The Spirit of Love and Resistance Behind St. Valentine's Day

Although I'm no longer a practicing Catholic (or Christian for that matter), February 14th still resonates with me as a committed activist and evolving spirit. I understand why so many loathe this holiday because, once again, capitalism has robbed it of any substantive meaning. But if you look at the history behind this day, there is much to inspire both politically and spiritually, especially in these times of economic crisis, global terror and greedy warmongering.

In a nutshell, Valentine was a priest who was martyred for marrying soldiers. The ruler of his time was a relentless hawk. Because he waged endless war and this weighed heavily on the morale of his homesick soldiers, he banned marriage. Valentine defied him and married couples in secret until he was caught and executed.

Valentine's spirit particularly resonates with me today because of the movement to nullify the legal union of thousands of gay couples in the wake of Proposition 8. As a heterosexual woman who has the right to marry (and intends to one day soon), a person who is committed to social justice, a spiritual being that understands that the opposite of love is not hate but fear, and a heterosexual citizen who owes a great deal of debt to LGBTQ activists for my sexual liberation, February 14 holds new meaning for me. And it really is irrelevant to me whether or not marriage is an institution worth fighting for. The choice to express one's authentic self or not is alway worth fighting for, and until all of us can make that choice, that freedom is under constant threat for everyone. This is why one of my acts of love and resistance today will be devoted to beating back the forces of hate that would deny gay people the right to marry. Give them the choice. Let them decide for themselves - as heterosexual people do -- whether it's something they want to do or not.

And as a socialist at heart, I'm really not about conceding anything -- least of all a positive spiritual concept -- to the crass agenda of capital. I'm thankful for thousand things everyday, but I still make a point to be extra mindful on Thanksgiving. So I celebrate Valentine's Day, not because I don't show my love or appreciate the love I am fortunate to know every single day. So I send cards, blow kisses (real and virtual), call my loved ones, and continue to fight the good fight. To me, reclaiming this day and making it my own -- my socialist, feminist, spiritual-but-not-religious own -- is an act of love for myself, my family, my friends, my, community, my ancestors, my comrades.

It is also an act of resistance.

To watch a fun video about the man behind the holiday, click:
http://tinyurl.com/d5agvy

Call for Submissions by Dominican Women Writers

I'm pleased to share this, and hope you will pass it on, too.
__________
Saludos escritoras,

I am writing to you because I have finalized the call for submissions for the anthology of Dominican women writers. I am currently in Santo Domingo on the Fulbright grant I received to conduct this project. As I collect stories from creative writers here, I would also like to ask Dominican women living in the U.S. to submit pieces for consideration. A publishing contract has still not been finalized because of the current financial crisis but an editor is willing to look at the book once it is compiled, so we are moving ahead.

Following is the call for submissions in English and Spanish. Please distribute widely. Forward it to other Dominican women writers you know, or to people you know who may know other Dominican women writers etc. I appreciate all of your help in getting the word out there. I look forward to reading your work.

Erika
www.erikammartinez.com

CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS
Quisqueyanas: Contemporary Writings by Dominican Women
Edited by Erika María Martínez
To be published in the United States in English and in Spanish
Dominican writers are under-represented in literary discourse. And most literary studies of the Caribbean focus primarily on some male writers of the past century such as Jose Martí. There is a similar unfamiliarity of female writers in comparison with male writers of the Dominican Republic, yet Dominican women, at home and abroad, have created a space for literary and artistic production. The body of literature developed by Dominican women depicting the cultural, social and political life of the country, is a testament to the talent of all Dominicans. Quisqueyanas: Contemporary Writings by Dominican Women, an anthology of prose by women in the Dominican Republic, and women of Dominican descent living in the United States, will strengthen the voice of Dominican women in the world of literature.
This project develops at a crucial point in the history of Dominicans and Americans; during the nineties the Dominican-American population grew by two hundred percent, making it the fourth largest Latino community in the United States. With this growth, the community's cultural values were often merged with the larger Latino identity. In order to genuinely associate with our numerous parts, it is essential to reconnect with origin-based artists. Writers give a viewpoint that is informed by history and tied to the Dominican Republic, yet at the same time it is affected by the greater American culture. Through a sampling of various Dominican and Dominican-American women's narratives the literary legacy and unique history of the island will be highlighted in content and style. In addition, it will be evident how the history and the future of the two countries are intertwined. This anthology will be a step in the direction of greater understanding between these two cultures and how each one affects the other as we approach the turn of another decade.
This collection will be unique yet use successful techniques from preceding anthologies. As in Lillian Castillo-Speed's anthology Latina: Women's Voices from the Borderlands the work will include both fiction and nonfiction. Like Edwidge Danticat's anthology The Butterfly's Way: Voices from the Haitian Dyaspora in the United States, the book will have a thematic structure according to the contributions received.
Possible themes include but are not limited to:
Family
Feminism
Exclusion
Femininity
Fertility/Infertility
Maternity
Migrations/Immigration
Racism/Prejudice
Silence
Double lives
Politics
History
Work
Relationships
Infidelity
Machismo
Editor: Erika María Martínez is a Dominican-American writer with an MFA in English and Creative writing from Mills College in Oakland, California. She is currently residing in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic as a Fulbright Fellow. Her work has been featured in Colorlines Magazine, The Womanist, Homelands: Women's Journeys Through Race, Place and Time and in Terror?, an exhibit at the Intersection for the Arts in San Francisco.

Publication: The anthology will be published through an independent press in English and in Spanish to be distributed internationally.

Guidelines: Dominican women living on the island or women of Dominican descent living in the United States are encouraged to tell their stories. Submissions may include fiction, creative nonfiction, personal essays and memoirs. Please only send unpublished work. No simultaneous submissions. Writings submitted will not be returned.

Deadline: January 31, 2009

Length: 3,000-5,000 words

Format: Pieces should be typed, double-spaced and paginated. Please include your mailing address, e-mail address, telephone number and a short bio on the last page.

Submitting: Electronic submissions are preferred. Send work electronically as a Word or Rich Text Format file (with .doc or .rtf extension) to Erika María Martínez at HYPERLINK "mailto:antologiaquisqueyana@gmail.com" Put "Anthology" in the subject line. If e-mail is not possible, mail essay to
Erika Martínez 1-12682
3508 N.W. 114th Ave. Suite A
Doral, FL 33178
Reply: Please allow until June 1 for a response. If you haven't received a response by then, please assume your work was not selected. An effort will be made to contact each writer.

Solicitud de Colaboración
Quisqueyanas: Narradoras Contemporáneas Dominicanas
Editada por Erika María Martínez
Se publicará en los Estados Unidos en Ingles y Español
La literatura dominicana tiene escasa representación en el ámbito internacional, donde los estudios literarios del Caribe se enfocan principalmente en algunos escritores importantes como José Martí. El mismo desconocimiento ocurre cuando se comparan los escritores dominicanos con las escritoras dominicanas. A pesar de esto, la mujer dominicana ha estado envuelta en procesos creativos, tanto en su país como en el extranjero, donde muchas se han radicado en busca de mejores condiciones de vida y espacios para la producción literaria y artística.
Esta presencia de la mujer dominicana pone de manifiesto la capacidad creativa y el talento del pueblo dominicano. Muchas han escrito obras interesantes en las que reflejan la realidad de su cultura y de la vida social y política de esa nación. Quisqueyanas: narradoras contemporáneas dominicanas surge como un proyecto que procura producir una antología de narrativa de escritoras de la República Dominicana y de escritoras de ascendencia dominicana residentes en los Estados Unidos, y que tiene como objetivo dar voz a la mujer dominicana en el quehacer literario.
Durante los noventa, la presencia dominicana en los Estados Unidos experimentó un considerable aumento que la llevó a convertirse en la cuarta comunidad latina emigrante más grande de esta nación. Este crecimiento ha conllevado una mayor presencia de los valores culturales de nuestra comunidad, los cuales se han fusionado en gran parte con los valores de otros países de América Latina; factor este que contribuye al alejamiento de la identidad de nuestra población en el devenir de sus vidas en el extranjero.
Esta realidad plantea la necesidad de fortalecer la expresión cultural dominicana en la sociedad norteamericana, a fin de que, los referentes culturales y la identidad de nuestro pueblo mantengan una presencia dinámica que nos permita encontrar las manifestaciones producidas por nuestra gente a través de la narrativa, el cuento y otros géneros literarios con los que se expresa la manera de ser del ente dominicano.
Una muestra de escritoras dominicanas y dominico-americanas contribuirá a preservar la herencia literaria e histórica de la isla a través del contenido y del estilo. Esta antología será un paso hacia un mayor entendimiento y una mayor dinámica entre estas dos culturas.
Si se identifica con este planteamiento, la invito a formar parte de esta propuesta en la que se utilizarán técnicas de antologías estadounidenses como la editada por Lillian Castillo-Speed, Latina: Women's Voices from the Borderlands, que hemos tomado de ejemplo por el éxito tenido al incluir ficción y memorias. Como en The Butterfly's Way: Voices from the Haitian Diaspora in the United States, seleccionada por Edwidge Danticat, elaboraremos una estructura temática. Nuestra antología seguirá el mismo modelo escogido por esas dos autoras. Como pueden observar, habrá una gran amplitud para desarrollar diferentes temas en áreas como:
Familia
Feminismo
Exclusión
Femineidad
Fertilidad/Infertilidad
Maternidad
Migraciones
Racismo y prejuicios
Silencio
Doble vida
Política
Historia
Trabajo
Relaciones
Infidelidad
Machismo
Editora: Erika María Martínez es escritora Dominico-Americana con una Maestría en Bellas Artes y Escritura Creativa de Mills College en Oakland, California. Actualmente reside en Santo Domingo, República Dominicana como becaria Fulbright. Sus publicaciones están incluidas en Colorlines Magazine, The Womanist, Homelands: Women's Journeys Through Race, Place and Time. También colaboró en la exposición Terror? del museo Intersection for the Arts en San Francisco.
Publicación: La antología se publicará en inglés y español con una casa editorial independiente que se encargará de la distribución internacional.
Requisitos: Se solicitan obras literarias de escritoras dominicanas residentes en la isla o escritoras de ascendencia dominicana que residan en los Estados Unidos. Escritoras interesadas pueden colaborar con ficción, ensayos personales y memorias con un mínimo de 3,000 palabras y un máximo de 5,000 palabras. Favor de enviar trabajos que no hayan sido previamente publicados o que se encuentren en proceso de estarlo o de participar en un concurso No se devolverán los trabajos entregados.
Última fecha de entrega: 31 de enero de 2009
Formato: Los trabajos deben ser escritos a doble espacio y tener las páginas numeradas. Favor de incluir en la última página dirección de domicilio, correo electrónico, número de teléfono y una breve biografía (50-100 palabras).
Presentación: Preferiblemente vía e-mail. Favor de enviar trabajos como un documento en formato Word o Rich Text Format (extensión .doc o .rtf) a Erika María Martínez al correo electrónico <antologiaquisqueyana@gmail.com>. En la linea de asunto escriban "Antología."
Si no es posible entregar por correo electrónico enviar a:
Erika Martínez 1-12682
3508 N.W. 114th Ave. Suite A
Doral, FL 33178
Respuesta: Se enviará informaciones con respecto a la antología antes del 1ero de junio del 2009. Si no reciben respuesta para esa fecha es porque su trabajo no ha sido seleccionado. Se hará lo posible para contactar a todas las escritoras.

When Life Refuses to Imitate Art

 

Sometimes things change for the better, and it totally screws me up.  

 

This morning I turn on the television in time for the reading of the names of those lost on 9-11.  The ceremony always interests me for more than the obvious reasons.  In one of my novels-in-progress, a character who lost his father in the World Trade Center attack still cannot bring himself to join his family on the annual pilgrimage to Ground Zero. Angel’s last conversation with his father Emilio was a heated political argument over who to vote for in the Democratic primary scheduled that day.  He grows so frustrated with his immigrant father’s increasing conservatism, he hangs up the phone on him. An hour later Angel learns that his father – a server at Windows on the World on the top of the North Tower – died in the attack.

 

Now every year Angel watches the reading of the names with conflicting emotions. While he appreciates the diversity that the organizers use in selecting those who read the names, it bothers him how the immigrants who died that day remain unacknowledged. It particularly grates Angel in the face of the rising xenophobia in the United States since the attacks. He watches the ceremony on television while sipping gin and juice and making makes sociological observations and political judgments, all in an effort to avoid the guilt of having disrespected his father for expressing admiration for then-mayor Rudolph Giuliani. 

 

But watching this morning’s commemoration, I immediately discover that I have some rewriting to do.  The organizers have changed little this year. The readers – loved ones of a life taken that day – still take the podium two at time. They read a dozen or so names as each soul’s name, picture and town scrolls at the bottom of the screen.  Virtually all the duos are interracial, but this year, the reader on the left has been charged with making a special pronouncement.   

 

 

 

 

 

“I came to read with love on behalf of the people of the commonwealth of Dominica.”

 

“And I’m here today on behalf of Cyprus.”

 

“I’m proud to have read on behalf of my fellow citizens of the Dominican Republic.”

 

“I’m here honoring and remember the people of Ethiopia.”

 

“I came today with the hearts and best wishes of the people of the Gambia.”

 

“And I’m honored today to have represented the people of Ireland.”

 

“I’m proud today to have represented my country the Iran.” 

   

After the moment of silence at 9:59 AM when the South Tower fell, a Latina dressed in NYPD blue takes the podium. Her father was a pastry chef on Windows on the World. She says that whenever she and her father parted ways, he would say te quiero y vaya con Dios. She says, “Today, I want to tell my Papi the same thing. I love you and go with God.” It is one of the few times the solemnity of the proceedings is broken with applause.

 

So this minor change throws a bit of a monkey wrench into my beloved scene about this young man who harbors tremendous guilt because his liberal politics were not changed despite the personal cost of what occurred that tragic day. Yes, I have quite a bit of rewriting to do. This is not the first time that changing tides have disrupt my creative flow like when Harvard’s decision to offer free tuition to admitted students whose families made less than $60,000 per year threw my young adult novel Efrain’s Secret into a tailspin.  The writer who doesn’t admit that the occasional change for the better doesn’t sometimes trigger a moment of petty frustration with life’s failure to imitate art is a liar.

 

But for the first time, a tiny shift toward progress demands a rewrite for once I will be very happy to make. 

 

 

To Snitch With Love

“Hell, yeah, I’d give you up!”

 

I laugh even though I know he’s serious.  Maybe it’s because Pa’s answer to my question doesn’t surprise me. The average person would be horrified to learn that if she committed murder, her father would turn her into the police in a heartbeat. Me, I’m just heartened by the fact that we’re so close, the man rarely stumps me and only in good ways.

 

In my house, boob tube often serves as an unusual bonding tool. Even the most inane show can lead to a rich discussion about morality and politics and the like between my parents and me, especially my father. (Court shows are particularly provocative.) That is, once we negotiate control over the remote.

On Sunday night, Pa and I quickly come to an accord. We agree to watch in the following order: In Plain Sight (the season finale of a show that only he follows), Law and Order: Criminal Intent (the last episode with Chris Noth of a show we both watch religiously), and Mad Men (a show that my father gave up on several episodes ago, hence, the need for this negotiation.  Thank AMC for encore presentations.)  

For the most part, I’m ignoring In Plain Sight. (Another blog for another day reflecting on why, strident feminist that I am, I couldn’t care less for shows like The Closer, Saving Grace and In Plain Sight which my father watches faithfully. I mean, I’m very pleased that these show exists. I’d just much rather pour out some Corona for The Wire than watch them.)

But at one point, the storyline catches my attention. Shero Mary Shannon plays a federal marshal (I think) who’s intent on giving up her drug addict sister to the authorities for a range of criminal offenses.  This makes her mom (played by Lesley Anne Warren who I still can’t decide if I like or not) go batshit. You’d give up your sister ?!? she shrieks to which Mary calmly replies, Yes… Yes, I would.

“Hey, Pa,” I say, prodding him in the elbow. “If one of us committed a crime, would you give us up?”

 

“Hell, yeah, I’d give you up!” I think he believes I’m laughing because I think he’s playing. I know he isn’t.  That’s what’s funny. 

 

 

 

 

Pa rushes to qualify.  “I mean, if I know you out there doing things I didn’t raise you to be doing…” I just laugh harder, prompting him to qualify even more.  “If you kill somebody, and, you know, it’s in self-defense, I’ll do whatever I can to help you. I’ll get you a lawyer or whatever. But if you out there doing stupid things…”  

“You’d give me up, huh?” “If you had a drug problem, I’m going to try to get you help, but…”  “Just like that,” I laugh, snapping my fingers. “You’d snitch like a bitch.” Now I double over, in part because I know my mother would actually beat him to the phone.

Pa finally lightens up.  “You’d be hiding under the bed, and the police would come, and I’d go She’s right there…

“… Now gimme my reward!”  

 “Snitches get stitches,” he says, quoting my Uncle Nelson – a former correction officer and his younger brother.

I shake my fist at him and put on my gangsta chick mug. “Talkers get walkers.”

Lots of folks would be hurt even furious to know – never mind be told to their faces – by a loved one that they would readily turn them over to law enforcement.  I can hear Hoochinetta McHood now.  Uh uh, he wrong for that.  Family’s family!

That’s right, Hoochie, family’s family, and that’s why I find my father’s response immensely heartwarming. Not only do I expect it, I understand and respect it. But that’s because I’m truly my parents’ daughter. As different as I am from them in fundamental ways, I have a moral structure of which they are the primary architects, and the Quintero code doesn’t define loyalty as I got your back no matter what dirt you do.  In our clan, loyalty demands that we tell you the truth about yourself no matter what and struggle mightily to get you to fly right when you get off track.  

So if I did do something irredeemably stupid and got the law on my ass, I wouldn’t see my family turning me over to the authorities as an act of betrayal. If anything, I first betrayed them by acting the fool. Facing the music would be the first step towards making amends to them as well as society. 

That’s just the way I was raised. 

 

A (M)Ad Man Creates a Campaign to Find Missing Children of Color

5 Questions for a (M)ad Man with a Cause: Giving Visibility to Missing Children of Color





With the phenomenon that is the show Mad Men, former ad man Hadji Williams chose an interesting time to put his copyrighting skills to use for a good cause. Fed up with the lack of news coverage for missing children of color, he launched a campaign of his own. It has caused some controversy, but that just proves to the sought-after brand consultant that he’s doing the right thing. I posed five questions – including one about America’s current favorite TV show – to Hadji Williams, and interspersed his replies with some of the artwork of his provocative yet necessary campaign.


Q. Introduce yourself, brother.


Hadji Williams here. I’m an 18-year vet of the advertising/marketing industry. Built my rep as a copywriter/brand consultant. I’ve worked on everything from Mercedes Benz to AT&T to Wrigley’s Gum to… wow, all I can say is if you drive it, ingest it, drink it, there’s a really good chance I sold it to you. I’m also an author of the Knock the Hustle series which gives people an insider’s view of the corporate culture and some of its crazy hustles.


Most recently I helped launch a campaign called “We Want Our Children Back, Too” which is an online effort dedicated to shining light on missing children of color who get almost zero coverage from America’s media. It includes pictures of actual missing children of color with challenging lines like “He had his whole life ahead of him, too” and “Her close-knit community was shaken, too."





Q. What inspired you to create an ad campaign focused on missing children of color?


Well, it was something that always bugged me because I’m from the south and west sides of Chicago – in the’ hood – and I was always amazed by how little support and understanding young victims of crimes in our community received. I had neighbors who lost family members to violence, hit ‘n’ runs, kidnapping, and every case was ignored by the media and not prioritized by law enforcement. We used to say, “White victims make the papers, black victims make the police blotters.”

I really got concerned with the Madeleine McCann case where the media would rather focus on a little white girl from England who went missing in Portugal than pay attention to missing Black, brown and Asian kids right here in the states. I checked with groups like the Center of Missing and Exploited Children, the FBI and other law enforcement sites. Black, Brown and Asian kids account for almost 45 per cent of all missing and kidnapped kids. Yet who gets all the attention?

But alternative sites like Color of Change, Black and Missing, What About Our Daughters, and Missing Minorities were highlighting kids who don’t get enough coverage, and it inspired me to do something I’m good at—create ad campaigns—for something more worthwhile than cars and toothpaste.






Q. Only a cold stone could not sympathize with the family of these kids, but such folks exist. So... has there been any criticism about the way you’ve chosen to go about this? I mean, no way your "Missing White Girl" spoofs is making you friends in all quarters.


Some people have emailed me saying that I’m just another Black person whining about “the white man” or “the system.” I get all kinds and I know the folks over at Black and Missing and the other sites that focus daily on this issue get their share of hate mail, too. All I can say is, when it’s your kid, your community that’s affected, you’re gonna want the whole world to stop ‘til that child comes home.

The white girl spoof actually furthers the point I’m trying to make. I got a bunch of mail from people saying that I shouldn’t be making fun of “people like that.” They meant missing white people. Most people who've seen the white girl and the white boy spoofs got it right away though and showed love. As for the rest, you can't please everybody.


You can’t get right with some people. I’ve gotten complaints for stretching some of the pics in Photoshop. People don’t keep camera-ready/production quality pics of their family members laying around so sometimes you just gotta tweak the pics to make ‘em fit. I say do your own campaign and hook it up the way you want. If you think this isn’t “expensive enough” then spend your own money and get out there and help instead of doing nothing but complain. I complained about what the mainstream media doesn’t do then I got busy to try and help. You’re free to do the same.






Q. So how do folks who want to step up go about it?


Spread the word. The artwork for the campaign is available online for distribution. It could be your kid next. I also encourage folks to know your neighbors. Many missing and exploited kids get snatched up by people from around the way. And keep a couple of media-quality headshots of your loved ones, something that reproduces well online and in papers. Outlets need artwork they don’t have to stretch, lighten or darken to use.



Q. Good advice that hopefully no one reading this will have the need to actually use. But you know I have to ask you this next. As a former ad man -- a Black man at that in an industry that still remains dominated by White men -- what do you think of the show Mad Men?

On the real? Mad Men reps the advertising industry the way Friends repped being a New Yorker or Two and a Half Men reps single parents. Granted, the industry was predominantly white male driven back then and still is now, but say why that is. Are these guys staunch racists? Are they latent bigots? Are they a "product of their environment?" Don't tell me that wouldn't make for better characters than what they have now. There’s drama in explaining that kind of bias. There's humor in that.

As for the rest of the show, it's not even how the industry works. You can do episodes about how you deal with different clients and types of ads and make it exciting and intriguing. Mad Men, in my opinion, is just some half-assed joint cooked up by folks who've either never worked in the industry or weren't allowed to do the show they really wanted to do in order to get it on the air. But leave it to the Emmys to pick some BS--filled show with white folks being loud and self-indulgent and call it "entertainment."

Coming Out When You're Not Gay?

“Are your parents coming to the show?”

 

Someone needs to write a book on how to come out when you’re not gay.  The catalog of books for White folks interested in promoting racial justice grows each day, and there are a some titles geared toward men committed to gender equality.  But where’s the how-to manual for heterosexual people who desire to be allies to LGBTQI community? Such a field guide would’ve come in handy when I served as the dramaturge for Pandora’s, the multimedia off-Broadway show produced by my company Sister Outsider Entertainment.

 

An ambitious production that intersperses ten monologues with seven documentary shorts, Pandora’s sought to bring a higher and more complex visibility to queer Latinas than you might see on, say, The L-Word. The show is the brainchild of its creative director Elisha Miranda who also happens to be my business partner. But E’s also my sister warrior, road dawg, ace coom boom.  In other words, she always has my back, and I always have hers. 

 

 

 

 

When Elisha told me years ago that she wanted to produce a multimedia show about the Latina queer experience and asked if I were dramaturge the monologues, I didn’t hesitate.  If anything, I was honored.  There were several more experienced and critically acclaimed playwrights she could have approached who would’ve jumped at the chance to work with her on Pandora’s (E be magnetic like that.) And that’s why when she asked me if my parents were coming to see Pandora’s when it premiered at Theater Row last month, the simple question reduced me to tears.

 

I hadn’t even told them about the show.

 

One reason I had not told them about Pandora’s is because, in explaining to them why Sister Outsider was “doing a gay show,” I would have to out Elisha.  My parents have come to love Elisha and her husband Alex as if they were their own children.  Although Elisha is openly bisexual and a relentless activist for queer issues, being married to a man often thwarts any consideration that she might not be heterosexual. As open as Elisha is about her sexuality, around certain folks like my parents, Don’t ask, don’t tell was in full effect, and I didn’t feel it was my place to announce her sexual orientation to anyone.

 

I explained this to her when she called and asked if my parents were coming to the Pandora’s premiere.  “Well, girl, you know, I haven’t said anything,” I said while standing in the shoe aisle at the Bruckner Boulevard K-Mart.  “’Cause, like, I’ve noticed in the past that you’ve kinda held back about talking about that when they’re around.”  Like the time we both stayed with my parents at their home in Puerto Rico. While there Elisha was finishing her novella for Juicy Mangos, the erotica anthology we were both writing for at the time.  Hers was about a lesbian who’s haunted by her first kiss. I noticed that when my parents were in earshot, Elisha censored the way she talked about her story, and I took that as a cue that she wasn’t ready for them to discover that aspect of her identity. Indeed, it would be like coming out to her own mother (who I affectionately call Mom2) all over again.

 

 

 

But when I explained this to her, Elisha surprised me by saying, “You know, girl, I know this must be hard on you because you’re single and after what your cousin did to you… I’ve seen how you get targeted in different ways so whatever you decide to do, I’m cool with it.   I support you.” 

 

When we ended our call, I sat there staring at it for a moment, thinking When did this become about me?   I walked shell-shocked out of the K-Mart, leaving behind those cute sandals I had been eyeing.  As I started on my way home, knowing that I would find my father nestled in the living room recliner and switching back and forth between the Yankee game and a Law & Order rerun, the truth hits. 

 

It was about me. 

 

When you’re a perpetually single, unapologetic feminist with a queer best friend (and therefore, run with more lesbians than the average heterosexual, single gal), queer and straight folks alike keep trying to yank you out of a closet you’ve never been in. Sometimes it can be flattering, a sign that you’re walking your anti-heterosexist talk. You’ve succeeded in communicating to queer folks not just with your words but through your actions You’re safe with me.

 

But more times than not, it stings of the homophobia that LGBTQI people have to endure every day.  For example, it becomes an  “explanation” why I go for long periods of time without a relationship (because, you know, it couldn’t possibly be that I have enough self-awareness and esteem to stay single than settle for any man just to be able to prove I can nab one.) For patriarchal men and women alike, it becomes an opportunity to dismiss my feminist ideals as well as a rationale for queer folks whose internalized homophobia is so deep, that despite their demands that straight people get over themselves, acknowledge their heterosexual privilege and become allies, they cannot fathom that someone is genuinely trying to step up and heed their call. 

 

No way.  She must be a closet case. 

 

I’m proud to say that most days I take these incidents in stride.  I understand the ignorance and fear in which they are rooted, and I know who I am as do the people who truly matter.  That’s a’ight. Go ‘head and do me like that. You’re saying way more about yourself than you are about me.  Having had considerable practice, I easily resist inclinations to assert my heterosexuality as doing so only perpetuates the homophobic thinking and behavior I have committed myself to challenging.  But I’m only human, and there are days when I particularly feel vulnerable and cower behind my heterosexuality, especially when it strikes close to home, and you don’t get much closer to home than with family. 

 

A few weeks before Pandora’s premiered, my own cousin targeted me this way. She was angry with me over something too petty to mention. Rather than contact me and discuss the matter, she wrote a blog where she stated that if I’m a lesbian why don’t I “quit with the bitch-assness” and “come out already, damn!!!”  Mind you, this same cousin fancies herself a queer ally because she never misses an episode of her favorite show The L-Word.



I didn’t realize how much that blog impacted me until Elisha asked me if my parents were coming to see Pandora’s and I had to admit that I hadn’t even invited them.  At first, I didn’t even think my cousin was referring to me when she wrote that blog, and my primary contention was not with the homophobic allegation disguised ironically as an anti-heterosexist demand to keep it real.  It was that she chose such a juvenile way to express her anger with me. And I believed that was all there was to it, especially when I confronted my cousin and never mentioned the suggestion that I was a closeted lesbian. 

 

But when I reflected on my conversation with Elisha as I walked home from K-Mart, I had to confront myself.  For all my talk, I could no longer deny that another reason why I had not even mentioned Pandora’s to my parents was because I was afraid that they, too, might think (and worry and fear) that I was a lesbian. This is what brought me to tears: the realization that I wasn’t the ally I prided myself on being and had failed my best friend, my homegirl, my camarada who never thinks twice about standing up for me.

 

I walked for several blocks, sniffling to myself, Bitch, you ain’t shit.

 

What I needed to do was instantaneously obvious, too. I had to invite my parents to Pandora’s.  The sudden buzzing in my stomach at the thought confirmed that “outing” myself as a queer ally and dealing with the repercussions whatever they may be was the right thing to do. 

 

So when I got home, I settled in besides my father in the living room.  “Look, Elisha and I are doing this off-Broadway show, and I’d like you and Ma to come,” I began after some baseball chit-chat. “The thing is you should know that it’s a gay show.”  I give Pa all the reasons why producing a project like Pandora’s is important to me, all of them boiling down to the same fact: it reflects who I am and what I stand for as a person. Then I confess, “And the reason why I haven’t said anything until now was because I was afraid that you might think I was gay.”



Pa and I end up talking for about three hours, from the personal (all the gay people he admires like “Pompa” who works hard and is a great son) to the political (“It is kinda messed up that they can serve in the military but can’t get married so the wife or husband won’t get their benefits if they die at war.”) Now let’s not get it twisted.  I went to Pa because he’s unusually open-minded for a person of his kind – a working-class Puerto Rican man who came to the United States in ’52. That’s why I often describe myself as my father’s daughter (with not a small hint of braggadocio), we are the best of friends, and all my friends want to adopt him. 

 

But he’s still very much, well, a Puerto Rican man who came to the United States in ’52. Hence, there are some things he just can’t grasp, sometimes out of sheer unwillingness.  Pa Dukes doesn’t “get” bisexuality, definitely belonging to the “pick a team” school of thought on that one but, in his defense, so do many gay people) so forget about breaking down what it means to be transgendered.

 

But I did try, and that in and of itself is no small victory.  My parents didn’t go to Pandora’s, and to be totally honest, I didn’t approach Ma for reasons other than (but not excluding) residual homophobia.  But she did know that Sister Outsider was putting on a show (even if she remained unaware of its content), and when I would come home, Pa would smile and ask, “How’s it going?” genuinely interested in the backstage lore (OK, gossip.)

 

Just when I thought it wasn’t possible, Pa and I are even tighter because no part of who I am or what I believe is hidden from him. It truly paid off to feel the fear and do it anyway.  Hopefully, I’ll be an even better ally now that I have personally experienced an inkling of what it must be like to come out.  In fact, maybe I’ll evolve into a better activist overall, recalling this feeling the next time I’m in a cynical funk and smirk at a man who claims to be a feminist or a White person who describes him/herself as anti-racist.

 

In addition to being evidence of one of the feminist movement’s most insightful contributions to social justice of all kinds – the notion that the personal is political –  “coming out” as a queer ally to my father has proven to be a multifaceted blessing.

 

 

A (Feminist) Job for Tyrese

Lately, I’ve been inspired to explore the “ride or die chick” archetype. According to the best rated definition in the Urban Dictionary, this is “a chick that ain’t afraid to be down with her man, she’ll do anything her man needs her to do.”

From what I see, she’s the only female in mainstream hip hop that gets any love on a regular basis (mothers and daughters don’t fare nearly as well.) Rappers write odes to RDC, and she has become a staple in predominantly male “urban” films (as if Sex and the City, Gossip Girls, et al aren’t urban, but that’s for another blog.) I wanted to see just what a sister has to do get any respect in a genre roundly criticized for its misogyny.

So I head over to Hollywood Video and stock up on videos I ordinarily wouldn’t go near (the sacrifices one makes for social justice.) Most of these were trashed by critics and tanked at the box office only to rack up on the video market. In other words, plenty of folks are spending time and money on these movies without a half-damn for the opinions of J. Hoberman., A.O.Scott or any of these cats with initials for first names.

First into the DVD player is Waist Deep starring Tyrese Gibson and Meagan Good. Meagan is second on my list of Sisters Who Are Better Actresses Than the Roles They Get (Vivica Fox has been hard to dethrone, but let her keep on with the excessive and unnecessary surgery, hoochie antics and the WTF? flings with dudes like 50 Cent…) Despite a breakthrough performance in Kasi Lemmons classy debut Eve’s Bayou, Meagan has become a preternaturally beautiful young woman who appears regularly in films that range from the tolerably mediocre to the laughably awful. But the sister’s a goddess in hip hop circles. In fact, I select Waist Deep because she is the female lead. Gwendolyn Pough once argued that Jada Pinkett Smith was a “hip hop” film icon because by merely casting her in a role, filmmakers immediately evoked that girl who was “in” the hood yet not “of” the hood. As I settle in while the opening montage plays, I suspect that Meagan Good is on her way to becoming the symbol of the “ride or die chick” archetype.

Yes, overall Waist Deep is crappy. Sure enough, Meagan is your classic RDC who does everything her man Tyrese says so they can hustle up the loot he needs to pay off the street urchin who has kidnapped his son. And as to be expected from most films in this genre, there’s just enough visual oomph, bumping music, and crispy dialogue (Larenz Tate just skyrocketed to the top of my Brothers Who Are Better Actors Than the Roles They Get list) to make it entertaining enough for you to see it through the end, forestalling the inevitable recognition of how terrible it actually is.

But here’s the craziness. Right or wrong, I watched Waist Deep expecting all the aforementioned to be true. That said, I expected I would have to push myself to don a more sophisticated lens when deconstructing Meagan’s character CoCo, understanding that very few films can be fairly described as irredeemably sexist or thoroughly progressive.

What I didn’t expect was for Tyrese’s character Otis to be the most feminist character in the movie.

[Note: Waist Deep was co-written and directed by Vondie Curtis Hall who is also married to Kasi Lemmons so maybe their union plays a role in what I’m about to discuss.]

Not because he relinquishes male privilege, overtly stands up for women’s equality or anything radical like that. (C’mon now… this is the Game’s acting debut. Playing a thug named Big Meat, no less.) Otis stands out in the small but explicit ways he challenges traditional ideas of masculinity. For example, he is the primary caretaker of his son, stands up against violence towards women and doesn’t feel entitled to sex with CoCo simply because she’s in his line of sight.

OK, let me keep it real. Otis’s is only a slightly kindler, gentler patriarchy. He’s left with his son because his babymama’s a treacherous ‘itch, and he intervenes when some dude hits CoCo by issuing a merciless beatdown (yelling the entire time between kick and punches What the !@#$ is wrong with you, boy? Don’t you ever beat on no mother!@#$ing woman like that!) Hey, this is still the ‘hood, and Otis aka O2 is still is a down-ass thug nucca, ya feel me. For this genre, such male behavior is kinda sorta progress.

[Spoiler alert: If you haven’t yet but want to see Waist Deep, stop reading. Yeah, I figured you’d keep going. I ain’t mad atcha.]

Aw, hell. Maybe all that’s BS, and I just got taken in by the ending. Whether it’s an homage or a ripoff, there’s no denying that the climax of Waist Deep was inspired by both Set It Off and Thelma & Louise, two films wildly popular by feminists of all stripes from the street corner to the ivory tower. After smirking through much of the film, I found myself perched on the edge of my recliner when Otis, surrounded by police, drives his car off an open bridge. “Oh, no, they didn’t!” I yelled at the television. “No, you did NOT bite off of Thelma and Louise!” And let me ‘fess up. As I watched O2’s car sink into the river, I said it.




“That boy better be dead.”

Because if he was a woman, that’s the way the film would end. The tropes of feminist popular culture deems that it go like this:

1. Woman breaks out of suffocating traditional sex role.

2. Woman is deemed outlaw for such defiance and is sought out for punishment.

3. Woman gives the patriarchy one last fuck you by refusing to submit to punishment.

Therefore, unless, this is sci-fi, fantasy or some other genre not rooted in contemporary realism, homegirl must die.

So for a few moments, I was a bit heated that a film in which the female lead is little more than a plot device, the male protagnist not only gets to appropriate the bittersweet chick flick convention where the true RDC only makes the ultimate sacrifice for herself and other women, he also gets to live. He makes it to Mexico. And he has a family waiting for him to boot.

And yet if not for this appropriation, I might not have ever gone back and reexamine the character of Otis and noticed some of the other things about him that are unusual -- in a good way -- for a male character in this genre. Rather I was focused on what messages were conveyed through the female character CoCo. Yet I always preach to young men of the hip hop generation that feminism is for everybody and can liberate them from debilitating ideas of masculinity.



So this ending reminded me that part of the feminist project must include seeking out men – and representations of them in the media – that challenge archaic notions of masculinity, big and small. Like I said, Waist Deep stays overwhelmingly loyal to the tropes of its genre which implicitly necessitates the marginalization of women, and ain't changing no time soon. Within those narrow confines, however, it does engage in tiny betrayals and even, steals, er, borrows from the best of pro-women popular cinema.

So if the RDC for the cause of women’s liberation can sometimes be a man, then maybe sometimes we have to send Tyrese to do a feminist’s job.