LET TERS
WEAK FORESTRY LAWS
On Oct. 16, 2013, over two dozen
residents of Cedar Valley noticed two
helicopters fl ying over our homes. We at
fi rst did not give it any thought but soon
came to realize that they were releasing
some of their herbicidal product upon us.
Many of us have become ill immediately
and still suffer from the effects of this
spray. We have property damage, including
animals, some of which are dying or
already dead. We went to our local
Health Department immediately and were
informed we had to seek help from the
State Agriculture Department, which we
did. It has been over three months and we
still do not have answers; our own doctors
cannot seem to get any information. We
have been passed from department to
department with no resolution; however,
we have had contact with the U.S. Center
for Disease Control and sent a petition for
the federal government to step in.
Beyond Toxics has been instrumental
in helping us navigate this maze of
bureaucracy that we now face. We are
requesting the help of our state legislators,
our health professionals and even our
federal agencies. Oregon has such weak
laws for forestry and pesticides that many
rural residents are harmed and our property
is being damaged. The forestry laws only
apply to protecting fi sh and habitat streams.
What about human health? What about our
drinking water? We need help and we need
stronger and protective regulations. I hope
our governor will stand up for protecting
our health.
Kathyrn Rickard
Gold Beach
SOMEHOW FEMINIST
Saba Malik, Deep Green Resistance
functionary, deems Shannon Finnell’s
“Transphobia at the PIELC” full of lies.
And the DGR cult has pumped out several
near-identical letters from its clones, who
follow orders and evidently swallow
anything.
But the fact is that Lierre Keith, the
subject of Finnell’s article, has made a
career of publicly hating transgender folks.
This is simply a matter of record and Keith
has always seemed proud of it.
There are no lies in the EW piece. The
lie is in claiming that trans people do not
NOTES FROM THE RIVERSIDE
deserve respect and acceptance, and in
cloaking this bigotry as somehow feminist.
John Zerzan
Eugene
IN LOVE AND AT HOME
Thanks for getting out the word about
my fall and broken neck. I have good
news. Friends of David Oaks (FODO) has
succeeded in raising enough money for a
2013 accessible van for me.
I would like to thank my brother Tony,
who came to my side from Texas within
hours of my accident and spent most of the
year with me.
My amazing wife, artist Debra
Nuñez, has helped so much. The spouse
of someone who has a major disability
deserves a lot of support. Debra is such a
delight for my heart. I am in love and at
home, what a wonderful Valentine!
As some of your readers know, I have
continued to be an activist. I have focused
on how our progressive community needs
to be more active about the climate crisis.
I am sorry that the Eugene Area
Chamber of Commerce has still not put
out a statement about the climate crisis and
THE COLOR AND FORM OF GIVING MATTERS NOT
P
4
February 20, 2014 • eugeneweekly.com
LET IT POUR
Rain is so welcome! I’m so glad to
see it pour! I have wondered if we would
be faced with a drought as serious as
California is experiencing. It reminds me
of how precious every source of water is
and how the three streams of the Amazon
Headwaters must be protected. If you
haven’t walked the paths by the headwaters
I hope you will before the city decides its
BY M A RK H A RRIS
A Reverie in Black
and White
art of my Eugene Experience is mentioning
observances of famous birth days, like Martin
and Malcolm, and getting the response:
“Martin who?” or “Malcolm who?” Even
mentioning Angela’s work on the prison-
industrial complex, and the school-to-prison
pipeline, and people saying “Angela who?” Black
History Month grew from Carter Woodson’s Negro
History Week, which was situated to encompass two
birthdays, Lincoln and Douglass, so we would always
remember the contradictions of America, who actually
freed us and wanted us free, and who took the credit
for freeing us, but didn’t actually want us living free,
alongside him: a sentiment Oregon’s founding fathers
could well relate to. I had a dreamlike reverie. See how
many references you are familiar with without resorting
to Wikipedia.
’Twas the fi rst day of Kwanzaa, and all through
the home, the savory scent of Nawlin’s style gumbo
imbued each room. Grandma Dosha’s signature rum
fruitcake was on the table, a hogshead cheese was on
the counter, as well as a baked salmon and the remains
of both a turkey and a tofurkey in deference to the
vegetarian guests.
On the Kinara, Black Umoja candle burned bright,
in hopes that Sankofa’s song would sound through
the night. It was somewhere in the alam-al-mithal
I recognized in the scene before me. How else could
Black Santa, a godlocked Black Jesus, the griot
Sankofa from the fi lm of the same name, Grandma
Zeely, Chinosole, Nelson Mandela, Amiri Baraka, Paul
the problem of the U.S. Chamber, which
is one of the main obstacles in the U.S.
to address greenhouse gases. The way we
people have treated Earth has placed us all
in a position of disability. Let us support
one another during this crisis.
FODO plans to do a living estate sale
Feb. 21-23. FODO is on the web and
in Facebook; just search for the phrase
“Support David Oaks.” People may also
fi nd my personal blog on the web and my
page on Facebook by searching for David
W. Oaks.
Thanks to everyone who has offered
support. What a great community.
David W. Oaks
Eugene
Robeson and The Preacher be sitting around the kitchen
table in my grandmother’s house in the Haight?
I didn’t know, but as I shook my head to clear the
disbelief, closed my eyes and took some breaths of Ruach-
Holy Spirit. Intoning within my mind the Aramaic fi rst
line of the Lord’s Prayer mantra Abwoon D’Bwashmaya
— Birther! You create all that moves in light.
Illumination revealed other rooms and spaces, not in
the original building, which were fi lled with people and
other beings, and the resemblance to my actual earthly
childhood home ended. I thought: As a child, I did learn
about Black Jesus, and Black Beethoven, here, why not
Black Santa?
Isho nodded at me when I opened my eyes, shook his
locks and laughed, saying, “In one sense for children,
it doesn’t matter what color or form the spirit of giving
takes,” nodding whassup and q’vole to Pancho Claus,
as he walked into the room. “You’ve pointed out in your
classes, the power of a meme does not lie in its veracity.
People can childishly believe a fi ction like Santa Claus,
the Easter Bunny or white supremacy, until they grow
up and recognize the reality of diversity without fearing
being annihilated by it.”
Amiri, nodding around the room, quoted from his
poem “Ka’Ba”: We are beautiful people, With African
imaginations, full of masks and dances and swelling
chants, with African eyes, and noses, and arms, tho we
sprawl in gray chains in a place full of winters, when
what we want is sun. We have been captured, and we
labor to make our getaway, into the ancient image;
into a new Correspondence with ourselves and our
Black family. We need magic, now we need the spells,
to raise up, return, destroy, and create. What will be the
sacred word?
“Word!” said the Preacher. “Ameyn,” said Ieshua in
his language. “Amandla!” said Nelson, in his.
I moved to the den where Martin and Malcolm were
engaged in a chess game. Nzingha and Harriet Tubman
seemed to be setting up a second one. Trayvon Martin,
Emmett Till, Rosa Parks and Keke Palmer were playing
a fi erce Scrabble game.
In the backyard, on a half-court replica of the White
House basketball court, Angela Davis and Michael
Franti were playing against Kareem and Sheryl
Swoopes. Barack and Diana Taurasi seemed to have
next. The garage band seemed to be the Coltrane’s
Alice, John and Ravi, Miles, Mingus, Mongo, Art
Blakey, with Hendrix sitting in on a version of “A Love
Supreme,” with Spanish Key intensity.
I started to walk out into the night; the Drinking
Gourd hanging in the Western sky, my granddaughters
sitting at the piano with Beethoven playing “Fur Elise,”
with the Chevalier De Saint-George accompanying
on violin. The ancestors, the living and the future
remembering how to make our world anew.
Mark Harris is an
instructor and
substance abuse
prevention
coordinator at
LCC.