Editor:
There was a stark difference in the images and coverage of the Women’s March stories in your Jan. 26 issue (“On the March”). The elegant and inspirational language of Dr. King was there — at least in part, in D.C. — alongside supportive signs of men supporting the right thing, and the other clearly common sense message: “More voices, better choices.”
Also in Linda Stansberry’s coverage of the Eureka walk where, supposedly, some of those signs echoed the same higher sentiments, but to carry a sign, up high, saying, “I can’t believe I’m still protesting this shit,” — doesn’t that just descend to the obscene level of Donald Trump talk? I get it, the emotion, the frustration, but doesn’t it neutralize, if not nullify, the whole point of the protest? Not quite the same thing as “I have a dream,” or We Want a President Who is Not a Danger and a Disgrace! Same with arson and other deliberate destruction, and chanting, “Hey, ho, the pussy grabber must go!” and the sign reading: “Donald Trump Eats Pizza with a Fork.” Where is that relevant? So do I; knife, too, sometimes, when needed.
Some years ago, I joined my son and others in West Hollywood’s Gay Pride Parade. It was the one and only time I participated in a march, although it will probably not be the last time I do so. Onlookers threw fruit and insults at us. Some straight guys tried to start fights and, from what I observed, failed. Abuse was in the air (it wasn’t easy to walk past all that) but so was the exuberance of nonviolently doing what was clearly the right thing to do. It was a day of simply proclaiming the right to live life, peacefully, as you wish and to love the one you love — what we all want.
Patricia Jerome, Trinidad
This article appears in Wild 2017.
I am the person who wore the sandwich board sign that said at 80 I can’t believe I still have to protest this f—ing shit. Roe v. Wade 44 years. I had my picture taken at a non-stop rate for the entire time I was there. Rarely more than a half a minute went by without my being asked if I would let someone take my picture. I think my sign was the single most popular sign at the march. I went into Galleghers later and they insisted on giving me a meal on the house and when I asked why they said, “We like your sign.”. When I have to, at the age of 80, fight for the rights so hard won by myself and other women after 50-60 years all over again I feel quite entitled to swear. Further: we have a president who is an obscenity and who uses obscenities regularly. How about worrying about that instead of nit-picking at the content of heart felt signs.
Way to go, Sylvia, you rock (still!)
How on Earth do 3,000 rural protesters believe they can influence the (obscene) administration in D.C. when they have never been able to extract the development industry from dominating every elected and appointed county office?
About 10 dedicated volunteers is all it would take.
The chronic (rigged) shortages in affordable housing, decade after decade, has had immense impacts on every human crisis currently plaguing this county.