March 18, 2009
Posted on 03/18/2009 10:17 AM Comments (14)
October 12, 2008
He wanted his friends to spread this letter and the message around. I dont really understand why any discrimination should occur because of someones sexual orientation, yet alone violent acts of hate. At the bottom of the page is a picture from back when we shared a house 10 or 11 years ago, and a picture of him after being beaten to a pulp in a homophobic attack in which he nearly lost his sight in one eye.
http://www.matthewshepard.org/
Here is his letter.
Dear Mother,
I call you “Mother” because so few of us have accepting families. I am just another face in the crowd of rejected, tormented, bullied, raped, and murdered children, who were rejected by their mothers, fathers, and siblings for the “sin which dares not speak its name,” and have suffered so much of our lives under the heel of homophobia, which came to a head 10 years ago, when Matthew was hung on a fence and left to die.
I never had the chance to meet Matthew, although I am sure I would have eventually but for the turn of events. When you’re gay and live in one of the massive Western states, it feels like you are the only gay person within a thousand square miles, but with the proliferation of the Internet, gay people could meet others, who might, indeed, live a thousand miles away.
Myself, I was born and raised in Butte, Montana, one of the most dangerous small cities in the United States.
For example: during my eighth grade year, there were numerous knife fights, stun guns, and three, very-real bomb threats; terrifying because there were actual pipe bombs stashed in various lockers.
The elected town sheriff was known as “Chester-the-Molester” because if he caught any body (male or female) after curfew, he did not call your parents, nor were you officially arrested. Instead, generations of kids lived in fear of the unspeakable things he would do to them if they got caught.
I was one of the lucky teenagers who were never taken into custody.
The relevance of that dreadful anecdote comes into play when, several years later I was working at a JB’s Restaurant and the news of Matthew’s murder became a rallying point for LGBT groups, and P-FLAG meetings started convening to address the struggles of any gay kid, both in and out of the home.
With sorrow, I must admit to an unspoken acknowledgment amongst my peers, it was surprising more kids did not end up like Matthew, and you put yourself at risk for even appearing to be sympathetic to homosexuals.
That said, I beg your forgiveness for not attending the solitary, candle-lit vigil held at one brave little church for fear that I would be recognized or my car would be recognized, and so I chose to stay home…and have regretted that decision ever since.
When I went to the March on Washington the following year and heard your awe-inspiring, grief-stricken, speech, I fell to my knees, surrounded by thousands of other gay people; all of us weeping uncontrollably.
Not long after, Fred Phelps and his crew showed up, and I had to be forcibly restrained from attacking them with my bare hands.
I suffer from a lot of emotional disorders, which fall under the umbrella of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, with its depressive, manic, and obsessive/compulsive states. Phelps and crew are not the sole reason for my mental state, but a black hole burns in my gut whenever I hear his name.
Several years later, I found myself majoring in World Arts & Cultures at UCLA, and one bleak day, I came face-to-face with the God-Hates-Fags.com people, who claimed their constitutional rights to assemble on public grounds!
Once more, the counselors and administrators of the LGBT Center on campus held me back, and I grimly went to class.
We were having group performances, but after several minutes, I interrupted the class and shouted that the real forces of evil, homophobia, bigotry, and ignorance were on our doorstep. Then, I ran back to Bruin Plaza (supposedly a Hate-Free Zone) where the GHFs were still preaching their message of hatred to a growing crowd of gaping students as well as a unit of armed riot police at hand, should any “incidents” flare up.
A grotesquely fat woman wore an XXX-large t-shirt broadly proclaiming, “Matthew Shepard Burns in Hell,” at which point, I admit to complete loss of self-control and hurled myself at her, attempting to wrench her flag from her hands.
I was swiftly and forcibly “subdued” by a UCLA police officer, which added fuel to my rage, because the ostensibly "good guys” were protecting the obvious “bad guys.”
A few minutes later, however, my entire department had joined hands in a circle around the hateful core and actually forced them to leave our campus.
Proudly, we (or rather they—my colleagues) had scored a point against the GHFs, although the neo-conservative campus newspaper ran headlines to the effect of “Peaceful Demonstration Interrupted By Violent Attackers…)
Flash forwards a couple of years, and I found myself in Louisville, Kentucky to care for a friend whose partner had died from AIDS-related pneumonia.
There, in River City, home of the World-Famous Kentucky Derby as well as the fittingly-named “Sluggers,” my tale climaxed on Memorial Day, when I was fag-bashed by three men and severely hurt —I was knifed repeatedly, and pummeled, kicked, and beaten into a a bloody pulp before some people came by, who called for help.
I am 100% convinced if the attackers had not retreated, they would happily have killed me.
My stab wounds gushed blood, I had a major concussion from a fractured skull, and my right eye had been blinded.
Perhaps the most disturbing thing about that series of events—the stuff that keeps me awake at night—happened after a squad car arrived on scene, and when the police heard I was gay, the officers hastily backed away, and only then donned their Personal Protective Equipment!
Additionally, to this day, I have not been able to find any record of the “incident,” at any of the police precincts, and furthermore, the University of Louisville Hospital Emergency Room maintains they have no record of me being treated there, despite a whispered referral one intern gave me for an ophthalmologic surgeon, who was able to repair my eye after a couple of surgeries.
I am so sorry for your loss.
What’s more, I am sending this letter to many people, gay and straight, hoping they will petition their respective legislatures, courts, and police regarding hate crimes.
I am also sorry for the world’s loss of a gentle, promising, intelligent young man whose life ended on a barbed wire fence ten years ago.
Thank you for your diligent struggle to make a difference in this country.
That young man could easily have been me.
PS for any concerned readers of this letter, please help the Campaign To Erase Hate by visiting http://www.matthewshepard.org/
Sincerely yours,
Dan Tyler & Tucson-the-Wonder-Dog
Posted on 10/12/2008 3:32 AM Comments (12)
June 23, 2008
James Hansen is a hero
I wish more scientists would speak out like him.
Put oil firm chiefs on trial, says leading climate change scientist
· Speech to US Congress will also criticise lobbyists
· 'Revolutionary' policies needed to tackle crisis
James Hansen, one of the world's leading climate scientists, will today call for the chief executives of large fossil fuel companies to be put on trial for high crimes against humanity and nature, accusing them of actively spreading doubt about global warming in the same way that tobacco companies blurred the links between smoking and cancer.
Hansen will use the symbolically charged 20th anniversary of his groundbreaking speech to the US Congress - in which he was among the first to sound the alarm over the reality of global warming - to argue that radical steps need to be taken immediately if the "perfect storm" of irreversible climate change is not to become inevitable.
Speaking before Congress again, he will accuse the chief executive officers of companies such as ExxonMobil and Peabody Energy of being fully aware of the disinformation about climate change they are spreading.
In an interview with the Guardian he said: "When you are in that kind of position, as the CEO of one the primary players who have been putting out misinformation even via organisations that affect what gets into school textbooks, then I think that's a crime."
He is also considering personally targeting members of Congress who have a poor track record on climate change in the coming November elections. He will campaign to have several of them unseated. Hansen's speech to Congress on June 23 1988 is seen as a seminal moment in bringing the threat of global warming to the public's attention. At a time when most scientists were still hesitant to speak out, he said the evidence of the greenhouse gas effect was 99% certain, adding "it is time to stop waffling".
He will tell the House select committee on energy independence and global warming this afternoon that he is now 99% certain that the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere has already risen beyond the safe level.
The current concentration is 385parts per million and is rising by 2ppm a year. Hansen, who heads Nasa's Goddard Institute for Space Studies in New York, says 2009 will be a crucial year, with a new US president and talks on how to follow the Kyoto agreement.
He wants to see a moratorium on new coal-fired power plants, coupled with the creation of a huge grid of low-loss electric power lines buried under ground and spread across America, in order to give wind and solar power a chance of competing. "The new US president would have to take the initiative analogous to Kennedy's decision to go to the moon."
His sharpest words are reserved for the special interests he blames for public confusion about the nature of the global warming threat. "The problem is not political will, it's the alligator shoes - the lobbyists. It's the fact that money talks in Washington, and that democracy is not working the way it's intended to work."
A group seeking to increase pressure on international leaders is launching a campaign today called 350.org. It is taking out full-page adverts in papers such as the New York Times and the Swedish Falukuriren calling for the target level of CO2 to be lowered to 350ppm. The advert has been backed by 150 signatories, including Hansen.
Posted on 06/23/2008 2:01 AM Comments (5)
August 31, 2007
The Latest Buzznet game I was tagged for. Thanks Catiag and Sonya...really.
1. You post your top 10 fantasy guys/girls.
2. You tag 10 people.
3. You CANNOT tag someone who has already been tagged.
4. You have to let the people you tagged know that they've been tagged.
5. These are the rules that must be repeated every time.
6. THERE MUST BE PHOTOS! AT ALL TIMES!
Fantasy guys / girls ??????
Well maybe cos I have real love, I dont need fantasy love, but probably Im just not in touch with my sexual desires, and I have no sense of humor about it. It wasnt always this way though. Once I was young, and horny and wanted to fantasize about people that I had no chance of ever being rejected by. I gave a shit about pop culture, though I never came close to achieving hipness. And so who was the object of tweeny and teeny bop obcession?
Then he got a haircut and I grew up.
The likes of Catiag, Lexidiem and Tessy interpreted this more as people they admire, and the rest of my list is more along those lines.
Johnny Morris OBE (20 June 1916 Newport, Monmouthshire — 6 May 1999) was a legend of my childhood. He was an old style Zoo keeper who presented a TV show <A HREF="http://www.televisionheaven.co.uk/animal.htm"> Animal Magic </A> on the BBC. Johnny would often enter the animal's cages and proceed to do what zookeepers are supposed to do. His trade mark was to dub the film with himself talking as if he was the animal, while educating kids about the animals. He and the animals he worked with seemed to have a mutual respect for each other. His fascination for them and their behaviour captivated me. 'Some hated it because it was anthropomorphic' Johnny himself admitted. 'And anthropomorphism is one of the deadly sins. To make animals appear as though they were talking was totally and absolutely unscientific. Not only that but it was a cheap and facile way to entertain boys and girls. To indulge in such worthless underhand tricks week after week was a disgrace.' Yeah the old guy had a sense of humor. In a way he was more of a gentile version of the Crocadile Hunter.
He was the grandfather I wish that I had. When he went on a story telling tour of theatres my parents took me to see him. They warned me before hand that he would look different than he did on TV, and he did, which has often made me wonder if it was a stand in, or maybe he just wasnt wearing his Zookeepers uniform, cos he sure sounded like he did on TV. Johnny's style may be seen as old fashioned, but towards the end of his life he actually allied himself with environmental protestors by taking part in the British anti road protests of the 1990s. Another reason to admire him in my book.
Which brings me to hero number 3. Swampy.
Swampy was a 22 year old anti road protester in 1997 when he became the ecowarrior posterchild. He was the last of a group of protestors to be evicted from warren-like complex of tunnels they had built underneath a proposed extension to the A-road between Exeter and Honiton in England. Having evaded the police for seven days and caused a much bigger media frenzy than Julia Butterfly Hill could in the States, he was finally dragged out into the glare of sun and TV cameras. He used his new found fame well, appearing on the satirical news quiz Have I Got News For You (probably my favorite TV show at the time), where he repeatedly and coherrantly pointed out the insanity of building more roads so we can have more cars, when what we really need to be doing is cutting our carbon emmisions. I'm not saying the dread locked crusty changed anybodys minds, but I do think that he empowered a lot of people who agreed with him, and for that reason he is a hero.
Number 4 is David Attenborough
The man is a legend as far as Im concerned. Ive loved every one of his 'Life Series'. I love his style of presentation and I love the way at the end of each series. Having shown all these amazing and beautiful things about the planet we live on, he comes back with the subtle message of...but humanity is destroying it, and we have got to think about how we can make our actions less destructive. I love the logical way that he has been bringing that up since the 1970's because it wasnt preachy. Of course being arguably the most travelled man on the planet his carbon footprint probably rivals Al Gores, but it was definately better spent.
5. By now I sound like a way too righteous eco geek with no sense of humor, so continuing with that theme number 5 is George Monbiot
Pretty much the most radical journalist at least on environmental issues that gets mainstream media work (in the British Guardian). I find his stuff pretty compelling and he lives near my parents, in mid Wales His wikipedia page is quite informative http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Monbiot
6. Brian Haw. yay, starting to get through em now.
Brian Haw is famous for living in a peace camp in Parliament Square, London since 2001 in an anti-war protest. Tony Blair tried so hard to get rid of him, but he is still there.
7. Skin (from the band Skunk anansie)
Skunk anansie were a pretty hard hitting yet melodic rock band from London with a tall skinny muscular, bald, black female lead singer, who went by the name of Skin. They were one of my favorite bands of the latish 90's. Skin has an amazing voice. They were totally unique and against the grain. The following is quoted from their fansite 'Skunk Anansie could tap into politically-inclined anger with all the feral fury of a thousand Rage Against The Machines, Skin's open-mouthed holler pinning you to the wall with exfoliating force. Yet she could also sing quite beautifully. Remember the gorgeous singles Charity and Brazen (Weep)?' When the volume came down, Skin revealed that not only could she sing, but she could sing like a diva'. I think it sums them up well.
8. Lassie. Finally a film star.
When I was a kid I didnt just love Lassie. I wanted to be Lassie. My mum took me to the cinema to see a Lassie film once, but she made me promise not to cry, and got quite stern when I couldnt keep my promise. I dont think I was sniffling that loud, as I was trying so hard to conceal it.
9. Rachel Carson. Pretty obvious. A strong woman who had more beneficial effect on the environment than most. 
10. Brad Lancaster.
Local hero.
Trying to live life in harmony with the planet, and he is quite evangelical. If you want to see more of his stuff you can look in my permaculture gallery.
Ok this was way too much work, so Im not gonna tag anyone else.
Posted on 08/31/2007 11:15 AM Comments (20)
August 8, 2007
Here are the rules:
1) Only list 8 facts.
2) You must then list 8 TAGS at the end of the post. This means you must name 8 people on Buzznet who now must do the same blog.
3) Then go comment on their profile and tell them to come read yours! Probably everyone has given up on reading these.
1. I got mistaken for Elliott’s son last week. Poor guy was so embarrassed, he just wanted to crawl under the cracks. He came round to Elliott’s house to give an estimate for cleaning the floor. Turned to Elliott and said “is this your son”. “Actually that’s my wife” Elliott replied.
This was not the first time I have been mistaken for a boy, or Elliott’s child, but it was the first time for that particular faux pas double. I’m not sure which should have been the biggest give away, my breasts or my wrinkles. Prolly the wrinkles.
2. I was born almost exactly 9 months after my Mothers 40th birthday. Such a late life pregnancy was quite rare in the midlands of England in 1975. My mother thought she had her complete symmetrical family by the time she was in her mid 20’s. I was not exactly planned.
3. This one is in honor of Azannie, who nominated me for this game. I am 24 days younger than David Beckham.
4. I talk to plants, a lot.
5. When I was 12, we were asked to write about what our 3 ideal jobs would be, in an English class.
I wrote Veterinarian, Conservationist, and Environmentalist. I wasn’t smart enough to be a vet. I spent most of my life doing conservation and environmental work until Sept of last year. Ill probably go back to it, but now I’m a yoga teacher in training.
6. When I was 14 my mother said I should be a farmer’s wife or veterinary assistant cos Im good with animals. I was really pissed off at her. I still am, for her sexism rather than her low expectations of me.
7. The first time I flew in an aeroplane I was 18. I flew Air Sudan, London to Nairobi, via Charles de Gaul, Paris. Changing planes in Adis Ababa. The flight went ok until we touched down in Ethiopia, what with European airports having certain safety standards for their aircrafts. No such bureaucracy occurred in Africa however. The propeller aircraft that we boarded took 3 attempts at take off. On the 3rd time it finally alighted…with smoke billowing from the air vents.
8. I’ve only been thrown out of a bar once. Ed’s back alley, Banff, Canada. I was 19 and very, very drunk. I was later found passed out by friends in front of a hotel.
The 8 suckers I tag to continue this game are: athenspie, kathy1981, cueballsphotos, charlymaravilla, farmlife,
Apologies for those who have been double tagged. Its only fun not obligatory, and doing it twice is redundancy.
Posted on 08/08/2007 3:01 PM Comments (16)
November 17, 2006
Well Im not actually unhappy here. I like it, but there are some things I dont like that are becoming a little too intrusive and omnipresent. I might get sick and tired of it, especially if my interesting friends up and leave because of the problems.
Ok I understand the percieved need for teen appeal. I dont mind the homepage. Its easy to ignore. Not a problem, but the suspicion is that this preoccupation with home page glamification is causing the frustrating glitches. So for me that is what this protest is for.
Yeah Buzznet is slow a little too often. It is down a little too often.
The not being able to leave comments thing, can really destroy the community feel here. Thats why Im here really. Im not a great photographer, I dont aspire to be. I like documenting my life. I really like looking at other peoples amazing pictures, and commenting and acknowledging that they have captured a really cool aspect of this wonderful world for all to see. I dont care so much about celebratey, but other people do and thats ok. There is a place for it, but please not at the expense of community.
In case you are wondering, this my 1st, and possibly last, journal entry was in response to a message sent out by one of my friends.
The hope is that others who feel the same will write a journal entry expressing there feelings with the title:"i'm unhappy here", as part of a mass protest.
Here is part of the original message.
i realy have learnt to love the people i have met here and seeing it all being ruined in the pursuit of the mass teen dollar....breaks my heart...it used to be about photos?? now i cant even comment...for 2days now?
no more black screen of death either!!!!
enough is enough buzzwits
please join me in a protest and post a journal with the tital
"i'm unhappy here"
say whatever you want
please help
Posted on 11/17/2006 10:27 AM Comments (24)
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