More C.I.A. drone attacks have been conducted under President Obama than under President George W. Bush. The Air Force’s fleet has grown quickly in recent years now consisting of 195 Predators (27 feet long valued at $4.5 million each) and 28 Reapers with greater firing capability then the original models. From computerized controls in Langley, VA innumerable missions are carried out throughout Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iraq. Reports of neutralized threats with “limited” civilian causalities are counted an increase in military spending on developing these technologies sends the message that our government and subsequently the American people agree with Charles Shoemaker at Robotics Program in Army Research that with this technology “we can save lives”. Assuming the “We” in this statement is the United States government (which as citizens of the United States “WE” pay for through our taxes and participation) I wonder whose lives are “we” saving? In an attempt to clarify exactly whose lives we are saving Waffa Bilal records the current casualties of war in individually tattooed points on his back; 5,000 American soldiers and 200,000 Iraqi’s. With a rapidly increasing Drone fleet growing from 10 in 2001 to 180 in 2007 and a plan for 150 more over the coming years drones are the most frequently used unmanned military vehicles. The praised “accuracy” of the technology coupled with rising reports of civilian casualties shows evidence of multiple factors that must be considered. In addition to potential technological precision what are the relationships our men and women “in arms” have with the technology they are utilizing? Is it in our interest to have our soldiers firing live ammunition at the same pace that they kill zombies on Playstation 2?

This was a vigil organized three days before his trial.

***

I eye the myriad NYPD booths, all vigilant, turning heads as I run past them on Pear Street. I reach the Manhattan Correctional Facility -my backpack is soaked. There is a group of people gathered on the other side of the brown building, everyone holds an umbrella. I stand with them, next to me stands a man who wears a Muslim cap, a Taqiyah.

Do you have any relation to him? I ask the man. I am his father, oh, I recall his face from the documentary on the case. His mother is standing behind him by a fence in a green poncho, silent

A short woman with frazzled hair wearing a Kaffiyeh speaks: did you hear? he is sick. Is it a cold? someone says. No no, he has a urinary infection,

oh, his father asks, he’s not feeling well

Was he in a jacket? Another woman asks. No, he was not, the frazzled hair woman shakes her head with a sad smile. He was not, he was in his prison clothes, he sort of went like this- she puts her hands up and looks up at the sky. Like thanking or something.

He excused himself from the hearing because he was sick, and they asked if he wanted to go back to another cell that was closer, or back to his own. He said he wanted to go back to his own which was more familiar to him, she looks down with a slight smile

Will he be alright for the trial on Wednesday? I ask.

I don’t know, she looks up at me from under the sea of umbrellas: Do you not see? This is the whole point of it. She shrugs her shoulders and remains shrunk.

Where are you from? His father asks me.

Massachusetts? You came all the way from Massachusetts?

I am thanked, with grace by his father and the organizers, you came all the way from Massachusetts? That’s incredible, there’s a women who drove all the way from Washington, where is she? He looks around at the crowd. Thank you for being here

Brain Pickett goes on stage, the microphone just having been set up in a rush by tech people, the cameras circle around him. Brian is announcing the speakers, the performers, we’re welcoming you to the 81st vigil for Fahad Hashmi, welcome to the studio-

Opera singer starts she says, thank you for being here you can barely hear her when she speaks

She pierces the rain with high-pitched shrieks, thank you for supporting this cause she says and leaves the stage

Brain says thank you. Now, this is Fahad’s good friend, he is going to speak now, he tends to ground things really well welcome to the studio

His friend speaks, he says, I was going to recite a poem but I’m not inspired to do that under the rain, instead, I think the rain is very appropriate because this case is about water proof ponchos and socks, and here you all are holding your weapons against the rain, engaging in our jihad. Some people laugh, a woman holding a camera shakes her head looking down.

Even though we have spent so much of our energy doing this, we are not weak, we are made stronger, he says firm. Strong words, soaked in effort.

My brother, he was taken from me. Fahad’s brother goes up to speak he stands under the rain for a minute in silence before he starts. He is 12 miles from me, my brother, and the United States would rather have him tried in an island. They call him a terrorist I call him my brother, and we should all be concerned because next it can be your brother

Soaked, thank you for being here,

The frizzled haired woman whispers: They are making the jury anonymous, the jury will be accompanied, escorted by security forces in and out of the court room and will remain anonymous, this is happening because of the same violence, the same violent support this case has elicited from the public-so they say

Excuse me I’m a photographer from the New York Times ma’am, I just took your picture, can I have your name? The man in blue says to the woman in front of me. The New York Times, will later write about this vigil in an article “It is likely that the jurors will see in the gallery of the courtroom a significant number of the defendant’s supporters,” prosecutors write, “naturally leading to juror speculation that at least some of these spectators might share the defendant’s violent radical Islamic leanings.”

It is all because of you, a speaker says pointing at us, at the crowds because they are afraid of you and your militancy that they are protecting the jury

On my way to the vigil I picked up a wet copy of the Metro newspaper off the ground, the headline read in bold black letters:

What does this say about N.Y.?

Chilling reminder of the city’s coldheartedness as some two dozen walk past good samaritan as he lies bleeding on Queens sidewalk for more than an hour. Homeless man was killed protecting woman in Jamaica

“I think people are afraid to help,” said Lower Manhattan resident. Also, he was homeless. Maybe if he was wearing a suit, it would be a lot different.”

I think, also Fahad, he was Muslim. Maybe if he was wearing a different suit, it would be a lot different.

More than two dozen people were captured on surveillance camera footage released this weekend walking past him as he lay face down bleeding into the sidewalk. Homeless man left to die.

Before the correctional facility stand such imposing buildings, made of thick grey material, wide steps to fit crowds, fat columns to uphold hollow words engraved in capitals that read:

TRUE ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE IS THE FIRMEST PILLAR OF GOOD GOVERNMENT

The Courts of the United States

-The city was morally commanding, every step of the way-

The subway ads begging my attention:

Which one is real? Not the one you think

There is an image of two guns, a red gun that looks like a toy gun, and a black gun. Which one is real? It is illegal to paint real guns to look like toy guns or buy or sell them, if you see or know anything about this call 311

Feeling Under the Weather?

Best thing to do is not get on the train

You will not be left alone. TAKE CARE. The staff or the police will be with you.

Sexual Harassment is a crime in the Subway

A crowded train is no excuse for improper touch. Do not stand for it or be afraid to speak up.

Did you hear, Judge Preska she’s a demon, she’s with them, she’s with the government. She hasn’t allowed them to change the Strict Administrative Measures, whispers the frazzled hair woman.

I haven’t spoken to my son in 5 months.

He’s been proven guilty before anything can happen, what message does this send? When the jury is to remain anonymous and be accompanied in and out of every secret entrance, what message does this send?

What ever happened to the right to assemble? Someone screams out.

His professor from Brooklyn College speaks, Dr. Jeanne Theoharis.

You know, she says, Fahad wrote a paper in my class. It was about the violation of the rights of Muslim people in the United States and he is living it today,

America, say it with me! Be true to what you say on paper, chant with me, be true to what you say on paper! Be true to what you say on paper! America, be true to what you say on paper!

And then what can you do when what it says on paper is this?

Which one do you think is true? Two guns, one is painted red the other is black, which one do you think is real, not the one you think, not the one you think,

And the question that lingered in my head when I walked over, what if he is guilty, in fact and you don’t know it? Your father, your brother, your mother, what then?

Nothing then. I walk over to drop a white flower in front of the correctional facility, candles won’t do under the rain.

***

On Tuesday April 27th, Fahad pleaded guilty on one count of material support. His sentencing will be on June 7th and he is faced with up to 15 years in jail, as opposed to the potential 70 years he risked by going on trial. “He made the best deal that was available under the circumstances,” David A. Ruhnke, one of his lawyers, said after the hearing. The best thing possible under the circumstances.

leg walkies gazing sternly down at me, like that,

clomp clomp or clip clip I think- it must make walkies feel accomplished

going up down steps,

On my third arc back to the front and no one at the reception desk answering the phone

I see a vaguely bright and brown looking man hopping up the steps.

I stop him with my big little girl voice and ask him to tell the receptionist I have an appointment and a wheelchair.

Dr. Peter Ferber meets me at the back door. He is trying to smile at me but I can tell that it is difficult for him. I recall the two x’s to mind, under my eyes done with green and grey eye make up. They make my head reminiscent of a piece of shiny older meat. I smile wider.

The waiting room is playing smooth jams.

Two pretty words have never been more gruesomely combined.

Smooth jams are for white upper middle class folks who feel that they might have the potential to like jazz but have no idea what those crooning spinny sparkly strange black folx is complaaaaining about and Dr. Ferber takes me early because I overestimated the amount of time it would take me to walk from the bus stop on Bay Road to Russell Street in Hadley.

He wants my ids and my money, my tongue and teeth and fingers and toes. He wants my memories, my excuses, my hysteria, my shame. As soon as he sits down I feel my ribs tingling, my stomach hollowing out the way that it does when a lover tells me “we have to talk”, without an inkling about what or about what we will be eating during the talking.

-You look very different from your id photo, what happened? Dr. Asks.

-Three and a half years happened. We become different people, grow new skins.

-What is your rationale for looking the way that you do?

-I am my own canvas.

But you speak more civilized than you

look look look lil crazy indian girl dig up your land for funnel

out your own memories minerals for me for I am old I am the machine.

Scrape off your war paint I can’t tell who you are,

your eyes are a challenge your lips are a sin.

Who was your daddy lil brown baby?

I bet you don’t know bet you don’t i bet your mama don’t either and if she do I bet she lied to you about it.

You smell funny, you dirty little devil where is your home

were you ever homeless that fucks you for life your friends cannot be your family, your people cannot be your house.

Your monsters cannot be your friends because they are hallucinations, your family cannot be your friends, your people cannot be your future.

-It’s good that you came to see me when you did. Dr. says. Better late than never. It’s clear to me that you have psychotic episodes. Which would make you bi-polar one. Lots of doctors are prescribing lamictal now, but abilify takes a much shorter time for results to show. 10 mg. It’s an anti-psychotic and I got a woman to stop talking to God in her attic.

During my time at this conference, I wasn’t aware of the radical nature of the space; there were folks from almost every aspect of the gender and sexuality spectrum, but overall, it felt more like a gathering than anything else. Looking back, I couldn’t be more wrong. Only because of the fear and hatred professed by the world concerning difference, and especially difference concerning gender and sexuality, was this space so incredibly rare. I am a fairly large framed, black Dominican/Haitian identified male, and this shapes my life in innumerable ways. The conference reawakened my desire to treat myself with delicacy, with love, with attraction. Robyn Ochs, the keynote speaker, told us she had never been in a place where folks thought of these issues so deeply and freely before.

I went to my first workshop, Trans 101 and left it with the realization that most folks, myself included, use the acronym LGBTQ, without really ever taking the time to make an inclusive space for the T.

I let that sink in.

During lunch I spent some time standing in a corner not knowing how to communicate. I was preoccupied I would offend people by communicating ‘wrongly,’ by playing into the whole notion of stereotyping. I was bugged down by the fact that it is so hard to see someone and not treat them based on your initial prejudices of them.

I waited for the Anti-Racism in the Queer Community workshop with a nervous kind of excitement, and thankfully, I wasn’t let down. We played a game, where as a group, we had to figure out a puzzle. There is a rising flood and 14 people on the roof with short yet specific bios (a Hasidic Jew, a burned victim, a person with life insurance, etc). There is a boat that can only hold 10 people. You have 7 minutes. My group sacrificed a few folks, and so did all the other groups. We made our decisions by evaluating people based on who would be most likely to survive in a time of crisis. We very clearly resorted to our deep-seated prejudices, all justified on the fact that we were in an emergency. We then found out that you can save everyone by using the boat in creative ways, but no one even considered the possibility. It let us sit with our socialization to amerikan individualistic culture where only the best survive, best of course, being defined by our miniature world views and our majority lackluster control of our emotions. It effectively dispelled my fear of whiteness being the unspoken foundation of this conference, which loosened me up a bit.

Sunset. I headed to my last workshop run by the keynote speaker, Robyn Ochs, titled ‘Beyond Binaries: Identity and Sexuality’. I don’t think I had ever been so uncomfortable in a setting before. Speaking of gender and sexuality as existing on a spectrum, and thinking we can move along this spectrum continuously throughout our lives, made my body shiver for some reason, it made my bones feel stiff. I felt paralyzed, because I was in a place I had not been in before. The openness in which we talked of this gender and sexual spectrum was exciting and also terrifying. I realize my reaction came from a place of fearing the possibility I would find out something I didn’t want to accept about myself. Ochs then spoke of attraction as being composed of a million different elements that sometimes seem incredibly irrational, and of our similarities only really resting in how different we all are. I saw how my paralysis came from an urge to push love away from myself, and from denying the idea that I can fully embrace myself in all of my differences. I had undermined how deep my fear of homosexuality was, and how much damage that did to me, and others around me.

I have put a good amount of work into trying to understand how my male identity influences and affects others. To hear someone speak about my sexual identity as being defined in a box, is insulting, categories are stifling. This cracked when I tasted the freedom of defining myself based on how I feel. It is such a radical conception nowadays, to define our sexuality and gender based primarily on what feels best, as opposed to as a reaction to the terror of white domination and supremacy, patriarchy, classicism, ableism, heterosexism, and all those other ways that make people feel crushed and paralyzed.

Overall, it was a conference that began to unravel my denial of myself, and I was faced with the question of what I was afraid of. I was afraid of difference, of having to rethink what it means to be a man of color, to rethink my gender and sexual identification. My mind, these fingers, these eyes, my arms, my skin, my sexuality, my gender, my hair, my history, my attractions, they all see the possibility of loving themselves with a desire to be with one another as wholly as possible. I don’t feel as dirty, and I can’t begin to describe how grateful I am for that. It was liberation I tasted that day, the possibility of a different frame of thinking, a different form of me, or more specifically, the beginning of a journey to my truer form.

The speakers of the March in October included human rights activist Cleve Jones who worked alongside Harvey Milk and who founded the AIDS Memorial Quilt, Julian Bond former chair person of the NAACP who stood with Martin Luther King in 1963, and performer Lady Gaga who spoke of the connection between LGBT rights, misogyny and sexism in the music industry, amongst many others. This emerging force was sparked by the storm of protest in reaction to the victory of the Proposition 8 gay marriage ban in California. The demands arising out of this new national movement are set even higher than just same-sex marriage rights–it is demanding full equality for LGBT people in all matters governed by civil law, in all 50 states.

The conference in Boston was a leap forward for this movement that developed nationally but had yet to gather regionally since last fall’s National Equality March. The workshops addressed some of the most salient concerns of the LGBT movement today, including the need to repeal the “don’t ask, don’t tell,” policy and uphold the defense of Marriage Act (DOMA). Central to this struggle also is the support of the passage of ENDA, the Employment Non-Discrimination Act, which outlaws discrimination based on sexual orientation in the work place. ENDA was first introduced 36 years ago and despite the fact that 89 percent of Americans today support its passage, it has not yet passed. Al Riccio, a senior at Southern Connecticut State University expressed the residing sentiment at the conference. “It is ridiculous that we should still be waiting when the majority of the country agrees that we should have our rights.” In 38 states, it’s legal to fire or not hire someone because they’re transgender, and in 29 states if they’re gay, lesbian or bisexual. Every day, millions of LGBT workers face a choice: remain in the closet on the job, or come out and face legal harassment, discrimination or termination.

Integrating lessons from the history of LGBT activism and other social movements into the context of today was an important theme throughout. One of the speakers in a workshop titled, ‘Radical History LGBT’, Gerry Scoppettuolo spoke of the lesson he learned from the successful long-term boycott of Coors beer in the 70′s. In 1977 Coors beer was leading union busting in Colorado in tandem to funding the new right, a source of aggression against LGBT, and women’s rights organizations. Harvey Milk and his supporters joined the Teamsters in a boycott against the beer–Coors beers were emptied on the streets and removed first from 87 gay bars in San Francisco, and eventually from many more in California. When the Briggs initiative, Proposition 6 arose, the measure that would ban gay and lesbian teachers in California, the Teamsters joined Harvey Milk in successfully banning the proposition. The collaboration between groups was what allowed for their causes to be so successful, a lesson to be taken for all forms of activism.

From the topics covered in workshops and the diversity within the participants, it is evident that the character of the current LGBT struggle for equality, is multiracial and young as well conscious of the importance of transgender rights. Gunner Scott, director of the Massachusetts Transgender Political Coalition, expressed the need for transgender issues to be at the heart of the movement, “The movement cannot speak for transgender people, it has to speak with them,” he said. Activists discussed regional actions for transgender rights, including mobilizations to the annual New England Trans United March in Northampton, Mass., which will take place in September 2010.

The sense of the conference was strongly centered on the need to not just stand against LGBT rights, but also against all forms of oppression. Poet and activist Staceyann Chin performed a poem where she spoke of her dislike for fragmented activism, “fuck you for crying for homophobia while you exploit the desperation of undocumented immigrants to clean your hallways,” she said, “bathe your children, cook your dinner for less than you and I spend on our tax deductible lunch. I want to scream out loud,” she began to scream, “all oppression is connected you dick! At the heart of every radical action in history stood the dikes who were feminists, the-anti racists who were gay rights activists, the men who believed being vulnerable could only make them stronger.” Expressing the necessity for the LGBT movement to put issues of racism, sexism and systemic inequality at the forefront, she received the longest standing ovation of the weekend.

Veteran activist Tom Barbera, founder of LGBT labor organization Pride at Work, spoke at the opening panel of being reinvigorated by the influx of young people in the movement, “When I look at this audience,” he said, “I see youth and I see progress.”

- – - – - – - – - – - – - – - -

On Sunday, 80 activists gathered to discuss next steps for the movement. While there was no formal national coalition formed, over 80 activists signed up to be part of EAA, and activists agreed for the need to act locally, as well as nationally. City-wide organizing meetings in Boston, New York City and Northampton will take place in the coming weeks to plan for a national day of action coinciding with Harvey Milk Day on May 22.

Supporting the spirit of the conference as a whole, Al Riccio stated, “We can’t just take things in bits and pieces. We need full equality now.” Sherry Wolf, author of Sexuality and Socialism and EAA interim board member, echoed the sentiment and expressed the need to build a national movement with coordinated actions, saying, “Consciousness is with us, but consciousness doesn’t change policies. Movements do. If we want to fight national bigotry, we need a national movement.”

Ruled by Physical Forces;

Blessing in Disguise?

On February 27^th, Chile was hit by an 8,8 earthquake, followed by a tsunami. This event marked all Chileans radically; from our daily routines to the way we see each other and ourselves. In our modern societies, where humans have adapted their natural surroundings according to their needs for creating culture, we grow with the idea that the physical changes always follow those that are political, social or moral. Our history of building civilization, our urban life styles, and our daily activities, all revolve around the idea that we control the world; nature accommodates to our needs. However, this is not always the order of things.

This reverted dynamic has ruled Chilean life for the past month.  We have seen how this geological phenomenon has become the precursor of the activities, relationships and decisions of and within our nation. This, of course, has determined life at all levels, and it is my intention to explore the way it has influenced the contact and interaction among regular citizens; those directly affected by the earthquake and those that did not lose as much, but whose ground moved just the same.

The first days

Regrettably, the Chilean government reacted slowly, and even though this lethargy cannot compare to the one shown in the handling of Katrina’s devastation, it certainly aggravated the chaos in the affected areas of the country. First of all, they discarded the possibility of a tsunami, leaving no room for a warning, which inevitably incremented the number of dead. Furthermore, many people had gone to the hills, and when they heard on their car’s radios that there was no danger of a tsunami, they went back down to the lowlands. Many of those did not make it.

Looting

A day after the shock, there was still no water or food supply. Men and women started gathering outside a supermarket in Concepción looking for food. The situation started to get sketchy, so finally the supermarket decided to open its doors and let everybody in to take food. However, this situation got out of control and, soon, there was looting all over the region. Yes, you could see women desperately filling their back packs with powdered milk and diapers, but soon you could also find people carrying plasma TV’s, refrigerators and liquor on their shoulders. This event caused the utmost repudiation not only among authorities, but also among citizens.

The two faces of disaster

The sentiment against looters and the outrage of watching the help being delayed was so strong, that soon the whole country was united by a common drive: help those in need. Not three days had passed and companies, schools, organizations, businessmen and regular citizens were directing campaigns to help. Classes were canceled on Monday, and if you drove past any school in Santiago, you could see the parking lots full of kids and parents and hills of clothes and food. In my house alone we gathered sufficient goods to fill up a small airplane. Even kids had their own way of participating; writing the labels on the boxes the grownups had prepared with the classified goods. Many boxes travelled to the south with hearts and drawings on them… “To the kids of Coliumo, with love”.

All over the country a unifying bond rose among Chileans that went beyond social, political, gender and age barriers. Everyone was willing to help and actively looked for ways to engage. We were all working for a common cause that emerged from our very own roots… for many, it was the first time they felt truly connected to all Chileans, linked physically by a ground that was still shaking. It was as if our hands could reach directly to the hands of those in the southern towns, as if there was no separation between the hands of the kids, the drivers, the pilots, the policemen, the firemen, the volunteers, and the lady who received a tent and a sleeping bag to set up where her house had once stood. We were all part of a continuum, and I wondered if maybe that’s what quantum physicians meant.

One morning, the streets were filled with the plasmas, washing machines and the looted goods, all piled up for the police and army to take back. Weather this initiative came from fear of being prosecuted or out of true regret, there were folks that publicly apologized, saying they were driven by mass hysteria and did not want to perpetrate a state of chaos since solidarity was the most valuable feeling right now. “I have learned from this mistake”.

From then on, the army was received cheerfully and perceived as genuine and effective help. They were the only ones that, at a time like this, could efficiently distribute the help, restore order, and assure security. With the exception of a couple cases of unnecessary violence, the Chilean army has proven to be humane and very close to the people, worrying about the water and food supply, but also about cooking a cake for a little girl’s birthday.

Reconciling with the sea

March 10^th. Today, for the first time after the earthquake, the fishermen go out to sea. They hope that the sea will be generous and in this way return what it took. The few boats that the tsunami spared came back filled with fish, and the town is happy and can start thinking of the future again. March 20^th. The surfers in Pichilemu confront the sea and offer a truce… life must go on.

As days passed by, it still amazed me how a physical force could permeate all the levels of the living. In politics, newly elected president, Sebastián Piñera (sworn in amid a 7,2° aftershock), accommodates his agenda and dives into the earthquake relief. He also plays a benefit soccer game with Bolivian president, Evo Morales, who, as he expressed, in spite of not having access to the sea (a historical border conflict between the two countries), donated the most significant amount of drinking water to the Chilean people; a former Marxist mayor, that worked with Allende, demands the military to be sent to his town to control looters and apply “a hard hand”, trespassing ideologies and old resentments. In economics, the country stirs; unemployment increases, people lose their source of income; important businessmen make significant contributions (in the form of money and services, such as sending their machinery to clear the streets from rubble); highway infrastructure is severely affected; the wine industry lost millions of liters, the fishing, as well the wood and pulp industry, are mostly paralyzed; total damages are estimated above 30 billion USD. Socially, communities organize themselves to protect their houses from looters and, others, to build canals around the tents, their new homes, so that the winter rains will not spoil the few mattresses they managed to rescue; organizations arise to, for example, file a lawsuit against the Chilean government for manslaughter and negligence when they did not warn about the tsunami, or against the construction company of the building that collapsed in Concepción; strangers unite efforts to save the remaining cats and dogs, vets volunteer and families adopt; there is communication across social classes: the town’s mayor cries and works side by side with the citizens, sharing a common pot of food; a strong nationalistic feeling arises, messages of “Fuerza Chile” written in car windows, and Chilean flags rise in every house of the territory… or where a house once stood. Culturally, our language changes, new adjectives are created, and the payadores sing to the earth, the sea and the moon. Spiritually, people come closer; friends contact forgotten friends, families come together: there is a need of sharing, of caring.

Drinking Bolivian water, eating Russian food and sleeping in Arab tents, the Chilean spirit remains strong. With better days than others, the general feeling is optimistic, and we believe that the rebuilding of the country, at all levels, will, for the most part, be an opportunity for improvement.

Trader Joe’s disposes of items such as bread, pastries and cookies that cannot be sold after the day they are made; food items in damaged containers, boxes of fruit with as little as one rotten item, frozen foods, meats, and other packaged foods that are about to pass their sell-by date. The sell-by date is listed by the food manufacturer as the date when an item should be taken off the shelves of the store. This date is different from the use-by date and is not intended to be relevant to consumers. Many of these food items are still acceptable to eat, but due to strict regulations, and in having to attend to the interests of manufacturers, Trader Joe’s is required to dispose of them.  A large portion of this food heads straight to the landfill; however, there are ways in which the food can be intercepted and redistributed. The local community has effectively broken the boundaries between what some consider ‘waste’ and what others see as food.

After doing some of my own investigative work in the dumpster, I thought the next logical step would be to talk to the managers and find out what they thought about it. The manager at Trader Joe’s and I seem to hold different views on the subject. When I first asked, he skirted around the topic of dumpster diving.  He explained that not much food actually gets thrown away, because many of the items that cannot be sold are donated to local churches and survival centers, which is about 90% of the food that would otherwise be thrown out. The other 10%, that is of worse quality, goes to the dumpster, he explained.

Attempting not to give away the fact that I am one of the guilty, I mentioned I had heard the dumpster is usually filled with a lot of edible food.  When I asked what kinds of items have to be thrown away and not donated, I received the vague answer that only food that is really moldy is thrown out. I was still not ready to tell him that I had only seen one moldy clementine in the bundle of clementines hidden away in my bike bag right outside.

As I asked more questions on the topic of dumpster diving, the manager’s smile began to grow and he kept on looking back at his coworker.  He started to have trouble coming up with answers, especially when asked about Trader Joes’s opinion on dumpster diving.

The official response stated: “we have no opinion of that at this time.” However, the manager’s personal opinion was that customers should be buying food and should not be trespassing on private property.  Because of the continuous giggles coming from the manager and coworkers, I had the feeling that this dumpster diving talk was something they had to deal with often.  Although he mentioned how dumpster diving is not a good thing and that the food is in the trash for a reason, he surrendered to the fact that it does occur, “It’s going to happen,” he said shrugging his shoulders. “It’s not worth fighting over trash.”

I walked away with the feeling that these Trader Joe’s workers see dumpster diving as a sport for the anarchist college student- a ridiculous concept but nothing too harmful for the business. As I was checking out, the manager approached me with a question, “Were you trying to distract us as your friends were out in the dumpster?” He asked. “No,” I answered. “But that’s a good idea, for next time”.

I paid for the food that I could not find in the dumpster, hopped on my bike, and cycled away, with my dumpster flowers sticking out of my bag. I saw the manager skirting back to check on his dumpster to make sure there was no one was in it. The manager disapproves of dumpster diving for his own reasons, but I hold on to a different opinion. I was ready to get back to eat some of the clementines, bananas, tomatoes, and asparagus that I collected from the dumpster.

1) There will be no text messaging unless sitting down and not in conversation.

2) In conversation, it is necessary to let conversation partner(s) know when I am expecting a call.

3) If in the middle of a conversation there is an unexpected call, I must first excuse myself from the conversation. If the phone call is not urgent, I must tell the caller I will have to call back, because I am in the middle of a conversation.

“Oh, that will be really good for you Molly,” said my friend when I told her about my experiment in cell phone etiquette. “Yeah, I’ve noticed that you always answer your cell phone right away without excusing yourself”. I was somehow surprised to learn that I was guilty of cell phone misdemeanors.

I’ve been pretty righteous about cell phones- so many micro-interactions missed while arranging and planning ahead in the social space! I find that cell phones intrude incessantly into social situations, their (mostly) unarticulated presence in almost every social situation… And apparently, I am just as guilty of being rude and inconvenient as anyone I might be implicating in my complaints.
So I’ve been following these rules for two hours when I sit down in a café with the same friend who suggested that this would be a good exercise for me. My phone rings in the middle of our conversation. It’s my brother. My friend grimaces at me, I listen to the phone ring in my pocket. I finally pull it out, “Hey Har, can I call you back in about a half hour?” It felt so strange, to be privileging my lunch and conversation over a phone call. But it wasn’t an emergency, so Harry could wait.

I called him back after the meal, politely taking the phone outside to the smoking benches instead of interrupting my friend’s study space. He didn’t pick up. So annoying. I sent him a text message as I walked inside-first mistake- texting and walking, I lose my footing on a step that dropped off sharper than expected. And there it is. The tiny consequence of trying to pretend text messaging is a natural as breathing.

When my brother called me back, I made the small effort again, of differentiating the space between my real-life social situation in the café and ‘phone call space’. Outside again, we had a chat. I told him he was an active participant in my etiquette experiment.  He said, “Can you hold on a second while I send a text message?” I realized that I couldn’t really say no- it’s such a small thing to ask. So while I waited for what felt like a good three minutes, I had plenty of time to consider the absurdity of a cell phone that was designed to promote multi-tasking. I didn’t know there were cell phones that could send text messages and have conversations simultaneously. (I’ve heard before that there is no such thing as multi-tasking, only, alternating between two tasks really fast.)

My feeling is that these moments are so small, the rudeness so easily to forgotten, our time so micromanaged, that we don’t see the corrosive affects these habits have on our social interactions. I do not doubt the power of instantly connecting to anyone, or the amazing ability to communicate information without ever picking up the phone. Yet, there is something pretty weird about the lack of designated space for cell phones, or the acknowledgement of all of the missed interactions that inevitably add up when so much time is spent plugged into a palm sized device.

When I am sitting with people who are constantly text messaging, it is as if they are in two places- I’d like to think people will offer me the courtesy of paying attention to the world they are physically, rather than virtually, occupying.

I began following these rules as a 24-hour experiment. After my morning of tripping over text messages, I conveniently forgot my cell phone somewhere. That night, I checked it (politely) to find seven missed calls, and my life was no different than before. Only, I had control over when and where I would be calling those people back.

chartering inequality by Alex Krales

In Brown v. Board of Education 1953, the Court decided that separate but equal public education is inherently unequal. However, in the case of the charter school movement, policymakers aren’t even trying to feign equality. Choice, autonomy, competition-driven success – America tends to idealize these notions. However, judging by history and the effects that these values have when they manifest in their socio-political, socio-economic applications, the concept of equality tends to be pushed aside. I think it is fair to say that public education reform does not deserve a framework within which equality must yet again become severed from America’s conceptualization of progress.

In forty states, parents may have the opportunity of choosing to send their children to a charter school instead of their district’s traditional public high school. A charter school is a public school – paid for by local, state and federal tax dollars – that operates independently of its local district’s board of education and their respective regulations. As a result, charters have the liberty to develop innovative curricula and teaching methods. Many of these schools specialize in a particular subject matter such as the maths and sciences, the performing arts, or foreign languages. The first charter schools began appearing in Minnesota in 1991, and their numbers have been increasing across the country ever since.

Any organized group, usually comprised of teachers and/or parents, may submit an application with their state in order to open a charter school or to convert a preexisting public school into a charter school. Most states place caps on the number of charter schools that they will allow to open in each district and the percentage of students they will allow to attend these schools. Currently, sixty-four charter schools are running in Massachusetts. However, while the cap on district spending for charter schools has been 9%, only 2% of the commonwealth’s student body currently attends these schools and another 2% are on waiting lists. Admission to charter schools – in Massachusetts and just about every other state — is determined by a lottery that is open to the public. Thus, any parent who chooses to send their child to a charter school technically has the same opportunity for acceptance as every other family applying to that charter school. According to the Department of Education, 4,600 charter schools are operating around the country. The nation-wide enrollment for charter schools is 1.4 million, in comparison to the 50 million students who still attend traditional public schools, and with the recent trend that has been set, the number of charter school students is likely to steadily increase.

In the past couple of years, President Obama and Education Secretary Arne Duncan have applauded the increasing emergence of charter schools across the country. The administration’s philosophy is that in opening up charter schools, states are opening up “laboratories for innovation.” They envision local districts establishing charter schools so that the charter schools can in turn improve their local public schools by sharing their newly developed methods for education.

The State gauges the quality of a charter school via student standardized test performance, the main reason why Obama has been pushing for more charter schools in conjunction with his 2009 Race To the Top Act. Under this bill, states have been competing for a chunk of a $4.35 billion dollar federal grant. States will win a portion of this money if they demonstrate to the Administration that they have carried out the greatest effort towards the improvement of their public education systems, especially in low performing districts – as measured by standardized test performance, of course.

In light of education reform and Race to the Top, Obama and Duncan have been aggressively encouraging states to expand and open up more charter schools. In a conference call with the press in June 2009, Duncan explained: “States that don’t have charter school laws, or put artificial caps on the growth of charter schools, will jeopardize their application [for a portion of this federal grant money]. Simply put, they put themselves at a competitive disadvantage for the largest pool of discretionary dollars states have ever had access to.” The Obama Administration believes that new charter schools will raise test scores in low performing districts. Therefore, if states wish to appear effortful and receive a portion of the Race to the Top funds, they must employ the Administration’s methodology and open up charter schools. (This reasoning, however, that charter schools breed higher performing standardized test-takers, has yet to come to fruition: A recent study released by Stanford University’s Center for Research on Education Outcomes (CREDO) revealed that across the country, on average, charter schools have been slightly underperforming in comparison to traditional public schools.)

Massachusetts recently made the effort and got on board with the charter school movement and Obama’s Race to the Top competition. The Commonwealth passed legislation in January that will lift the statewide cap determining the portion of public education revenue allowed to be spent on charter schools from 9% to 12%, and in the 10% lowest performing school districts the cap will eventually be lifted to 18%. In the past, Governor Deval Patrick has been quite reluctant to raise the cap. While discussing this issue in 2006, Patrick spoke during a gubernatorial debate: “As important as charter schools are and as helpful as they are, we need to come up with a different and better funding mechanism before we raise the cap…The formula works in theory, but in real life, there are real tensions between real families and that is not community building and that is not advancing education reform.”

Patrick was referring to the fact that funding for charter schools comes from the same pool of money – local and state taxes – that public schools fully depend on. Basically, the total budget for a school district’s fiscal year is divided by the number of students who are enrolled in district. This figure represents how much it costs to educate one student for that year, and when a student decides to transfer to a charter school he takes this money with him as his tuition.

Because of this funding policy, many residents view charter schools as boutique schools that leech off of the already struggling public school systems. According to the Boston Globe, Boston’s public school district plans to lose about $50 million to charter schools next year.

Even smaller districts with fewer students chartering out have felt the punch. At the Saving Our Schools Conference that was held at the University of Massachusetts-Amherst this past March, Mike Hussen, the former chair of the Amherst-Pelham Regional School District budget committee, spoke to this concern. His district, along with many other school districts across the country, has been forced to make some serious budget cuts. His district had to cut over two million dollars in order to write a budget for the upcoming school year, leaving them with a budget just under 28 million dollars. The committee projects that around 50 students will choose charter schools and that, as a result, over $730,000 of their budget will go to these schools.

Now, Massachusetts does have a reimbursement policy. However, districts qualify for compensation only when they experience a drastic increase in the rate of students chartering-out in a given year. If this occurs, the district will receive 100% of that year’s spending on charter school tuition and then 25% of that amount for the five following years. The theory is that districts will be able to “adjust” to charter school spending during this period of compensation.

Mike Hussen also pointed out that charter schools tend to hold quite hefty reserves of unspent tuition cash. “Charter schools at first had no cap on excess. They would have 25-50% of excess in their bank accounts.” Earlier this year, the Commonwealth passed legislation putting a 20% cap on charter school reserves and mandating that charters must report their spending and reserves to the state annually. Hussen compared this number to the 5% cap on public school reserves, which districts are forced to dip into as expenses continue to increase. Charter school tuition only serves to exasperate this issue. “We’re losing every year,” says Hussen. “Charter school parents are unaware of this impact on public schools.”

Annually, a handful of K through 8th grade students leave the Amherst district for the Pioneer Valley Chinese Immersion Charter School. “Amherst could teach Chinese – we’ve tried to get a Chinese program, but instead we keep having to cut languages out of the program every year,” Hussen exclaimed.

These are some of the effects that the charter school movement has had on small-town Massachusetts. Across the country, low performing urban districts in cities such as New York, Chicago and Michigan having been shutting down long-standing neighborhood schools and opening up charters in their places. As a result, students have been displaced and communities have been broken up.

Still, whenever critics point out the negative effects that the charter schools are having on public schools, advocates are quick bring out the “choice” rhetoric – the idea that the existence of charter schools provides parents with more choice as to the education of their children. Many parents strongly value education and simply want what’s best for their individual children over what’s best for the greater system of public edication. In February, Daniel Clark Sr., field director of “Parent Power Now” and father of an eighth grader who is attending a charter school in Harlem, NY, spoke in a roundtable discussion on Democracy Now: “If it weren’t for Democracy Prep, where he goes now, if it wasn’t for that option, that choice, God forbid, I don’t know what would happen to my son. And so, I’m organizing parents, and I’m fighting so that people like me, parents like me, who aren’t rich, can have a choice, and whose kids, who they love, can go to a school that’s excellent, like Democracy Prep.”

While individual success is encouraging, what happens to the country’s public education system as a whole as more and more of the reform effort is put into increasing the number of charter schools? Charters are not accountable to their local communities, and many people would go so far as to deem the schools privatized. Even when these schools do end up providing high quality education for their students, the vast majority of children do not reap the benefits of charter schools. Privatization and increasing the stratification of quality of education does not seem to appeal to the idea of improving education as a public institution. Education reform cannot go on disconnected from this most basic concept of equality.