yesterday was a very long day
Aug. 31st, 2004 03:12 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
lapsedmodernistTo: The RCP-ers
CC to: The ICL
Re: Stop Flyering Me!
If and when I come to you and say "take me to your leader" you may take me to Bob Avakian. Until then, take your posters of The Revolution and your copies of Workers Vanguard and go back to your mothership.
To: My Coworkers
Re: Face Masks
Dear Coworkers,
I am sorry that the masks that I brought to the office, along with ear plugs aren't coutour protest gear. My mom sent them. They use them at her hospital when they get patients with tuberculosis or, like, SARS. They are called particle masks. They are very effective. Therefore, the thing to do when I give them to you is say "thank you" and not to focus on how much they may or may not look like Maxipads.
To: Dude on top of the phone booth with me
Re: Rocking the phone booth
Dear Dude,
Now, I understand that you have been condtioned by MTV to Rock the Vote, or maybe you like to think of yourself as someone who Rocks the Boat, but when it's myself, you, and another dude on the top of a scorchingly hot phone booth on a street corner, and I am trying to film as much as possible before the cops shoo me down, don't be jumping up and down in rhythm with the crowd chant to show your solidarity. Yes, I understand the hypnotic power of call-and-response and agree that the answer to whose streets? is our streets, but the phone booth isn't the sturdiest contraption on the block, and wasn't really designed have three people on top of it, so when you do a jiggy on it, it wobbles, and that makes me feel like I am about to fall off it. So, when I turn around and ask you to please not do that, that's because I value my limbs and my expensive three-chip camera, and thus looking at the other dude with a complicit "girls, man, they are such pussies" look just makes you look like an ass.
To: Dumbfuck protesters
Re: What you did wrong
Dear dumbfuck protesters,
When we are all in the middle of an intersection, and the police have split the march into two groups, and the air is tense, and they are patrolling the perimeter and putting on riot gear, and when the proteters append a strategic chant "give the cops a raise" to "let them through," and furthermore after the cops do, in fact, listen to the crowd's demands and move to to open the barriers and let the marchers through, that is not the time to start screaming agitated calls to violence. I am sorry if you are short, and your trigger-happy MaChesmo stems from a Napoleon complex, but even if you can't see over people's heads what is transpiring at the barricades, you should actually figure out what is happening before you start inciting behavior that has nothing to with creating a productive atmosphere for a protest and everything to do with your secret fear that your cock does not measure up.
To: The Daily News
Re: Lying
Dear Daily News,
Much like my ex-boyfriend, you never fail to disappoint. And no one expects accurate estimates on the number of protesters anyway. Not from authorities, not from the corporate press. So we know that if the organizers say there were 750,000 people at the march yesterday, the unofficial police source will (and did) say that about 500,000 people came. Downplaying is the name of the game. But, dear Daily News, reporting that "tens of thousands protesters" is really above and beyond the acceptable margin of lying. Perhaps you are overimpressed by the old adage that it is easier to get away with a bit lie than with a small one, but I bet what you didn't know is that rumor was perpetrated by Pinnochio. Pre-nose job.
To: Boys at the Media Convergence Space
Re: wallowing in filth
Dear Boys,
I was already covered in layers of grime and dirt by the time I arrived at the Space. From the magic markered-phone numbers that blurred into an undifferentiated amoeba-shaped blob on my forearm. From sweating in the sun all day. From lying on the ground in Union Square between the rally and the march. From climbing on top of things to get a better shot. However, it wasn't until I spent quality time in the video workroom logging and dubbing that I started to feel Unclean, like biblically so, like I needed to bathe in the waters of some Sacred River or something. Just because the Revolution will not be televized does not mean that we should wallow in filth. So, um, boys, pick up the banana peels and your random scraps of paper and crumpled business cards that say "film producer/revolutionary" and take the garbage out. And unless you are one of the people who just came back from Pier 57 thissecond, take a shower. And what the hell was that plastic bag with, like, 12 pieces of pale rubbery boiled chicken legs in it in the middle of the conference room?
Anyway, enough bitching, here are some photographs. I don't have that many pictures from the actual protest, since I was videotaping most of the time, but it was a long, long day, and here are a few snapshots, in chronological order.
The night before
The night before, Pnts and I trying on the aforementioned masks. They are a little complicated, so we practice putting them on to create airtight seals.
Pnts and I in Union Square taking a break from filming and flyering.
Little boy who hung out on the grass next to us
Peace doves at the protest
Me filming
Head of the Green Dragon a little while before it went up in flames.
Pnts,![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
totalvirility, my boss Brian and Brendan
saintpegand her boyfriend
I really liked this sign
Blurry occifer
Vote for a Change
After the protest Pnts and I went to see The Fourth World War (amazing) and then she went off to promote her website on Air America and I went down to the convergence space. Much later we went to Kiev for some late-night food and beer with Brian, Jello, and two Chrises. Emmanuel and Terence came later. Interestingly enough, not one of them knew what the phrase "bros before hoes" meant. We conducted an impromptu poll. Weird, right?
Wide-eyed Pnts in front of the deli on 2nd and 4th
I got some Baltika, a Russian beer, then everyone else wanted it too.
Brian and Jello
Emmanuel
Jello
After a couple of beers Pnts and I started drawing on each other.
As you can tell.
After another beer we started bitching about sexism and misogyny in the IMCs, but that's another story for another entry.
CC to: The ICL
Re: Stop Flyering Me!
If and when I come to you and say "take me to your leader" you may take me to Bob Avakian. Until then, take your posters of The Revolution and your copies of Workers Vanguard and go back to your mothership.
To: My Coworkers
Re: Face Masks
Dear Coworkers,
I am sorry that the masks that I brought to the office, along with ear plugs aren't coutour protest gear. My mom sent them. They use them at her hospital when they get patients with tuberculosis or, like, SARS. They are called particle masks. They are very effective. Therefore, the thing to do when I give them to you is say "thank you" and not to focus on how much they may or may not look like Maxipads.
To: Dude on top of the phone booth with me
Re: Rocking the phone booth
Dear Dude,
Now, I understand that you have been condtioned by MTV to Rock the Vote, or maybe you like to think of yourself as someone who Rocks the Boat, but when it's myself, you, and another dude on the top of a scorchingly hot phone booth on a street corner, and I am trying to film as much as possible before the cops shoo me down, don't be jumping up and down in rhythm with the crowd chant to show your solidarity. Yes, I understand the hypnotic power of call-and-response and agree that the answer to whose streets? is our streets, but the phone booth isn't the sturdiest contraption on the block, and wasn't really designed have three people on top of it, so when you do a jiggy on it, it wobbles, and that makes me feel like I am about to fall off it. So, when I turn around and ask you to please not do that, that's because I value my limbs and my expensive three-chip camera, and thus looking at the other dude with a complicit "girls, man, they are such pussies" look just makes you look like an ass.
To: Dumbfuck protesters
Re: What you did wrong
Dear dumbfuck protesters,
When we are all in the middle of an intersection, and the police have split the march into two groups, and the air is tense, and they are patrolling the perimeter and putting on riot gear, and when the proteters append a strategic chant "give the cops a raise" to "let them through," and furthermore after the cops do, in fact, listen to the crowd's demands and move to to open the barriers and let the marchers through, that is not the time to start screaming agitated calls to violence. I am sorry if you are short, and your trigger-happy MaChesmo stems from a Napoleon complex, but even if you can't see over people's heads what is transpiring at the barricades, you should actually figure out what is happening before you start inciting behavior that has nothing to with creating a productive atmosphere for a protest and everything to do with your secret fear that your cock does not measure up.
To: The Daily News
Re: Lying
Dear Daily News,
Much like my ex-boyfriend, you never fail to disappoint. And no one expects accurate estimates on the number of protesters anyway. Not from authorities, not from the corporate press. So we know that if the organizers say there were 750,000 people at the march yesterday, the unofficial police source will (and did) say that about 500,000 people came. Downplaying is the name of the game. But, dear Daily News, reporting that "tens of thousands protesters" is really above and beyond the acceptable margin of lying. Perhaps you are overimpressed by the old adage that it is easier to get away with a bit lie than with a small one, but I bet what you didn't know is that rumor was perpetrated by Pinnochio. Pre-nose job.
To: Boys at the Media Convergence Space
Re: wallowing in filth
Dear Boys,
I was already covered in layers of grime and dirt by the time I arrived at the Space. From the magic markered-phone numbers that blurred into an undifferentiated amoeba-shaped blob on my forearm. From sweating in the sun all day. From lying on the ground in Union Square between the rally and the march. From climbing on top of things to get a better shot. However, it wasn't until I spent quality time in the video workroom logging and dubbing that I started to feel Unclean, like biblically so, like I needed to bathe in the waters of some Sacred River or something. Just because the Revolution will not be televized does not mean that we should wallow in filth. So, um, boys, pick up the banana peels and your random scraps of paper and crumpled business cards that say "film producer/revolutionary" and take the garbage out. And unless you are one of the people who just came back from Pier 57 thissecond, take a shower. And what the hell was that plastic bag with, like, 12 pieces of pale rubbery boiled chicken legs in it in the middle of the conference room?
Anyway, enough bitching, here are some photographs. I don't have that many pictures from the actual protest, since I was videotaping most of the time, but it was a long, long day, and here are a few snapshots, in chronological order.
The night before
The night before, Pnts and I trying on the aforementioned masks. They are a little complicated, so we practice putting them on to create airtight seals.
Pnts and I in Union Square taking a break from filming and flyering.
Little boy who hung out on the grass next to us
Peace doves at the protest
Me filming
Head of the Green Dragon a little while before it went up in flames.
Pnts,
totalvirility, my boss Brian and Brendansaintpegand her boyfriendI really liked this sign
Blurry occifer
Vote for a Change
After the protest Pnts and I went to see The Fourth World War (amazing) and then she went off to promote her website on Air America and I went down to the convergence space. Much later we went to Kiev for some late-night food and beer with Brian, Jello, and two Chrises. Emmanuel and Terence came later. Interestingly enough, not one of them knew what the phrase "bros before hoes" meant. We conducted an impromptu poll. Weird, right?
Wide-eyed Pnts in front of the deli on 2nd and 4th
I got some Baltika, a Russian beer, then everyone else wanted it too.
Brian and Jello
Emmanuel
Jello
After a couple of beers Pnts and I started drawing on each other.
As you can tell.
After another beer we started bitching about sexism and misogyny in the IMCs, but that's another story for another entry.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2004-08-31 06:32 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-08-31 07:34 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-08-31 08:41 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-08-31 10:23 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-08-31 07:49 am (UTC)Agreed that the anti-cop protestors have small penises. I personally checked each one of them.
Was the green dragon affiliated with Greene Dragon? I figured it wasn't because it didn't, like, have a tri-corner hat on.
I'm glad you posted this. I was eager to see your reactions to the day.
no subject
Date: 2004-08-31 10:23 pm (UTC)Agreed that the anti-cop protestors have small penises. I personally checked each one of them.
Hahahahaha.
flabber:gasted.
Date: 2004-08-31 01:06 pm (UTC)What was Jello like? Was everything he said all cynical and sardonic? But funny though, right? your impressions please.
Also, great entry and nice pictures.
Re: flabber:gasted.
Date: 2004-08-31 10:21 pm (UTC)And Jello is really nice and cool. He went to participate in the Man in Black Bloc, in defense of Johnny Cash's memory today.
Re: flabber:gasted.
Date: 2004-09-01 08:55 am (UTC)Re: flabber:gasted.
Date: 2004-09-01 10:17 am (UTC)Re: flabber:gasted.
Date: 2004-09-01 08:57 am (UTC)Re: Filth
Date: 2004-08-31 03:01 pm (UTC)At my old job it was so disgusting. The bathroom hadn't been cleaned in over a year and there was this weird power struggle over it--none of the women wanted to do it because even though it made us nauseous, we'd kind of be "encouraging them" by cleaning it. And none of the men would do it because they were men and they'd mostly had their mothers cleaning up after them until they were 19. (Most of them probably didn't even know how to clean a toilet.) Eventually when all the senior men were on holiday myself and another woman just said "fuck it" and cleaned the whole room top to bottom. The boss took me aside to thank me when he got back and explained that he "never would have asked" because that would have been sexist. Thanks!!!
Re: Filth
Date: 2004-08-31 10:24 pm (UTC)what was your old job?
no subject
Date: 2004-08-31 06:19 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-08-31 10:25 pm (UTC)Erm, thanks.
no subject
Date: 2004-09-01 07:16 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-08-31 08:48 pm (UTC)http://www.rnc.freespeech.org/
on the other hand, this link below continues to work for me:
http://www.freespeech.org/
-mjm
no subject
Date: 2004-08-31 10:26 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-09-01 04:47 pm (UTC)just http://rnc.freespeech.org
no subject
Date: 2004-09-01 07:18 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-09-01 10:19 am (UTC)I kind of wish I was at Burning Man. But as my friend, who is visiting, and would have gone to Burnging Man if not for the RNC said, she wasn't even sad she was missing it this year, because it was equivalent in scope. And surreality.