Tag Archives: activist

May23

change of heart.

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A 9-year-old girl’s plea to save a sidewalk slab with a heart-shaped cavity has tugged at the heartstrings of Ann Arbor officials, who have agreed to let it stay. The inspector also spray-painted an X over the R that previously marked the slab for replacement, while writing “Save!” and giving the heart a fresh touch of color.
Where Dahlia left a note along the sidewalk last week making the case for keeping the slab, the city’s inspector on Monday left a response letter complete with the city seal on it. “Thank you for your wonderful letter, and for bringing this to our attention!” it reads. “Your note is very well written, and after further considerations, we feel this sidewalk slab can be saved. We’re so glad you let us know, and that we can save your ‘heart.’”
Seventh Street heart sidewalk

“Thank you for being so passionate and proactive about your community!” the response letter states. “When you’re old enough, you should consider working for the city to continue making it a great place to live. Sincerely, City Sidewalk Repair Program.”

Dahlia, the daughter of Kelly and Matt,  said in her note to the ‘Sidewalk People” last week that she was devastated when she saw the slab was marked for replacement.

“You see, the heart is not just a heart,” she wrote. “Ever since I was little, I said hi to the heart. Don’t you see how much it means to me? Every time I pass the heart, I say hi and it brings me joy.”

Anyone else who wants to say hi to the heart now can find it along the east side of Seventh Street across from Waterworks Park between Murray Court and Washington Street.

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“kind words do not cost much, yet they accomplish much.”

-blaise pascal

 

 

 

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source credit: ryan stanton, mlive, ann arbor news

Jan16

birmingham.

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Letter from Birmingham Jail

In the spring of 1963, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. organized a demonstration in downtown Birmingham, Alabama. With entire families in attendance, city police turned dogs and fire hoses on demonstrators. King was jailed along with large numbers of his supporters, but the event drew nationwide attention.

In his famous Letter from Birmingham Jail, King eloquently spelled out his theory of non-violence:

“Nonviolent direct action seeks to create such a crisis and foster such a tension that a community,

which has constantly refused to negotiate,

is forced to confront the issue.”

 

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credits: biography, history channel, photo credit: the atlantic

Jul31

get in the way.

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The Bloodiest Sunday 

Bloody Sunday was a cruel incident that occurred on March 7, 1965  in Selma, Alabama. Six hundred orderly protesters were ready to march to Selma on a Sunday to support the Voting Rights Movement. They were led by John Lewis, SNCC, and SCLC activists. All six hundred of them crossed the Edmund Pettus Bridge, but were blocked by Alabama State Troopers. The police commanded them to turn around, but the protesters refused. The police say ‘they had no choice’ other than to start shooting teargas into the crowd, and beating the non-violent protesters. Sadly, they hospitalized over sixty people. To this day, Lewis still has a visible scar on his forehead from Bloody Sunday. This week, I watched as you made one final trip over that bridge, in your casket, with Alabama State Troopers saluting you, and people holding you in their hearts for all you did for them. You will always be remembered as a brave and compassionate leader who truly led by example.

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RIP, John Lewis, thank you for always getting in the way, and showing us how it’s done.

 

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“you must be bold, brave, and courageous and find a way… to get in the way.”

-john lewis

Jul26

100.

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until the election

think, read, listen, ask, talk, learn, know

make your choice

vote. 

 

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“everything in your life is a reflection of a choice you have made.

if you want a different result, make a different choice.”

-jonathan kiavi

Jan2

sci-fi or reality tv?

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 Rod Serling – working at home in Connecticut, 1956

anti-war and social justice activist, tv-writer, producer, narrator

and one of my idols. 

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*In 1955, the miscarriage of justice in the Emmett Till case proved a galvanizing point in the Civil Rights Movement. Rod Serling, a 30-year-old rising star in a golden age of dramatic television, watched the events play out in the news. He believed firmly in the burgeoning medium’s power for social justice. “The writer’s role is to be a menacer of the public’s conscience,” Serling later said. “He must have a position, a point of view. He must see the arts as a vehicle of social criticism and he must focus the issues of his time.”

Soon after the trial concluded, Serling, riding off the success of his most well-received teleplay to date, felt compelled write a teleplay around the racism that led to Till’s murder. But the censorship that followed by advertisers and networks, fearful of blowback from white, Southern audiences, forced Serling to rethink his approach. His response, ultimately, was “The Twilight Zone,” the iconic sci-fi anthology series that spoke truth to the era’s social ills and tackled themes of prejudice, bigotry, nuclear fears, war, among so many others. At this point in history, the censors didn’t know what to make of this genre and he was free to deliver his message in a new way.

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in honor of Rod Serling on national science fiction day,

who understood the power of the arts

as a way to communicate important messages. 

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“there are weapons that are simply thoughts.

for the record, prejudices can kill and suspicion can destroy.”

-rod serling

 

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credits: Getty Images, *Smithsonian Magazine