37days of Activism
You wanted to know what role you would have played in the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s? Now’s your time to find out. You were shocked by the outcome of the U.S. Presidential election, and the aftermath of racial violence. You didn’t know this kind of racism still existed …
I will not be quiet. I am intolerant of your intolerance.
I am thinking of the singular commitment of the North Carolina General Assembly to being pioneers in bigotry and hatred, willful unknowing, and discrimination because of ignorance and fear. It hurts me, deeply, to know that my lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, intersex friends face this kind of reality daily, …
A is for advocate
We fight for men and women whose poetry is not yet written. –Robert Gould Shaw, abolitionist In 2008, I will be a better advocate for those who need—and want—my advocacy. Long ago on a faraway planet, I once worked in an organization where I sat through a management meeting every …
H is for human rights
Most people, no doubt, when they espouse human rights, make their own mental reservations about the proper application of the word ‘human.’ –Suzanne LaFollette In 2008, I will fight for the rights of human beings I see being dismissed and excluded and not listened to. And killed for who they …
Read this book…
Thanks to everyone for diversity book club suggestions – you are helping to create an amazing list. Keep those suggestions coming… The first book we’re reading for our April meeting is "The Time of Our Singing" by Richard Powers. My philosophy professor from way back in my days at Guilford …
Remember the green book
“Far away is only far away if you don’t go there.” -O. Povo When my friend Gay tells a story, it comes out like a hot knife through rich butter—all soft, fluid, full, with a drawl that makes you want to move to Mississippi and listen to a big bearded …
Replace “they” with “we” with “I”
We all believe in equality, as long as it is equality with our superiors. What is the tipping point? I’ve long been fascinated by the fact that our Social Contract works—that people stop at four-way stop signs and allow the person to their right to move first, creating a sweet …
Follow the disturbance
“Put down your clever,Let your partner affect you:Tenets of Improv” — review of Keith Johnstone’s Impro on HaikuBookReviews I recently had an interesting experience that revealed to me a big truth, a Big Truth, that is, in capital letters. It was an encounter with a client. My business partner, David, and …
Be outraged by your own racism
“No human race is superior; no religious faith is inferior. All collective judgments are wrong. Only racists make them.” –Elie Wiesel When my oldest daughter was in the first grade, she stopped me cold with just 16 words. “Mom,” she said as we stopped at a traffic light near Dupont …
