How Not To Be An Activist

A friend sent me a link to this blog, I liked the title so I went on to read it. When I'm at work and trying to read, I usually end up talking at the same time but to day I just read and then read it again. It makes perfect sense to me.

I frequently get asked why I do this kind of work and most often I'm at a lost for words to explain but this does it. You can read the rest of the blog at Just a Rez Chick...How not to be an activist.

 

 

How Not To Be An Activist

I never thought of myself as an activist. The first time someone called me an activist, was an internationally well known activist in a message to me on Facebook. She told me to keep up the good work and always stand up for what I believe in. That the life of an activist wasn’t easy. But to keep doing what I do.
“Wow” was what came to mind. “Really? Me? An activist?” I was shocked and honored. I’m a writer who feels very passionately about what I write for. I’m not on the front lines, yet. Legally, I can’t afford to be out there-yet. I have always cared about the wrongs of the world, talking in extent to both my parents about it all the time. I sit home and write about what all the wonderfully courageous people who have crossed paths with me by caring about the same things I care about are doing to make the world a better place. I respect that they care enough about the drinking water of grandchildren they will never meet. Or that they care about the future generations of our little brown Native children and their rights, without even knowing how this world will be at the time. Whether it will be better or worse, but hoping in their hearts, what they do here and now will make it better. Or they care about all the lives lost to alcohol two miles away from the reservation. That they care about a piece of land so sacred and important to The Creation Story of our people that it is considered The Heart Of All That Is, that they would help spread the word via social media. And all the Indigenous people who live in colonized governments who are sending support to the First Nations of Canada by saying enough is enough Idle No More as a globalized, unified movement with a heartbeat so strong, you can hear it like a drum beat in your soul. Like the game Jumanji is buried nearby.

Stories we dont hear, from people we all know.

Fired from @WholeFoods because they needed time off for surgery. #ows #S17 #election2012

There are hundreds of stories like this one and worse. The stories of folks like us, who are directly affected by injustice. Our concern is where do they go? Where do they live? Who will help them?
And most important----What can we do?
Get involved- We need your voice.
Peace...

NOT A GREAT WAY TO START THE 2013 NEW YEAR FOR STUDENTS & TEACHERS AT THE SAWYER CAREER INSTITUTE!

Denise Maldonado, my Lady, currently resides in Hartford, CT, and on the 3rd of January she received a letter in the mail with disappointing news from Sawyer Career Institute. The letter stated that the school informing her that Sawyer will be closed permanently.  

Not only the Students received the bad news, also the Teachers did not get a notice before the Holiday vacation. 

Miss Maldonado was majoring in Medical Terminology, and she was really looking forward to her bright future. It's pretty overt that Denise's 2013  New Year is not going well for her. By this sad news, it does not phase her at all. She has her chin up high, moving forward with motivation, dedication, and to find a new home  to continue her education.

Here is more information below on how the Sawyer Career Institute closed down.

Students and teachers gathered outside the Sawyer School in Hartford on Wednesday morning, angry over the school’s sudden closure during holiday break.

Students and teachers are frustrated with the lack of answers coming from Academic Enterprises, Inc., the Rhode Island company that runs the Sawyer Schools in both Hartford and Hamden, as well as the Butler Business School in Bridgeport, all of which have shut their doors, kicking a total of 1,200 students out of class. 

“I was ready to graduate and then they closed the school,” complained Charlene Brimage, who was trying to get her degree in business.

“I was three classes away from going out on externship and graduating in April,” Arelis Quinones said.

“Our schedules were already out.  We were already scheduled for classes,” Don Lanier, an instructor, said.

Some students received a letter telling them class was out permanently, while others heard through social media.

The instructors, including Lanier, received a call from their supervisor over the holidays reporting that classes would not resume this week as scheduled.

“We have no answers about anything,” Lanier said.

The Office of Higher Education addressed the abrupt closing in a statement saying they “received a brief email on December 30, 2012 from Academic Enterprises Inc., stating that the schools have 'suspended' operations.'"

The statement also urges students impacted by the closure to contact the Office of Higher Education for assistance.

"We encourage all impacted students to register with our office so that we may learn of their status and help answer their questions about finishing their coursework and obtaining potential tuition reimbursements,” said Jane A. Ciarlegio, executive director of the Office of Higher Education.

Connecticut General Statutes prescribe procedures for schools to follow in the event of closing.  Schools are required to notify the Office of Higher Education at least 60 days before closing.  The notification gives agency officials time to work with school representatives to assure an orderly transition and cessation of business.  Both Sawyer Schools and the Butler Business School allegedly violated this requirement.

How the schools will be punished, if at all, following the state’s investigation, remains to be seen.

By Todd Piro

|  Wednesday, Jan 2, 2013  |  Updated 12:38 PM EST

Sexual Minorities Uganda v. Scott Lively – why you should care, why you should go!

On Monday January 7th 2013 in Federal Court Springfield, opening oral arguments will be heard for the motion to dismiss the case of Sexual Minorities Uganda (SMUG) v. Scott Lively.  This is not the defendant’s first attempt at dismissal.  

Lively is of course claiming his First Amendment right of Freedom of Speech and Religion. This historic case against Lively is for crimes against humanity, for persecution on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity.  It is a first case of its kind anywhere in the world and it is happening here in Massachusetts now that Scott Lively and his Abiding Truth Ministries – Southern Poverty Law Center designated hate group – reside here in the Commonwealth.

For many years Scott Lively has travelled not just our country but the entire world spewing his own special form of hate and persecution imparting his own unique ‘knowledge’ of the ‘Gay Agenda’.  He claims he “knows more than almost anyone else in the world” about homosexuality.

In 2009, he brought his theory and his purposeful anti-LGBTI agenda to a Uganda workshop and a month or so later the Ugandan Parliament suddenly saw the introduction of what is now known as the ‘Kill the Gays Bill’, the Anti-Homosexuality Bill, with harsh penalties that currently includes the death penalty. 

Scott Lively bragged that he had created a "nuclear bomb against the gay agenda in Uganda."  Oh, and don’t believe the rumors from the BBC or the AP or even Lively’s latest missive about the death penalty being removed as the bill cannot actually be modified until it is officially debated in the Ugandan Parliament.

Why should we care about what is happening in Uganda thanks to American Evangelicals?  Because if you’ve listened to the crowing of Lively, Perkins, Fischer, and others of that ilk following the bill’s reappearance on the Ugandan Parliament’s agenda in November you’ll have heard that it is exactly what they envision for the US too!

Not as likely to happen here as it seems in Uganda where it enjoys a 96% favorability rating thanks to the decades of lies spread throughout the African continent about how the American and European gays are coming for their children to recruit them into homosexuality, and how pray-away-the-gay really works, no really, and a whole host of other ridiculous unfounded claims easy to dispel if you have access to facts.

Here in the US, Scott Lively recently traveled to Springfield Missouri to lend his hand to derail that city’s proposed sexual orientation nondiscrimination ordinance, which he called a “Gay Fascism Bill” for which he now brags that he should be called in whenever a ‘Trojan Horse for the Gay Agenda’ like that crops up because surely he is the only one who can extinguish them as he claims to have done there.

So our LGBT brothers and sisters in Missouri will continue to be fired, evicted, and denied their civil rights thanks to our Commonwealth’s resident. 

Keeping in mind the more they succeed, the more emboldened they become everywhere. Here in the Commonwealth, we remember how public accommodations were removed from the Trans Civil Rights Bill.  Are you good with all that?  Are you okay with death and life imprisonment penalties for gays and their allies?  If not, please consider attending the court hearing to show support that this demonization of the gay and trans communities must stop everywhere.

What: Oral argument on Defendant's Motion to Dismiss in SMUG v. Lively

Where: Hampden Courtroom, Federal Courthouse, 300 State St., Springfield, MA

When: Monday, January 7, 2013 at 11:00 a.m.

Cathy Kristofferson

GetEQUAL/MA and Stop The Hate and Homophobia Coalition Springfield

ARISE IS PROUD TO BE ONE OF THE FOUNDING MEMBERS OF THE “STOP HATE AND HOMOPHOBIA COALITION.”