A couple of days ago on Facebook I saw a billboard of First Avenue supporting same sex equality. I was so excited that I had the Hubby drive me downtown so that I could see it and snap some photos for myself. The board is located off of Glenwood Avenue by the Minneapolis Farmer’s market:
Isn’t it pretty?
First Avenue is a Minneapolis mainstay – a concert venue that’s been around since 1970 and has hosted some truly remarkable bands. It continues to draw large crowds for touring shows, local acts, dance nights and special events.
As always, First Avenue, you rock. Thanks for supporting marriage equality in Minnesota.
A couple of days ago on Facebook I saw a billboard of First Avenue supporting same sex equality. I was so excited that I had the Hubby drive me downtown so that I could see it and snap some photos for myself. The board is located off of Glenwood Avenue by the Minneapolis Farmer’s market:
Isn’t it pretty?
First Avenue is a Minneapolis mainstay – a concert venue that’s been around since 1970 and has hosted some truly remarkable bands. It continues to draw large crowds for touring shows, local acts, dance nights and special events.
As always, First Avenue, you rock. Thanks for supporting marriage equality in Minnesota.
Last Thursday night I was approached on the street by four puppy-eager teens. I was getting off of my motorcycle and heading to the 19 Club, a gay bar one block off of Nicollet Avenue and a few blocks from downtown Minneapolis. The four kids were all clean-cut and smiling kindly. One of the girls stepped forward and asked me if they knew of anybody or anything that they could pray for, and if I’d like to pray with them. I asked them to pray for the wall of church-state separation, because it has been weak as of late and it needs all the strength they could lend to it. They looked bemusified as I walked away.
Last Thursday night I was approached on the street by four puppy-eager teens. I was getting off of my motorcycle and heading to the 19 Club, a gay bar one block off of Nicollet Avenue and a few blocks from downtown Minneapolis. The four kids were all clean-cut and smiling kindly. One of the girls stepped forward and asked me if they knew of anybody or anything that they could pray for, and if I’d like to pray with them. I asked them to pray for the wall of church-state separation, because it has been weak as of late and it needs all the strength they could lend to it. They looked bemusified as I walked away.
Update (5/2/12 12:50pm): Colorlines is reporting that CeCe has taken a plea deal that could result in a 41-month jail sentence: “Reports out of Minneapolis have it that CeCe McDonald has accepted a plea deal to second degree manslaughter due to negligence in the death of Dean Schmitz. ”
**************************
CeCe McDonald, a 23 year-old, black, transgender woman is looking at up to 80 years in prison for a hate crime-induced fight that left one man dead.
Here’s what’s being reported by Minnesota Daily and colorlines.com – While walking past Scooter’s bar in Minneapolis, CeCe and her friends were subjected to homophobic, transphobic, racist slurs by a group of three white bar patrons, one of whom was displaying swastika tattoos. A fight broke out. CeCe was physically attacked – allegedly one of of the attackers broke a bottle on her face, causing a laceration that required 11 stitches to close – and another of the attackers, Dean Schmitz, was killed – stabbed by a pair of scissors from CeCe’s purse.
The details will be established during CeCe’s trial, but at least the court will take into consideration the fact that the fight was likely started because hate crimes were committed, right? From Minnesota Daily:
Minnesota Public Radio’s recent coverage of the case focused on a debate that has become central to McDonald’s case: Should the hate crimes committed and attempted against McDonald be a consideration in her trial?
Both Minneapolis City Council member Cam Gordon and Rep. Susan Allen, DFL-Minneapolis, have weighed in, urging Hennepin County attorney Mike Freeman, the prosecutor in this case, to mind the hate crimes committed. Freeman, however, has stated that McDonald’s “gender, race, sexual orientation and class” will not be considerations in his case against her. Then of course there were the story’s comments, many of which made the claim that hate crimes don’t actually exist.
Nah, the fact that a young, black, transgender woman was walking down the street, was verbally assaulted by white supremacists (well I shouldn’t assume…I suppose the swastikas might have been applied in the ancient historical context, as a tantric symbol to evoke peace and a sense of eternity) and had a bottle broken on her face had nothing at all to do with the fact that CeCe was a young, black, transgender woman.
Update (5/2/12 12:50pm): Colorlines is reporting that CeCe has taken a plea deal that could result in a 41-month jail sentence: “Reports out of Minneapolis have it that CeCe McDonald has accepted a plea deal to second degree manslaughter due to negligence in the death of Dean Schmitz. ”
**************************
CeCe McDonald, a 23 year-old, black, transgender woman is looking at up to 80 years in prison for a hate crime-induced fight that left one man dead.
Here’s what’s being reported by Minnesota Daily and colorlines.com – While walking past Scooter’s bar in Minneapolis, CeCe and her friends were subjected to homophobic, transphobic, racist slurs by a group of three white bar patrons, one of whom was displaying swastika tattoos. A fight broke out. CeCe was physically attacked – allegedly one of of the attackers broke a bottle on her face, causing a laceration that required 11 stitches to close – and another of the attackers, Dean Schmitz, was killed – stabbed by a pair of scissors from CeCe’s purse.
The details will be established during CeCe’s trial, but at least the court will take into consideration the fact that the fight was likely started because hate crimes were committed, right? From Minnesota Daily:
Minnesota Public Radio’s recent coverage of the case focused on a debate that has become central to McDonald’s case: Should the hate crimes committed and attempted against McDonald be a consideration in her trial?
Both Minneapolis City Council member Cam Gordon and Rep. Susan Allen, DFL-Minneapolis, have weighed in, urging Hennepin County attorney Mike Freeman, the prosecutor in this case, to mind the hate crimes committed. Freeman, however, has stated that McDonald’s “gender, race, sexual orientation and class” will not be considerations in his case against her. Then of course there were the story’s comments, many of which made the claim that hate crimes don’t actually exist.
Nah, the fact that a young, black, transgender woman was walking down the street, was verbally assaulted by white supremacists (well I shouldn’t assume…I suppose the swastikas might have been applied in the ancient historical context, as a tantric symbol to evoke peace and a sense of eternity) and had a bottle broken on her face had nothing at all to do with the fact that CeCe was a young, black, transgender woman.
Alright. So Joseph Kony and the Lord’s Resistance Army are responsible for kidnapping children and turning them into sex-slaves and child soldiers, for the spreading of his odd mix of Christianity/Mysticism, for attempting to turn Uganda into his particular brand of theocracy, for committing war crimes and crimes against humanity. But now we in Minnesota have a real reason to wake up…now it’s turned personal.
Someone spray painted “Kony” on the Spoonbridge. You know, the iconic spoon and cherry sculpture that I have in my blog banner? And because one good tag deserves another, the vandals hit two more of the outdoor sculptures. You can see the vandalism of the spoon here. According to the City Pages the vandalism may be linked to Invisible Children’s Cover the Night campaign, which took place on Saturday at the same time that the graffiti occurred.
Now I’m really upset. Grrr! Now I want to go out and find Kony and bring him to justice. And it’s all thanks to those vandals!
Said no one ever.
Kony is evil. Finding him and bringing him to justice is important. But vandalism – whether the target be our cherished Spoonbridge or the side of building – isn’t the kind of tactic that generates widespread support for your cause. There were other legal, more visible ways to participate in Cover the Night. Organizing people, printing literature, knowing the details of the cause you support, prepping your elevator speech, getting out and spreading the word about Kony is hard work, hard work that these people could have committed to doing if they really wanted to be effective. Spray paint is lazy. Activism fail.
You know how when you’re doing data analysis, you sometimes get sucked right in? You’re working with the raw data, getting it all organized and pretty so you can drop the whole chunk into a statistics program and watch the Passing-Bablocks and Pearsons fly forth onto the computer screen? But it takes a while to do all the organization, data point exclusions (with valid justifications), reprocessing, manually checking the lines and watching the SD and CV calculations to make sure there are no cut/paste errors, double-checking formulae, making sure no single reps in set of mostly double reps are mucking up the whole scheme, but finally! – you’re ready to define the final data set, you click the analyze button and BAM! SLOPE OF 1.01, R=1.00 BEETCHEZ!
*ahem* So, work went well last night. How about you?
Anyway, after getting home from work and the grocery store at 10:30pm I lazed out on the google reader and blog writing. But here are a few things that I’ve been mulling over.
