right-wing amerika/veteran's day

soldiers don't sacrifice their lives, corporations and politicians sacrifice the soldiers for profit

you can think whatever you want of me, that i'm wrong and 'unpatriotic'
just as i have the right to think of you as a whack job nationalist/imperialist.
probably racist.
which often goes with misogynist
and fundamentalist.

so many nasty words for you.
no wonder right-wing media takes so many low blows at progressives, socialists, anarchists, feminists
call us bleeding-hearts, dumb, idealistic
because you can't understand the world outside of your privilege and power.
fear a world not being consumed by christian capitalist amerika

there was a world before amerikan imperialism.
there will be a world after.

amerikan math

capitalism+white paranoia=racist police state
bullying and gender policing=squash diversity, deny nature, kill difference
national borders+free trade+sweatshops+oil wars=evil empire/world domination
world domination=the bad guys in literature, amerikans in life

ugh. my heart is sad today.

i feel so lost and alone.
can't connect with the people i used to rely on.
desperate for their support
but theyre gone.

still can't tell if its cuz they're busy...
or they just can't deal with me anymore.
you've given up on me.
fuck you for yr hypocrisy.
you go to such great lengths for everyone but me.
you say i'm yr best best.
but i'm always last on yr list.

quit lying.
yr such a fake.

i don't know if i can handle this cave i'm in much longer.
every time i go out i feel like i have to learn how to be around people
my friends
all over again.
i'm such a failure at living
at being
just being.

why is it so hard for me?
shut the fuck up and relax already!

quick rant on dropping out vs. being shut out.

Not all students who don't graduate are "drop outs."  I think we need a new term.  Many are "shut outs," shut out of a public education system designed for them to fail.  Underfunded California schools, made further impotent by the No Child Left Behind Act (Every Child Left Behind), cannot meet the needs of students of different skill levels, learning styles, and god forbid we should adequately help students with different primary languages!  I watch students act out in class, not because they are trouble makers or failures, but because with rigidly defined curricula and overcrowded classes, the schools are failing to adjust to meet their needs.  They act out in class, get in trouble, and have the idea that they are bad kids hammered into them.  Hear it enough and eventually they believe it and once shut out of an education they turn to other means to survive.  Before to long they find themselves riding the school-to-prison pipeline straight in to juvenile jail or adult prison.  Our system is the failure, not them.

Education is a vital investment in a democracy.  California's divestment from education over the past 30 years is a divestment from a democratic state.

Then again, history tells us the promise of democracy was a joke to begin with.  Well, those of us who learned history from somewhere other than the white-washed, manifest destiny, fast food nation, critical-thinking-aversion version taught in high schools know U.S. democracy is a joke anyway.

mental illness: criminal? or are the real criminals making us sick?

between the number of people taking anti-depressants, anti-psychotics, anxiety meds, who drink or take drugs to cope, and people who just plain can't deal with this world it kinda seems like we can all be defined as "mentally ill."

a conservative estimate of the number of incarcerated individuals with mental illness is 16% however the number goes way up if you consider drug use a mental health issue not a criminal one... more than 20% of inmates in state prisons are there on drug charges, the rate is higher for federal prisons. 
whatever the on-record number might be, the truth is that prisons and jails represent the largest mental health care-providing institutions in the country, with rikers in new york, cook county jail in chicago, and l.a. county jail representing amerika's largest mental health facilities.

reagan switched up laws back in the day..he criminalized mental illness, took away mental health programs and just started stuffing people in prison..

not trying to make excuses but.. damn!  this world is fucked and most of us can't cope and wind up criminalized in some form at some point.  at bare minimum we take drugs (street or pharmaceutical) to cope.  we're just supposed to ignore the mind-numbing inhumanity of living under the heel of capitalism and militarism, feudalism/colonialism/imperialism.. a world built on domination.  never mind skills or communication or love or connection... life doesn't matter unless you have STUFF!  can't afford STUFF? well you fail at life... when can we drop the consumerism and just be people again?

the power elites have their domination of people and land and resources and its makin us all fucking nuts.  and when you can't hang, you wind up in a cage like an animal until you've had time settle down or rot.  

this is a sick, sad world.  get in line or they'll get you... don't worry, you'll be convinced soon enough.

FEMMES Unite...zine from QZAP

http://www.qzap.org/v5/gallery/main.php?g2_view=core.DownloadItem&g2_itemId=1398

i love this zine and i love exploring the celebration of the femme identity. i've rejected everything girly since i was really really young. butterflys were stupid, hearts were cheesy, pink was for losers, and i sure as hell was gonna prove to every boy around i was TUFF. i've always inserted myself into this conservative, misogynist city/world by being boyish while repressing the parts of me that wants to wear dresses and bottom and loves flowers and wants to be treated like i'm soft. this isn't to say my butch phases weren't hella legit, but just that it didn't represent the whole of me and really was the only way i knew how to be a strong woman.  i'm not sure yet if i identify as femme, but it makes more and more sense as i read about de-dichotomizing femme-ness...not defining femme as the inverse of butch but instead seeing strength in my femininity. dressing cute and liking pretty colors and wanting a fella to be sweet to me isn't frivolous and it doesn't make me weak. its just stuff i like and i'm still tough as nails in a cute dress and mary janes holding a fella's hand.  somehow whenever i start to date someone, to go into being-loved mode or being-the-girl mode i switch into this passive mess cuz i guess thats how i know how to be feminine or cuz i am afraid my strength will intimidate the folks, mostly guys, that i date.  its like i can't be strong and be the girl to someone's boy at the same time.  but i need to validate what i've known all a long.  i'm a tough woman who tends to date men who need or are attracted to my strength... its ok if i'm both the feminine one and totally independent and TUFF.  in fact, its fabulous.  and i need to get over this hang up.  passivity makes me even more awkward than i already am cuz its just not me.  and its being tough yet grrly that makes me who i am and attracts the lucky fellas who get to be my lovers (and you know i'm sexystrong when i bottom and FUCKING FIERCE when i top).  all this FEMME-positive lit thats coming out these days is rad and validating and i love what its teaching me about myself and about other women.  about being woman-identified (think adrienne rich and the lesbian continuum) and smashing the misogyny that makes us overlook, ignore, or disregard feminine women and men, that makes me disregard myself.  sure i wouldn't mind a knight in shining armor, but i know better than to hold my breath and really when dude rides up my badass self will already have everything under control then sweep ms. or mr. knight right off their feet. cuz this grrrls got it covered.

hmm.. anyway, this zine is hot shit. check it out.

zine!

found this through sally darity's web journal.  sally darity is awesome.  check out her sites too!

Why She Doesn't Give A Fuck About Your Insurrection | zinelibrary.info