need a mirror, America?

“The people of the [United States], like people everywhere, are seeking a chance to contribute and to have a role in the decisions that will shape their lives. Leaders need to respond to these aspirations and to help build that better future for all. They need to view that civil society as their partner and not as a threat…

But they were met with an iron fist…

The [American] people sought nothing more than to exercise their universal rights. We call upon the [United States] government to abide by the international obligations that it has to respect the rights of its own people. We call for the immediate release of all who have been unjustly detained…

I am confident that history will be on the side of those who seek justice.

It is the responsibility of the government of [The United States] to respect the universal rights of their own people, including their right to free expression and assembly.”






behold,

the beginning is coming.

come gather 'round people wherever you roam and admit that the waters around you have grown and accept it that soon you'll be drenched to the bone.  if your time to you is worth savin' then you better start swimmin' or you'll sink like a stone for the times they are a-changin'.

come writers and critics who prophesize with your pen and keep your eyes wide the chance won't come again and don't speak too soon for the wheel's still in spin and there's no tellin' who that it's namin'.  for the loser now will be later to win for the times they are a-changin'.

come senators, congressmen please heed the call.  don't stand in the doorway, don't block up the hall for he that gets hurt will be he who has stalled.  there's a battle outside ragin', it'll soon shake your windows and rattle your walls, for the times they are a-changin'.

come mothers and fathers throughout the land and don't criticize what you can't understand.  your sons and your daughters are beyond your command, your old road is rapidly agin'.  please get out of the new one if you can't lend your hand, for the times they are a-changin'.

...

-Bob Dylan, 1964.

1,279 cities and growing, worldwide.

we are peaceful.

we are powerful.

we WILL prevail.

we are the 99%.

occupy together.

the revolution is NOW.

Occupy Wall Street.  Occupy Los Angeles.  Occupy Together.

170+ cities all around the country, and all around the world.

In Solidarity.


the 99% of the US population have been forced into poverty and injustice while the greedy corporate pigs have been collecting on our behalf.  we have been repeatedly shown that the people matter less than personal profit and power.  hundreds of billions of people are hungry, exhausted, and scared for their future.  our government has been bought, and our democratic justice has been compromised.

but not anymore.
we, the people, are fed up with this subjugation.  we will not remain silent. we will no longer remain enslaved.

"We, the people of the United States of America, considering the crisis at hand, now reassert our sovereign control of our land." (Occupy Wall Street)

The Occupy movement is a leaderless organization with demands of direct democracy from the government.  we are exercising our rights to protest and we stand together in peaceful Civil Disobedience.  we all have different specific demands from our governments, but the main ideals are held in common.  we want CHANGE.  we want to see the HOPE that has been promised to us. 


for me, personally, the Occupy movement represents freedom.  freedom to stand up against oppression, together, hand in hand, as citizens of the free world. and this, to me, is Anarchy at its purest and most glorious.  such overwhelming joy fills my heart to witness and physically experience this rise of the people.  we haven't won anything yet, but at least we are starting to wake people up. 



I love you, people of New York.

[live feed of Occupy Wall Street]



if you want to see more, AnonOps Communication has great videos covering the Occupy movement. as always, Anonymous has been hugely dedicated to the revolution, and i personally find this [non]organization extraordinary and extremely sexy.







"Anonymous seeks to make a difference... There are no leaders. We do not centralize from one area. We have no targets, only outcomes... Perspective is what allows us to decide how we see things, how we judge, how we love, how we feel for one another. We must start to change our perspective of how we see our world. One does not need to possess my ideology, nor am I trying to force it upon you. Rather, I'd like for you to develop your own... We are Anonymous. We are Legion. We do not forgive. We do not forget. Expect us."

my allegiance is with you, Anonymous. you beautiful, brave, leaderless computerized voice of truth, you.  the power belongs to the PEOPLE.

LONG LIVE THE REVOLUTION!!!  <3

Daddy

You do not do, you do not do

Any more, black shoe

In which I have lived like a foot

For thirty years, poor and white

Barely daring to breathe or Achoo.

Daddy, I have had to kill you.

You died before I had time -

Marble-heavy, a bag full of God,

Ghastly statue with one grey toe

Big as a Frisco seal

And a head in the freakish Atlantic

Where it pours bean green over blue

In the waters off beautiful Nauset.

I used to pray to recover you.

Ach, du. *

In the German tongue, in the Polish town

Scraped flat by the roller

Of wars, wars, wars.

But the name of the town is common.

My Polack friend

Says there are a dozen or two.

So I never could tell where you

Put your foot, your root,

I never could talk to you.

The tongue stuck in my jaw.

It stuck in a barb wire snare.

Ich, ich, ich, ich, **

I could hardly speak.

I thought every German was you.

And the language obscene

An engine, an engine

Chuffling me off like a Jew.

A Jew to Dachau, Auschwitz, Belsen.

I began to talk like a Jew.

I think I may well be a Jew.

The snows of the Tyrol, the clear beer of Vienna

Are not very pure or true.

With my gypsy ancestress and my weird luck

And my Taroc pack and my Taroc pack

I may be a bit of a Jew.

I have always been scared of you,

With your Luftwaffe***, your gobbledygoo.

And your neat moustache

And your Aryan eye, bright blue.

Panzer****-man, panzer-man, O You -

Not God but a swastika

So black no sky could squeak through.

Every woman adores a Fascist,

The boot in the face, the brute

Brute heart of a brute like you.

You stand at the blackboard, daddy,

In the picture I have of you,

A cleft in your chin instead of your foot

But no less a devil for that, no not

Any less the black man who

Bit my pretty red heart in two.

I was ten when they buried you.

At twenty I tried to die

And get back, back, back to you.

I thought even the bones would do.

But they pulled me out of the sack,

And they stuck me together with glue.

And then I knew what to do.

I made a model of you,

A man in black with a Meinkampf look

And a love of the rack and the screw.

And I said I do, I do.

So daddy, I'm finally through.

The black telephone's off at the root,

The voices just can't worm through.

If I've killed one man, I've killed two -

The vampire who said he was you

And drank my blood for a year,

Seven years, if you want to know.

Daddy, you can lie back now.

There's a stake in your fat black heart

And the villagers never liked you.

They are dancing and stamping on you.

They always knew it was you.

Daddy, Daddy, you bastard, I'm through.

Sylvia Plath, 1962 

from Ariel.

* Oh, you (German)

** I (German)

*** The Nazi air force in World War II.

**** An armored unit in the German army in WWII.

on about the10th time reading this, I cried uncontrollably.  something moved inside of me, and it hurt.  it still hurts, and i think it will always hurt.

but..  i don't think this is a sad poem.  it's certainly dark and fucking intense, but i think it's an empowering poem.  by simultaneously connecting her father to her ex-husband, Hitler, and God altogether, i think this poem refers to all oppressive powers; sexual, religious, and political.  Sylvia Plath transcends her physical relationship with her father to a metaphysical reflection in which she empowers herself by abandoning the dark forces that burden and dishearten her.

what makes this poem so sad is the fact that she stuck her head in an oven and left this world, just 4 months after writing it.  this was about a month after she'd left her unfaithful husband.

i have killed my "daddy" too, a while ago.  and although i feel empowered to forgive and to accept the flaws of the giant brutes of men who tore me to pieces, the evil black spirits still haunt me.  every Hitler that i have loved was a reflection of my relationship with my father.  my father, was never a daddy to me.  a proud man, a flawed man, but a good man.  i love him for the man he is, and for the man wishes to be, yet i still mourn for the little girl who had to stake her daddy's heart, just to survive and bloom into the flawed and damaged woman she is today.

Sylvia Plath, I adore you.  <3

cat art saves the day, again.

this is EXACTLY how i felt after my physics midterm today.

cat art for the win. <3

uh huh, yea, yea, i'm listening. i'm listening.

cuddle time!




you know what's better than cat photos with funny captions?





LIVE cat art.

peek a boo!

[applaud]

bravo.




puppy art for the encore.

 

thank you, kind people of the internet, for taking the time to brighten my day. 

cheers,

Vamos Angelinos, Vamos Campiones!

2 April 2011

Los Angeles Galaxy vs. Philadelphia Union

Home Depot Center, Section 121.

Angel City Brigade,

you've completely won me over. 

thank you for the most amazing experience.

fyi.  that's David Beckham, right there in the middle.  :)

salutes to ACB, from the team.

thanks Chrystal and Glenn, 

and their beautiful friends of the Angel City Brigade. 

 

 

see you guys at the next tailgate.  ;)

oh Egypt, I love you.

you are beautiful.

long live the revolution.

"one day, i'm gonna whistle?"

this 24 yr-old dreamboat & his 6 yr-old daughter deserves wonderful things. read their story here & see more of them here.


replay video as necessary.
and once you get that overwhelming desire to hug and love this beautiful pair forever, buy their t-shirts. he's a full-time student at UCSD who supports his two daughters whilst trying to pay off his student loans.


kudos to Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros.