“This law will make me feel like a Nazi out there.  I have a great deal of contempt for it; I’m very emotional about it… This law is – pure and simple – a racist law.”

In the lead-up to the implementation of SB1070, the Arizona law known commonly as “papers please”, it is heartening to see a police officer in AZ speak up against it:

He very clearly states why this law is a huge health/human rights violation:

“So under SB1070 I know that people will not call officers in the case of a real emergency. I could see this type of scenario: a woman is being beaten by her husband or her significant other.  And, if I show up, and I develop reasonable suspicion, or LESS, even, that the person that is a perpetrator in this case, is in this country extralegally, i’m going to start heading in the direction of asking the victim of the case, are you here illegally?  I will have to arrest both of them — I’ll be required to — and both will be deported.  It violates our calling to serve and protect. It violates, under our Constitution, the requirement to serve and protect.”

Thanks to the savvy folks at Cuentame for collecting video testimonials. And check out Alto Arizona for actions in Arizona this week, and solidarity actions you can join in your own towns and states.

First, it’s a story, in typical NPR style, that’s pre-packaged and presented in sing-song like fashion, from beginning to end.  It’s sad, and honestly nauseating, how so many NPR stories are crafted like “afterschool specials”. Please, treat us with a little more maturity and respect.

Second, and this is my bigger issue, the story celebrates gay marriage and Indian-Americans (a step forward), while celebrating and lauding practices of arranged marriages and twisted ideas of what is acceptable in society (parents advertising their children in the paper, using socioeconomic status and fair skin and other regressive ideas of what is desired in society).  The story ends with this sequence of paragraphs:

And I remembered that old coming-out line: “Mom, Dad, I am not going to get married.” The next generation of immigrant gays and lesbians might have to come up with some other coming-out line.

In fact, I can imagine this ad in the local Indian weekly:

“Hindu very well-established Los Angeles family invites professional match for daughter, 25, 5-foot-3, slim, fair complexion, U.S. born, senior executive in Fortune 500 company. Loves music and dancing. Prospective lesbians encouraged to reply in confidence with complete bio data and returnable photo. Must be professional, under 30, caste no bar.”

It might just be time for the gay arranged marriage.

Gay marriage is NOT the only manifestation of gay/queer relationships, so the idea that in the future most Indian kids who are gay are going to need a coming out line other than “mom, dad, I am not going to get married” is a little silly.  And, the ad in the local Indian weekly, I almost jumped out of my seat when I read it.  The piece is embracing the idea of moving gay marriage into the old ways of representation of desire — socioeconomic status, fairness of skin (don’t say caste no bar when you’re bringing these two things into the mix!).   This is exactly the very fear that queer people have about gay culture and marriage ‘equality’ — that it risks succumbing to the normative model of what is desired and what is not desired in society, as a compromise instead of moving to a model of liberation and love.  Embracing the modern day caste system doesn’t feel very much like progress to me.  Thoughts?

Schoolhouse Rock and the Health Care Reform Bill, where I discussed some of the background on the bill’s tortuous history and the senate shenanigans (filibustering, cloture, politics).

and ‘Twas the Night Before Christmas and All Through the Senate, about the historic health insurance reform vote passage in the Senate on Christmas eve. I discussed fantastical nerdy Senate history (the history of the filibuster, the last time the Senate ever met on Christmas eve, etc).

Well today’s LAist post on Mr Young’s house — “Happy Holidays from Youngwood Court” — titillated me. I was so stoked to see this house decked out with Black Santa and Mrs Santa life-size decorations, beautiful lights everywhere, each of the SEVENTEEN David’s with red tops and no bottoms, and a life-size cutout of Norwood himself. I love the creativity that went into this decoration — probably one of the most unique christmas house decorations I’ve ever seen. And it makes me giggle that he does that in Hancock Park, pissing off many of the neighbors and making them worry about their property values. Koga, who wrote the post on LAist, linked to this article from 1997, about neighbors’ reactions to the ‘House of Davids’. The best line from the article:

“It is like spitting in somebody’s eye,” said Marguerite Byrne, a member of the Hancock Park Homeowners Assn.’s board of directors. “It is individualism run amok.”

Oh, the irony! The irony!

Anyway, Norwood Young’s website is a trip, with full episodes about his house, his costume parties, and his music. All this eccentric youngwood court history I didn’t know of when I lived in Los Angeles. Norwood Young and LAist, you made my christmas day.

EveryBody!: Visual resistance in feminist health movements, 1969-2009

Now, four years later, four years wiser, four years sillier, I’ve landed in Albuquerque, New Mexico and will plant my feet and some seeds for a little while. I will share my stories on why and what and how, later. I’ve been in quite a wonderful transition from my work in Los Angeles to my work and life in New Mexico and have been quite sporadic and impersonal with my blogging here. I’ve been blogging a little bit more over at Cure This, a health justice blog that I co-founded in residency in Los Angeles. And I’m navigating that space that bloggers often do when they’re managing two blogs — should I stop posting at one of them? What should I post where? (and other totally useless thoughts that such privilege entails). I guess there’s always a need for this blog, at least to post autotune the news, or videos of europeans doing dances to the sound of music in a subway.

In related news, today also marks the day that my parents met, 37 whole years ago.

peace.