Speaking of Cement

I’d like to begin by saying… GO CANADA!! I hope we get some ‘trickle-down’ sanity from our most excellent neighbors to the north.

Thank you for your patience while I took this little sortie down memory boulevard. These are the last few old letters that I wanted to publish here.

The first are responses to those companies and organizations that are trying to do the right thing. The APA is to be commended for dragging itself out of the Dark Ages. Ford Motor Company, hats off to you.

Kraft Foods… Well, what can I say? I actually have a “shit list,” a printed out list of companies and products that I do not buy for one reason or another. I started it about 15 years ago. Exxon got on my list for that whole Exxon Valdez/Prince William Sound thing, and I haven’t stopped at an Exxon station since. I will only buy organic chocolate because of the child slave labor used to produce cocoa on the Ivory Coast. Companies have found themselves on my list for animal testing, contributing to the Republican Party, racial discrimination… any number of things. Never, until today, has a company managed to earn its way off.

The last letter is not actually a letter; it’s a copy of the presentation I did at the Maricopa Community Colleges Board of Directors meeting last night. I was the first person called up to speak. I addressed my comments to Mr. Walker, I got applause from the audience. Brad addressed the rest of the Board (also applause) and, gratifyingly, there were others there who spoke out on this issue (applause all around, no boos). I hope they all got the message. Read the rest of this entry »

Okay folks, we’re coming up on the end of the old letters. Just today and maybe one more day and we should be caught up. The first of today’s letters is in response to a teenage girl who’d written a letter to the editor (likely with mom or dad standing over her shoulder). The next is a response to another letter writer. The third is to our dear representative, Trent Franks (the flaming fool). Then there’s one to the TV stations that refused to air the commercial from UUC churches welcoming anyone. There are a few more various and sundry letters. The last entry was not a letter, but a presentation I gave at the press conference we held outside the state capitol right after the final vote to send their stupid postcard to congress.

Tonight we’re going to attend a meeting of the Maricopa Community Colleges Board of Directors. One of them, Jerry Walker, was on the campus at one of the community colleges a few months ago. It was during Club Days, he was talking with a student and Walker pointed to the rainbow flag and asked the student if that was the “local gay group.” The student replied yes and Walker said,”It’s a shame that they’re here.” The student told him that he (the student) is gay, and Walker replied, “Well, it’s a shame that you are.” We’re going tonight to let the Board know how we feel about Mr. Walker’s comments. The letters… Read the rest of this entry »

Tonight’s letters : The first one is a short response to a letter that was phoned in to the editor (they call it the Vent Line and it’s anonymous) in one of the local news publications that get thrown on our driveway once a week; have to keep track of where the dialog is gong on a local level, too. I think it’s important to call them on it every time they try to justify their prejudices with fallacious reasoning. It keeps them from getting too bold.

(Ooh, ooh, I just remembered a couple of letters I wrote just after we moved back here; those were great! When I get done with this series of old letters, I’ll have to find those and put them in the lineup. But now back to today)… Read the rest of this entry »

Here are the next few letters, one to our US Senator, Jon Kyl, one to the state representative from Mesa, Mark Anderson, and a reply to 3 letters in a local paper.

Also included is one to my mother. I must say, it’s been a process to pull my mother into the light, but I have to hand it to her; she’s going to be 80 in a few days (July 6) and I have a new-found respect for her. I really didn’t give her credit for being able to change her views so drastically at her age, but she’s been willing to discuss this issue with me for many, many, many hours. She’s read a bunch of books I’ve given her, and newspaper clippings that I haul over there by the ton. She’s done a lot of thinking.

A couple of weeks ago, my husband, our youngest son, another member of the Marriage Task Force and I spent the day stuffing postcards objecting to the “marriage amendment” into a local gay magazine. I am proud to say that my mom worked right alongside us, she says the magazine is “really good,” she’s been to a couple of Task Force meetings and I even took her to church at Gentle Shepherd one Sunday at her request. (she says she’s never felt so welcome at a church and she just loves Pastor Brad). I have decided that my mom is an amazing woman; her love for her grandson and a more open mind than I ever gave her credit for are overcoming the blindness of the hate groups that call themselves Christians. Mom, I am so proud of you.

Here are the letters: Read the rest of this entry »

Here are the next few letters, as promised… Read the rest of this entry »

I’ve gone back over some of the letters I’ve written over the past few years on the issue of civil rights for gay people. I had them in a number of different files on my computer, based on whether a letter was to an editor or a politician or someone else. I’ve combined all those files into a master file based on chronology and I’ve decided to post some of them on the blog. I’ll do this over several days, just a couple each day so as not to overwhelm anyone.

I wanted to do this because I think that although they were written in response to particular issues at the time, the issues in these letters are still cropping up, still relevant, and I’d just like people to read them. I hope you find in them a word or phrase that you can take with you and drag it out when you need a quick response. They’ll be posted in chronological order so you can see the progression of the politics (forward and backward) and of my thoughts.We’ll start with a letter to Clinton… Read the rest of this entry »

If we take money out of the Social Security system and allow those who choose to do so to invest in private stocks, that would remove money from the system, but it would also lower the guaranteed benefits to which those persons would be entitled when they retire. If we allow a person to take 25% of his Social Security tax to invest himself, and we cut his Social Security benefit by a corresponding 25%, then that should equal out, I guess. But the equation is not as simple as that. Read the rest of this entry »

Tony D’Abbracci was my college professor for Philosophy 3, Critical Thinking. I spent 8 years as his Reader and a tutor for his classes. One goal of his classes, besides getting students to think more logically, was to get them to go out and advocate for the things in which they, with their new-found thinking skills, would come to believe.

So now, I’m on the email lists of a whole bunch of environmental and social justice organizations. I am deeply involved in working with a gay rights organization and I spend a lot of time at that, so I find my email lists very helpful. Some of these organization have just magically appeared on my computer and others have been sent by friends. My lists allow me to stay connected to other issues and to take some action, even if it is just to add one more small voice to thousands of others. Read the rest of this entry »

Recently, the stupid bare majority of the Arizona legislature voted to send a “postcard to Congress,” an official message stating that the people of Arizona support an amendment to the U.S. Constitution that would read, “Marriage in the United States shall consist only of the union of a man and a woman. Neither this Constitution or the constitution of any State, shall be construed to require that marriage, or the legal incidents thereof, be conferred upon any union other than the union of a man and a woman.”

This passed by one vote.

So I’ve been working with the Marriage Equality Task Force for several months on a special project; it is finally coming into bloom and I’m really excited about this. Read the rest of this entry »

On my way to my daughter’s house this morning, I got to thinking about good advice; just little bits of wisdom I’ve heard or read or been given through the years. I wanted to share just a few of the best: Read the rest of this entry »