Real Life Political Struggles

Hey all,

Since there are a fair number of real life activists or former activists in this group, I thought it might be interesting to start a thread where folks could post info about campaigns you are or have been involved in.

As for me, I just wanted to post this link to a recent article by Garance Franke-Ruta in the Atlantic:
http://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2013/02/the-plague-years-in-film-and-memory/273449/

If you haven't seen "How to Survive a Plague" yet, I recommend it. Being involved with ACT UP was definitely the highpoint of my political "career". In my case, it was ACT UP/Boston.

I can relate to a lot of what Franke-Ruta says in this article and am kind of curious if any others out there are old enough yet to have experienced the kind of pain/trauma/stress/nostalgia about social struggles that she describes in this piece?

Even if not, it's an interesting article. Not least because I knew or still know most of the (living) people she mentions -- several of them are my "Facebook friends" -- and of course I have my own "list", and ofc there's legions of ACT UP activists who lived thru similar experiences but weren't in the limelight, or aren't media-savvy enough, or don't live in NYC so will never be featured in a Oscar-nominated film. All of which adds an extra level of weirdness and angst... as I was watching the film, especially during the demonstrations -- nearly all of which I was at -- I kept thinking, "If he'd have panned the camera just a little more, then you'd be able to see... so-and-so.".

Anyway. That's it. Please do post info about your own RL political struggles and lives if you feel like it.

Well every Sunday for more than a year now there's protests outside my police department because of a killing they did, here's the video of the event:

The police say that he had a knife on him and the DA "investigated" and found that the officer was right in shooting him because Ernest supposedly charged him with a knife. When presented with the question of how it was justified when it was revealed Ernest didn't have a knife on his person after the shooting the response is that he was holding a knife when the pig shot him and he threw it into the back of the truck while being shot because there was a knife found in the bed of the truck. Now you can look at the video and tell me if you see any knives traveling from Ernest's hands into the back of the truck...So yeah, been involved in that as much as I can.

I was also involved in Occupy Oakland and Occupy Stockton. Probably the biggest high's I've ever gotten watching hundreds of thousands of people shouting down the cops and making them retreat and just taking over the streets. On May Day we were in the streets in Oakland and most of the march I was in up to that point in the day was going a different direction to meet up with a different march coming from a BART station about a mile away then one group when the cops tried arresting people in the other group throwing tear gas and shit. We immediately run over there and because I was so close to the front of the march at that point I got the opportunity to hold up one of those big freaking metal shields the anarchists made even though I wasn't an anarchist. It was pretty intense too as the police line kept getting bigger with more and more cops coming out with their weapons and vehicles including like a freaking tank. But we all just shouted them down and shit before we headed out with them following us. I know exactly what you're talking about Phoenix about seeing photos and video of events and just thinking "If you pan over just a little bit to the right you would be able to see me" or I'd find pictures of me holding a banner but like only half of me is actually in the picture. But I found a good picture with me on that day with the shields, I'll leave it up to you all to try and figure out which one is me



Also I've been to a few protests by the United Farm Workers in my area, those people are pretty cool in my book.

you must be the guy alllll the way to the far right, with the Guy Fawkes mask.

Lol god no, I can't stand those Guy Fawkes masks.

Are you the lady to the far left with the sign ?

This is so fricken sickening

Fredrick Engels wrote:

Well every Sunday for more than a year now there's protests outside my police department because of a killing they did [...] I'll leave it up to you all to try and figure out which one is me  

What a sad state of affairs. ACAB.

P.S. You're obviously that one guy in the pic.

I like the idea behind the OP and I am going to read that article and will have a response, so hold onto your hats; my 'political activism' happened many, many moons ago in the Gobi Desert in '69....

:pipe:

I've never really been an activist, more an under the radar kind of person, although I was a Kucinich delegate to our state convention when Kerry was nominated, stood up for Mo Udall when he ran, and voted for George McGovern, which I guess a lot of people would consider pretty radical. The one thing I am most proud of is working hard at the phone banks for Equality Maine in 2012, alongside many members of our social-justice oriented Unitarian Universalist Church. Maine vote 2012 I've lived through the pain caused by having to hide who you are - both my first husband and my youngest brother are now openly gay men, each the father of 3, and each in a relationship with another man who was formerly married and has kids, so this issue is pretty near to my heart. I don't want to see the next generations of family and friends having to go through what we went through.

Well, I am still perking on said article, but...I have a younger brother who has been openly gay most of his life, unfortunately he grew up in the middle of the 'plague' and became sick; several of his friends died before he got into a test program. Have not seen him in years for various reasons, but last I heard he was doing well, my initial reaction is research into ailments of all kinds needs to be given much more of a priority than our government now gives it.

Hell, sadly the government can't do it either, just look at the VA and 'Obama Care' fiascos and believe me most those stories about the VA are true...