Ideas and action for a new generation. en-us http://www.wiretapmag.org/rss/button.gif http://www.wiretapmag.org/ Wiretap http://www.wiretapmag.org/ Copyright 2009 Independent Media Institute. All rights reserved. en-us http://www.wiretapmag.org/immigration/44316/ A young undocumented activist speaks on her fight to push the Dream Act. {$media.0.html} Wed, 01 Jul 2009 17:00:01 PDT WireTap http://www.wiretapmag.org/immigration/44312/ Undocumented students move past stigma and fear to become part of a growing national network working to pass the Dream Act. In today's struggling economy, college graduates rarely turn down job offers. But Lizbeth Mateo has no choice. The 5'1", soft-spoken graduate of California State University, Northridge (CSUN) received offers to work for several human rights NGOs -- her dream profession -- but Mateo had to decline because she doesn't have a Social Security number. Instead, she works six days a week cooking and cleaning at a local deli. Although Mateo graduated high school and college in the United States, speaks a firm California Spanglish, and knows more about her adopted Los Angeles than her native Oaxaca, Mexico, she's still legally an outsider. "[Being undocumented] is something that's with you the whole day," she says. "We forget about it sometimes, but it's always there with you, day and night." For the past several years Mateo has been volunteering her time to be a part of a growing national network of college and community-based organizations working to gain public and legislative support for the <a href="http://dreamact.info/">Dream Act</a>. She describes the proposed law as "a ray of hope for thousands of undocumented students who want to stop living underground." Like many of her peers, she divides her time between full-time work and activism. This sacrifice means that she seldom sees her family and risks being deported for discussing her legal status openly. "My dad starts to cry because he doesn't want me to be in this situation and, in a way, told me that he feels guilty," Mateo says. "He shouldn't feel like that because, thanks to my parents' decision, I am what I am today. I'm very thankful to them for that decision, for having the courage to leave their family and everything they knew." According to the United States Census Bureau, there are about 2.5 million <a href="http://www.labor.ucla.edu/publications/reports/Undocumented-Students.pdf">(PDF)</a> undocumented youth under 18 living in the U.S. Roughly 65,000 undocumented youth who have lived in the United States for five years or longer graduate from high school each year. But only 20 percent <a href="http://www.energyofanation.org/sites/25e1f498-741c-478a-8a08-aa486d8533a5/uploads/Undocumented_Students__National_.pdf">(PDF)</a> of undocumented students who have lived in the U.S. for five years or longer, like Mateo, enroll in post-secondary education. The Dream Act -- officially known as the Development, Relief and Education for Alien Minors Act -- is a proposed bill in Congress that would allow undocumented students a path to become conditional permanent residents and apply for federal and state financial college aid. After a failed run in 2007, the federal bill was officially re-introduced before Congress this year by Senator Dick Durban (D-IL), and has seen several state-based iterations over the past decade. Among its conditions: students must graduate high school, be of "good moral character," have lived in the U.S. continuously for five years before the law's enactment, be younger than 35 years old and attain at least an associate's degree or complete two years of military service. The proposed legislation has become a lightening rod in the national debate over immigration reform. Opponents claim that the bill rewards undocumented students whose parents committed the federal crime of crossing into the U.S. Dan Stein, executive director for the anti-immigration reform group Federation for American Immigration Reform (<a href="http://www.fairus.org/site/PageNavigator/homepagenew">FAIR</a>) referred to the bill in a 2003 <a href="http://www.fairus.org/site/PageServer?pagename=media_mediaf23a">press release</a> as a "massive giveaway of higher education to illegal aliens [at] a time when every state university system is raising tuition and cutting education benefits." Some immigrant rights activists <a href="http://www.citizenorange.com/orange/2009/03/the-politics-of-the-dream-act.html">oppose</a> the Dream Act's <a href="http://www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/2007/06/16/immigration_bill_offers_a_military_path_to_us_dream/?page=1">military service</a> provision. The argument is that while a relatively small percentage of undocumented youth would gain legalization through attending college, the majority would be coerced into the armed services in order to stay in the U.S. -- unfairly putting their lives at stake. <font size="2" color="blue"><b>Getting Involved</b></font> <img src="/images/managed/Story+Image_lizbeth+speaking.jpg"> For Mateo, the Dream Act isn't just a political football -- it's her life. When she set off for Santa Monica College in 2003, Mateo didn't expect to become an activist. As an undocumented student, she didn't qualify for state or federal financial aid, so she had to take a full-time job at Venice Beach to pay for school. One day, during her two-hour bus commute, she saw a young woman named Alma. Mateo recognized Alma from one of her classes, where she was collecting signatures to support the Dream Act. Eventually, Alma explained the measure to Mateo, who realized that the legislation was speaking to people exactly like her. The two are now best friends. "We understand our struggle more than anyone else," Alma said. "If we don’t get involved, then nobody will understand our struggle." After they both transferred to CSUN, Alma and Mateo founded a support group for undocumented students called "Dreams." Many of the students in the group feared publicly identifying themselves and risking deportation, so for almost a year they met secretly twice a week early in the morning. Unbeknownst to Mateo and the rest of the members of Dreams, there was another group of undocumented students (calling themselves "Heard") meeting in a building less than 500 feet away. The two groups eventually merged to become "<a href="http://dreamstobeheard.com/">Dreams to be Heard</a>" and they now have more than 20 members. Together, they have participated in hunger strikes and lobbied in Sacramento and Washington, D.C. in support of the Dream Act. They're also part of a statewide network of high school and college student organizations called the <a href="http://www.chirla.org/CADREAMNetwork">California Dream Network</a>. On top of educating students and faculty about the challenges facing undocumented students at CSUN, the group also organizes fundraisers that support undocumented students. Similar lobbying and support networks are organized on a national level, mainly through the internet, with websites such as <a href="http://www.dreamactivist.org/">DreamActivist.org</a>. Mateo recalls how the climate of organizing for the Dream Act was initially one of fear and isolation. Students were afraid of being stigmatized, or even deported. Now, with more public support, Mateo says that they're much more open about their battle. "We're asking for a reform not because we want to take these resources to our countries of origin," Mateo explains. "This is our home, the place we were raised, where we went to school [and] we want to stay." <font size="2" color="blue"><b>Positive Impact on the Economy</b></font> <img src="/images/managed/Story+Image_studentsorganized.jpg"> While undocumented students have found more avenues for activism on college campuses, they still face a great deal of anti-immigrant rhetoric and discrimination. Mateo points to some anti-immigrant activists who often accuse undocumented immigrants of having a negative impact on the economy by unfairly benefiting from public resources. William Perez, a professor at Claremont Graduate University and a former researcher for the RAND Corporation, argues that the opposite is true. The <a href="http://74.125.93.132/search?q=cache:518ifgcYDEsJ:www.chirla.org/files/Policy_May_2008_newsletter.pdf+2004+CalWORKs,+Los+Angeles,+undocumented+food+stamps&cd=3&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us&client=firefox-a">numbers</a> from Los Angeles County help bolster his claim. Perez says that contrary to popular refrains by anti-immigrant activists, the main beneficiaries of state programs are not undocumented students. In 2004, Los Angeles County reported that 93.9 percent of CalWORKs cases, 88.1 percent of general relief cases, and 90.3 percent of food stamp cases were initiated by documented residents. The program most utilized by undocumented immigrants was medical assistance, and those numbers only represented 4.1 percent of all cases, according to the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights of Los Angeles (<a href="http://www.chirla.org/">CHIRLA</a>). Perez also points to the test-case of Texas, which enacted its own state-based form of the Dream Act in 2001. For every dollar invested in the Texas higher education system, the state received more than a five-dollar return to the local economy, according to a <a href="http://www.window.state.tx.us/specialrpt/highered/">report</a> by the Texas Comptroller of Public Accounts. In 2006, the Texas Comptroller also <a href="http://www.window.state.tx.us/specialrpt/undocumented/">reported</a> that undocumented immigrants produced $1.58 billion in state revenues, which exceeded the $1.16 billion in state services they received. Without the contributions of undocumented workers in the 2005 fiscal year, the state of Texas would have seen a loss of $17.7 billion to the gross state product. Perez argues that all of the studies that look at the potential economic impact of the Dream Act show that the act would be a net benefit. An educated workforce is more beneficial to the country's economy in the long-run because college graduates earn twice as much as those without high school diplomas. That ultimately means there would be more taxable income going back into state and federal budgets. This fall, Perez, who got his legal status during the Immigration and Control <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immigration_Reform_and_Control_Act_of_1986">Act</a> of 1986, will offer these arguments, and more, in his forthcoming book, <i>We Are American: Undocumented Students Pursuing the American Dream</i>. <font size="2" color="blue"><b>Staying With the Fight</b></font> Since she graduated from CSUN, Mateo has been working six days a week in a deli, cleaning and cooking. Even though she wants to go to law school, she hasn't applied yet because she's saving up money and waiting for the Dream Act to pass. Although she speaks optimistically about the Dream Act, Mateo admits that sometimes she doesn't want to hear more about the issue because of the rollercoaster of emotions she's experienced through her years as an activist. If the legislation is not approved, achieving her dreams will take just a little longer. "It doesn't matter if nothing changes," she says. "At least <i>we</i> changed and that's something." ===== <b> Watch a video interview with Lizbeth:</b> {$media.0.html} Wed, 01 Jul 2009 00:00:01 PDT Alonso Yáñez, WireTap http://www.wiretapmag.org/stories/44311/ California students say no to budget cuts. California, as mighty a state as it is, happens to have an extremely large budget deficit of $24.3 billion. With such a heavy number, there are some very large budget cuts on the horizon, and California’s education budget is supposed to suffer a heavy blow. In May, nearly a thousand students rallied at city hall in Sacramento to protest these cuts, organized by Californians for Justice (CFJ) and Campaign for Quality Education (CQE), and I went to cover it. {$media.0.html}<p><a href="http://vimeo.com/5299508">Education Cuts in California</a> from <a href="http://vimeo.com/namvideo">New America Media</a> on <a href="http://vimeo.com">Vimeo</a>.</p> Mon, 29 Jun 2009 16:00:01 PDT YO! Youth Outlook Multimedia http://www.wiretapmag.org/stories/44303/ Young people seeking mental health care are forced to navigate a web of disconnected school and community-based programs. Is there an easier way? <i><b>Welcome to the first feature in WireTap magazine's Mental Health and Youth series. In the coming weeks we'll examine the myriad ways young people cope with mental and psychiatric conditions and explore what needs to change in order to achieve mental healthcare equity.</b></i> You probably know what to do if you get sick in school. Stomachache? See the nurse, or go home early and get some rest. But what do you do if you're feeling depressed, anxious or having trouble concentrating in class? What's the plan of action when it's not your body, but your mind that feels ill? Adults across the education and medical spectrum are interested in answering these questions. Nationally, teen suicide remains the third leading <a href="http://www.afsp.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=home.viewpage&page_id=050fea9f-b064-4092-b1135c3a70de1fda">cause of death</a> among young people aged 15 to 24. Untreated learning disabilities or mental health problems are also a contributing factor in high school dropout and delayed graduation <a href="http://www.edequality.com/press/archive/preventing_high_school_dropouts_can_start_in_4th_grade">rates</a>. Of the nearly 15 million young people diagnosed with a mental disorder, only about <a href="http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/08/080813114222.htm">one-quarter</a> of them receive the treatment that they need. Pediatricians, psychologists and educators continue to debate over the best solution. Some argue that schools are the best place to reach out to young people while others suggest that primary care physicians are a better route. What is generally agreed upon is that the dearth of mental health resources for teens is an epidemic that can't be ignored. Youth seeking psychiatric care face societal and school stigmas, over-medication and faulty diagnoses. In such a complex mental health landscape, it is difficult to assess what resources are available and what works. Laurie Flynn is the executive director of <a href="http://www.teenscreen.org">TeenScreen</a>, a program that has developed a questionnaire to screen young people for severe depression in schools and medical centers. She says that those parties interested in keeping young people from acquiring mental disorders have an important window of opportunity in the teen years. Flynn explains that those with psychological conditions usually start to display symptoms around the age of 14, when teens are entering high school. According to Flynn, untreated mental disorders can translate into more teens entering the juvenile justice system and increased high school dropout rates. Young people and society both pay a high price for inadequate mental health care. According to a <a href="http://www.bocyf.org/prevention_researchers_brief.pdf">report (PDF)</a> by the National Research Council, an estimated $247 billion a year is spent on social services like child welfare and the juvenile justice system to tackle issues in youth that often stem directly from untreated mental illness. Rosemary Chalk, director of the Board on Children, Youth and Families <a href="http://www.bocyf.org/">(BCYF)</a> argues that it is in the public interest to help young people diagnose mental disorders and seek early treatment. Primary care physicians are often among the first to encounter young people experiencing a mental health crisis. Because a physician's purview is primarily diagnosing conditions and prescribing medications, some are critical of what they see as a resulting over-medication of youth. "Doctors shouldn't always be looking at this issue with an economic eye, they should be asking themselves, 'Is this the right thing to do?'" says John Genrich, a pediatrician from Colorado Springs, CO. Colorado Springs has one of the <a href="http://www.allbusiness.com/society-social-assistance-lifestyle/death-dying-suicide/12316855-1.html">highest</a> suicide rates among cities of its size. Genrich believes primary care doctors should question young people about their mental health, because they may feel more comfortable speaking to a medical professional about these issues than their parents. On the other hand, it can often take a strong parent to become their child's advocate when navigating the many diagnostic and treatment options in the realm of mental health. <b><span style="color:blue;">"You Can't Put a Village on a Shelf"</b></span> Adam Thometz was diagnosed with autism when he was in elementary school. "Since I was one of the special ed students," he explains, "I got teased in elementary school and middle school. I couldn't really stand up for myself." Since his initial diagnosis, he's been through several different schools, programs and doctors. "We were told by the doctors that Adam was probably going to be institutionalized for the rest of his life," says Adam's father Kurt Thometz. "But we did intuit a glimmer of intelligence that made us question the diagnosis, or at least the inevitability of it." Thometz enrolled Adam in an "<a href="http://www.autism-pdd.net/iep.html">inclusion program</a>" at <a href="http://www.nyclabschool.org/group_profile_view.aspx?id=12dbafc6-0f42-4162-afbd-036217e4b43f">New York City Lab School</a>, a progressive public school in New York City. Inclusion schools like Lab put special needs students into mainstream classrooms and offer extra help on the side. "I looked at a special education program where he would be thrown in with nothing but other kids with needs," Thometz says, "but I thought that Adam would rise to the level of the kids that he was around." Adam agrees. "The thing about autistic kids," he says, "is they have hidden talents that no one would really expect of us." Adam was lucky to have a parent who questioned medical professionals' advice and found a school program that was right for him. Many young people lack an adult advocate who can help them navigate the mental health system and explain all the options. "Youth are vulnerable, and the vulnerable are the ones that get hit by the mental health system," says David Oaks, executive director of <a href="http://www.mindfreedom.org">MindFreedom International</a>, a mental health human rights organization. "Often, kids and families are misinformed," says Oaks. "They're told by a doctor in a lab coat that they have a chemical imbalance and this is intimidating to families who love their kids and want to help them to get ahead." According to Oaks, the system is very much oriented to prescribing drugs to "correct" conditions like attention deficit disorder (ADD), depression, schizophrenia, autism and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). According to a survey of recently trained child psychiatrists published in the Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, only one in ten children seen in their practices was not <a href="http://www.psychsearch.net/teenscreen_antidepressants.htm">receiving medication</a>. "It's very easy to get a psychiatric diagnosis and it's very easy to get a label," Oaks explains. He thinks early labeling and drugging of young people is damaging, as it isolates rather than engages them with the community support that they need. "They say it takes a village to raise a child," Oaks says. "Well, you can't buy a village in a bottle. You can't put a village on a shelf." While outside organizations play an important support role, for others, self-advocacy is the first step toward breaking free from unnecessary drugs and misdiagnosed conditions. <img src="/images/managed/Story+Image_sadgirl.jpg"> <b><span style="color:blue;">Questioning the Experts</b></span> Brandon Chambers, 16, is an Oregon student who has a long history with the mental health industry. At the age of eight, he was diagnosed with attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and was put on various medications including Ritalin and Prozac. He now works as a youth advocate for the Oregon Family Support Network (<a href="http://www.ofsn.org">OFSN</a>), a program that helps teens navigate the mental health system. "I think the school wanted me on medication so that they didn't have to deal with me," he reflects. "They wanted me to sit in class and be quiet." He felt that his school did not do enough to support him in his treatment. "There were a couple of meetings with my mom, just informing my mom about how bad I was. I don't believe I ever got a teacher that actually tried to work with me." 22-year-old Chrissy Peirsol works with Chambers at OFSN. She was also diagnosed with ADHD and bi-polar disorder at an early age and was put on various medications. "My mom really didn't care because I was so crazy, she was just like, 'Do what the doctors say.'" Peirsol felt that her mother and the other adults in her life deferred to the recommendations of her doctor without really taking her own opinions on medication into account. "My word had no validity compared to my psychiatrist." Since she discontinued her medication, Peirsol feels that youth advocacy has been therapeutic: "It's really helped empower me by helping me empower others." Like Peirsol, young people with experience battling mental health stigmas and forced treatment are often the most in-touch advocates. Martin Rafferty, 22, is another such advocate. As a youth outreach coordinator, he provides counseling for young people involved in the mental health system. He's concerned that programs like TeenScreen are misguided. "The [surveys] are ridiculous," he says. "The kids don't understand the point of the questionnaire and it's not taken very seriously. But that's not how the answers are perceived." Rafferty worries that patients trust doctors too readily and do not question the treatment. "Society says that if a doctor tells you to take medication, you should." Rafferty thinks that, instead of medicating young patients, doctors should work with families to help young people deal with their feelings. "We need to give young people the chance to work in their community and have real access to positive adult role models," he says. But doctors hastily prescribing meds are just one hurdle young people face in gaining adequate mental health care. Schools also lag behind in giving proper advocacy and information to young people who need support. <img src="/images/managed/Story+Image_notcrazy.jpg"> <b><span style="color:blue;">Schools and Stigmas </b></span> Confronting mental health stigmas on high school campuses is an issue for both students and administrators, says Albert Galves, a former school psychologist from Las Cruces, New Mexico. "We have to get over this idea that there are 'normal' kids and there are 'mentally ill' kids. [Those] who receive the label of mentally ill are told that they are scientifically, chemically, different from their peers, and that they will have that condition for the rest of their lives." They often end up in special education classes where, according to Brandon Chambers from OFSN, students are almost exclusively taught social skills, falling behind on their academic education. "I spent three years in special ed," he explains. "I'm still really behind on my math skills because of it." He fell behind in fourth grade when he was just nine years old. At 16, he is still working to catch up. Dealing with the stigma of mental illness and navigating the system to seek appropriate treatment is especially hard in smaller U.S. cities. Yet even in major metropolises like New York City, students requiring mental health care frequently do not receive the treatment they need. Many end up being tracked into special education courses. The NYC Department of Education has invested a lot of energy into assuaging this problem. In New York City, <a href="http://schools.nyc.gov/Offices/Health/SBHC/MentalHealth.htm">135</a> public schools currently have school-based mental health centers equipped with a staff of social workers, psychologists and psychiatrists who can treat students who either refer themselves, or are referred by parents or teachers. One of these school-based clinics is located at the Martin Luther King, Jr. High School complex in Manhattan, a building that houses six different public schools including Manhattan Theater Lab and the Urban Assembly School for Media Studies. Behind an inconspicuous door labeled "Hospital-based Health Center" are a nurse practitioner, medical assistant, physician, social worker and two psychiatrists affiliated with St. Luke's hospital. This team works with students but is not a part of the Department of Education. "We get walk-ins, students who come in for their sports physicals or job physicals, or we get referrals from teachers or guidance counselors," explains Paula Comi, a nurse practitioner. "If during my interview with a student I sense that they may have some depression or family problems, I'll refer them to our social worker. If they seem like they may be suicidal, or they may be a harm to others, I'll refer them right away to the psychiatrist." At the clinic, all interactions between students and doctors are confidential and free of charge to students. The clinic bills Medicaid for any costs they may incur. Students do need to receive parental consent for treatment unless the service pertains to reproductive health. In New York City, students under 18 are able to seek confidential reproductive health services without parental <a href="http://www.nyclu.org/node/1081">consent</a>. Despite the presence of the clinic on campus, many students are not accessing the services available to them. Students at Manhattan Hunter Science High School, located on the top floor of the MLK complex, seemed a bit in the dark about the St. Luke's clinic. "I didn't even know it existed," said 17-year-old student Nicholas Alexopoulos. Another student, Alvin Rivera, 16, said he might have utilized the clinic's services if he had known about them when he was having some family troubles last year. "I was going through some stuff and I talked to the guidance counselors at my school, but they seemed like they were really focused on grades. I didn't feel comfortable opening up to them because I didn't really know them," he said. He ended up seeking treatment with his mother at Mount Sinai hospital and says he's doing better now. "I don't know that the clinic would have helped, but it would have been something to try," he said. <img src="/images/managed/Story+Image_ofsn-kids.jpg"> At schools lacking clinics, students can get referrals to outside organizations from their health centers or from their principals. "Principals can choose to partner with different community organizations that can help their students," explains Scott Bloom, director of <a href="http://schools.nyc.gov/Offices/Health/SBHC/MentalHealth.htm">School Mental Health Services</a> -- part of the NYC Department of Education. Funding for these programs comes from various sources including private donors, private insurers and <a href="http://schools.nyc.gov/Offices/Health/SBHC/MentalHealth.htm">Medicaid reimbursement</a>. According to Bloom, the goal is to get as many schools as possible to offer these comprehensive services on site to increase the chances that a student will receive the help that they need. A <a href="http://www.nyc.gov/html/doh/downloads/pdf/pub/na-cmh0803-bx.pdf">survey (PDF)</a> conducted by the NYC Department of Health and Mental Hygiene in the Bronx shows that out of 100 students who were referred to an outside doctor regarding a mental health issue, only 43 ever received any kind of treatment. "It's great to do screenings," Bloom says, "but you've got to have the resources to back it up." A good example of Bloom's vision are New York's 21 community schools, which partner with the Children's Aid Society, offering a wide range of social and mental health services (<a href="http://www.childrensaidsociety.org/files/PP_Spring_07.pdf">PDF</a>). The schools are primarily located in the Bronx and Washington Heights where the demographic is largely Hispanic and African-American. Children of new immigrants are particularly vulnerable to mental illness because they often experience separation anxiety and social isolation. Stigma surrounding mental illness is also prevalent in the African-American community. "For many of us, anything other than praying to God is seen as a betrayal," says Terrie Williams, a mental health advocate with the <a href="http://www.thestaystrongfoundation.com/">Stay Strong Foundation</a>. She says that in the black community, mental illness is considered a weakness. "We're the strong ones, we're considered survivors," she explains. "That means that you can't go and say that you can't think straight." She feels that young black men in particular are taught to hide their pain. "They are catching hell every day and we don't pay attention to their pain until it manifests itself outwardly in suicide or school shootings." Ultimately, the most important factor impacting the mental health of a young person may be whether they have an adult in their life that they trust and with whom they can be open about their feelings. "Parents set their kids up for a lifetime legacy of emotional pain by trying to protect them, by hiding from them who they really are," Williams explains. "When we're crying, we hide it from our kids. Every time we lie and say we're fine, we're teaching them that that's what you do. You pretend, you wear the mask." <b>For more information, visit</b>: <a href="http://www.thestaystrongfoundation.com/">Stay Strong Foundation</a> <a href="http://www.mindfreedom.org">MindFreedom International</a> <a href="http://www.theicarusproject.net">The Icarus Project</a> Mon, 29 Jun 2009 00:00:01 PDT Amanda Thieroff, WireTap http://www.wiretapmag.org/arts/44302/ Review: A new book attempts to authentically survey Western pop culture tastes in the Muslim world and mostly succeeds. In light of the president's public overtures to Muslims, the omnipresent background noise about "a clash of civilizations," and a sustained Western fascination with its own influence on everything Muslim, a detailed assessment of the popularity of Western culture and its role in Muslim societies would be welcome. Richard Poplak's <a href="http://www.thesheikhsbatmobile.ca/#"><i>The Sheikh's Batmobile</i></a> is not that book. And as it turns out, that's not a bad thing. <a href="http://www.richardpoplak.com/updates/">Poplak</a>, who traverses almost two-dozen cities across three continents, makes no bones about his real aim: this is not a <i>National Geographic</i> documentary. Rather, it is a sometimes uneven, often funny and always insistent quest to seek out signs of appreciation for Western <i>kitsch</i> and culture among Muslims, an appreciation which Poplak — and none too few of his colorful subjects — share in abundance. A book like this invariably tends to polarize readers. If you want a dispassionate, academic overview of the cultural dialectic between Islam and the West, this tome may not accord with your tastes. If, however, you're willing to join the author on his irreverent excursions to dictators' palaces, blaring Egyptian heavy metal sessions, concerts preempted by Kalashnikov fire, and secret Batmobile laboratories (yes, the book does live up to its name), then you will doubtlessly ease right into Poplak's narrative. Poplak explains in his introduction that he lived as a "white in Johannesburg during the waning days of the Apartheid regime, an Orthodox Jew" clinging to disparate American pop culture icons like Bob Dylan, Magnum PI, and Madonna "so much that I <i>viewed</i> myself as an American." He begins his mission to find Muslims likewise afflicted by cultural disconnect with an attempt to hunt down details of Lionel Richie's supposed shock-and-awe appearance at Colonel Qaddafi's request in Libya. Perhaps my reaction is merely a crude reflection of my own status as a "Generation 1.5" Muslim immigrant, but as I have no idea who <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PDZcqBgCS74">Lionel Richie</a> actually is, reading about whether Richie did or did not animate the Libyan masses was like watching two people argue heatedly in a soundproof room. <img src="/images/managed/Story+Image_we7.jpg"> Nonetheless, the pace picks up as the author heads to the Persian Gulf, meeting a Texan in "Doo-bay" who discusses his semi-clandestine exotic car projects for wealthy sheikhs, a Saudi inclined to smash his expensive TV in reaction to a neutered local remake of <i>The Simpsons</i>, and a media head who strives for entertaining broadcasts in a suffocating <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wahhabi">Wahabbist</a> setting, unleashing his surplus frustration on stress balls. The author is at his best describing such encounters in vivid detail and with a sarcastic, whimsical sense of humor. When Poplak quotes a media flack as saying, "In Saudi companies, there is no culture of analyzing failure...[H]ere, bombs are swept under the carpet" and then adds, "I assumed she was being figurative, but nonetheless stepped gingerly," he is genuinely funny, not hackneyed, as it might otherwise seem sans narrative context. The book has genuine cultural revelations as well, including Afghanistan's entrenched love of WWE pro wrestling and muscleman like <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arnold_Schwarzenegger">Arnold Schwarzenegger</a>, as well as serious underground metal moshpits in Cairo, Egypt and throughout Indonesia. Although Poplak occasionally overreaches by trying to extrapolate broad conclusions from individual anecdotes, he deserves credit for not interjecting, with the doe-eyed naiveté of Disney's <i>Bambi</i>, a forced and fake yarn about Western cultural artifacts single-handedly "building bridges." In his extensive section on <a href="http://www.myspace.com/we7">Israeli-Arab rappers</a>, for instance, we get an unvarnished picture of music as an outlet for a seething frustration that spills into a near-violent confrontation with competing Zionist rappers. <i>The Sheikh's Batmobile</i> is, all told, an engaging effort. The book is not a magnifying glass searching for Western brushstrokes on an Islamic canvas, but rather a kaleidoscope that bounces the reader's assumptions and expectations off the colorful mirrors of zestful narrative and impressive legwork. <b>Palestinian rappers GTown</b> <a href="http://vids.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=vids.individual&videoid=21717414">G-Town live on the ( jerusalem cinematheque) stage on 28/10/2007</a><br/><object width="425px" height="360px" ><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"/><param name="wmode" value="transparent"/><param name="movie" value="http://mediaservices.myspace.com/services/media/embed.aspx/m=21717414,t=1,mt=video"/><embed src="http://mediaservices.myspace.com/services/media/embed.aspx/m=21717414,t=1,mt=video" width="425" height="360" allowFullScreen="true" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent"></embed></object> Fri, 26 Jun 2009 00:00:01 PDT M. Junaid Levesque-Alam, WireTap http://www.wiretapmag.org/stories/44291/ The ancient sport of pigeon racing is alive and well in Baltimore. {$media.0.html} Thu, 25 Jun 2009 10:00:01 PDT Current TV http://www.wiretapmag.org/stories/44300/ Citizen Aim is a 27 year old emcee in Yuma, Arizona who might literally rap his last breath. {$media.0.html} Thu, 25 Jun 2009 10:00:01 PDT Current TV http://www.wiretapmag.org/arts/44296/ The Oscar Grant Memorial Arts Project inspires artists and activists to heal their communities with poems, paintings and photography. <i>(This feature originally appeared at <a href="http://www.urbanhabitat.org/rpe/oscar-art-of-protest">Urban Habitat</a>)</i> "The role of the revolutionary artist is to make revolution irresistible." —Toni Cade Bambara, Writer and activist People are angry. Sometime after the midnight hour, a 22-year-old black man was murdered on New Year's Day — another innocent victim of police brutality. His name was Oscar Grant, shot and killed in Oakland, California by a Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) agency policy officer. Onlookers video-phoned the horrific spectacle: Grant surrounded by officers, unarmed, bleeding to death on the station platform, his arms shackled behind his back, his face pressed against the cement. Several hours later, Laron Blankenship, a friend of the deceased, locked himself in a sound studio. He flashed back to the words Grant had spoken to him one day, "No matter what happens, even if I was to die, don't quit doing this music thing." His hands trembling, crying and near broken down, Blankenship produced a compelling rap anthem dedicated to Grant, "<a href="http://urbanhabitat.org/node/3325">Never be Forgotten</a>." He sings, "I know for a fact your soul is still alive and you will never be forgotten." A few days later, artist and activist, Melanie Cervantes' memories flooded back to the many instances of police brutality she witnessed growing up in Los Angeles. At five years old she watched the local library call security to kick her father out of the building. As a teenager, police victimized her peers on a regular basis. She says the video-taped beating of Rodney King and the later riots induced post-traumatic stress, which was re-triggered by Grant's all too similar death. Spurred by these emotions, Cervantes and fellow artist Jesus Barraza create a visual call for justice that would resonate within the community and beyond. In a single evening, within the confines of their kitchen, they produced the first 50 silkscreen copies of their widely distributed poster bearing the slogan "<a href="http://urbanhabitat.org/node/3167">Justice for Oscar Grant, Justice for Gaza, End Government Sponsored Murder in the Ghettos of Oakland and Palestine.</a>" One week later, during a protest demanding justice for Grant, a young Mexican woman's voice singing in her ancestral Nahuatl language inspired graffiti artist Desi of Weapons of Mass Expression, while he painted the face of Grant in vibrant colors on the plywood sheets boarded over the windows of a 14th Street storefront. It read, "<a href="http://urbanhabitat.org/node/3159">Rest in Power Oscar Grant</a>" and "All Power to the People." <img src="/images/managed/Story+Image_gwen+harlo.jpg"> Thousands have been appalled by the Oscar Grant shooting and have taken a stand to fight injustice. Many have chosen to creatively express their stance through the arts. Its forms have been many: Songs have been written and dedicated to Grant. Poems, paintings, and posters have been created. Graffiti artists have painted murals. These artists have contributed works to the <a href="http://www.urbanhabitat.org/rpe/oscar">Oscar Grant Memorial Arts Project</a>, an online, print, and multimedia compilation of works dedicated to Grant's memory. Editor Jesse Clarke at Race, Poverty and the Environment says he co-sponsored the project because, "Art is an essential element in building the movements for social change. Oscar Grant's murder is a catalytic event that crystallizes underlying social and political tensions." Clarke says, "If his death is memorialized and communicated as a representation of those tensions, it can help build a movement. Similar tragic incidents which do not get codified can leave people feeling traumatized, disempowered, and more isolated." <b><span style="color:blue;"> Movement Art</b></span> From the civil rights movement in the United States to the antiapartheid struggle in Africa and environmental activism internationally, art has been used as a symbol, to frame the message, to attract resources, to communicate information, and foster emotions. "The strongest voice I have is my art," says graphic artist Santos Shelton, another contributor to the memorial project. "Every day, people of color in this country are reminded that they don't matter by the powers that be." He says he made his piece entitled "<a href="http://urbanhabitat.org/node/4206">Fighting for the Lost</a>" because "Regardless of the fact that a president is black, the generations of hatred and social injustice that are still within society will take way longer to change." According to sociologist Jacqueline Adams, movement art helps communicate a coherent identity, mark membership, and cement commitment to the cause. It's not only pervasive in many movements, it's instrumental in the achievement of a movement's objectives.[1] Craig McGarvey, quoted in Art, Power, and Social Change agrees. He says art is a catalyst that makes change possible as it shapes the dreams, aspirations, and problems of people, thus inspiring them to work with activists/organizers to develop their collective authority and ability to build their community.[2] "We dream it and then we manifest it into some form of reality and then it can actually happen. It's an accessible way for people to identify with the issues and the movement. You can argue with protesters but not with the painting," says muralist Desi. Movement art is a crucial means of attracting people, pulling them together, and opening up their interconnectedness, McGarvey explains. Cultural change is made possible by the connecting influence of cultural exchange. "Two summers ago, myself and a lot of other artists were working on an antialcoholism mural at the Raindeer Indian reservation in northern Cheyenne, Montana," says Desi, reflecting on an experience where he witnessed people provoked to change by an artwork. "It was two to three stories tall, in the center of town, at an intersection. During the process, people were crying. Many came up to us, emotionally moved by the piece, promising to check themselves into Alcoholics Anonymous." <img src="/images/managed/Story+Image_bartshoes.jpg"> <b><span style="color:blue;"> A Catalyst for Social Change</span></b> From art emerges political and cultural resistance. We've seen it in the Civil Rights movement through the tradition of music in the African-American church, and in the farmworker rights movement through teatro in the fields. The birth of the hip-hop movement in the Bronx paved the way for a marginalized group of black and Latino youth to express themselves, communicate their experiences, and criticize social inequality and poverty. The use of photography by the Mothers of the Disappeared at Plaza de Mayo, in the context of post-dictatorship Argentina, reminds us of the state violence done to those denied the most basic human rights and the recognition of citizenship in a functioning democracy. [3] On behalf of mostly elderly Filipino and Chinese tenants who were fighting a battle against eviction at the International Hotel in the 1970s, artists protested alongside tenants and other advocates to become the cultural arm of the struggle by silk-screening protest posters, painting murals on the I Hotel, and producing exhibitions and publications. It wasn't until hundreds of artists marched down Mission Street, with their faces painted white protesting the displacement of people of color in San Francisco, did the global mass media finally pay attention to the anti-gentrification message advocates had spent years trying to get across.[4] Rooted beneath these acts of artistic liberation, produced by the soul's inherent expressive nature, is the artist's pain. Lives entrenched in poverty and hunger, a desperate need for healthcare, gender inequality, police brutality, institutionalized racism, and the myriad other evils of the system create deep wounds in the psyche. Creative visionaries recognize these injuries and their efforts are intrinsic to the healing process. "The complexity of the racial reality comes down to the economy. Crimes happen because of poverty, which happens because of no jobs, yet millions of dollars are going into the police force," says Cervantes. "I hope people see how various struggles are connected." "Police harassment is a symptom of the prison- industrial complex—it's more valuable to put people into prison than to educate. It's about trying to maintain power," Desi argues. <b><span style="color:blue;"> The Struggle Continues</span></b> In 2009, in honor of Oscar Grant, artists are once again compelled to speak out using the greatest gift that they know how to use. They hope to spark change, fight corruption, and build stronger communities. Their designs not only critique the failures of the system that denies many of their human rights, but also pose solutions and open avenues to social health. "The last time I spoke with Oscar Grant was the day he called me to wish me a happy birthday on December 3. I felt like getting back at the police officer. But instead, I wrote," says Grant's friend Blankenship. "I grabbed a dictionary to look up a couple of words to define the pain I fel t— 'overwhelmed,' 'overexposed,' and 'despair,'— another innocent life gone. But my rhymes are not just for my situation. It's for those that have lost someone dear and are feeling like life's a wasteland." For poetry writer and activist Dee Allen, this was the best way she could pay homage to the memory of an African American working class man who was denied his right to a fair chance. "Bay Area Rapid Transit's management needs to know that the public will not forget this act of violence. No community — black, brown or white — needs young sacrificial lambs slaughtered because of some cop's racist/classist power trip," says Allen. <i> Brutality, never an "accident" It's systemic And replicates itself In different cities to the nth degree. Bleeding Stony hearts blame such handiwork On "a few bad apples." And everyone knows How that tired old maxim goes. Tell that to the last Victim inside the chalkline.</i> (Excerpt from <a href="http://urbanhabitat.org/node/3882">Face Down</a> by Dee Allen.) Houston hip-hop artist Rukus chose to reach out specifically to Oscar Grant's daughter. He wrote a song called "Dear Tatiana" like a letter, and dedicated it to her. "We all know that this is unjust. People are gonna' march. People are gonna' protest. There's gonna' be a big court battle. Hopefully, this guy will end up going to prison," says Rukus. "But at the end of the day when the dust is settled, when the last person has marched and put down their picket sign, there's still gonna' be a young girl that doesn't have a father." <i> Dear Tatiana, Please don't ask why does a man have to die just to touch the sky. I don't have the heart to lie and say it's alright when your daddy isn't home tonight... This is for father's day, this is for single parent fathers who really give a damn and take care of their daughters. Ay. This is the way I pray, wishing for a better day. I'm staring at the picture of concrete where a brother lay.</i> (Lyrics from <a href="http://urbanhabitat.org/node/3948">Dear Tatiana</a>.) <b><span style="color:blue;"> The Power of Icon</span></b> The images created in memory of Oscar Grant, from the compelling figure with a halo and a spear, to the countless graffiti and poster prints of his face, bring to mind icons of past struggles. One can see the resonance with "Handala," the image created by Palestinian cartoonist Naji al-Ali's, which portrays a 10-year-old refugee boy with ragged clothes, bare feet, and his back to the audience — a symbol of Palestinian struggle and defiance.[5] One can hear thousands of demonstrators marching through Mexico City chanting "Todos somos Marcos (We are all Marcos)," referring to the Zapatista Subcomandante who was being hunted by the Mexican government. Oscar Grant's memory lives on — encased in collective artistry, something that can't be killed. Epitaph expressions painted on the side of buildings, gates, and even on mailboxes, echo the heart of the masses, "I am Oscar Grant." <i>To see the full compilation of creative works in the Oscar Grant Memorial Arts Project visit: <a href="http://www.urbanhabitat.org/rpe/oscar">www.urbanhabitat.org/rpe/oscar</a>.</i> <b>Endnotes</b> <ol> <li>1. Adams, Jacqueline. "Art in Social Movements, Sociological Forum, Vol 17-1 (March 2002): 21. </li> <li>2. David, Emmanuel A. and McCaughan, Edward J. "Editors' Introduction: Art, Power, and Social Change." Social Justice Vol. 33, No. 2 (2006): 1-4. </li> <li> 3. Ibid. page 3</li> <li>4. Martinez,Maria X. "The Art of Social Justice." Social Justice Vol. 34, No. 1 (2007): 1-4 </li> <li>5. Naji al-Ali remarked that "this being that I have invented will certainly not cease to exist after me, and perhaps it is no exaggeration to say that I will live on with him after my death." www.najaialali.com</li> </ol> Wed, 24 Jun 2009 00:00:01 PDT Christine Joy Ferrer, Urban Habitat http://www.wiretapmag.org/stories/44280/ Vermont's youngest elected official shares her experiences in the electorate and her vision for progressive change. Twenty-two-year-old <a href="http://www.kesharam.org/">Kesha Ram</a> is a politician whose career you'll want to keep an eye on. After graduating from the University of Vermont last spring, she ran and won a campaign to become the youngest member of the Vermont House of Representatives, and its only person of color. Ram grew up in Los Angeles, and as a high school student she was involved in environmental activism. She worked to pass legislation banning carcinogenic chemicals from dry cleaning and started a recycling program for her school. At the University of Vermont she received a dual degree in natural resource planning and political science and her thesis focused on the environmental justice movement. As a senior, she was the first person of color to serve as student body president. Ram also served on the Burlington Mayor's Environment and Energy Coordinating Committee. I recently had a chance to speak with Kesha about her influences, her thoughts on environmental justice and the political changes she'd like to see to improve the lives of young people across the country. <span style="color:blue;"><b>Your father migrated to the U.S. from India and your mom is a Jewish woman from Illinois. Has your upbringing in a bicultural home affected your politics?</b></span> My parents were married only a decade after the Loving <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loving_v._Virginia">decision</a> [was made]. I brought that very personal perspective into the public debate and into the legislature while we were discussing [same sex marriage in the state]. Most recently I was approached by [a group of] Congolese women who had just created an organization to focus on the civil war that's happening in their home country of the Democratic Republic of Congo. They saw me as someone who was a salient person, someone who would be compassionate to write a resolution from the state to call on Congress to support the <a href="http://www.amnestyusa.org/violence-against-women/international-violence-against-women-act/page.do?id=1051201">International Violence Against Women Act</a>. They almost felt scared to approach anyone in the legislature because there was too big of a cultural barrier to overcome. [Since I] grew up in a multicultural household, I was really able to form strong bonds [with them]. <span style="color:blue;"><b>Who are the people who have helped politicize you?</b></span> One of my mentors in the legislature is <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rachel_Weston">Rachel Weston</a>. There were very few people under the age of forty in the legislature but she just decided to run and get out there and it was really inspiring for me. We kept in touch [while] I was becoming the student body president at the University of Vermont and she was running for the legislature. I was doing my thesis on environmental justice in the state and the fact that we don't have policies to deal with inequities around lead poising and sewage in mobile home parks. She helped me turn that into a piece of legislation. <span style="color:blue;"><b>You have been involved in a number of efforts to improve the environment. How did you become interested in environmental justice work and what are some of the changes you'd like to see in environmental policy?</b></span> <img src="/images/managed/Story+Image_keesha2.jpg"> One of my greatest modern day heroes is actually <a href="http://www.ellabakercenter.org/page.php?pageid=16&contentid=100">Van Jones</a>. I met him when I was a senior in high school. I [was in] Los Angeles back then where environmental injustices are very apparent. But I had been approaching [the issues] from this very activist angle where, even as a person of color, I separated my passion for the environment from my passion for social justice. I never thought about the connections between the two. And then I met Van Jones who was speaking to a group of environmentalists, [telling them], "You know you need to be thinking about juvenile over-incarceration, you can't be talking to people who are struggling to put food on the table and whose kids have asthma that they need to be saving the polar bears. If you don't think about the social justice component of all of this then your movement will fail." That was incredibly poignant for me because I realized I was speaking this whole different language about what it meant to be an environmentalist. It wasn't really seeing people in the picture. <span style="color:blue;"><b>A number of studies and articles have been released that confirm that low-income people and people of color are being disproportionately affected by the <a href="http://www.wiretapmag.org/blogs/race/44230/">recession</a>, by toxic air <a href="http://www.peri.umass.edu/justice">pollution</a> and by a lack of adequate access to education and healthcare (<a href="http://www.kff.org/minorityhealth/upload/7886.pdf">PDF</a>) in their communities. What kind of work needs to be done on a local and national level to change these inequalities?</b></span> As a former preschool teacher, my real passion is for early childhood education and the accessibility of higher education. The dollars spent in early child education are shown to prevent so much crime and school dropout from happening later on. At the same time, you have to give all young people an equal opportunity to dream. I think right now we have a really big problem with the cost of higher education. I'm hoping to join a growing chorus nationally of people who are telling President Obama that we're really cutting certain people off from educational opportunities. <span style="color:blue;"><b>What are some of the more challenging or rewarding parts of your work since you've been elected?</b></span> Challenging and rewarding are synonymous for me in some ways. I was just working on green jobs legislation this year which is something that is near and dear to my heart. I think [there is a] strong connection between cleaning up the environment, putting people back to work and showing people that you don't have to pit people against environment. With every new issue you think, <i>Wow that's a great piece of legislation</i>. Then you hear some really compelling arguments from the other side and at some point you have to say "yes" or "no" to something. You may be able to amend it, but at some point it becomes a very black and white decision that you have to make. That can be a real challenge. <span style="color:blue;"><b>Oftentimes, I think young activists and organizers who are invested in grassroots work feel that there is a disconnect between the work they're doing and the work being done on a government level. Have you felt this disconnect? How do you think both sides can bridge that gap?</b></span> <img src="/images/managed/Story+Image_keesha3.jpg"> Part of the reason I ran [for office] was because I saw young people getting excited [about] what was happening on a national level but not on a state and local level. In some ways there is a lamentable lack of awareness about what happens in state legislatures or city councils. There was a lot of excitement for what could happen if not only Barack Obama was the president but if we got more young people and more dynamic Democrats at a more local level. I saw young people get excited in a way I've never seen before. I just think we need to do a lot to uphold that momentum. I think, so far, young people are proving that they are staying involved and they are holding the president's feet to the fire. <span style="color:blue;"><b>Even though your term has just begun, do you have any thoughts about what you'd like your future political career to look like?</b></span> I'm really, really happy with what I'm doing now. For someone at the age of 22 to land a dream job and to be able to figure out if it's really what they love doing is a huge blessing. I'm taking it one session at a time. I feel like I'm able to make so much of a difference in this regard that if at some point it helps me to advance the causes that I believe in, then I will potentially run for other offices or see what advocacy I can do. But I'm really happy with my position right now and I'm [also] starting a job as the legal advocate for one of our local organizations called Women Helping Battered Women <a href="http://www.whbw.org/">(WHBW)</a>. I just feel so great about engaging in my community and working on legislation that I know matters to people in my district and in my state. Mon, 22 Jun 2009 00:00:01 PDT Nina Jacinto, WireTap http://www.wiretapmag.org/arts/44276/ DJ E Da Boss takes his grassroots connections as seriously as he does international projects, all while putting the <i>hip</i> back in hip-hop. <i>Welcome to the second installment of WireTap's Monthly DJ Series! We believe strongly in the power of art and activism to bring people together. Over the years we've committed ourselves to covering a wide array of new, politically engaged artists, from our long running series on the <a href="http://www.wiretapmag.org/movement/43261/">All-Ages Movement Project</a>, to our election-inspired <a href="http://www.wiretapmag.org/blogs/elections2008/43689/">Vote Hip-Hop</a> contest. Now we're taking it a step further by bringing you exclusive monthly mixtapes and interviews from DJs whose music reflects their ideals -- and it's free. All you have to do is <a href="http://www.wiretapmag.org/subscribe/">subscribe to our weekly newsletter</a>. Current subscribers can just re-enter their email info and get the download link. And no, we won't "double subscribe" your info. Tell your friends about our newsletter so they can subscribe and get free music, too! </i> <b>E Da Boss</b> Meet a working-class American DJ: Part international touring mixmaster with fans in Finland, part homeboy from the block spinning in your local DJ bar on weeknights. Such is the life of San Francisco's Eric "<a href="http://www.myspace.com/djedaboss">E Da Boss</a>" Cooke , a producer, DJ and innovator who has been playing records since the mid-'80s and crafting his own beats for the past decade. He's traveled the world as tour DJ with hip-hop duo <a href="http://www.myspace.com/blackalicious">Blackalicious</a>, released singles on Stones Throw and Om Hip-Hop and he launched his own indie label, <a href="http://www.sleptonrecords.net/">Slept On Records</a>, in 2000. The dichotomy between his large and small projects sums up this open-minded music enthusiast's philosophy: Dream big but keep your feet on the ground. It was this spirit that inspired Cooke, in the summer of 2008, to organize an outdoor block party that raised money for an elementary school music program. This summer, Cooke will fly to Finland to finish an <a href="http://www.stonesthrow.com/news/2009/05/myron-and-e">album</a> with vocalist Myron Glasper and local retro-funk band, the Soul Investigators. The album is due out soon on Stones Throw Records, home to Madlib, Peanut Butter Wolf and J-Dilla. He's also busy recording DJ sets for <a href="http://www.grownkidsradio.com">Grown Kids Radio</a>, an online radio show. Busy as ever, Cooke took a minute to talk to WireTap and broke down some of his influences and experiences. <b><span style="color:blue;"> WireTap: You organized an outdoor street party that was also a benefit for music in schools. Why did you decide to spearhead that event?</b></span> <b>E Da Boss</b>: The party was called "Live on the Lane" and featured the Mighty Underdogs, Mochipet, Maus Haus, Ghosts on Tape and a ton of DJs playing outdoors on Maiden Lane in downtown SF. <a href="http://www.hiptohelp.com/">Hip to Help</a>, <a href="http://www.grownkidsradio.com/about/dj-brown-majic">Brown Majic</a>, <a href="http://www.otissf.com">Otis Bar</a> and myself worked on this event. We thought it would be a really good idea to get all of our musician friends together to help raise money for the children of [Dr. George Washington] Carver Elementary School who were losing their music programs due to state budget cuts. <b><span style="color:blue;"> Why did you choose to do it as a block party? </b></span> We made it an outdoor event so the kids from Carver Elementary School could come and see the acts. If we would have done it in a bar or night club it would have excluded the people we were there to help. <b><span style="color:blue;"> In what way is your DJ or production work political?</b></span> I like to think of myself as political but politics is a strange beast to me. Sometimes in America you have to wonder if the whole political system is really for the people or for groups with enough money to influence the powers that be. It's like an artist who makes a bad album but has enough money to hire the best press and PR; for the right amount of money, someone will put a good spin on it. <b><span style="color:blue;"> Have you been able to use your DJ'ing or production skills to work with young people?</b></span> Yes, too many times to count. I recently DJ'd a function at <a href="http://www.themyc.org/">The Myc</a> in San Rafael. If anyone reading this article knows of children to young adults interested in art, music or video editing, I strongly recommend checking it out. This place is the best facility I have ever seen for youth in my entire life. <b><span style="color:blue;">What song or music transformed you at a young age?</b></span> I would have to say the 1985 single "<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EGhk_TbxfGk">It's Yours</a>" by T La Rock & Jazzy Jay. Even as a child, the first time I heard that song, I knew hip-hop lyrics had moved beyond the infancy stage. <img src="/images/managed/Story+Image_e+da+logo.jpg"> <b><span style="color:blue;">What do you think needs to change to improve the working environment for DJs? </b></span> I think most venues are good. It's mainly promoters that need to step their game up. Just because you circulate a flyer on the web does not mean your party is going to be cracking. You need to get out and promote with well-designed flyers. And if you're not the type to get out and promote, most cities have street teams you can hire to do it for you. <b><span style="color:blue;">What do you want audiences to get from your live sets? </b></span> If I see people dancing, my job is done. There's nothing like making a crowd of people move in unison together. It's one of the best feelings in the world! <b><span style="color:blue;">San Francisco has a rep as a socially and politically liberal town. Have you experienced blatant racism or classism in San Francisco?</b></span> Yes. I live in a not so great part of town and I have had the police stop me thinking that I'm part of a group of undesirables who make trouble in my neighborhood. <b><span style="color:blue;">What do you take away from experiences like that? </b></span> It's a double-sided experience. On one hand, you're pissed because being racially profiled is not fun. But if I had really been one of the bad seeds, it's nice to know the cops are on the job. <b><span style="color:blue;">What gives you hope?</b></span> I'm hopeful every day I wake up that the day will be better than the last. <b><span style="color:blue;">Outside of DJ'ing, what other interests or hobbies do you have?</b></span> I really like to travel. I have been a lot of places on planet Earth but there are so many more places I want to go! <b><span style="color:blue;"> Any last thoughts for the readers of WireTap? </b></span> More <i><a href="http://www.yourdictionary.com/ars-gratia-artis">ars gratia artis</a></i>! <br> <b>E Da Boss -- WireTap Mix Track Listing</b> Intro: Brigadier Jerry-Live At Jack Ruby's 28th Anniversary 1986 Gift of Gab - <i>Hold On</i> (produced by Jake One - E Da Boss skipped out edit) Spectac feat Phonte - <i>Reasons</i> (produced by 9th Wonder) Spear of the Nation - <i>Clap</i> (produced by Aristotle the Great) Declaime feat. Grand Agent & Lil Dap - <i>Welcome 2 Reality</i> (produced by Oh No) The Roots - <i>Act Too (Love of my Life)</i> Maspyke - <i>Step</i> Stoney Rock a.k.a Black Spade - <i>The New African</i> Nosaj Thing - <i>3rd Complex</i> Doom - <i>Gazzillion Ear</i> </br> Fri, 19 Jun 2009 00:00:01 PDT Tomas Palermo, WireTap http://www.wiretapmag.org/stories/44286/ Thomas Robinson struggled in college but found his footing in the labor movement. <i>(This article originally appeared on <a href="http://www.campusprogress.org/cribsheets/4158/the-young-are-the-restless-thomas-robinson">Campus Progress</a>)</i> This is the second installment in a three-part <a href="http://www.campusprogress.org/cribsheets/4117/the-young-are-the-restless-jennifer-pae">series</a> about young activists facing a troubling economy. For the last five and a half years, Thomas Robinson has worked for Allied Barton Security Services as a security guard on the campus of the University of Pennsylvania. Throughout his employment, Robinson has worked the same overnight shift, from midnight until mid-morning. After several years of working, Robinson decided to return to school at Philadelphia's Temple University to get his Bachelor's Degree in Social Work. In the process of transferring to Temple, Robinson applied for financial aid, hoping for a way to attend school and continue working without incurring severe debt through student loans. Unfortunately, the rising costs coupled with low wages quickly overwhelmed him: "I did well for a while but then the money just became too much. Time management also became an issue as I tried to balance my work, my education, and my social responsibilities." Robinson was forced to discontinue his studies. While reflecting on his experiences as a struggling college student and a worker not making enough to support his education, Robinson joined a labor campaign. Known as <a href="http://phillyjwj.blogspot.com/2008/08/about-philadelphia-officers-and-workers.html">P.O.W.R.</a> (Philadelphia Officers and Workers Rising), the campaign is working to win unionization for all of the Allied Barton's employees in the Philadelphia area. The organization is a collaboration of security officers, students, faith leaders, community activists, and Philadelphia <a href="http://www.phillyjwj.org/">Jobs with Justice</a>, all working to get, among other things, better wages for the Allied Barton employees. <img src="/images/managed/Story+Image_jwjlogo.jpg"> As Co-Chair of the P.O.W.R. campaign, Robinson played an important role in establishing an independent union for Philadelphia's security officers in December of last year. Since the creation of the <a href="http://employeefreechoice.typepad.com/pa/2009/03/philadelphia-jobs-with-justice-stepping-up-to-educate-the-community-and-faith-leaders-about-the-employee-free-choice-act.html">Philadelphia Security Officers Union</a>, Robinson is now actively directing his energy towards the passage of the Employee Free Choice Act (<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Employee_Free_Choice_Act">EFCA</a>). EFCA is one of the most contentious debates right now –- the act would strengthen workers' rights to organize a union, which would then represent their interests in the workplace, such as higher wages. According to Robinson, EFCA (S. 560 / H.R. 1409) would impact workers in many ways beyond wages. As Robinson makes clear, unions can help make workers' voices heard: "Having a union in the workplace ensures that collective issues that affect all workers, regardless of industry, are taken seriously. It helps guarantee that discussions regarding wages, benefits, pension, and grievances processes are never ignored, nor forgotten." Robinson also understands how EFCA will help young workers, in particular: "The Employee Free Choice Act will [raise] the levels of employee compensation through collective bargaining...Those that would be new to the workplace would reap some of the benefits of the groundwork that is already being laid, no matter what level of industry they enter at." EFCA would also make the target of unionization for Allied Barton employees more attainable. Presently, the security officers must be organized separately, depending on their primary work site. P.O.W.R.'s main focus is on the Philadelphia Museum of Art, which Robinson says subcontracts 130 Allied Barton security officers. Approximately 65 percent of these officers have already signed a card stating that they would like the Philadelphia Security Officers Union to serve as their bargaining agent in contract discussions. Under the Employee Free Choice Act, this percentage would enable PSOU to seek certification as a union. The perfect storm of the inaccessibility of higher education and labor concerns has transformed Robinson into a fierce advocate for workers rights and economic equality. He is engaged in his community and working hard to ensure that the rest of his peers –- particularly young workers –- are afforded the rights and opportunities that they deserve. Thu, 18 Jun 2009 11:00:01 PDT Adam Raphael, Campus Progress http://www.wiretapmag.org/stories/44278/ Two high school girls swap private and public schools for a day. {$media.0.html} Tue, 16 Jun 2009 09:00:01 PDT Current TV http://www.wiretapmag.org/education/44270/ Children of incarcerated parents navigate the path to college. <i>(This story was originally published on <a href="http://www.youthoutlook.org/news/view_article.html?article_id=8a2c833b2594e0740dd4078ecde19806">Youth Outlook</a>)</i> <i>(Editor’s Note: One of the biggest issues facing the more than 1.7 million children of incarcerated parents in the United States is poor school performance. But those who succeed and graduate must navigate the complicated and frustrating college application process. Tanea Lundsford, 17, is a member of Project What, a leadership program that trains children of incarcerated parents to be advocates. This story was completed as part of the New America Media / YO! Youth Outlook Multimedia Education Reporting Fellowship for youth, funded by The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation.)</i> In a few weeks, I will be graduating at San Francisco’s Herbst Theater with approximately 160 other seniors from San Francisco’s School of the Arts. My mother, grandmothers, sisters and younger cousins will be there cheering. I will have a party at my house, invite all of my friends, eat until I can’t walk, and try to come to terms with the idea that I’m an adult. (I turn 18 the day before my graduation.) Everyone who has been an important influence in my life and education will be there to celebrate with me. My father, however, will be in San Quentin waiting for us to send pictures of the event. The number of children with an incarcerated parent in the United States is 1.7 million, a number that has been steadily increasing in the last few years. For this population, being successful in school is hard enough, but the path to higher education can seem almost impossible. The children of incarcerated parents have been known to have trouble in learning environment and are six times more likely than the regular child to be incarcerated as an adult. Now factor in one of the toughest times for college entry ever and a complicated financial aid and application process. It’s as though we were set up to fail. My father was first incarcerated before I was born, and has been in and out of prison ever since. I grew up in the Holly Courts Projects in San Francisco with my mother and my sister; my mother essentially raised us on her own. Even though my mother did everything in her power to raise us with all of the things she thought we would want or need, my father could obviously not be replaced. We went to visit him sometimes on Sunday mornings. I remember waiting in line for hours behind lots of women in too much make-up and perfume. When I was about 12 years old, my mother was diagnosed with schizophrenia. My father was still incarcerated and my mother, who was always the stable one, was not herself anymore—mentally at least. I felt as if my support system was gone. I immediately became the head of the household, trying to raise my sister and hide my mother’s condition. I started stressing about my situation at home and lagging in my schoolwork. I became a C average student in a matter of weeks. It’s not surprising -- it’s a statistical norm. But then I had an amazing realization that was one of the most important moments in my life. I realized that my grades and school were “my thing.” My grades were the one thing I could control while my father was locked up and my mother was unavailable, trapped in a world of depression. Ever since, I’ve been on the right track. Throughout my high school career, I've tried my hardest to achieve grades that would secure my place at the university of my choice. While many teenagers were out at the movies, I was doing extra credit assignments. While I could have been shopping, I was taking SAT prep courses. College, for me, meant a way out -- a way to break the cycle of incarceration. <img src="/images/managed/Story+Image_prisonfreedomstory.jpg"> Columbia University in New York City has been my first choice college since tenth grade, not only because of the mysterious and quick-moving city it was located in, but because of the quality of the education I could receive there. After doing my research, I finalized my decision to apply there. So when it came time for me to take the grades I'd earned and display my hard work and academic worth on multiple college applications, I often felt that even that wasn't enough. The average college application asks all kinds of questions: from grades to extra-curricular activities, from household income to personal achievements. However, much of the information concerning home life was simply unanswerable for someone like me. Filling in my parents’ Social Security numbers and how much money is currently in their bank accounts can be an overwhelming process. For some people, the complexity and frustration of the process pushes them away from applying to college at all. When it came time for Kashka Washington, a senior at Ida B. Wells High School, to choose the colleges to which she would like to apply, she felt like the process didn’t includes someone like her -- someone whose father is serving time in prison. “All the schools I applied to sound good on paper, but in the long run [the] debt and the paperwork don’t seem worth it,” she said. Washington said that the college applications were based on the idea of a "normal kid,” which alienated her. She preferred a trade or a straight route to learning a skill she could use. She will be attending ITT Tech in the fall. Joyce Anderson, an 18-year-old from Livermore, Calif., had similar concerns. “I think the problem is that the people who are making the application forms and running the college entry process don’t know anyone who is in jail,” said Anderson, who grew up mostly in foster care because her parents were in the criminal justice system. Anderson found the college applications and Free Application for Federal Student Aid, known as the FAFSA, extremely complicated. As a foster child, Anderson is actually able to declare herself an “independent” and sidestep the process -- a fact she didn’t know until late in the game. In the end, Anderson successfully navigated the process and will be attending UC Santa Cruz in the fall. Through my own journey, I began to realize the power of my unique situation. I knew that not many applicants would be able to say that one of their parents was incarcerated and that they themselves were doing something different; they were succeeding and thriving. On April 30, all of my hard-work--all the hours of sweating and struggling through the applications that asked questions I couldn't answer, the time spent completing the FAFSA to the best of my ability, and the hundreds of versions of my personal statement that I cranked out--paid off. I had been accepted to both Stanford and Columbia. Though New York is far away and I don’t have any relatives there, I feel it will be my chance to make a new academic and social life on my own. The majority of my friends will be starting off at local community colleges and making their way to a four-year school within the next two years. This makes me a little anxious about the type of people who will end up in school with me, but after going through the challenges I’ve faced, nothing could possibly take away the joy of accomplishing this dream. Mon, 15 Jun 2009 00:00:01 PDT Tanea Lunsford, YO! Youth Outlook Multimedia http://www.wiretapmag.org/arts/44260/ Spike's classic goes from indie art to one of AFI's top films all-time. <img src="/images/managed/Story+Image_dtrt20.jpg"> Fri, 12 Jun 2009 00:00:01 PDT Keith Knight, WireTap http://www.wiretapmag.org/stories/44264/ America's economic slump is changing the way young people think about higher education. {$media.0.html} Thu, 11 Jun 2009 10:00:01 PDT Current TV http://www.wiretapmag.org/stories/44259/ Opinion: Rather than reinforcing stigmas, ads need to promote holistically healthy lives. "We wanted to do something different," said Jim Pickett, director of advocacy at the <a href="http://www.aidschicago.org/home/index.php">AIDS Foundation of Chicago</a>. "Gay men are tired of hearing they are dirty." Pickett is referring to a new marketing campaign, "How Are You Healthy?" produced by <a href="http://www.lifelube.org/about.php">Project CRYSP</a>. Most of the ads scattered across Chicago's cityscape feature neither condom images nor directives like "get tested." Nonetheless, this is an HIV prevention campaign. For many of us, these ads are a breath of fresh air but also something of a shock. Until Gay Men's Health Crisis <a href="http://www.gmhc.org/">(GMHC)</a> ran the "<a href="http://www.gmhc.org/programs/institute/campaigns/my_boo.html">I Love My Boo</a>" campaign, I didn't know that public health initiatives could address HIV prevention outside the narratives of compulsory testing and condom use. GMHC's ads address gay men as adults rather than focusing on rules like wearing condoms for oral sex. (One recent study shows that only <a href="http://tinyurl.com/laposm">three percent</a> of transmissions occur through this act.) LifeLube's approach, as its <a href="http://www.lifelube.org">website</a> states, is holistic. The assumption, the declaration, is that gay men are healthy. HIV prevention campaigns usually engage their audience with directives. Some have controversially targeted specific individuals, such as Philadelphia's infamous and short-lived "<a href="http://ifbprides.org/ifbp_news_aug06_bgmlc_harmful_hiv_testing_campaign_pulled.php">Have YOU Been Hit?</a>" campaign that ran in 2006. The costly campaign depicted young African American men on the street, one in the scope of a rifle. The ads hit the streets at a time when handgun murder rates were on the <a href="http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/04/01/eveningnews/main2635629.shtml">rise</a>. At first glance, you might think: "What's with the public health directors and city agencies producing these tasteless campaigns?" <img src="/images/managed/Story+Image_haveyoubeensmall.jpg"> That question certainly came to mind when the San Francisco Department of Health debuted <a href="http://socialmarketing.com/campaign.aspx?v=campaign&s=homoboy&id=homoboy">Homoboy.org</a>, an ad campaign depicting a shirtless, muscular African American man decked out in bling with a caption that read, "Don't Be a Bitch, Wear a Condom." Les Pappas, director of <a href="http://socialmarketing.com/">Better World Advertising</a>, the social marketing firm that helped produce the ad, recalls receiving negative and often personal criticism for producing it. It turns out that the campaign was created through a collaborative process including focus groups and extensive target population evaluation. City agencies, private firms and the populations themselves share blame for producing these messages, which begs the question: Do we know what's good for us? Are we simply propagating the same stigma, homophobia and racism vis-à-vis mainstream society through marketing, as seen in the Homoboy campaign? Do these negative, racist and stigma-filled homophobic messages <i>sell</i>? Would positive messages work any better? Can one sell liberation? I suggest no. <img src="/images/managed/Story+Image_homoboy.jpg"> As negative as they are, these narratives serve a purpose. Misconceptions surrounding HIV/AIDS exist, and people are going to consume them, regardless of the message. But populations being addressed by these campaigns need to have the tools to be critical and question what the goals are. These campaigns may spark dialogue through controversy but are not always educational. Stigma and homophobia drive the transmission of HIV, which a plethora of <a href="http://www.champnetwork.org/fighting-homophobia-fight-hiv">organizations</a> are working to combat. So, why not focus on positive messages that strengthen family ties? While "you" are responsible for stopping HIV (as many HIV prevention ads loudly proclaim), so are the organizations that produce hate in the guise of "family values," schools that fail to educate our students in prudent health practices and parents who are too afraid to talk to their kids about sex. I am not opposed to targeted awareness campaigns, but what about all the people who do not think about HIV who should? Isn't it time we stop singling out individuals and start criticizing the institutions that drive this pandemic? These questions are necessary to ensure that everyone who needs to see these campaigns gets the message. For instance, will a young man who has sex with men but does not identify as gay or <a href="http://gaylife.about.com/od/thedownlow/a/downlowdlman.htm">DL</a> benefit from these ads? Departments of health and organizations are limited by their budgets to produce a campaign that "works," but how do we define what's effective? And how do these campaigns justify their effectiveness after 28 years of failing to make a difference? Maybe the problem is marketing itself. Can we expect social change if we use the same venues that oppress us? As New York-based HIV justice organization Community HIV/AIDS Mobilization Project (<a href="http://www.champnetwork.org/">CHAMP</a>) posited in a social marketing forum two years ago: "Are We Selling Us to Ourselves?" I want more positive messages in my neighborhood, school and workplace. These messages need to come from within our populations and make sense to us. It's irresponsible that we allow simplistic ads with messages like "wear a condom" or "get tested" when greater institutional issues such as inadequate education, sexual violence and poverty continue to drive the pandemic. We're placing too much value on the market. What's selling is not always best for us. <i>To learn more about Project CRYSP and the LifeLube project go to <a href="http://www.lifelube.org">www.lifelube.org</a>. You can also find them on Facebook and Twitter @ LifeLube.</i> Wed, 10 Jun 2009 00:00:01 PDT Kirk Grisham, WireTap http://www.wiretapmag.org/stories/44251/ Bay Area-based rapper DLabrie makes the unlikely pairing between hip-hop and chess. To the folks at the <a href="http://www.hiphopchessfederation.org/">Hip-Hop Chess Federation</a>, hip-hop and chess are both universal languages. In this video the group remixes their grassroots approach with Bay Area rapper DLabrie's song "Life Strategies." {$media.0.html} Mon, 08 Jun 2009 16:00:01 PDT Lyrical Swords http://www.wiretapmag.org/arts/44248/ A look into the history and culture of sneaker addiction. In late April, tribes of young people from Kuala Lumpur to Chicago relinquished the comforts of their warm beds and private bathrooms to spend a few days camped out on sidewalks waiting in line. Given the recession, it would be easy to mistake the <a href=http://theshoegame.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/04/air-yeezy-line.jpg>assembly</a> of sleeping bags and lawn chairs for impromptu tent cities. But one look at their freaked-out feet revealed that these were not street kids; they were sneakerheads. The sole fanatics who braved the city streets in April were jonesing for the new <a href="http://www.upscalehype.com/2009/03/update-kanye-west-air-yeezys-215-retail/">$215</a> Air Yeezy -- a collaboration between artist (and self-professed sneakerhead) Kanye West and Nike. Most who waited left empty-handed, casualties of the super-limited quantities. Those lucky enough to spend their money on a pair left feeling like they had won the lottery. Next month, next week, they'll all be clamoring for something new to whet their appetites. Almost everyone owns a pair of athletic shoes and a large percentage of males under the age of thirty have a casual interest in their shoe game. So what separates a sneakerhead (also known as a "sneaker fiend" or "sneaker pimp") from the average sneaker-wearer? Lori Lobenstine, founder of the online community Female Sneaker Fiend <a href="http://www.femalesneakerfiend.com/">(FSF)</a>, explains: "A fiend is someone who's always craving their fix, so a sneaker fiend is always on the prowl for their next pair." Loberstein says her mother remembers when, as a baby, she would scream with delight whenever she got a pair of new shoes. As she grew older and became a tomboy, Loberstein sported high-tops to prove to the boys that she was tough. Nowadays, she favors obscure 1980s basketball high-tops and is quick to point out the signs of other sneaker lovers: "Someone who obsesses about keeping their kicks ridiculously clean, who only wears them on special occasions, who remembers exactly how old they were when they got that certain pair -- like their first Jordans," she says. "[Some] risk not paying bills to buy sneakers, or just always look at folks from the feet up." This voracious shoe quest has only recently bubbled into the mainstream, but the roots of the movement began decades ago. <b><span style="color:blue;">The Legends</b></span> <img src="/images/managed/Story+Image_chucktaylors.png"> Sneakers first appeared in the 1890s when the U.S. Rubber Company began manufacturing rubber-soled canvas shoes. "Keds" were mass-marketed in 1916 and <a href="http://www.keds.com/custserv/customerservicemain.jsp?cid=1">advertising</a> for the new brand touted the shoes' quiet soles and the wearer's ability to "sneak up" behind someone -- hence the nickname. In 1917, Massachusetts businessman <a href=http://www.insidehoops.com/converse-history.shtml>Marquis Converse</a> revolutionized the industry by introducing one of the first shoes <a href="http://www.converse.com/About/FactSheet.aspx?id=3">specifically designed</a> for basketball, a sport <a href="http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/55245/basketball">only</a> 26 years old. A year later, the Converse All Star found its way onto the feet of <a href=http://www.classicsportshoes.com/meetchuctay.html>Charles "Chuck" Taylor</a>, an All American high school player who would go on to <a href="http://www.conversestore.net/Timeline.html">shoot hoops</a> for the Original Celtics, Buffalo Germans and Akron Firestones. In 1921, Taylor received an <a href="http://books.google.com/books?id=Q90VQiXk9RcC&pg=PA45&dq=Chuck+Taylor,+Chicago,+Converse#PPA45,M1">offer</a> to promote Converse shoes. Converse <a href="http://shoes.about.com/od/athleticshoes/qt/conversesneaker.htm">hired</a> the twenty-year-old and Taylor became one of America's first player endorsers. Known as the "Ambassador of Basketball," Taylor spent decades traveling the country on an "evangelist tour," <a href="http://chucksconnection.com/articles/ConverseArt49.html">teaching</a> and spreading the word about the game. Although they became staples of upper- and middle-class wardrobes around the world, sneakers remained limited to athletic environments. That changed in the 1950s when a brooding James Dean appeared on screen. Instead of a slick movie star suit, Dean's signature <a href="http://books.google.com/books?id=pv1FTqckZIIC&printsec=frontcover&dq=shoes+change+your+life#PPA139,M1">look</a> consisted of a white T-shirt, blue jeans and a pair of <a href=http://theselvedgeyard.wordpress.com/2009/01/17/james-dean-in-jack-purcells/>Converse Jack Purcells</a>, named after the badminton champion of the 1930s. With Dean's help, sneakers made the leap from function to fashion and cemented its association with youth, rebellion and coolness. Even with the icon's seal of approval, however, athletic shoes still didn't receive the amount of attention they do now. It took a movement more influential, more magnetic, for sneakers to become the money-making industry of today. It took hip-hop. <b><span style="color:blue;">Hip-Hop Takeover</b></span> <img src="/images/managed/Story+Image_rundmc-adidas.jpg"> Like looping drum beats and cocky lyrics, sneakers have been a part of hip-hop since its inception in the 1970s and 1980s. The way the young pioneers of hip-hop dressed was a reflection of their environment -- that included the skyrocketing rates of crime and incarceration of the 1980s. The trendsetting way artists like <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doug_E._Fresh">Doug E. Fresh</a> and <a href="http://www.egyptsaidso.com/wp-content/uploader/2009/01/run-dmc-6.jpg">Run-D.M.C.</a> wore their sneakers -- no laces with the tongues hanging out -- was really just a <a href="http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=6444453634416523444">copy</a> of the stick-up kids from the neighborhood. The style <a href="http://exclaim.ca/articles/timeline.aspx?csid1=73">originated</a> from prisons where inmates had their shoelaces confiscated out of fear that they might use them to strangle someone or hang themselves. Some prisoners got so used to the practice that they continued the lace-less look after being released. These men were often the toughest and most respected in the neighborhood; it was only natural that youngsters tried to emulate their style. B-boys played a vital role in determining which specific brands became popular. Movies like <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0086946/">"Beat Street"</a> and <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0084904/">"Wild Style"</a> introduced hip-hop to the rest of the country and audiences modeled themselves after the dancers featured in the films. Given the intense footwork involved in breakdancing, a b-boy's kicks couldn't just look good. Breaking crews in the 1980s typically favored Adidas, Puma or Fila -- lightweight shoes that could grip the floor. It took a while for shoe companies to fully catch on to the thriving movement. Adidas executives were <a href="http://74.125.155.132/search?q=cache:IR3gTwyQ6RAJ:www.soleseek.co.uk/tt.pdf+Adidas+Superstar+hip-hop+sudden+demand&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us&client=firefox-a">famously</a> perplexed in 1984 at the sudden spike in <a href="http://www.lawweekly.org/?module=displaystory&story_id=699&edition_id=7&format=html">popularity</a> of their Superstar model, a shoe whose sales had been in steady <a href="http://www.solereview.com/Features/reviews/Adidas/Superstar_II">decline</a> for about a decade. Any American under the age of 25 could have told the bigwigs that the reason for the surprise surge was a trio of 20-year-old rappers hailing from Hollis, Queens. Run-D.M.C. had recently released their groundbreaking debut and were quickly becoming cultural icons. Luckily for Adidas, the group's shoe of <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Rundmc_2.jpg">choice</a> was the shell-toed Superstar. As Run-D.M.C. conquered arenas around the world, sales continued to skyrocket. Still, it took the 1986 <a href="http://www.rundmc.com/index.cfm/pk/content/pid/400092">release</a> of the chart-topper <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yoQ0zNF73rs&feature=related">"My Adidas,"</a> and some arm-twisting from manager Russell Simmons, before Adidas properly acknowledged what the band had done. After years of free publicity, Run-D.M.C. signed an unheard of $1.5 million endorsement <a href="http://www.bizbash.com/newyork/content/editorial/4473_adidas_promotes_shoes_with_run_dmc_charity.php">deal</a>. The deal legitimized hip-hop culture as a target market worthy of respect. While b-boy culture was rejuvenating Adidas and others, Nike fell by the wayside. Stuck with its "white man jogging brand" <a href="http://www.uptempoair.com/nike-air-jordan.aspx">reputation</a>, Nike desperately needed a reinvention. <img src="/images/managed/Story+Image_jordan+nike.jpg"> In 1984, the company <a href="http://books.google.com/books?id=KYP03bw1mVIC&pg=PA47&dq=1984+Nike+signs+Michael+Jordan">signed</a> rookie Michael Jordan, a player epitomizing the excitement and swagger that Nike lacked. The results of this unlikely union turned the shoe industry on its head. Done in a flamboyant red and black color <a href="http://www.nike.com/jumpman23/home/index.html#jordanLegacyContent?contentID=aj01_intro">scheme</a>, the first Air Jordan was unlike anything seen on a professional basketball court. The shoes were so different, in fact, that the NBA had them <a href="http://books.google.com/books?id=v8r__pvCopgC&pg=PA56&dq=NBA+bans+Air+Jordan">banned</a> for being nonconformist. Jordan wore them anyway and was hit with a <a href="http://books.google.com/books?id=v8r__pvCopgC&pg=PA56&dq=NBA+bans+Air+Jordan">fine</a> of up to $5,000 each game. Nike gladly footed the bill -- the controversy combined with Jordan's play on the court proved to be a perfect marketing technique. The success of Air Jordans cannot be overstated. They have consistently been among the year's <a href="http://www.airjordannikes.com/">best-selling</a> shoes since their creation. The name and "Jumpman" logo have become synonymous with not only Nike, but basketball and sneakers as well. According to the documentary <a href="http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=6444453634416523444">"Just For Kicks,"</a> one out of twelve Americans owned a pair of Jordans by the mid-1990s. Yet sneakerheads aren't interested in what's popular; they want what's unavailable. For them, footwear isn't just something that covers their feet and takes them from point A to point B. Sneakers act as status symbols that announce to the world who they are, what they're about and why they're special. Established brands have been more than happy to supply their core customers by releasing old favorites in new <a href="http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/colorway">"colorways"</a> (sneaker-speak for color combinations) and textures. Collaborations with <a href="http://www.kicksonfire.com/nike-sb-skateboarding-releases/nike-sb-skateboarding-2004-releases/09-2004-september-releases/nike-dunk-high-pro-sb-unkle-dunkle-futura-black-white-pink/">graffiti artists</a> and cutting-edge <a href="http://www.sneakerfreaker.com/sneaker-releases/Jeremy-Scott-For-Adidas-js-wings-G04653/">designers</a> have also yielded great successes. The desire for something new has also opened the doors to upstart brands. Japanese labels <a href="http://us.bape.com/">A Bathing Ape</a> and <a href="http://www.madfoot.jp/">Mad Foot</a> as well as San Francisco's <a href="http://www.suite2206.com/home.htm">JB Classics</a> are all building a strong following based on their envelope-pushing designs. <b><span style="color:blue;">Chicks in Kicks</b></span> <img src="/images/managed/Story+Image_sneakers2.jpg"> In many ways, sneakers are the great unifier. Black, white, Japanese, Australian, skater, ballers -- sneaker-lovers come in all shapes, colors and backgrounds. However, one group has historically been left out of the picture: the female sneakerhead. While males still dominate the scene, a writer from <i>Sneaker Freaker</i> notes that women's sales <a href="http://www.sneakerfreaker.com/feature/she-thang-sneakers/1/">were up</a> almost 35 percent from 1999 to 2005. <a href="http://www.femalesneakerfiend.com/">Female Sneaker Fiend</a>, the website Lobenstine founded in 2005, boasts a membership of over 17,000 and is at the center of the burgeoning community. Women around the world flock to the site to communicate with one another, get insight into the industry, and of course, flaunt their footwear. While Lobenstine says that her peers at traditional sites have been supportive of FSF, she started FSF in response to the prevalent male chauvinism found on those same websites. "Whether dudes were laughing at girls on the forums or posting <a href="http://solecollector.com/images/ebay/poster_dunks_550.jpg">sexist photos</a> of mostly naked girls in kicks, I realized sadly… I didn't really belong [to that online community]," she remembers. "It made me decide to create a site dedicated to girls who loved sneakers, with no sexism tolerated, so we knew we had a site where we belonged." Manufacturers have been hesitant to turn their attention to their female customers. Unlike the research and innovation seen in guys' sneakers, women's designs are typically reduced to what Lobenstine refers to as "shrinking and pinking" -- simply shrinking the sizes of men's styles and slathering them in pink and other "girly" hues. Trolling the forums and blog posts, it quickly becomes clear that women take their shoe game as seriously men. "I think they say something important for girls and women who are breaking new ground: DJs, skaters, ballers, rappers, b-girls, rockers -- all use sneakers to show and prove that they belong, just like I did back when I was a kid playing kickball with the boys." Websites like FSF and others have proven to be an invaluable resource for brands looking for insight into the ever-elusive question of what women want. And if Nike, Adidas and the rest of the big boys need any other proof of female aficionados' dedication, they can <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UVjNjVLQBOw">watch</a> rapper Kim D wax poetic on the history of her sizable collection of Air Jordans. <b><span style="color:blue;">Supply & Demand</b></span> <img src="/images/managed/Story+Image_sneakerrack1.jpg"> The process by which these designs make their way to the eager hands of sneakerheads is a ridiculously profitable dance between manufacturers, retailers and resellers. Manufacturers produce limited runs of their latest special edition shoe and distribute small batches of them (around 20 to 30 pairs) to a select list of boutiques. The boutiques then sell them to the public at a minimum of four times the suggested retail price. The math is often based on the amount of buzz surrounding the shoe's release. Not everyone who camps out for new releases is looking to cherish the shoes themselves. Thanks to eBay, reselling is an industry unto itself. At this stage in the process, it is assumed that the coveted supply is either almost or completely gone and the level of demand increases. Even after paying the retailers' inflated price, resellers can turn a serious profit. The best example of how this process works (and doesn't work) is the notorious release of the <a href="http://www.solepedia.com/images/4/46/Pigeon.jpg">Nike Pigeon Dunks</a>. In 2005, Nike produced an ultra-limited run of its Pigeon Dunk skateboard shoe. Only 150 were manufactured and distributed to New York boutiques. Two days before the release date, dozens of people <a href="http://www.sojones.com/news/feb_23_riot_in_nyc_over_new_nike_pigeon_dunks/">camped</a> outside of the Reed Space, which had only 20 pairs available. 70 people were waiting in line when the doors opened. Those lucky enough to get a pair had to be escorted by police to avoid the <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ADIGNcQqTsc">riot</a> that had formed outside the building. When the crowd finally left, a baseball bat and knife were all that remained on the streets. All of this chaos was over a shoe with a <i>suggested</i> retail price of $69. The price retailers actually <a href="http://www.sojones.com/news/feb_23_riot_in_nyc_over_new_nike_pigeon_dunks/">charged</a> was $300. Within just a few days, a pair was <a href="http://www.csmonitor.com/2006/1002/p13s02-lign.html">sold</a> on eBay for $750. Today, the market <a href="http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9C0DEFDB1F30F930A25757C0A9609C8B63&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=all">price</a> for a "deadstock" (never worn) pair of Pigeon Dunks is around $2,000. <b><span style="color:blue;">What's Next?</b></span> The question facing sneakerhead culture is whether it can continue to sustain itself. It has always been a movement brazenly based on conspicuous consumption and excess -- a volatile mix in our current economic climate. Add in the dispassionate and inflated world of reselling and you have to wonder how sneakerheads will adapt. One recent and promising change is the slow, but steady shift away from the purely corporate side of the culture. Companies like <a href="http://www.sneakart.com/bin/WebObjects/SneakArt.woa/wa/homePage">Sneakart</a> and events such as FSF's <a href="http://www.femalesneakerfiend.com/events/cookinupcustoms.html">Cookin Up Customs</a> are helping to celebrate sneakers as a form of self-expression and creativity. Lobenstine feels this a conscious effort. "What we share is our love for kicks, but what the site gives love to is the fiends," she says. "Instead of highlighting Nike's latest exclusive-exclusive release, we highlight the girl who sleeps out [on the street] for them. Instead of fawning over the companies, we fawn over the artists who make their sneakers into one-of-a-kind works of art. And instead of sucking up to the industry, we dedicate ourselves to the community." <b>Sites Every Sneakerhead Must Know:</b> Female Sneaker Fiend: <a href="http://www.femalesneakerfiend.com/friends.html">http://www.femalesneakerfiend.com/friends.html</a> <i>Sneaker Freaker</i>: <a href="http://www.sneakerfreaker.com/">http://www.sneakerfreaker.com/</a> SneakerPlay: <a href="www.sneakerplay.com">www.sneakerplay.com</a> <i>Just For Kicks</i> Documentary: <a href="http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=6444453634416523444">http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=6444453634416523444</a> Hypebeast: <a href="http://hypebeast.com/">http://hypebeast.com/</a> Mon, 08 Jun 2009 05:00:01 PDT Anika Brown, WireTap http://www.wiretapmag.org/stories/44244/ Column: A young Sri Lankan wonders if there were any true victors. <i>(M. Junaid Levesque-Alam's <b>Crossing the Crescent</b> column runs every first Friday of the month and covers American Muslim identity, U.S. foreign policy, and international politics.)</i> <a href="http://www.thenation.com/doc/20040503/greider">Critics</a> bemoan the United States and its allies' failure to decisively defeat Islamist militant movements, casting a pall over the policy debate and ceaseless invoking the ghosts of Vietnam. Meanwhile, a fierce insurgency that has haunted Asia for decades conceded defeat last month to the Sri Lankan government, which trumpeted its apparent victory over the Tamil Tigers by holding <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/newsOne/idUSTRE54D1GR20090517">celebrations</a> in the capital. But is this a victory for peace, or merely a victor's peace? Brintha Jeyalingam is <a href="http://www.mcclatchydc.com/117/story/68475.html">skeptical</a> of the Sri Lankan government's claims and intentions. A 29-year-old American activist with the organization People for Equality and Relief in Sri Lanka (<a href="http://www.pearlaction.org/">PEARL</a>), her family is of Tamil origin. Tamils comprise about 12 percent of the population of Sri Lanka; historically oppressed by the Sinhalese majority, they've sought an independent homeland since the nation won independence from England in 1948. In her youth Jeyalingam didn't witness the conflict first-hand, nor did she jump headlong into the advocacy fray based on political preconceptions. Though in her childhood days she helped prepare advocacy letters that her father sent to congressmen and senators, her knowledge of the conflict was minimal. "I had heard my parents saying that they came to the U.S. with expectations to return to Sri Lanka one day," she says, "but it never happened and I never questioned why — I grew up living a comfortable life, ignorant to the Tamil issues." When Jeyalingam visited Sri Lanka to see extended family, her itinerary was confined to the capital Colombo. What ultimately impelled her to broaden her scope was not political interest, but humanitarian catastrophe. "In December 2004 I went to Sri Lanka to visit my relatives. It turned out that I landed there the day after the [Indian Ocean] <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2004_Indian_Ocean_earthquake">Tsunami</a> hit, killing about 40,000 people mostly on the Northeastern coast," she says, adding that she remained in the capital, "[glued] to the television like everyone else while my relatives were making phone calls to find out who survived." It was not until she returned to the U.S. a week later that she questioned why she didn't visit the destroyed villages or the surviving orphans in outlying areas. "At that point I knew I wanted to offer assistance to those affected, but I wasn't sure what it would be." Jeyalingam researched tsunami relief efforts and, in 2005, quit her job to begin volunteering with the Colombo-based <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tamils_Rehabilitation_Organisation">Tamils Rehabilitation Organization</a> (which two years later was blacklisted by the U.S. government for allegedly funneling money to the Tamil Tigers). She spent time in Colombo and then in Kilinochi, to the northeast, absorbing information about reconstruction projects, relief efforts and funding opportunities. But that's not all she learned. <img src="/images/managed/Story+Image_femalesoldierr.jpg"> "As I met more people living in the Northeast," she says, "I saw a clearer picture of the human rights abuses the Tamil population faced for the last 60 years." She learned of and soon joined a local human rights organization, the Northeast Secretariat on Human Rights, and heard people relate the horrors of life in government-held areas, "where sons were abducted by armed men in white vans within military high security zones; where daughters were raped and killed when walking nearby military bases; where families were massacred in their own homes." Locals reported <a href=" http://www.nesohr.org/hrr/?show=all">human rights violations</a> including assassinations and kidnappings targeting key civil society members, as well as young women and children. The binding theme? "All were Tamil," Jeyalingam says. She remembers a particularly striking experience from August 2006, when government forces bombarded an area approximately 20 miles away from where she was volunteering. "[P]eople were used to daily bombings; sometimes we would not know where it hit, but could feel the ground shake and hear the fighter jets scraping the sky," she observes. Jeyalingam learned only hours later that the bombs fell on a residential camp where high school girls were being trained in disaster relief; 53 died and hundreds were wounded. Her touching account deserves to be quoted at length: "Our organization started to immediately piece together a report with these accounts and collect information about the girls. We were able to get individual school photos of all the girls over the next few days and were preparing the report. My mind was racing, I was trying to comprehend what just happened, and write the report at the same time. At one point I looked at my desk, which was covered with small 1" x 1" photos of these beautiful girls, hair tied neatly back, hope in their eyes. I wondered what each one of their dreams were, what they wished for and whether or not they were able to laugh enough in the last days before their death. In the middle of these thoughts, I picked up one photo and on the back, the name 'Brintha' was written. A Brintha with such a different and cruel fate. That forced me to think about what my role was going to be in the Tamil cause, so that the next time I see someone named Brintha, she is alive." Jeyalingam's experiences on the ground doubtlessly inform her assessment of the government's claim to total victory. "I do not believe that the Sri Lankan government has achieved any kind of 'victory' as reported in the mainstream media," she says, adding that only genuine recognition of Tamil grievances would prove meaningful. Is the national government committed to accommodating the Tamil minority's concerns and aspirations? Present and past indications inspire little confidence. As noted in a <i>New York Times</i> <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/27/opinion/27wed3.html">editorial</a> titled "No Victory in Sri Lanka," President Mahinda Rajapaksa "callously rejected international pleas for a cease-fire to let civilians escape the war zone, while his troops shelled the area" in the waning months of the war, and his vague statements about reconciliation so far lack <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/20/world/asia/20lanka.html?_r=1&scp=2&sq=sri%20lanka&st=cse">specifics</a>. While acknowledging that allegations leveled at the Tamil Tigers (as well as the army) of using civilians as human shields should be investigated, Jeyalingam points out that it was the army that refused several ceasefire offers in April and May. Citing massacres committed against Tamils in the past several decades, she believes that reconciliation will not come easily. <img src="/images/managed/Story+Image_srilankaflag.jpg"> UN officials place the Tamil civilian death toll since January 2009 at 20,000, and, she says, the government is still preventing international aid in some camps ("every Tamil is suspected of being a 'terrorist' and has no protection"). Jeyalingam therefore believes that the government's actions thus far amount to a sort of slow-motion genocide. She is resolved to continue to struggle for Tamil rights from wherever she happens to be, forming part of an extensive Tamil diaspora that, as one <i>Times</i> blog headline <a href="http://thelede.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/05/18/outside-sri-lanka-tamil-diaspora-not-ready-to-surrender/">announced</a>, is "not ready to surrender." "Some analysts have claimed that a younger generation of Tamils could be 'radicalized' leading to new forms of terrorism, which I find completely absurd," Jeyalingam says. Highlighting the <a href="http://www.pearlaction.org/action-alerts/2009/aa83.php">value</a> of action alerts and outreach efforts, Jeyalingam says, "If one looks at the efforts of the younger generation, you will see that they are using grassroots advocacy to engage with their elected officials and human rights organizations." Such activism, she says, offers a distinct advantage: "This is a movement that the Sri Lankan government cannot defeat militarily." Fri, 05 Jun 2009 00:00:01 PDT M. Junaid Levesque-Alam, WireTap http://www.wiretapmag.org/stories/44247/ Opinion: What is the real price for journalism in the 21st century? Last night, over fifty people gathered at Freedom Plaza in Washington D.C. to hold a candlelight vigil for <a href="http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/31042169/">imprisoned journalists</a> Laura Ling and Euna Lee. The two reporters for <a href="http://current.com/">Current TV</a> were in China filming a piece on sex trafficking when they inadvertently crossed the border into North Korea. They were detained by North Korean forces and have been awaiting trial for the last three months. The trial began today and there is still no word on the fate of the two journalists. The D.C. event was <a href="http://www.usasianwire.com/release.php?id=1675541660">one of six</a> happening across the nation, with people from Los Angeles, San Francisco, Chicago, Boston, Portland, and Birmingham all coming out to show their support. At the vigil, fellow Current Journalist Dan Beckmann shared his experiences working closely with Ling and Lee. A letter of support written by recently freed Iranian-American journalist Roxanna Saberi was read, along with remarks from Lucie Morillon of <a href="http://www.rsf.org/-Anglais-.html ">Reporters without Borders</a>. The group tracks freedom of the press around the globe, and runs a tally of journalists and media makers who have been abducted, killed, or imprisoned for their commitment to the truth. So far this year, 21 journalists have been killed, 143 were imprisoned (along with nine media assistants), and 70 cyber-dissidents (including bloggers) have been imprisoned. <img src="/images/managed/Story+Image_cimg0178.jpg"> <b><span style="color:blue;">Press Freedoms Under Attack</b></span> The purpose of a free press has been a major topic lately, with many newspapers and legacy media institutions running low on funding and slashing their coverage of local news and in-depth reporting. What Ling and Lee were doing with Current TV's <a href="http://current.com/vanguard-journalism/">Vanguard program</a> was an attempt to reverse that trend by creating accessible journalism that covered topics like the recession and the drug war in Mexico in a way that was understandable for a wide audience. Ling and Lee's work is invaluable to what I do as a media maker. As we enter a world where corporate interests often trump stories that impact every day people, Current TV's work developing user generated content and training citizens to become journalists is rapidly emerging as a model to follow to keep citizens engaged in their communities. But, it is like the old truism: Nothing in life comes for free. In the process of fighting for truth, we have to dig deeper and go to places we never thought we'd go, often at the risk of running afoul of authorities who would rather this information was not released. I read an article published in the <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2009/apr/13/investigative-journalism-protecting-sources"><i>Guardian</i></a> newspaper a few weeks ago where the writer noted that with all the monitoring of digital sites and email addresses that investigative journalists would be wise to adopt the tactics of drug dealers to keep their sources safe. While it seems ridiculous that reporters would need to buy prepaid phones by the pound and run messages via courier, we may be approaching a time where information will be worth as much as a kilo of cocaine and possessing this information will be just as dangerous as trying to run drugs. This is why Lee and Ling's case matters so much. We all hope