Month: September 2010

Disarm BART Flyer #2

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Last night on my way home from Oakland to SF, I boarded the bart train with no intention of handing out any flyers.  It was late; I was tired; also feeling a little shy.

I’d been burned the day before while trying to hand out a different flyer on a similar theme.  This one announced an October 23 rally sponsored by the Oakland/SF local (Local 10) of the ILWU longshoremen’s union, in solidarity with the Oscar Grant movement.  The ILWU has a history of militant, class- and race-conscious organizing: to challenge apartheid South Africa, they shut down the shipping yards along the whole US West Coast.  It’s a pretty inspiring labor-community connection (more explanation over at Advance the Struggle blog), and I was jazzed to be talking to folks about it at the Ashby BART seller’s market on a sunny Saturday afternoon.

But you know, rather than talking politics, most of the men I approached were more interested in hitting on me.

Now.  As I’ve discussed here before, hollering doesn’t alarm me too much and I generally respond with friendliness or neutrality rather than coldness or anger.  But this day, man, I was not in the mood.  The previous night I’d been up at a radical politics discussion in Oakland from 9pm til 3 in the morning.  Exhaustion left me exposed and tender, with little energy to break through the banter and engage the humans behind the Gaze.

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Dear Author Of fuckyeahdukkha:

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This is just a note to say that I have a big ol’ internet crush on you and your incredibly awesome treasure trove of a tumblr. And I hope to be able to organize with you someday.

I wanted to write and tell you that directly but I can’t find any contact info. So if you are reading this, please know that I am sending you all kinds of mental hugs and mental bows and mental incense and mental plantains (yum!), and thanking you so very deeply for your work and inspiration.

love,

katie

Disarm BART Flyer #1

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Simple, clean, sincere. Inspired by Burmese monastics who, when demonstrating in the streets against the military, chant: “May all beings be free from killing one another. May all beings be free from torturing one another…”

[Update: I forgot to mention, but if you’re in the bay area and are interested in passing out some flyers on your BART travels, hit me up at katie (dot) loncke (at) gmail (dot) com and I’ll get you a batch! Or, even better — take some inspiration and make your own, and let the rest of us know about it.]

Radical Sangha and Disarming the BART Police

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Sorry I didn’t get a post up today, folks!  Wednesday is my one day off from work at the Faithful Fools, and this one I spent in an especially uplifting way: having one-on-one meetings about Oscar Grant organizing, disarming the BART (Bay Area Rapid Transit) police, and organizing spiritual communities against Prop L: the sit/lie measure on San Francisco’s November ballot that would make it a crime to “sit or lie down on any sidewalk or on top of any object (blanket, lawn chair, milk crate, etc.) on any sidewalk in San Francisco between 7 a.m. and 11 p.m.”

Plus, inspired by the response to the Dangers of Compassion post, I’m tryna make moves to get a little radical sangha started here in the Bay Area: a group of dhamma practitioners (mostly of-color and gender-oppressed, hopefully) with structural critiques of oppression and empire.  It wouldn’t be the first or the only, I’m sure, but hey — if folks are interested, why not start another?*

So anyway, my apologies for not having a real post offering for today.  Luckily, however, I can call on my good friend, fellow compassionate actor, and future-famous-writer, Mary Catherine Curley, to fill in.  Here is a snippet from her blog The Over-Cher, which I crawled out from underneath my rock just long enough to discover this week.

Treehugging

Some time ago, while taking pictures in Central Park with some co-conspirators, I became criminally excited about the idea of taking a picture in which we were all standing behind a tree, but leaning out so you could see our heads. In my mind, this was an established genre of photograph that I wanted to be a part of. My “co-conspirators” told me this was the stupidest idea ever. I think you know what I thought then:

Take MC’s wisdom to heart, compassionate militants!  No, really.  The next time you feel tempted to give in to beefing and sectarian infighting, or if you feel silenced by a movement patriarch, remember our friend in the sleeping bag suit, and keep your head up.

See you Friday, friends!

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*If you are in the Bay Area and interested in joining up with this radical sangha business, write me at katie (dot) loncke (at) gmail (dot) com,  and let’s get acquainted!  I’m pretty serious about the people of color and gender representation, but that doesn’t mean that if you are a middle-class white dude you can’t participate.  It probly just means that you will need to wait your turn.  So write me anyway!