Gentilly Girl- a part of the 99%

May 3, 2008

The Second Time on the “Second Lines”…

Last Saturday, a major dissing of our Cultures and Traditions here in New Orleans went down: Da’ NOPD broke up a Second Line, a Jazz Funeral, in the Treme last Saturday. (Of course the local paper didn’t report on the event until the wee hours of the morning today.) This was as the mourners had finished and were walking to a place to share the Repast at a Community Center.
For those of you unfamiliar with the concept of this kind of funerary rite, here’s what it entails:`a procession heads toward the ceremonial place of passing (could be a business, a fishing hole, a certain park or the cemetery.) A brass band leads the folks playing dirges. When the selected place is reached, the words are said and the departed is ready to move on. Then the band strikes up a different beat and the mourners start to dance in order to help their friend move on to the other World. “Dancing them Home” is also a way to stop the tears and just remember our friend as we continue through day-to-day life. We are a Family. We take care of our own.
Once the Second Line is done, the folks gather in places and share food, drink and stories about the departed. Some members of the “Family” might be at one place, others at others. But this is usually how it goes down.
This is a Sacred ritual. It is rooted in Culture and Tradition, Respect and Humanity. This act is seen as essential by many of us as part of our Heritage and our City. Events such as this define us as a people and a Culture, the continuation of what has been for many, many years. As a Native I will say now: “This is part of our Birthright, our being a part of the Life that moves through the heavy damp air as it sways the Spanish Moss on the oak trees. Here is where we came from and in the fullness of time where we shall return. The muddy waters of Old Man River, the clays in the swamps… the scent of cypress trees… all of these things are also part of us. We dance the Dance of Life, knowing full well the fragility of the living, and we will not give our ancestral ways up. This is our home and these are our Traditions. This is OUR Dance.”.

This is why what happened last Saturday is an attack and an affront to the Culture of New Orleans. It is orchestrated by those of money and power. Our city is badly damaged by the Federal Flood, and they want the land for speculation, for those who would buy a condo near the French Quarter in order to “celebrate” three days once every year at Mardi Gras. To break the back of the old Cultures in order to be able to schedule and charge for every little thing we locals do as a matter of course. To make their way our way. These are the desires of malignantly evil creatures.

These are the carpetbaggers, those who swoop down when the we are hurting and gnaw on our bones even as we die. They only see New Orleans as a cash register, not the living entity that it truly is. Our Life, our city’s Life, is something they can never know. The Spirit of Place can never enter them because they cannot “feel”.

New Orleans belongs to Her people and they to Her. Native or adopted, it doesn’t really matter: we are all infected with Her elixier… the “Water of Life”. Our strange little anachronistic bastion of the Old World infused with the desire to just be ourselves in the midst of American Culture gone crazy. The reminder of what could be, if only one accepts it.

One paragraph of the above article caught my eye:

“Snuffing Saturday’s parade was an “attack on the culture,” the same culture that gave birth to the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival, said Wilson’s longtime friend, Jerome Smith. He found the timing ironic: At about the same time that police had scattered an authentic funeral march, near Esplanade and Claiborne avenues, Jazz and Heritage Festival-goers were lined up behind a band at the Fair Grounds, ready to follow a second-line recreated for tourists.”

Need I say more?

Senn Fein

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Perfesser Ashley Morris, a determined lover and defender of New Orleans and Her Culture passed one month ago yesterday. I can almost hear him ranting about this. He did have his Second Line, and he’d be pissed that someone else couldn’t have their’s.
We have established a fund to help his family through this rough period in time. Please donate.

March 7, 2008

Another Reason I Stay Home or in the Starlight…

I freakin’ hate Conservatives.

February 29, 2008

Raise the Drawbridge! Release the Gators to the Moat!

The peasants are revolting! (or they might not be… depends on your point of view.)
Lonely is the head that bears the crown. The Defender of New Orleans paces wearily upon the the ramparts of the Fortress of Orleans pondering the rumors that have been brought to light by his operatives in the Kingdom. He looks out into the fog-shrouded night for the glow from and armed crowd. He tries to listen for the creaking wheels of siege engines being moved into position, the sounds of marching feet or the whoosh of an arrow flying by, but alas, there are no sounds such as these tonight just as there is only the glow of street lamps.

The noble Defender stands guard through the night knowing that one day the end is coming. His End and the ending of all of the magnificent works which he so generously gave to the people of the Kingdom. Tears run down his cheeks as he wonders what went wrong…

I call B/S on the above narrative. Our Invisible Mayor is beefing up security at City Hall months after the fracas that accompanied the City Council Meeting that voted for the demolition of the Projects, but only a week after he informed the World that his picture is now on the Aryan websites. (I wonder if that’s what all the new cop toys must be for: protecting the his castle.)

Yes violent crime is up in the City, but since the Flood there have only been the aforementioned skirmish in the Council Chamber in December and the 5k+ March on City Hall to decry the upward spiral of murders here in Jan. ’07. Nothing bad happened at the march, and the probs during the skirmish was limited to a few “outside agitators”. Outside of the fact that City Hall is a bitch to get to work for your needs, it’s a fairly peaceful place (amazing, ‘eh?)

So why the beefing up of security at this time? Is King Amon-C. Ray going to spring some new crap on us in the near future? Will his minions announce the start of more stupid Nagin tricks upon the city? Or did he sell us to Disney?

I really wanna know.

Sinn Fein!

(Note to self: stock up on Greek Fire and arrows. Should get some more torches and pitchforks. Get boots… flats just won’t do for the assault upon anti-logic. Where’s my Captain’s hat? Hitch teh Katz to my chariot!)

February 4, 2008

“We Don’t Need No Stinking Corporate Sponsors…”

It seems that our “wonderful” invisible Mayor was trying to sell out OUR traditions to the Corporate Pigs.

Mr. Nagin, OUR city’s gov’ment ain’t no freakin’ company: it belongs to the citizens. You are not a fucking CEO, you are OUR servant. Same holds true for anyone who works for OUR city gov’ment. You work for US.

The Social Contract states that we help each other, that we care for each other, and that we arrive at a common scheme of governance. Those who are part of that governance structure obey US. Get that one you jerks?

Not one of you fuckers have the right to sell our culture, our souls, our lives to the highest bidder. We will not allow any company’s “Brand” on us. We are not serfs.  And you and those misfits you have placed in City Hall are not overlords. (Remember the term “Civil Servants”?)

There will be no “Muses, sponsored by Monsanto” or “Proteus by Phillips”. Or “Comus provided by Chevrolet”.

We are the people of this city. This is our culture, our way of living… it is our heart. It is alive, just as it’s been for three centuries. This city is ours, you corporate whack-job.  We are New Orleans, and without us all that will exist is a freak-show Disney version of the real thing. New Orleans, the city and the soul, belongs to US, not you and your corporate B/S.

In other words you SOB, we ain’t for sale.

My ancestors helped found this city, carving a place to live out of the swamps. Some of my family were “Free People of Color”. A few others were Haitians that drove the French from their island. Some of my forebearers were pirates, others fished the seas. Many are my elders that died fighting for our country and the reason for it’s existence. They lived their lives, just as I do.
“This Land is My Land, this Land is Your Land…”. Get the fucking picture you fucking corporate slaves?

Why don’t you, Mr. Nagin and gang, stop trying to brand and sell us, and instead actually do your damn jobs as OUR servants? Otherwise we will storm the Bastille, and you fucks will be toast. (Remember last year?)

New Orleans is OURS. We ain’t for sale. OUR culture belongs only to US, not your corporate masters. We will not be “Branded”.

Sinn Fein!

 

December 9, 2007

Ripping A Soul Apart

This week has been nothing but pain. The house is coming along, but I keep seeing the faces of the boys that died during the Crisis. I’m freakin’ feeling guilty: I still live. Working through the feelings of pain, loss and guilt are nothing but torture. (Last night a friend of ours almost lost it over the death of his good friend last Christmas Eve… I had to come out of my funk in order to try to help.)
Death is no stranger to me: my mom died in my arms when I was 13. That was the start for me: I wound up dealing with the AIDS Crisis a decade later. (do you have any idea what it feels like when everyone but yourself dies in a week from your Billiards team? How about finding out that your clerks are dead?) I remember my friend Adam having to have a lobotomy due to his AIDS dementia: he couldn’t remember my name when I would show to clean his home. I remember bailing a good friend out of jail because of the medications not working well together. I remember taking my coven to the top of Bernal Heights one night to show them the  “void” of light over S.F. General Hospital.
I lived that life, and the now current purging of New Orleans reeks of the same shit. I will not tolerate it.
Decades ago I dedicated my life to service. I knew what the cost was, but I also understood the benefit. (not that I knew that I’d be having nightmares and B/S, not to mention acts of kindness that still haunt me.)
When the Federal Flood happened, I made my decision to fight for New Orleans. Yeppers, my partner Betts tells me to STFU at times, but I continue the fight. The catz sit on my desk whilst I’m going crazy, but they know that Grand Ma is focussed. They understand. Do you understand me?
And ya’s know what? Ya’s don’t want me to go Freya on your asses… I have a ton of catz to unleash. I don’t wish to do that.
Alright, we must fight for Public Housing. We who stand for New Orleans must be there.
We cannot allow outsiders to determine the the future of our city, our home. This place is OURS dammit! New Orleans is our place, and the mother-fucking outsiders should have no say about our future.

At the risk of getting my tail feathers singed, I was the first here in NOLA to bring up Klien’s book “The Shock Doctrine”. Here is an article from ZNet that tells it like it is.

This coming week is the time for those of us who love New Orleans to prove how much we believe in this place… the proof of the pudding when it comes to love of place. Getting our house back means little when thousands of others are denied homes.

WE ARE ALL IN THIS TOGETHER Darlin’s.

I will never be able to have a peaceful sleep in our almost fixed home if I know that there is a Grannie, or an Auntie, Uncle, Grandpa… who cries because they cannot return home, can’t be with their families.

My lament over these last few decades was that I could not die, that the Goddess would not let me die. I’ve always wondered what the reason for that shit. Now I know… the Fourth Battle of New Orleans starts soon. It’s about Humanity over dollars, a Human breath against the ticker tape from the Stock Market. The value of Life and Living…

If you have a heart, and a soul… work with us to stop the destruction of all of these homes. Please, please… don’t let this crime happen. We will pay for this in the Future if it goes down this way.

December 7, 2007

Barbarians At the Gates

Since the Federal Flood of our city I have been monitoring the news, especially concerning the Projects. Know now that I AM NOT a fan of the Projects, but I do understand the need for them at this point in time. People need to be able to come home. (And these folks aren’t the crack-head murderers… they are the Elders who care for the kids and act as teachers)

ThinkNOLA has a piece by Professor Quigley concerning this topic.

I will be at one of the complexes that HUD wants to bulldoze on the appointed day. I’m going to stand for my fellow citizens and against the money/Repug machine’s desires.

Once again this is our time to stand against the money pigs and reclaim our city, our home. We know what New Orleans means… now we have to stand for the most vernerable of our folks. It is time to prove that color doesn’t matter in this city, only love and trust… acceptance… NOLA is our bloodtype. We MUST fight for the soul of our city.

October 30, 2007

What Happens When Yuppies Invade a Neighborhood…

Filed under: Carpetbaggers,New Orleans — Tags: , — Morwen Madrigal @ 7:58 pm

The mother-fucking Christian assholes and Yuppies have finally found a way to destroy one of the best Pagan and Queer celebrations in this country.

I saw this coming in ’95 (not this, but the influence of non- San Franciscan dot-com money pigs buying up the landscape). That’s why I had to leave: a retail manager couldn’t exist with the Yuppies pushing up property values and rents.

The reason I am posting this, outside of the fact that we used the Halloween Celebration to help fund HIV issues for 15 years, is that it could easily happen here. Not just Halloween, but all that we hold as sacred, a part of our Culture could go down the shitter because the “new” arrivals to our city “Just don’t like it”.

I lost my San Francisco to the Yuppie assholes and their ways. I will not lose this battle for the soul of New Orleans. Fuck Yuppies, fuck the rich that desire once-a year condos. Stay out of our city you sliming pieces of money.

October 3, 2007

Is This My World?

Here.

September 19, 2007

Shock Doctrine Redux

Here’s another review of Naomi Klein’s “The Shock Doctrine”.

‘Nuff fucking said.

September 7, 2007

The “Shock Doctrine” in New Orleans

Well just bugger me with a tuning fork: I thought the B/S surrounding the “rebuilding” of the Gulf Coast in general, and New Orleans in particular, was just the Moron-In-Charge and the Corporate Capitalists’ way of having things their way down here. Sadly, I see that the Prophet, the architect of this insanity down here is Milton Friedman, the creator of the Chicago School of Capitalism.

Here’s some snippets from the Guardian UK in their extract of Naomi Klein’s “The Shock Doctrine”. (Read the whole thing please.)
“One of those who saw opportunity in the floodwaters of New Orleans was the late Milton Friedman, grand guru of unfettered capitalism and credited with writing the rulebook for the contemporary, hyper-mobile global economy. Ninety-three years old and in failing health, “Uncle Miltie”, as he was known to his followers, found the strength to write an op-ed for the Wall Street Journal three months after the levees broke. “Most New Orleans schools are in ruins,” Friedman observed, “as are the homes of the children who have attended them. The children are now scattered all over the country. This is a tragedy. It is also an opportunity.”

And:

“In one of his most influential essays, Friedman articulated contemporary capitalism’s core tactical nostrum, what I have come to understand as “the shock doctrine”. He observed that “only a crisis – actual or perceived – produces real change”. When that crisis occurs, the actions taken depend on the ideas that are lying around. Some people stockpile canned goods and water in preparation for major disasters; Friedmanites stockpile free-market ideas. And once a crisis has struck, the University of Chicago professor was convinced that it was crucial to act swiftly, to impose rapid and irreversible change before the crisis-racked society slipped back into the “tyranny of the status quo”. A variation on Machiavelli’s advice that “injuries” should be inflicted “all at once”, this is one of Friedman’s most lasting legacies.”

And:

“Most people who survive a disaster want the opposite of a clean slate: they want to salvage whatever they can and begin repairing what was not destroyed. “When I rebuild the city I feel like I’m rebuilding myself,” said Cassandra Andrews, a resident of New Orleans’ heavily damaged Lower Ninth Ward, as she cleared away debris after the storm. But disaster capitalists have no interest in repairing what once was. In Iraq, Sri Lanka and New Orleans, the process deceptively called “reconstruction” began with finishing the job of the original disaster by erasing what was left of the public sphere.”

I’ve always been a Keynesian type of spirit: a Free Market with checks and balances on certain activities that affected the whole of Society. I never saw this one coming, but thanks to Ms Klein, mine eyes have been opened to Reality. That economic forces would be so brutal to an old culture just to play out their games, to justify their philosophy. My heart hurts, and mainly it hurts because we here in New Orleans may just lose this battle and become as banal a place as almost every other locality in the country is.

“This desire for godlike powers of creation is precisely why free-market ideologues are so drawn to crises and disasters. Non-apocalyptic reality is simply not hospitable to their ambitions. For 35 years, what has animated Friedman’s counter-revolution is an attraction to a kind of freedom available only in times of cataclysmic change – when people, with their stubborn habits and insistent demands, are blasted out of the way – moments when democracy seems a practical impossibility. Believers in the shock doctrine are convinced that only a great rupture – a flood, a war, a terrorist attack – can generate the kind of vast, clean canvases they crave. It is in these malleable moments, when we are psychologically unmoored and physically uprooted, that these artists of the real plunge in their hands and begin their work of remaking the world.”

Sorry you “Creators”, I don’t wish to be a part of your freakin’ experiment. I want our City back.

Fuck you Chicago School capitalism. Fuck you to the Nth degree. I don’t desire your kind of “purity”.

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