PeaceWave
PeaceWave's JournalWhy naturalized citizens and their children born in the U.S. should NOT be treated like ordinary citizens...
That's right. I said it. Naturalized citizens and their children born in the U.S. should NOT be treated like ordinary citizens. No sir. And, the reason is simple. Families who have immigrated to the U.S. have left behind everything - friends, family, culture, their native language and land - to be HERE in the U.S. All of which makes the leap of faith that comes with leaving your country to move to a foreign land something far, far from ordinary. Just the opposite in fact. Naturalized citizens and their children born in the U.S. are our constant everyday reminders of the extraordinary miracle that is hope against all odds. Hope to overcome hardship. Hope to better one's life. Hope to see the next generation do better than the one before it. A reminder without which an America prone to complacency might occasionally think itself Great Again, when in fact America has always been and always will be a garden in constant need of renewal.
For the umpteenth time, the man's name is spelled N-E-W-S-O-M...
As in awesom, handsom and wholesom. Of course, if you're a Republican snowflake, you might think him fearsom. Regardless of the case, the fact that some of you have yet to figure this all out is irksom, worrisom and tiresom. Get it together, get the man elected - so that we can finally evict the current loathsom, wearisom and decidedly unawesom resident of the White House.
My nephew just sent a text saying he'll only attend our Thanksgiving if we're serving an "indigenously sourced turkey."
He says his decision is based on "ethical and political" reasons. I don't know what he's going on about. Back during the pandemic, he was suddenly insisting that Thanksgiving be referred to as Indigenous People's Day. Maybe it's related to that. All I know is that we got our turkey from Safeway and it weighs damn close to 25 pounds, which was a son of an itch to carry since I'm currently suffering from tennis elbow in one arm and a pain unlike anything I've ever experienced. Will he even know the difference, one turkey from another?
Okay, I have an update per Google AI:
"Indigenously sourced turkey" can refer to turkeys with a direct cultural connection to Indigenous peoples or, more recently, turkeys raised on farms that prioritize sustainable and natural practices, often locally. To find such a turkey, search for local farms, especially those raising heritage breeds, and inquire about their sourcing and farming methods.
Modern "indigenously sourced" or "heritage" turkeys
Modern farms, particularly those that promote sustainable and natural practices, are sometimes described as offering "indigenously sourced" turkeys. Many farms raise "heritage breeds" which are a result of the original domestication process from Indigenous populations in North America. Look for farms that raise these birds with specific methods:
(1) Pasture-raised: Allow birds to roam and forage on pasture, often supplemented with organic feed.
(2) No antibiotics or hormones: Raised without the use of antibiotics, growth hormones, or other non-therapeutic chemicals.
(3) Sustainable practices: Some farms have breeding stock on-site and do not rely on commercial hatcheries, which can involve vaccination programs that are not considered "natural" by some standards.
The Democratic Party should change it's symbol from the donkey to the cat and here's why...
First off, there is nothing official about the donkey being the symbol of the Democratic Party. While widely recognized today to be the logo of the Party, the donkey has never been officially endorsed. It's all based on tradition, and an old outdated tradition at that. Way the hell back in 1828, opponents of Andrew Jackson referred to him as a "jackass" - an insult to imply he was stupid and stubborn. Instead of rejecting the derogatory reference, Jackson embraced the label and started using the image of a donkey as part of his presidential campaign. But, why need we follow in the footsteps of Andrew Jackson? The man was a prolific slave owner throughout his life, acquiring his first slave in 1788 and owning over 150 slaves by the time of his death in 1845. Today, our Party should not be bound to a symbol chosen by and representative of such a man. If anything, the cat, an animal with over 75 standardized domesticated breeds in addition to approximately 40 wild species, far closer symbolizes the diversity of our Party. Smart, adaptable, vigilant and protective, the cat is everything the donkey is not. It is also a creature that has, in this modern age, been used as a symbol of derision directed at us by our opponents, both in discussion and in debate. Let the Republican Party taunt the cat - at their own peril.
I'm sorry. Since when did threats against each other's family become accepted here? Perhaps I missed that memo...
I logged in this morning only to find this...
40 years ago, through the lens of John Hughes, I fell in love with the now embattled city of Chicago...
For a generation of kids hitting their teens in the 1980's, there was one film director who towered above all others. John Hughes was writing and directing the films that hit closest to our hearts. Sixteen Candles, The Breakfast Club, Ferris Bueller's Day Off and many other Hughes films were by no means perfect. But, however imperfect, they belonged to our generation. And, we needed them. We'd grown up in a world threatened by the insanity of nuclear annihilation and we needed a fucking break from it - even if only for 90 or 120 minutes on a Saturday afternoon at the theater in the mall. In this way, John Hughes took us all to one foreign land, over and over again. Chicago.
Hughes adored Chicago. Building on the success of the Chicago set Risky Business (a film he did not write or direct), Hughes set seven films - including the aforementioned Sixteen Candles, The Breakfast Club and Ferris Bueller's Day Off - in the city and its surrounding suburbs. All were box office hits fueled by teenage audiences. And, in this way, Chicago - not Los Angeles, not New York - became the mecca for an entire teen generation's imagination. Chicago was complicated and interesting and fun and hip. It was the home of Edward Hopper's Nighthawks and George Seurat’s A Sunday on La Grande Jatte and so much more. Feelings spanning the breadth of moving you to tears to moving you to fall in love. And, as kids not yet adults, we were quickly learning that life would be just such a wild ride. Not surprisingly, many of us would later hang on our dormitory walls prints of the art Hughes had introduced us to through film.
All of this is to say that, having fallen in love with you Chicago so many years ago, we can never forget you. Though a dictator now bangs at your city gates, the spirit that imbues your people can never be defeated. And, if John Hughes were alive today, I am sure he would say that Chicago, of all cities in this country, is capable - if need be - of taking a stand, of defending itself and not sitting on its ass as the events that affect it unfold to determine the course of its citizens' lives.
A freshman in high school, my 14 year old grandnephew recently encountered his first bully...
Two weeks into his first year of high school and my 14 year old grandnephew W has learned one of the greatest lessons of all, one worthy of being reminded of, considering the times we all now live in…how to deal with a bully.
It all started on W’s second day at the new school that he himself chose. Today’s version of an educationally aspiring, hopeful kid’s Willy Wonka golden ticket is an approved inter-district transfer. That ticket allows a kid to circumvent the school he or she normally would have been routed to pursuant to a seemingly arbitrary school district map created decades prior by crooked local politicians on the take from greedy housing developers. Even kids aren’t immune from the effects of gerrymandering.
Rather than attend the local school, little more than a funnel for future employment at the dying mall across town, W wanted to attend the nearest magnet school. Scratch that. W needed it. He’s got his sights set on a career in engineering. Coming from a household that is struggling to make ends meet because neither of his parents made the most of their own educational opportunities, W is already feeling the pressure of being “the one” who lifts up the rest of his branch of the family. It’s a pressure I know all too well.
And so it was that W found himself on the second day of high school standing with about forty other boys in an 8 A.M. first period PE class. The teacher, a ball headed bull of a man who decades prior had starred at the local high school basketball powerhouse knew just how to deal with a group of still bleary eyed 14 and 15 year old boys. A half mile run around the grassy perimeter of the school, every runner returning to a numbered spot on the blacktop, after which PE class really began.
As my grandnephew would later tell me, that first run was an exercise in humiliation. Out of forty two boys, he finished second to last, the number 41 staring up at him from the blacktop like a scarlet letter of shame. The only kid W managed to eke past congratulated him, “Welcome to the Loser’s Club. Name’s Nick. I’m only at this shitty school because my Dad’s a dick.” The candor of another affects us all in different ways, depending on the thickness of our skins and our own life experiences. W was horrified.
A lot of kids would have accepted their numbered spot in life, give or take a few digits, the floor and ceiling between which they’d operate the rest of their lives. Not W. A couple of days later, when the boys again ran the half mile, he pushed himself past that first sensation of pain that all beginning runners know, something akin to being keenly aware that your spleen is about to explode. Scurrying back to the blacktop, W stared down at the number between his shoes…28. Turning around, W saw Nick staring at him, forefinger and thumb to his head, mouthing the word “L O S E R.”
Two more days and W, starting to grasp the most efficient use of his gangly teenaged body, finished in 16th place. Nick’s response, when the PE teacher wasn’t looking, was to trip W, sending him to the ground and bloodying his knee. Nick is significantly bigger than W. Side by side, the one looks like a young man while W is still very much a boy. A little too sheltered and unacquainted with bullying, W was initially confused. What just happened? More than just his knee was hurt. The boy’s default world view that human beings are essentially good natured had also taken a critical hit.
Wednesday came and W and the rest of the boys of Sleepy Company again launched into their half mile run around the school. This time though, W felt something different. Even with a skinned and bandaged knee, he felt comfortable. Beyond the pain, he found there was a place of calm, a place where all that mattered was a point on the horizon you know you are destined to reach. His hands and arms having transformed from purposeless flapping appendages to cutting blades, W swooshed onto the blacktop. The number 5 drew him in like a magnet. The PE teacher took note, as did the other boys. Hand claps all around, except for Nick - whose response was to shove W’s head into a locker once they were back in the locker room. W’s head was left ringing. “Knock it off. You’re making me look bad” followed by a cynical laugh. The world had to be better than this.
At the end of the second week of his first year in high school, W had something to prove. He wanted to run as hard as he possibly could and finish first. The thought of one day being an engineer, of becoming the bread winner expected of him, was an apparition. All that existed this morning was the goal of being unrivaled in one simple task. It wasn’t going to be easy though. On every previous day the boys had run, top place had gone to a sophomore who bore an unmistakable resemblance to a very young Mick Jagger. W couldn’t take him. The one time Mick felt W closing in on him, the sophomore shifted into a gear W’s body simply was not equipped with, not yet. Mick took first while W finished second. The younger boy should have been proud of himself but he wasn’t. A harder judge of himself than any other is another trait I recognize well. W’s got it too.
Back in the locker room, Nick was prepared to be the hardest judge of all. The shove caught W’s shoulders in a way that sent his head and arms backwards, leaving his belly undefended to Nick’s subsequent gut punch. The wind left W’s body and he felt himself collapsing and heaving on the ground. The other boys took notice. A few of them turned to intervene before another stood atop a bench and proclaimed for the whole room to hear, “Nothing to see here. Let ‘em settle it between themselves.” Regaining his breath, W briefly imagined himself murdered in a crowded room, inexplicably without witness. It was never going to stop unless he did something to make it stop. Digging deep, he reached a calmer place beyond the pain. He stood up, ready to defend. Nick looked quizzically at W. “I’ll kick the living shit out of you. You really want that?”
The way that my grandnephew later described it to me, the voice that rose up out of him was one that he didn’t recognize. “LEAVE…ME…ALONE” each word said slowly, menacingly and unequivocally. Neither you nor anyone like you will ever stop me. So, don’t even try. And, for just a moment, surprised that his target would no longer be cowed, the bully flinched. What would have ensued will never be known, one of a million unwritten David and Goliath stories none of us will ever be privy to. A moment later and a sophomore a half foot taller than Nick put a hand on the bully’s shoulder and said “It’s over. Unless you wanna continue this outside with me.” And, in this way, W - with an assist by Mick Jagger - dealt with and defeated his first bully.
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Gender: Do not displayMember since: Fri May 15, 2015, 09:46 PM
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