The Freeschool Community of Olympia is getting ready for their 8th and 9th year of Freeschool Classes! The Freeschool would love to help publicize your class, tutor opportunity or event if it is free of charge with no donations required or accepted at the class or event.

We publicize your class (or your tutor opportunity) on our twitter account (which has over 2,400 followers and growing fast), through our Natural Learning newspaper (which has a circulation of over 5000 and through our website) which sometimes has hundreds of hits (people reading it) per day.

The Freeschool Community also works with a radio station, podcast and online film and video series here at FemPeacePower.org which will occasionally have interviews with Freeschool Community facilitators and many more activists and social justice organizers.

You can also Subscribe to our itunes stations and search for our podcast episodes in Itunes here: http://tinyurl.com/link2itunes

To Start Using the Faster, Self-Sign up Process for Giving Classes at the Freeschool Community in 2009-2010 here is what we need you to do:

[Some of these things you may have already done, so just skip to the steps you have not done].

Step #1. Register at the Freeschool’s Social network: http://www.peacecommunities.ning.com – If you have any problems registering please contact us.

Make sure to upload some kind of photo (it can be of you, your project or any object or place) onto your profile.

Step #2. Once you do that you will be able to join the Group called:

Free Classes and Free Workshops That You Would Like to Share.
Join that group.

Step #3. Once you are in that group click on

* Start Discussion

When you start a Discussion you should title the discussion the name of your class or event and Post the Description of the group and all the details.

If you have more than one class, make a new discussion for each class. Make sure that you spellcheck your class before posting it.

Once you do that we will place a link to that discussion group onto the Freeschool calendar and website.

Why do we do it this way?

Many reasons:

a. It puts the power in your hands to instantly update, change or cancel your class without needing volunteers to update it, spell check it or reword it.

b. It also enables you to add photos, videos and much more making the class more attractive to students due to the fact that we live in an increasingly audio/video society in which decisions are based on audio/video promotion of the events.

c. We want to begin using our online community to promote free events worldwide. Even when you leave the Freeschool. You can use that forum to promote your free events outside of Olympia.

d. It enables people to discuss the class openly long after it is done. Even people who didn’t attend or who are in other countries. Our desire is to expand the Freeschool movement worldwide.

e. It enables you to send a public message of thanks to our Freeschool volunteers when they help to promote your class or your tutor opportunity. When freeschool volunteers feel appreciated, they tend to help with the Freeschool longer, which helps to promote your class or your tutor opportunity.

Please keep in mind events that ask for or require donations are not eligible to be listed on the Freeschool space calendar. We are a Freeschool free class movement, not a Donations-requested school Movement, no offense.

Again, we can publicize your free-of-charge class or event if it is free of charge with no donations requested.

Thanks.

If you have any questions about any of these steps you can call us from 11am-11pm, 7 days a week.

Keep up the great work,

Love, peace and free classes for everyone,

-Freeschool Community

I’ve been thinking about the term “queer.” In the past, the word meant “strange, odd, weird,” and, I suppose, technically and literally, still does. But in recent years the word has become something entirely different. It’s been taken and reclaimed, turned around and made positive, by the LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender) community. As I understand it, the word encompasses even more than the standard LGBT acronym. ‘Queer’ refers to anyone and everyone whose gender, sexual identity, or sexual orientation is non-normative; is weird, is different, is something “other”- pansexuals, asexuals, transvestites, intersex individuals, two-spirits, pomosexuals, hermaphrodites, etc, etc, etc. (I took a course at Evergreen recently about all of this. The theories and terms and names are still all on my mind.)

But there are issues with the reclamation of the word, and disagreements about the current and correct usage of it. One thing I’ve run across: older generations don’t necessarily like the word. They don’t buy that the term “queer” can be a positive descriptor of sex- and gender-deviant persons, that it can be reclaimed and turned positive. For these middle-aged baby boomers, who were the ones to pave the way so that my generation’s homosexuals could be out and proud, ‘queer’ was derogatory, an insult flung at them during riots along with physical objects and other slurs like “faggot” and “dyke.” They know how hurtful “queer” can be, and aren’t so sure that us younger generations taking it back and shifting its meaning to a positive, all-encompassing term, is a good thing.

Another issue: the new meaning of the term is somewhat vague. Who’s to say who’s “queer” and who’s not? Is a primarily heterosexual woman who has had one or two sexual encounters with men queer? Or the opposite: a gay woman who has slept with a few men? What about a FTM who, upon transitioning, starts dating men? What about an individual who rejects both male and female pronouns and instead opts for gender-neutral pronouns like “zie?” What IS queer? The problems start when people begin to get defensive about it. I know some people who use the term, but do so selectively. Some call themselves queer but then tell others that they cannot or should not. Some hesitate to invite certain people to social events because they’re not “queer enough.” Who’s to judge? It seems to me that some of my generation (of early 20-somethings, of college kids) have taken the term too far, become too judgmental with it, too nit-picky.

This issue of “who is queer, who is not” leads to another problem that I’ve seen happen recently among friends of mine in the (fairly small and somewhat exclusive) LGBT/queer community we belong to here in Olympia: the issue of “queer space.” Some individuals I know argue for the importance of creating and strictly maintaining “queer-only” spaces. This essentially means no straight people, no allies. They throw parties which they sometimes advertise as such, as specifically “queer-only.” But, first of all, isn’t this confusing? If no one actually knows who is queer and who isn’t, because the term itself is so damn vague, then who can judge who should be allowed at the party and who shouldn’t? Those who advocate for queer-only spaces do so in the name of creating “safety.” The LGBT/queer community has always been (and continues to be) marginalized and oppressed, they say. We (and I include myself in this; I identify as queer) have been targeted and judged, we’ve feared for our safety. The whole rest of the world is “straight-space,” they say, so it is hugely important to have some spaces that are only for queer people, so we can have somewhere where we can be ourselves and feel safe; a place where, for once, LGBT/queer people won’t feel like a marginalized minority.

I don’t disagree with this. Of course we need some spaces where we can be ourselves and of course we have a basic human right to feel safe in a space. But what happens is that when these gatherings (especially college parties!) are “queer-only,” then they become very exclusive. Anybody who isn’t “queer enough” in the eyes of the party hosts feels judged and unwelcome. Allies of the queer community, people who actually fight alongside us for our rights, but don’t happen to be homosexual, are excluded. Heterosexuals who want to come to the parties feel judged and discriminated against, simply for belonging to the sexual majority. A sort of reverse homophobia happens, where the minority (the LGBT/queer community), which has always fought for equality and for fair treatment for themselves, doesn’t “practice what they preach.” They turn around and perpetuate the same judgment and discrimination on others (namely, non- “queer” people) that they’ve been fighting against!

So what to do? There’s no easy answer to this quandary, but I think a lot of it has to do with everyone’s attitude. Kicking straight people out of a party because the queers have decided they don’t want them there anymore is rude and only perpetuates reverse homophobia (or, I guess, “heterophobia”). (I’ve seen this happen, and many feelings were hurt all around.) I suggest a peaceful, respectful sit-down to discuss the issue and to create safe spaces for queer people without furthering a strict and exclusive queer-only agenda like I know so many people to do. Perhaps in the course of the sit-down we can also discuss the actual meaning of the word “queer,” and how people feel about it, including whether people think that the word is an acceptable identifier, or whether it’s simply a label for a group of homosexual or non-hetero-normative people, which is another issue and one I got into an argument over recently.

Stay tuned for more on this later; I could go on. “Queer” issues seem to me huge and very prevalent right now.
photo credit: -Marlith-

Olympia, Washington. I thought I’d pass this along.

Love for the people,
-IndigoClaySkyLink

original author: Olympia SDS

A Critical Look at U.S. War and Occupation

April 9th
7pm
Lectural 2, Evergreen State College

A Panel Discussion Brought to you by Olympia SDS

Join us as faculty members Steve Niva and Zoltan Grossman start a conversation about US war and Occupation so that we can start the conversation about what is next in the Anti-War movement.

As i prepare to leave Paraguay to return to Ecuador….I need to say goodbye…..

Goodbye to the tererè (iced yerba mate) vendor in Plaza Uruguaya who was my first introduction to Paraguay and with whom I have passed many hours chatting in the hot afternoons….goodbye to the girls in the tourist office in Villa Florida who treated me like a king and who tried so hard to promote their country….goodbye to Jazmin in Encarnacion whose house will soon be under water because of the Yaciretá Dam and whose childhood memories will be washed away in the flood….goodbye to the chipa girls who get on the buses outside of every city to sell those hard little doughnuts of cornbread that i dont particularly like…..goodbye to the moody Paraguayan local bus drivers and goodbye to the friendly ones….goodbye to the friendly grandmother who owns the house where I am staying now and who asks me to translate for those travelers who don´t speak Spanish and who invites me to watch the news with her and drink tererè…..goodbye to the suffocating heat….goodbye to Pino, the Italian settler who is slowly going mad in San Pedro after two divorces and a run of bad luck…..goodbye to the immigration officials at the Friendship Bridge between Brazil and Paraguay who had to be prodded into putting exit stamps in my passport but who were a pleasure to deal with…goodbye to the salesgirl in Ciudad del Este who tried to convince me to buy a camera I didnt need with a smile detector…goodbye to the spirits of the Jesuits who also tried so hard so long ago to change the world with mixed results but whose influence lingers on……goodbye to Alberto whom I just met on line to see Saturn through a big ass telescope that was set up in the park…goodbye to his wife who is pregnant with twins….goodbye to the truck driver who lives out in the Chaco (Western, sparsely populated, deadly hot in summer, thornbushy Paraguay) and who wants to open a restaurant truck stop for his retirement….goodbye to the waitresses at the Lido Bar, which is a throwback to an American 50’s diner….with their orange uniforms and little hats who sometimes forget about you but never on purpose….and adios to the mosto carts, whose owners pour an ice cold sugar cane juice for a measly 20 cents….and goodb ye to the spirits of all those who fought and died or were tortured in their struggle against Gen. Stroessner and who are barely remembered except by a little tiny park down by the government buildings and the port…..and goodbye to the shoe shine boys and men, the prostitutes and street boys asking for monedas, those persistent sunglass and fake Rolex sellers….goodbye to the hamburger sellers whom I persuaded to make egg sandwiches for me near the Plaza de Heroes…who couldnt understand why I didnt want the hamburger but who went along with me anyway  and goodbye to all those fruit sellers and street vendors and money changers who bring so much life to a city, who are seen as a nuisance but without whom there is no vibration……

My Argentine friend who relocated to Paraguay 30 years ago and who is a Jehovah’s Witness (yes, I have a friend who is a JW) summed up Paraguay this way……

Paraguay is a cemetery.

And in a way, a lot of ways it is…..at times the lack of movement speaks of death but at times it speaks of peace and tranquility and being left alone….there is still an innocence here I had not expected….just today in the paper was a lead story about the Congress passing a bill to delay, once again, the implementation of a personal income tax for another year…….imagine that !

I will miss it. Goodbye.