Tuesday, April 27, 2004
we've won this battle but the war is long and arduous
well, i'm back from d.c. i have a lot to say....
first of all, this weekend was awesome! so cool, i feel so inspired...let me tell you about it chronologically:
friday: we drove for 20 hours! we went insane. at one point, melissa and i were singing the battle hymn of the republic, in a round no less, while jill recited the gettysburg address. she forgot how it ended and thus made up her own ending, including the now immortal quote "i don't believe in sliverty", which i think was supposed to be "slavery" we laughed until we cried...it was hilarious...we got to d.c. about 5 in the morning, and we had to wake up our host to let us in..she was kind, and didn't care.
saturday: we got up at 10, and set out to see the sights. we walked around our nation's fine capital, noting the many other feminists we randomly saw. we ate pretzels while sitting on a monument...then melissa said, "well, let's get out of here and go to the white house". we noted that that was undoubtedly the first and last time that quote would ever be uttered within our threesome.
at the white house, we saw a hippie who knocked on the gate and whispered "stop killing people". he's saying what we're all thinking.
then, we went to a show which was part of the weekend's festivities. it was a benefit for NARAL prochoice america. we saw the butchies, which was really awesome and the lunachicks. it was a rad evening, and the show lasted six hours!! woooowww!!! they had speakers including a feminist comedian, the drummer from the band anti-flag, the man who helped rewrite the abortion laws, that had been mutilated during the reagan and bush sr administrations, when clinton took office, and an episcopalian minister who really pumped us up. she even said "i'm wearing my leather collar, i've never worn it", you know, the white collars that ministers wear. but she was wearing the leather one to be more punk rock. i thought that was really funny. the weather was beautiful, and the feminist comedian urged us to simply counter the anti-choice counterdemonstrations with the statement "what lovely weather god gave us for the march today". there was a feeling of unity unlike any i have really ever felt at a show. so that was awesome. then we went to an ethiopian restaurant/bar. it was yummy. and our waiter's name was cha and he proclaimed that the restaurant had been overrun by feminists all day and that he had been persuaded to attend the march. awesome!
sunday: this was the march day. the feelings were overwhelming. i have always considered myself to be a feminist, to be concerned with women's rights and lives, and seeing so many other people who shared my feelings was great. gone were the days of melissa, jill, and i being openly feminist in high school, being called feminazis or dykes or manhaters just because we think women should have equal rights and control over their bodies...here was a whole city of people who felt the same way! it was really validating. we got on the train, and immediately i realized that the whole train was full of feminists. an "independent photographer" took photos of us and asked some questions about where we were from,e tc. when we got off the train, there was a whole delegation of people in neon green tshirts that proclaimed "this is what a jewish feminist looks like". they were cheering and it was really awesome. then we got to the place where the march was and got "officially counted".
then it was time for the talks, including a really awesome speech from hillary rodham (clinton), who was introduced by her sister in law (bill clinton's sister?)...hillary encouraged us to elect a prochoice president and to change the way our country is heading under the current administration. after she got done speaking, the sister in law said "thank you, president clinton (oops!)" that got a great laugh. cybil shepherd spoke, and she was really inspiring. what a great speaker and activist she is. there were tons of other speakers, including lawyers who had helped with roe v. wade, medical students for choice, other youth leaders. there were celebrities. i missed gloria steinem (apparently we were still marching when she spoke) and whoopi goldberg, but we did see ani difranco and other cool artists, right? my favorite was this singer/songwriter who sang a song with this chorus:
"bye bye bush
goodbye ugliness
hello happiness
i feel like i could fly
bye bye george bush bye bye"
i honestly felt like he is totally out of there!! so everyone, register to vote! vote for kerry (not that i'm a huge kerry supporter, but a vote for kerry is a vote against bush, so let's do it!) there are so many reasons bush is evil, and i know that you all know that, just make sure you're registered and do it, it's so important right now...if he has his way, we're going to be teaching kids abstinence-only sex education (which is *real* realistic, by the way), not teaching young girls about their bodies or about contraception, making sex really shameful and therefore excitingly secretive and rebellious to them (and they'll have no education about it) while they hate their own bodies because of their sexual qualitites, which really disgusts me. then once they get pregnant, they won't have a choice, they won't be able to get emergency contraceptive. they won't be able to get abortions, especailly if they're poor (since medicaid won't pay for them), and they'll be forced to either give birth to unwanted children or to get a dangerous back alley abortion which will possibly kill and/or sterilize them. that makes me so sad. but that's what bush wants. and what he's going to get. did you know that the next supreme court justice to be appointed will really make or break the abortion rights debate? because there are so many anti choice (they call themselves pro-life) justices right now, that there is only one more pro-choice than anti-choice, and if bush is re-elected (or, technically, elected for the first time), he's going to appoint an antichoice justice and roe v. wade could be reversed. and from talking to/seeing/hearing speak older people who were alive before roe v. wade, those were horrible times for women as far as controlling when or if they have children. so many women died because of getting illegal/unsafe abortions, and many were forced to have children that they did not want and proably could not care for (which is not only bad for them and the children, but for society as a whole), and a coat hanger was actually a medical instrument! i personally don't want to live in that sort of climate, and anyone who cares at all about women, children, or human rights should not want to live in that sort of society either. that's why it's so important, imperative, to vote this november and to NOT vote for bush.
having said that, i'll get on to some lighter issues of the day (note, this may be sort of vulgar to some people):
i read in the washington post an opinion piece that said something like "it seems like the only good things the current administration has done for the women's rights movement is to have a president with the surname bush and a vice president named dick". and that's true, from the signs i saw! example:
"keep george w. out of my bush", "lick bush in 2004", "with bush and dick in the white house, you get screwed!", "wax bush", etc...
my favorite was the older ladies with these risque signs including "tell the patriarchy: roe v. wade or you won't get laid!", "buck fush", and a really cute one: "menopausal women nostalgic for choice".
so let's get on to the people, there was every kind of person there, every race, every gender/sexual preference, every age, from 90s to babies, pregnant women, "another adopted child for choice", etc. there were so many supportive men there, which is really awesome! feminism is not just for ladies! really...(my favorite male sign: "my penis is not a gavel")...cowboys for choice, roman catholics for choice, republicans for choice, religious coalition for reproductive choice, jews for choice, lutherans for choice, "another aging man for choice", awesome! i loved the older couples who had obviously marched many times before, they were inspiring to me, and we were inspiring to them. they knew that all they had fought for would not go away because the youth do care (including gloria steinem, aged 70, looking like a babe, and wearing a shirt "another youth for choice"), and we knew that these were the people who had fought for our rights before we had even been born. i really respect them and want them to know that we're going to continue the fight. i loved the speech that a girl gave, the president of law students for choice, and she instructed the crowd to yell "we're here, mr. president" every time she held up her cellphone. she pretended to be talking to him, and she said things like "you think the youth of america will let you trample their rights because we're apathetic?" "we're here, mr. president" "you think you're going to get easily re-elected because the youth of america won't vote against you?" "we're here, mr president". etc. that was an awesome speech.
anyway i have a lot more to say about the day's events, but i gotta do homework.
other things that happened sunday night:
i met joan jett!!!!! i got my photo taken with her and she said my name was cool. and thanked me and melissa for caring about our rights. she is awesome. easily one of the greatest moments of my life.
after running back to the bar where our friends were waiting (a couple of blocks away from where joan was playing; we couldn't afford to see her play, so melissa and i just waited outside for her, when we shouted "joan" when she came out, they waived us over, past the security guards, etc...), i realized i had lost my cellphone. jill tried looking for it with me, but it's probably in the alleyways of d.c. somewhere. so i'm going to get a new one. anyways i didn't even care after having met freaking joan jett!!
i had a dance party at a bar with melissa, jill, christen (my friend from here that went with us) and liza (our host, who just happened to be totally awesome, great for a sister of a friend of a friend), where we danced to michael jackson into the wee hours of the morning.
then we drove back. and now i have to do my homework.
thanks to everyone who asked about the march, supported my decision to go, helped me check the air in my tires, and supported the march in general. thanks for listening to me rant about my personal beliefs, which i'm usually not that open about. thanks to my mom for reading my blog and enjoying getting to know the raedy that my friends know and for appreciating that. i'll write more later, but i'm way behind in schoolwork now...eek!!!!! xoxoxoxoxoxox
well, i'm back from d.c. i have a lot to say....
first of all, this weekend was awesome! so cool, i feel so inspired...let me tell you about it chronologically:
friday: we drove for 20 hours! we went insane. at one point, melissa and i were singing the battle hymn of the republic, in a round no less, while jill recited the gettysburg address. she forgot how it ended and thus made up her own ending, including the now immortal quote "i don't believe in sliverty", which i think was supposed to be "slavery" we laughed until we cried...it was hilarious...we got to d.c. about 5 in the morning, and we had to wake up our host to let us in..she was kind, and didn't care.
saturday: we got up at 10, and set out to see the sights. we walked around our nation's fine capital, noting the many other feminists we randomly saw. we ate pretzels while sitting on a monument...then melissa said, "well, let's get out of here and go to the white house". we noted that that was undoubtedly the first and last time that quote would ever be uttered within our threesome.
at the white house, we saw a hippie who knocked on the gate and whispered "stop killing people". he's saying what we're all thinking.
then, we went to a show which was part of the weekend's festivities. it was a benefit for NARAL prochoice america. we saw the butchies, which was really awesome and the lunachicks. it was a rad evening, and the show lasted six hours!! woooowww!!! they had speakers including a feminist comedian, the drummer from the band anti-flag, the man who helped rewrite the abortion laws, that had been mutilated during the reagan and bush sr administrations, when clinton took office, and an episcopalian minister who really pumped us up. she even said "i'm wearing my leather collar, i've never worn it", you know, the white collars that ministers wear. but she was wearing the leather one to be more punk rock. i thought that was really funny. the weather was beautiful, and the feminist comedian urged us to simply counter the anti-choice counterdemonstrations with the statement "what lovely weather god gave us for the march today". there was a feeling of unity unlike any i have really ever felt at a show. so that was awesome. then we went to an ethiopian restaurant/bar. it was yummy. and our waiter's name was cha and he proclaimed that the restaurant had been overrun by feminists all day and that he had been persuaded to attend the march. awesome!
sunday: this was the march day. the feelings were overwhelming. i have always considered myself to be a feminist, to be concerned with women's rights and lives, and seeing so many other people who shared my feelings was great. gone were the days of melissa, jill, and i being openly feminist in high school, being called feminazis or dykes or manhaters just because we think women should have equal rights and control over their bodies...here was a whole city of people who felt the same way! it was really validating. we got on the train, and immediately i realized that the whole train was full of feminists. an "independent photographer" took photos of us and asked some questions about where we were from,e tc. when we got off the train, there was a whole delegation of people in neon green tshirts that proclaimed "this is what a jewish feminist looks like". they were cheering and it was really awesome. then we got to the place where the march was and got "officially counted".
then it was time for the talks, including a really awesome speech from hillary rodham (clinton), who was introduced by her sister in law (bill clinton's sister?)...hillary encouraged us to elect a prochoice president and to change the way our country is heading under the current administration. after she got done speaking, the sister in law said "thank you, president clinton (oops!)" that got a great laugh. cybil shepherd spoke, and she was really inspiring. what a great speaker and activist she is. there were tons of other speakers, including lawyers who had helped with roe v. wade, medical students for choice, other youth leaders. there were celebrities. i missed gloria steinem (apparently we were still marching when she spoke) and whoopi goldberg, but we did see ani difranco and other cool artists, right? my favorite was this singer/songwriter who sang a song with this chorus:
"bye bye bush
goodbye ugliness
hello happiness
i feel like i could fly
bye bye george bush bye bye"
i honestly felt like he is totally out of there!! so everyone, register to vote! vote for kerry (not that i'm a huge kerry supporter, but a vote for kerry is a vote against bush, so let's do it!) there are so many reasons bush is evil, and i know that you all know that, just make sure you're registered and do it, it's so important right now...if he has his way, we're going to be teaching kids abstinence-only sex education (which is *real* realistic, by the way), not teaching young girls about their bodies or about contraception, making sex really shameful and therefore excitingly secretive and rebellious to them (and they'll have no education about it) while they hate their own bodies because of their sexual qualitites, which really disgusts me. then once they get pregnant, they won't have a choice, they won't be able to get emergency contraceptive. they won't be able to get abortions, especailly if they're poor (since medicaid won't pay for them), and they'll be forced to either give birth to unwanted children or to get a dangerous back alley abortion which will possibly kill and/or sterilize them. that makes me so sad. but that's what bush wants. and what he's going to get. did you know that the next supreme court justice to be appointed will really make or break the abortion rights debate? because there are so many anti choice (they call themselves pro-life) justices right now, that there is only one more pro-choice than anti-choice, and if bush is re-elected (or, technically, elected for the first time), he's going to appoint an antichoice justice and roe v. wade could be reversed. and from talking to/seeing/hearing speak older people who were alive before roe v. wade, those were horrible times for women as far as controlling when or if they have children. so many women died because of getting illegal/unsafe abortions, and many were forced to have children that they did not want and proably could not care for (which is not only bad for them and the children, but for society as a whole), and a coat hanger was actually a medical instrument! i personally don't want to live in that sort of climate, and anyone who cares at all about women, children, or human rights should not want to live in that sort of society either. that's why it's so important, imperative, to vote this november and to NOT vote for bush.
having said that, i'll get on to some lighter issues of the day (note, this may be sort of vulgar to some people):
i read in the washington post an opinion piece that said something like "it seems like the only good things the current administration has done for the women's rights movement is to have a president with the surname bush and a vice president named dick". and that's true, from the signs i saw! example:
"keep george w. out of my bush", "lick bush in 2004", "with bush and dick in the white house, you get screwed!", "wax bush", etc...
my favorite was the older ladies with these risque signs including "tell the patriarchy: roe v. wade or you won't get laid!", "buck fush", and a really cute one: "menopausal women nostalgic for choice".
so let's get on to the people, there was every kind of person there, every race, every gender/sexual preference, every age, from 90s to babies, pregnant women, "another adopted child for choice", etc. there were so many supportive men there, which is really awesome! feminism is not just for ladies! really...(my favorite male sign: "my penis is not a gavel")...cowboys for choice, roman catholics for choice, republicans for choice, religious coalition for reproductive choice, jews for choice, lutherans for choice, "another aging man for choice", awesome! i loved the older couples who had obviously marched many times before, they were inspiring to me, and we were inspiring to them. they knew that all they had fought for would not go away because the youth do care (including gloria steinem, aged 70, looking like a babe, and wearing a shirt "another youth for choice"), and we knew that these were the people who had fought for our rights before we had even been born. i really respect them and want them to know that we're going to continue the fight. i loved the speech that a girl gave, the president of law students for choice, and she instructed the crowd to yell "we're here, mr. president" every time she held up her cellphone. she pretended to be talking to him, and she said things like "you think the youth of america will let you trample their rights because we're apathetic?" "we're here, mr. president" "you think you're going to get easily re-elected because the youth of america won't vote against you?" "we're here, mr president". etc. that was an awesome speech.
anyway i have a lot more to say about the day's events, but i gotta do homework.
other things that happened sunday night:
i met joan jett!!!!! i got my photo taken with her and she said my name was cool. and thanked me and melissa for caring about our rights. she is awesome. easily one of the greatest moments of my life.
after running back to the bar where our friends were waiting (a couple of blocks away from where joan was playing; we couldn't afford to see her play, so melissa and i just waited outside for her, when we shouted "joan" when she came out, they waived us over, past the security guards, etc...), i realized i had lost my cellphone. jill tried looking for it with me, but it's probably in the alleyways of d.c. somewhere. so i'm going to get a new one. anyways i didn't even care after having met freaking joan jett!!
i had a dance party at a bar with melissa, jill, christen (my friend from here that went with us) and liza (our host, who just happened to be totally awesome, great for a sister of a friend of a friend), where we danced to michael jackson into the wee hours of the morning.
then we drove back. and now i have to do my homework.
thanks to everyone who asked about the march, supported my decision to go, helped me check the air in my tires, and supported the march in general. thanks for listening to me rant about my personal beliefs, which i'm usually not that open about. thanks to my mom for reading my blog and enjoying getting to know the raedy that my friends know and for appreciating that. i'll write more later, but i'm way behind in schoolwork now...eek!!!!! xoxoxoxoxoxox
