rocking the horse

I went to a Laughing Horse Bookstore collective meeting today. There's a group that meet regularly at the bookstore and there was issue with one of their guest speakers earlier last week. The main issue was the the guy is an active member of a right-wing homophobic, pro-life political party and he did not allow for a safe space in this radically progressive bookstore. That, combined with the events of last Sunday, compelled me to go to the meeting. A lot of people were writing on Portland Indymedia about how they wanted to see Laughing Horse change their policies. Since it's an open collective (meaning anyone can go and join up) I decided to be the change I wanted to see.

After an hour or so, I wanted to run screaming from the place. Either that or I wanted a paintball gun with different paintballs assigned for each of the issues that arose their. 'You're a homophobe, you get a pink paint-cartridge. BAM! You're a holocaust denier. Black for you! BAM! Orange for the ageist! BAM! Multi-colored for the privileged older straight white male who puts himself in charge! BAM! BAM! BAM!'

I love some of the members there and I strongly feel for them for the shit that they have to put up with on what appears to be at least a weekly basis. But, wow, me and Mary Blige will stick together and walk away. No mo' drama!