"I'd rather see you up, than see you down"

 it was called JR's.

my first night, 

I met and talked with a table of three butches

each with at least 20 years on me

I remember one of them noticed my Justins, complimented me on their care 

my first night,

I danced with a boy

underage like me

I remember he wore a thin red flannel shirt, smelled like spearmint, and said he took the Greyhound most weekends, 3-hour round trip

my first night,

all queens were working

giving away shots in test tubes

I remember being called "baby" and "sweetheart" so many times, and how it felt like home.

my first night,

stepping out for some air

around the side of the building with the smokers (I didn't, yet)

I remember the feel of my hand on my knife in my pocket, just in case

my first night,

staying until close

riding back in Walter's car, windows down

an early morning line cook shift awaiting me,

tired and wired

and as far as I ever heard

nobody died that night,

my first night

"The bargain store is open, come inside..."

https://www.facebook.com/maishazj/posts/10100657216529672

Thank you for this ^ ^ ^, Marsha Z Johnson.
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I am grateful for poets, writers, storytellers, and others who share in these ways. I believe posts like these create more possibilities for listening and for loving hard work to show up as alternatives to silencing and sound bite hatred.
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I grew up in a mostly "red" state with a mom who was a Democratic party chairperson for our county. I witnessed as sound bite hatred was lobbed her way. I have been involved in electoral politics in some way or another since I was a kid and rode with my dad as part of a tractorcade of farmers driving hours to Omaha to speak out against Hal Daub (R). I remember the excited/nervous feeling as we rode along, that we were going there to do something important, to speak up for small family farmers. I remember the rally in Omaha less specifically (I was still a kid), but the sound bite hatred was all around. I remember that. It hurt. I remember how, as kids back there and then, we saw adults who felt broken and hopeless.
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Recently I saw a meme. It said something like, "I am not sure if people are getting more racist or if more rural areas are finally getting internet." I was nauseated. Sure it's just a meme. I get it. Hey, I am of a mostly white rural area, where all through my growing up (and still today) I talked about racism. Is racism there? Hell yeah. It's everywhere white supremacy is (read: everywhere). It's embodied everywhere I go as a white person, whenever any white people go. What this meme banks on is a shared inference by non-rural people about the way (or range of ways) rural white people express white supremacy. The meme leverages that shared inference into a contrast with some presumed sameness among non-rural people, specifically a sameness of "not as racist as" or even "not racist at all, unlike" rural people. That's a sound bite to me. That's a manifestation of sound bite hatred to me. It hates on rural people (and "rural" as used in the meme is often code for "white trash"), and, ultimately, it hates on people of color since it offers non-rural white people an opportunity to ignore or minimize their own internalized white supremacy, their own variations of enacting racism on a daily basis.
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Figuring out how to have conversations about race, growing up back then and there, was not unlike doing it now, actually. Figuring out how to talk about electoral politics, growing up back then and there, wasn't unlike doing it now either actually. I know I want to be able to stay in conversation with people around me and to try to always be increasing listening for all of us and to try to always be decreasing sound bites as much as possible. I am hopeful that doing that will keep us all seeing each other as humans and, thus, help us to collectively challenge dehumanization in all its forms. So, I read Marsha Z. Johnson's post and appreciate these humanizing words, this sharing of stream of consciousness, and I use it to help me go out listening again.
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Love you all.

"Come doused in mud, soaked in bleach..."

A Complexity of Social Media:
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I am deeply appreciative of these mechanisms for quite regularly reading the opinions and experiences of loved ones, accomplices, old buddies, friends of friends, and strangers. .Reading (and sometimes watching video about) their stories, experiences, and opinions shares with me some of who they are, informs my thinking, challenges me to learn and grow, gives me at least one great laugh a day (I'm looking at you, Stories And Videos About Dogs.), and, along with the rest of my daily interactions, highlights our interconnected humanity.
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Also, some of the seeming hallmarks of social media can leave me disheartened. While I dig brevity and wit, I am crushed a little each time these are used as tools to dismiss, belittle, or mock someone's experiences, opinions, body, life, self, etc. This means getting crushed a little bit repeatedly any day I am on social media. While I am energized and often pushed to greater depth of understanding by vigorous and engaging discussions among people with varied perspectives, these discussions don't often occur in my social media sphere. Often, discussions instead move quickly or slowly into tone policing, decontextualizing, preaching-to-the-choir, dismissal of both intent *and* impact, hardcore parsing of comments, and/or a number of other trends that manage to be simultaneously hurtful and incredibly boring.
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I start to wonder if it's a cruel joke. The mechanisms of social media both put us in closer proximity to riches of listening, watching, sharing, and changing and also smoothly support us in absolutely not investing in any of those.
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I mean, I have a hammer, right? Just turn me loose on all the screws.
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Love you all. Mean it.
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"And it's cheaper than a shrink..."

I have been carefully reading, listening to, and watching some people who are supportive of Trump. I am doing this to try to understand their support, since I am not supportive of Trump. I want to understand because my lived experience tells me that understanding often leads to authentic engagement and to positive social change. I want authentic engagement and positive social change because when I am in the midst of those things I experience my own humanity and connection to our shared humanity. I like my humanity. (True, I *wish* I were a Vulcan, but that is a different thread.) I like your humanity, our humanity. I am concerned about the always-and-ongoing erosion of humanity. I think the always-and-ongoing erosion of humanity is egregious in and of itself and also that it helps fuel the destruction of Earth. (Even if I *were* Vulcan, I would have no home planet to which to return, so self interest would still dictate investment in countering things leading to Earth’s destruction.)
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The people I am mentioning here –the Trump supporters I have been carefully reading, listening to, and watching– are not the Trump supporters who are excitedly and actively sharing his racist, misogynistic, xenophobic, etc. rhetoric in their writing and talking. (I am paying close attention to those Trump supporters too, but right now I am not talking about them.) The people I am talking about *here* are either not mentioning that part of his rhetoric at all or are downplaying it by characterizing it as just performance, not policy. Yes, I know, that characterization itself is a whole other (related) mess. *However,* I am not going to critique that specific characterization in this moment because right now I am writing about what I have noticed when I am paying close attention to what these particular supporters are writing and saying about why they like Trump.
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Here is what I notice. Some Trump supporters like him because they are getting the impression from him that he *does not hide anything from them*.
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They are getting the impression from him that he does not hide anything from them. When some Trump supporters say, “He tells it like it is,” or “He isn’t a politician,” or “He doesn’t sugar coat it,” or “He doesn’t tell you what he thinks you want to hear,” or “He’s honest,” or “He’s his own man,” I think they are often invoking their belief that *as a rule* their elected representatives, when interacting with the voters/citizens, are first and foremost actors; these supporters think Trump can serve as an exception to that rule. I think they are invoking their belief that their “elected representatives” are such in name only and that, rather, they are the moving parts of a system designed, powered, and perpetuated by forces wholly unknown to and unaccountable to the voters/citizens they “represent.” These supporters think Trump will absolutely care not for this unaccountable system and that he will wield the power of his Presidency outside of it, if need be, maintaining accountability directly with the voters/citizens.
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Since, as laid out in my very first paragraph, I am working to understand these particular Trump voters, these seeming invocations of their beliefs of *what is* matter very much to me. They matter at least as much, if not more than, what they think Trump might do in the future as President. Why? Because it is my observation that when people are making, in the present, a decision which will affect the(ir) future, they almost always express greater certainty about *what is,* i.e. the present, than about *what may be,* i.e. the future (or even *what has been,* i.e. the past, for that matter). The reasoning process includes both, of course, but I observe that most of us believe ourselves to know much more about what currently *is* than what *will be* and so we use our relative certainty about the present to make a decision that, we extrapolate with great hope, will result in the future we desire. So, in my effort to understand these particular supporters of Trump, one main area of focus for me is what they experience as the current realities of government/politics as outlined in the preceding paragraph.
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So then, when these particular supporters of Trump –and remember, these aren’t the ones who are excitedly, actively, and openly sharing the racism, misogyny, xenophobia, etc. (again, not getting into here what’s happening for them behind closed doors or internally in that regard) –say, “He tells it like it is,” I understand that statement to often be their call-out of their current “elected representatives” as just physical manifestations of sleight-of-hand in that system designed, powered, and perpetuated by forces wholly unknown to and unaccountable to the voters/citizens they “represent.”
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So, what’s my point? Why have I spent time and energy trying to understand these particular supporters of Trump? Why focus on this, a particular inference that they like him because they are getting the impression from him that he does not hide anything from them?

Here’s why. How deeply must these particular people feel that they are disregarded and disenfranchised because of their elected representatives hiding things from them if they are willing to brush aside, or at least diminish, almost everything else about Trump and support him anyway because they believe that he will not hide anything from them? How deeply must these particular people feel that their elected representatives are accountable to nothing but a self-serving mechanism if they are willing to elect Trump to the Presidency not *despite* the fact that he is inexperienced in governance but perhaps *because* his inexperience is a defiant and noble choice that could translate to him operating outside of government, replacing it with something directly accountable to them?
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I wonder if, in the context of their overwhelming disillusionment with the sleight-of-hand crowd, people are so in need of actual honesty and accompanying accountability that they are grasping at anything dressed up to look remotely like it. When, for example, these particular supporters of Trump say, “He tells it like it is,” are they really making a declaration that he has done solid research and put forth a particular reasoned position or are they just relieved that he is unapologetic and apparently uninterested in hiding things from them? I think it’s the later. If they are feeling screwed over because they think those in power are hiding things from them, people will look for someone who isn’t hiding things from them. If you’re feeling screwed over enough, perhaps the lying doesn’t even matter to you anymore, as long as the lying isn’t hidden. If people believe there is an absence of actual honesty and accompanying accountability, perhaps they will take unapologetic arrogance as a substitute.
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This is where I feel that connection to our shared humanity. When I read that last sentence of the above paragraph, I feel the truth of that in my chest. I am transported to a multiplicity of singular moments in my life. For example, on most any particular day in question, I would rather work the line next to a blowhard transphobe (and there have been plenty) than be sideswiped by hearing a buddy co-worker’s “tranny” joke, made at my expense but never intended for my ears. Now if I imagine that every single day on every single line I have ever worked I was repeatedly subjected to overhearing such jokes and that the co-worker buddies who made the jokes then tried to cover their tracks, deny, rationalize, distance, etc., basically do all the things that run counter to taking accountability; well, eventually, I might believe that co-workers who said they were my buddies were bound to be hiding things from me. That blowhard transphobe would start to *look like* a known quantity, at least. Would he be? Probably not. Still, he might seem like one.
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All of this is to say that carefully reading, listening to, and watching these specific supporters of Trump has brought me back around to something I had already been wondering.
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If Trump and Clinton are the only two remaining candidates for President, it seems to me that someone inside the Clinton campaign should be saying by now (should have said long ago), “Madam Secretary, you need to make yourself the *candidate of accountability*. You have the connections, the political savvy, the access to infrastructure, and the money to leverage. Why play defense or offense with Trump? It’s not a game. Have a desire to be unapologetically accountable. Name your mistakes in service: decisions you’ve made, statements you’ve made, policies you’ve supported, stances you’ve taken, perspectives you dismissed, perspectives you should not have incorporated, etc. People are talking about these things about you already. They don’t perceive *you* to be talking about them, but they do perceive you (like “all politicians”) to be hiding from them. Tell people how you were and were not accountable for those mistakes. Make a plan to be accountable now. Is there an enormous pressure on you to be perfect, more perfect, as a female candidate for President? Absolutely. Don’t play that game; you can’t win it anyway. Change it. Offer accountability as an antidote to perfectionist culture, to hiding, to the offense/defense framing. Be something other than Not-Trump.”
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The thing about an approach like that, though, is it is only applicable if the candidate *wants* to be accountable in those ways; wants to build/strengthen the relationships that make that sort of leadership possible; wants to really internalize that so many people think of their “elected representatives” as moving parts of a system designed, powered, and perpetuated by forces wholly unknown to and unaccountable to the voters/citizens they “represent;” and wants to engage that belief rather than argue “against it.” Does Clinton want those things? I have no idea. I am pretty sure that most of these specific Trump supporters I have been following don’t think she does. I am pretty sure that some of the Democrats, Independents, etc. not currently planning on voting for Clinton don’t think she wants those things either.
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I wonder what might happen if she did want them and she said so. Unapologetic accountability – it could be a thing.

"Love's In Need Of Love Today..."

I orginally posted this as a comment on a thread on the Facebook page of Kitsap Sun (https://www.facebook.com/KitsapNews/).  The comment thread is attached to a link Kitsap Sun posted there on Facebook, a link to their article about the action-in-solidarity-with-#BlackLivesMatter that we did in Bremerton, WA on Thursday, July 21st.  My posting (below) is in response to other comments made in that thread.

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Heya, Kitsap neighbors! I was at this gathering of solidarity yesterday. It's clear to me from some of the comments here that some people have been passed incorrect information it. So, I thought I'd share what I observed, since I was there:

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** 1. The Bremerton Police Department knew (in advance) all about this gathering of solidarity and, to my knowledge, expressed no problems with the gathering itself or with the location it. To the contrary, they offered support of the gathering; the BPD offered access (in advance) to the little parking lot adjacent to the building so that people who drove over for the gathering could use it.

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Chief Steve Strachan was there *at* the gathering in person, standing outside with us, for a good amount of time (I would guess at least 20-30 minutes), just chatting and such. I heard/saw nothing but positive exchanges between Chief Strachan and others gathered there. I didn't get a chance to speak to him personally because I was down the sidewalk just a little bit and keeping an eye on the kids who came with me; however, another person who was there (and who did chat with him at the time) let Chief Strachan know that I was interested in learning more about the Bremerton Police Department, its history, and its systems of working with the community and being accountable to the community. He expressed to this other person that he was looking forward to talking with me more about those things. I am stoked to talk with him and really appreciate his support of this solidarity gathering yesterday.

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So far, to me, everything expressed (verbally and behaviorally) by Chief Strachan indicates that he is invested in the Bremerton police force being accountable to the community, that he is invested in serving the community, and that he is invested in making space (physical space, conversation space, etc.) accessible to people who want to work together to make sure that Black Lives Matter to everyone so that we can get to the place where all lives matter to everyone. It seems clear to me that he values the importance of the citizens he serves being able to gather peacefully to share a message.

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** 2. This gathering yesterday resulted from a handful of local people searching each other out to come together to show solidarity in response to a broader nationwide call for people of conscious to express our desire for justice in our country. You can read more about that call to action here: http://freedomnow.movementforblacklives.org/.

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Our specific gathering yesterday wasn't organized, sponsored, etc. by any particular local group. It happened because local people (some whom already knew each other and some who met as recently as this past Saturday) found each other as they sought out ways to show solidarity with the #BlackLivesMatter national movement and to take local action in response to the #MovementForBlackLives call to action for July 21st.

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There were white people and people of color at this event. I don't know everyone who was there and so don't know how they identify racially/ethnically. However, even based on the friends I came with alone, I can let you know that both white people and people of color were at this event. (I mention this as a clarification, since some comments on this thread have mentioned only white people being there.)

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Some of us who ended up gathering yesterday have expressed interested in forming a local ongoing community group of the national organization Showing Up For Racial Justice (SURJ), which has a purpose of "moving white people to act as part of a multi-racial majority for justice with passion and accountability." Nationally, SURJ works "to connect people across the country while supporting and collaborating with local and national racial justice organizing efforts" and "provides a space to build relationships, skills and political analysis to act for change." One thing I personally like about the SURJ model is that it includes strategies for how white people can work toward racial equity and liberation for all people and do so in ways that are accountable to people of color and their leadership.

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If anyone reads this and is interested in joining me and other people who are exploring the idea of getting a SURJ group started in Kitsap, please feel free to send me a FB email!

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** 3. The people gathered yesterday were completely peaceful. I heard/saw none of us curse at anyone at all. Also, the only interactions I saw with any police were the friendly chats with Chief Strachan. The only yells I ever heard coming from our gathered group happened the handful of times that people in cars drove past and yelled toward us some version or variation of "all lives matter." When that happened, there was a person in our group who would yell back toward them, "Great! Come and join us then!" in a positive and inviting tone. That certainly didn't seem disparaging to me.

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The majority of our gathering time (which lasted from about 5:15 p.m. until about 6:45 p.m.) was very quiet; when talking happened, it was mostly quiet chatting among ourselves. Basically, we stood quietly on the sidewalk (leaving plenty of space for pedestrians to walk past us) while holding signs that faced the street and keeping an eye on the kids with us, who played together in the small open courtyard space behind us. I don't have a full list of the signs that were held yesterday, but here is a sampling:

- Black Lives Matter

- One Bad Apple Does Spoil The Bunch: Nationwide, Comprehensive Police Reform Now

- (this is a kid's sign) Treat people how you want to be treated. Do you want to be treated badly because you look different?

- Solidarity

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** 4. Of the people who drove past on the street (Burwell) in front of us, most of them didn't make any noise or gestures in our direction at all. Most just glanced over at us or our signs as they drove past. So, their thoughts are their own; nobody but they know what their thoughts were.

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I would guess that only about 5-10% of the people who passed us engaged us in any way more than that. Of these who did engage more, I think the vast majority (I would guess about 75% of them) seemed to be communicating a sense of positiveness and/or support. These kinds of responses included things like: a honk paired with a wave and a smile, a honk paired with a thumbs-up out the car window, a yelled "thank you" from a passing car, a yelled "good for you" from a passing car, and other similar things. The remaining 25% of people who engaged more seemed to be communicating a dissent and/or lack of support. These responses included things like: flipping us off, a few curses yelled at us, a yell of "screw you, all lives matter" from a passing car, and other similar things.

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I hope these details have provided clarification, neighbors, from someone who was at the event. 

"And the last voice I hear on Earth, is my mama's cry..."

http://highline.huffingtonpost.com/articles/en/sandra-bland-jail-deaths/
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"The jail in Brazos County, Texas, which has around 650 inmates, has had only one completed suicide in the past 10 years, according to Kit Wright, a sergeant and nurse at the county sheriff's office. The county makes an effort to keep people with mental health issues out of jail: Last year, crisis intervention officers diverted 214 people to mental health facilities instead of charging them with a crime. And the jail employs another noteworthy tactic. After being screened by an officer, inmates go through a separate interview with a nurse. In this second conversation, inmates tend to be more open about things like drug use and mental health history. People will 'answer one way to someone in uniform, and different to someone in scrubs,' Wright said."
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The above except is from the Huffington Post article linked above and below.  The writers' research revealed that, for the time period of the one year since Sandra Bland's death in jail, there have been 811 deaths in U.S. jails; this is just jails and does not include prisons. They also note, "By way of comparison, 178 unarmed people were killed by police during the same period, according to The Guardian."
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Both numbers are abhorrent to me.  They indicate that the often stated purpose of police, i.e. to serve and protect or to protect and serve, is not top priority, not even close.  If it were, we would "arm" police with glorious training (facilitation, deescalation, youth engagement, mediation, non-harmful restraint, listening, organizing, etc.), daily education sessions, mentorship from community elders, books on their institution's history, and therapy...not weaponry.
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Otherwise, who are they capable of serving and protecting?  Certainly not Sandra Bland and the 810 others who died in jail this past year.  Certainly not the hundreds of people killed out in the world by police this past year.
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If you still aren't at least wondering whether we need to demand, at minimum, broad and deep reform of our policing systems in this country, then please answer me this: How can "innocent until proven guilty" be true if we are not *absolutely certain* (through civilian oversight, meaningful police training, and systems of genuine police accountability) that those we are (en)trusting with knowing our rules and laws and monitoring that we are abiding by them are doing *just that* and not also taking it upon themselves to pronounce guilt (or, often in the case of white people, innocence) without due process?  Isn't part of their service to protect those of us they have accused of disobeying a rule/law, especially when we are in their direct care?
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http://highline.huffingtonpost.com/articles/en/sandra-bland-jail-deaths/

"Can I get a witness..."

Unsurprisingly, I guess, the backlash continues to grow. Well lots of (interconnected) backlash, actually. Here though, I am going to talk specifically about the backlash to the words “Black Lives Matter,” a backlash that comes in the form of the responding pronouncement “All Lives Matter” (or “Blue Lives Matter” or other similar responses). I am reading and hearing this backlash on social media, in mainstream media, and out and about in daily life. I keep wondering when it will peter out to ultimately just a few muttering it to each other. We’re not there yet, not even close, that’s for sure.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * Before I talk specifically about the importance of those specific “three little words,” Black Lives Matter, I want to follow a tangent into the word “backlash.”

From Merriam-Webster.com: “Full Definition of backlash 1a : a sudden violent backward movement or reaction b : the play between adjacent movable parts (as in a series of gears); also : the jar caused by this when the parts are put into action 2: a snarl in that part of a fishing line wound on the reel 3: a strong adverse reaction (as to a recent political or social development)”

Even though the above is the definition, I wonder at the derivation of the word.

I want to say that the irony should not be lost on us that, in the particular case of the “backlash” of using “All Lives Matter” as a retort to “Black Lives Matter” (whether when to the Black Lives Matter-named movement organizers all over or to the #BlackLivesMatter hashtag online or to signs/banners/etc. out in the world or to any other manifestation), the hurling of the retort is a current day public spectacle of a lash applied to the collective and individual back(s) of Black people. In other words “All Lives Matter” functions as a rhetorical lash, communicating to Black/of African descent people, that they’d better shut up and know their place.

I am not a rhetorician. I know a few of them though; maybe one or more of them will weigh in on this. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

So, here’s what I would like to offer about those specific three little words, “Black Lives Matter.” I offer this thought especially to those of you saying “All Lives Matter” and saying it in response to “Black Lives Matter.”

(SIDE NOTE: If you are someone who has been saying the mantra “All Lives Matter on a daily basis your whole life and it’s pure accident that others have now picked it up as a retort, this note is not for you. I will say, though, that, while that coincidence sucks for you --and reminds me a wee bit of how my dad named our family’s chocolate lab “Buddy” about three weeks before the Clintons did the same back in the day-- I encourage you not to take a stubborn stand on this one and instead, find some new language for your long-loved daily mantra.)

Back to the matter at hand. Here is the offering, the clarification, the grammatical Come-To-Jesus for those of you using “All Lives Matter” as a retort to “Black Lives Matter.”

YOU MISSED THE “TOO.”

There is an implied “too” at the end of “Black Lives Matter,” as in “Black Lives Matter Too.” It’s the “too” that is implied. There is no “only” implied. There is no “more” implied. There is no “in contrast to other lives” implied. There is no “over white lives” implied. There is no “for fuck’s sake!” implied. (Well, yeah, speaking for myself, that last one is implied.)

So, *since* there is an implied too, when you say “All Lives Matter” as a retort to “Black Lives Matter,” it’s like you’re saying Black lives don’t matter too. It’s like your saying the lives of Black people - Black people themselves- are less-than. It’s like this because you are ignoring the implied “too.” The implied “too” is a built-in acknowledgement that all lives should matter *and* a call for action for us to ensure that all lives *DO* matter to everyone by working to make sure that individuals and institutions (read: the police) have Black lives on their lists of lives that matter.

Get it.

#BlackLivesMatter