the most part his actual plans DON’T address them. The “affordable housing” is defined such that poorer residents would be quickly priced out as the overall value of the area goes up. The promise of jobs is in no way guaranteed and would mainly be white collar or very low paid jobs, not solid, union jobs. There is no plan for new schools and firehouses in an area where schools and firehouses are already too few and far between. And no one has yet addressed the problems of the massive increase in traffic in an already packed area or where the sewage will go with our already overtaxed sewer system. The already smelly Gowanus canal will be the ultimate destination of large chunks of the sewage from Ratner’s 17 skyscrapers and giant arena.

But all practical problems aside, one thing not one single Ratner supporter has ever been able to explain away are the blatant lies and almost as blatant corruption that surrounds Ratner and his business dealings. Let’s face facts. The practical problems like whether the affordable housing is REALLY affordable and for how long, whether the city’s infrastructure will be upgraded adequately to deal with the increased traffic, population and sewage can all be negotiated and worked out if Ratner would actually negotiate in good faith. But what is clear is that Ratner and his business are NOT dealing in good faith. Mostly he gives the community lies and corruption and THAT is something that none of his supporters, from Bloomberg and Pataki to Marty Markowitz, have been able to justify.

There's nothing like it! The old, the new, the coming-soon and the never-was blend seamlessly. Multidiscipline, multicultural and lingual, multieverything. I think Cirque du Soleil shows are incomparable even to each other, though the NYTimes review of "Corteo" opening last night suggests it's the only comparison we should even attempt.

[quote=John Rockwell]Drawing, like other major circuses, from the same international pool of small traveling circuses and circus schools, augmented by fresh talent from Eastern Europe and Asia, Cirque du Soleil has elevated the once marginal and innovative "new circus" experiments of Europe into an international brand name.

The Cirque format has surpassed the older-fashioned. . .
This is another exercise in slightly fey Cirque fantasizing
. . . accompanied by the sort of music mimes would make if mimes made music.[/quote]

I saw their resort show at DisneyWorld's Pleasure Island a few years ago, from the equivalent of center court, only three rows from the stage -- at any moment I was sure the tower of 50 chairs would fall directly on my head or a careening vehicle would drive off the lipless edge into my lap. And performers did come into the seats from all directions, you never quite knew what was coming or what it meant. Talk about live!

Brooklyn is burning and arson is suspected.

I first became suspicious when 1033 Pacific Street burned down, killing four people. It was while reading about this fire that I became aware that there has been an unusual spike in suspicious fires in Central Brooklyn. What particularly struck me was how many of those suspicious fires were around the area Bruce Ratner wants to develop. It was one of those thoughts you don’t like having. When you make a connection that is far fetched and disturbing, but does fit the facts. There is a huge push to declare the entire region blighted so Ratner can come and develop it. It isn’t just Atlantic Yards. There are surrounding neighborhoods that have already been promised to Ratner by Pataki and Bloomberg, a fact that was only made public because of a freedom of information act request by the group Develop Don’t Destroy Brooklyn.

My wife and I both had the same thought: that the sudden spate of suspicious fires was awfully convenient for Ratner’s plan to declare the area blighted. Coincidence? Quite possibly. But it is a disturbing thought. I pushed that thought aside because although Ratner certainly employs thugs to push his agenda (I have encountered some), I have never witnessed any sign of anything beyond run of the mill, in-your-face intimidation. In fact I even saw Ratner foe, Letitia James, diffuse that intimidation by essentially going up to the thugs and hugging them, leaving them rather sheepish looking.

Last night two politicians independently raised the same specter of arson in Brooklyn at the Park Slope Democracy for NYC meeting. This time the suspicious fire was the massive Greenpoint warehouse fire. First Wellington Sharpe, running for Assembly in the 58th district, then Bill Batson, running for Assembly in the 57th district, called the recent fires in Central Brooklyn and now at the waterfront arson and linked them with the plans to overdevelop Brooklyn.

Who's got your child's back?

Is it the certificated class, the malignantly multiplying army of school administrators, lawyers and agency-registered wonks who claim to know best what's in your child's interest?

Or is it you?

The Cleveland Bar Association is threatening to fine the parents of an
autistic boy $10,000 for not hiring a lawyer when they brought, and largely won, a court case on their son's behalf four years ago. . . Brian and Susan Woods settled their case with the Akron school district in 2002 when the district agreed to send Daniel, now 11, to a private school.

Michael Harvey, the Rocky River lawyer handling the charges for the bar association, said the goal is to protect the rights of children. Harvey said special education laws are so complex that children need experts, not untrained parents, looking out for their rights.

"You hope parents will do the right job for the child, but that's not always the case," Harvey said.

Maybe I can make sense of this -- we support the certificated class so it can exercise a sort of prior restraint over all parenting, to interpose legalisms between even successful parents and well-served children, at every opportunity they can claim by law?

The new Carnival of the Feminists is up at I See Invisible People. Go stroll the Midway, ride the roller coaster, eat some cotton candy. You'll feel smarter by the time you're done, I swear.