‘Raise Your Voice’ Archives
Raise Your Voice: Trending Hot
By PETER MOLENAAR Peter Molenaar It was a bearing on car 32 which was “trending hot” beneath its load of ethanol (boom?!) Nonetheless, the crew of the two mile long train was ordered to proceed, even as they approached a heavily populated area. Why? Moreover, for some folks, our entire economy had become “too hot to handle.” As it happened, a delegation of ruling-class types was deployed to tinker with the Federal Reserve (Oops!). In the process they managed to kill a few lesser banks, although their intent was merely to trigger a degree of recession (i.e., stymie wage growth) by raising interest rates. Remember the “Volker Schock” of 1979? I sure do. At the time, I was living in East Phillips and had just begun my employment at Smith Foundry. However, a period of mass layoffs would soon ensue, along with plant closings and anti-union campaigns all across the land. “The standard of living has to decline.” So said the chairman of the Federal [...]
Raise Your Voice: Stop Toxic Harm
Missing and Murdered Indigenous Relatives March goes down 24th Street on a rainy February 14. Photo Credit: Peter Molenaar By PETER MOLENAARThree years before my mother’s mother was born, a young man named W.E.B. Du Bois took note: “Among the most corrosive effects of racism is its tendency to make its victims see themselves through the eyes of people who hold them in contempt.” Yet today, we ponder the death of Tyre Nichols. Indeed, ‘The Souls of Black Folk’ was Du Bois’ seminal work. Thankfully, our nation’s book banning movement is resisted by the good librarians at Franklin, Hosmer, East Lake and Walker. ‘GO FREE OR DIE: A Story about Harriet Tubman’, has begun to circulate among our children. Yes, it is from within the ranks of the oppressed that the most transformative individuals emerge.38th and Chicago, not long after… I recall the convening of indigenous drums and dancers there. February 14, 2023… The gymnasium of the East Phillips Park [...]
Raise Your Voice: The Fusion Dance of MLK
Peter Molenaar By PETER MOLENAAR January 16, 2023… The MLK Day observance at the Powderhorn Park Community Center was a marvelous production. Tabatha, thank you so much for having mastered the ceremony straight from your heart. Oh, but it was the children who stole the show with spontaneous dance and gymnastic display. On the other hand, the two young women who performed a choreographed Afro-fusion dance blew me away. Then, to close the show, there was our own Brass Solidarity Band. Wow! One sour note: A young man had managed to insert himself ahead of the main program. He read on and on (and on) from a cell phone script (hmm) intent upon casting aspersions at Dr. King. Indeed, he asserted that Martin had been under the influence of “white liberals”. (Oh my!) Moral means to moral ends? To be sure, “everything depends on conditions, time, and place”. Hey, a strategic conception must make a connection to [...]
