News

Despite my attempts to have something smart and useful to say concerning current events most of the time, my friends and family have probably noticed my conspicuous absence of late on the Michael Brown and Eric Garner killings.

I’ve not been quiet because I had nothing to say about it. Far from it; I have plenty of thoughts about many aspects of these horrible situations, from police brutality to systemic racism, from media coverage to our “justice” system in the United States. I’ve been involved in activism since my teen years, and most of that in the civil rights category. Not just letter writing or the “slacktivism” of the Internet either. I’ve chained myself to a door; I’ve been detained during a protest (though passing for white and being a girl were probably why I didn’t end up getting arrested, like the black girls or the men who were also part of those protests). I’ve been part of various protests and even led them on occasion. So I am no stranger to any of this.

What I am today, however, is cognizant that the last thing that anybody in Ferguson or on Staten Island really needs right now is for me to add to the pile on of white and white-passing people offering their “advice” or explanations or ideas on this. A big part of the way that systemic racism continues to do its invisible and devastating work is the ease with which black voices are silenced. This doesn’t happen just through the ranting of outright racists, or by the lack of response from white people whose silence is louder than any words. It also often comes from well-meaning people trying to talk about being “colorblind,” or making assumptions and statements about black life in the United States that are simply not theirs to make.

The only thing I want to say is that I am listening, and I will do whatever I am asked to do, to help. It may be that there isn’t anything I can do personally to help. It may be that there is. But I am listening, and waiting for direction from the people who are directly involved, instead of deciding that for them. As a mixed-race person and a woman, my experiences, varied and sometimes distressing as they might be? – will never be the same as those of young black men. I will not speak for them, nor will I speak over them.

I will only speak long enough to say I’m listening, and I am hoping that others will shut up and listen too.

Discussion on the PantheaCon sacrifice panel is beginning. Here are two blogs that discuss it:

“A libation without a prayer is a spilled drink” by John Beckett

PantheaCon 2014: A Reflection” by the Anomalous Thracian (See his own website for the uncensored/uncondensed versions here)

Additionally, there’s been some more information on something being fishy in Denmark, notably that neither kosher nor halal have been conducted in the recently-made-illegal manner in Denmark for some time, and some Jewish and Muslim Danes are beginning to wonder if this is just a sneaky way to discriminate against them instead. Additionally, Denmark’s institutional concern for animal rights doesn’t appear to extend to zoo animals.

I’ll keep gathering information. Currently I’m trying to find out if the panel was recorded as it seemed to be, and if that will be made public. I also had a very long follow-up interview with the Coru that will be appearing somewhere soon, along with thoughts from other panel participants, and I’ll post links to that once I have them.

Last weekend at PantheaCon, I was part of a panel discussion on sacrifice (of all kinds, hosted by Coru Cathubodua). I mentioned at one point during the conversation, when we were talking about the utility and place of animal sacrifice in particular, that “any person who has eaten kosher or halal meats has taken part in animal sacrifice.”

When I got home, I found this article about kosher/halal practices in Denmark waiting for me to read. There are many things to say about it, both from the sacrifice standpoint and also the standpoints of religious and animal rights, but right now, I just wanted to post a link before I lose it.

Denmark Ban on Kosher and Halal Slaughter Comes Into Effect as Minister Says ‘Animal Rights Come Before Religion’

An older version of the website surfaced long enough for me to grab the articles off from it and export them to this blog. Now you can read what I had to say about U.S. aid to Haiti after the 12 January 2010 earthquake, and various shenanigans that kept it from getting to its destination, as well as some small snippets of news. Enjoy!

In the meantime, I’ve just returned from the PantheaCon religious conference, where I offered a demonstration of part of a Vodou ceremony for the Lwa Danbala, and where I was asked to speak on Coru Cathubodua‘s excellent panel concerning sacrifice. There’s already been some conversation about this panel around the Internet, and I expect there may be more as more people get home and start getting their thoughts together. I have a few more things to say, too, but first I could use some sleep.

It started with a text.

Hey there was just a bad earthquake in Haiti, is Mami Marie OK?

I was in the car that afternoon, waiting for my downstairs neighbor to come out of the appointment I’d driven her to. One of my initiate daughters, ti-Marie, pinged me with the text. Immediately I phoned my Vodou mother, Mambo Marie; I knew that she had returned from her trip to see the family in Port-au-Prince only a few hours before. I managed to catch her.

“I’ll call,” she said. “I’ll call you back.”

I turned on the car, and the radio news.

None of the news was good. A massive, shallow earthquake had hit near Leogane, right before dinnertime. The only thing the reporters seemed to know was that the airport was “damaged” and that there were reports that the cathedral – and the palace – The Palace? – had fallen down.

That was when the panic set in. The family lakou is in a neighborhood very close to the Palace. And if that big, fancy,  well-built thing had fallen down…

My neighbor came out of the building. I drove home, went upstairs to the apartment I had two floors above hers, grabbed both my phones, and started making calls.