#mongrel coalition

[sarahmadges]

“the white guilt spa for financing the revolution.” new favorite title for a poem? new favorite title for a poem.

[mongrelxcoalition-blog]

OPEN LETTER TO BHQgoFuckUrself

HELLO SEAN J. PATRICK CARNEY, ANDREA ARRUBLA  & THE OTHER SECRET ORGANIZERS OF “delete your account, vanessa place.”

IT HAS BEEN ABOUT 5 WEEKS SINCE YOU SHOWCASED THE “PROBLEMATIC’ WORKS OF VP. OOOPSIES--WE FORGOT TO REPLY TO YOUR INVITATION. OUR BAD!

HOW SINCERE OF YOU TO “OFFER” TO “INCLUDE” US IN YOUR WHITE SUPREMACIST PREMISE OF “PROBLEMATIC ART”

WE 4EVA REJECT YOUR INVITATION ON ALL FRONTS.

WE 4EVA REJECT BHQFU-- AND ITS STAFF AND TEACHING ARTISTS, NONE OF WHOM ARE BLACK.

Q: HOW DO YOU STILL EXIST?

A: BY LEECHING OFF OUR RACIALIZED SUFFERING!

WE ARE “DEEPLY EXCITED” TO TELL YOU:

WE DO NOT NEED YOUR SLOTS YOUR PRECIOUS LIBERAL CORNER HOLES. WE WILL NOT LEND YOU OUR BODIES TO LEGITIMIZE, TO GIVE PERMISSION, TO YOUR VIOLENCE & SILENCING. (WHY ONLY ALLOW PRE-APPROVED QUESTIONS TO VP. OH BCUZ IT’S A FARCE) WE WOULDN’T STEP OUR SHIMMERING PAWS IN THERE FOR ALL THE $$$$$ IN THE WORLD. 

VP’S WORK IS NOT ‘PROBLEMATIC’: IT IS ANTI-BLACK. PUT YOUR LILY WHITE NOSES IN JUST ONE FUCKEN BOOK. EVEN JUST GOOGLE. IT’S FREE! 

“Many of the members of our core community of poets at the school have further expressed that they are, at this point, simply tired of what she does….” THANK YOU BUT YOU SHOULD HAVE STOPPED RIGHT THERE. GIVE THESE PEOPLE PROMOTIONS. THEN FIRE YOURSELVES.

CUE MONGREL BARFLOLTRACK: “...We recognize and respect that. Still, our mission is to present public programs that would not happen anywhere else, and at times this means scheduling things that contain content that our community is opposed to.”

QUICK LIST OF PUBLIC PROGRAMMING THAT HAS YET TO HAPPEN:

--arts showcase for Palestinian/refugee/undocumented/trans life solidarity --Black Poets Speak Out showcase --community conversation regarding the black academics that have been fired for their tweets: how might we support them? --poetry for BDS --a meeting about why all these POC are so mad! where you come to the conclusion that maybe YOU ARE THE PROBLEM PARA SIEMPRE 

THIS LIST IS ALREADY FUCKEN LONG AND WE HAVE MORE: WHY IS VP AT THE TOP OF YOUR PUBLIC LIST. FAILED PR TRY AGAIN OR DON’T NEVER TRY AGAIN JUST CLOSE YOUR DOORS START A WASPY ASS GARDENING CLUB IN A SUBURB OR LIKE, PAINT ANTLERS IN PORTLAND 

IF YOU DON’T RESPECT YOUR COMMUNITY ENOUGH TO SUPPORT THEIR WISHES, THEY ARE NOT YOUR FUCKING COMMUNITY. THIS EVENT WAS FOR GENTRIFIED BROOKLYN, FOR KOMBUCHA LULEMON FLORAL MODCLOTH MANBUN ASS WP WHO REALLY WANT TO STRESS THE IMPORTANCE OF CONTEXT!!!!!! WE WILL NOT EXPLAIN THIS TO YOU AGAIN

& UMM PLEASE DO NOT FOOL YOURSELVES INTO THINKING THAT “what BHQFU wants to do is create a site where an actual conversation happens between people about a loaded topic--”  LOL “loaded topic” -- IS THIS A EUPHEMISM FOR: CANT RACISM BE INTERESTING AS ART? 

NO HOW MANY TIMES NO: RACISM IS NOT A LOADED TOPIC. RACISM AND WHITE SUPREMACY ARE DIRECTLY RELATED TO THE DAILY VIOLENCE AGAINST BLACK AND BROWN PEOPLE IN THE U.S.

“a place where there is actual accountability for a performer's performance in real time”--BE SERIOUS--VP DOESN’T GIVE A FUCK ABOUT ACCOUNTABILITY. SHE’S ACCOUNTABLE ONLY TO HER OWN DE$IRE$. IF SHE CARED ABOUT BEING ACCOUNTABLE TO ANYONE, SHE WOULD’VE PACKED UP HER IGLOO AUSTRALIA FAN CLUB KIT AND MOVED TO ANTARCTICA WHERE NONE OF US HAVE TO HEAR ANY MORE OF HER TEPID BULLSHIT AMID THE FELLOW SWIRLING FLAKES 

“The most important thing to us, as a school, is that our programs offer an open site to a variety of voices, especially dissenting ones.”--COOL STORY BRO!!! SO WE GUESS IT’S PERFECTLY FINE FOR YOUR NONPROFIT EDUCATIONAL INSTITUTION TO REPRODUCE VIOLENCE AGAINST BLACK PEOPLE BECAUSE THERE’S NO CONSEQUENCE, NO SKEWED POWER DYNAMICS, NO REAL LIVED AFTER EFFECTS AFTER ALL IT’S JUST POETRIES IT’S JUST THEORIES AND IDEAS IT’S JUST THAT YOU HAVE A RESPONSIBILITY AS EDUCATORS TO PRESENT ALL SIDES BECAUSE ALL SIDES ARE EQUAL #ALLLIVESMATTER AND YOU WOULD NEVER WANT TO ROB YOUR STUDENTS OF OPPORTUNITIES TO BE INDOCTRINATED IN NEOLIBERAL PRINCIPLES SORRY WE MEAN EDUCATED AS MUCH AS THEY POSSIBLY CAN 

IF YOU’RE FAMILIAR ENOUGH WITH THE VIOLENCE OF TRADITIONAL EDUCATION TO START AN ORGANIZATION FOR ALTERNATIVE EDUCATION, HOW DO YOU CONDONE REPRODUCING THAT VERY VIOLENCE. 

OH, RIGHT--CUZ YOU DON’T HAVE TO FEEL THE VIOLENCE BEING DONE TO YOU 

THANX K BYE FOREVER FU-BBQ!!! 

P.S. NEVER CONTACT US AGAIN. WHY DON’T U WRITE VP ANOTHER LOVE LETTER INSTEAD? CUZ WE’RE UNINTERESTED IN YOUR WHITE POWER ASSES FOREVER <3 

P.S.S. THE NEXT TIME YOU WANNA SHIT ON OUR PLATES & CALL IT “COMMUNITY-BUILDING,” (JAJAJAJA POR FAVOR) STFU & PAY YOUR BLACK ARTISTS & CURATORS.

[thewriterscaravan]

YOU WANNA QUESTION THE FUTURE DIRECTION OF ACTIVISM/LITERATUREWE QUESTION YOUR PREVIOUS COLLABORATORS--WHO U UPLIFTED BEFORE WE WERE BORN

— Mongrel Coalition (@AgainstGringpo) August 21, 2015

THINGS WP DON'T CARE ABT:DYING IMMIGRANTS AT THE BORDERS / ON BOATS / IN HOLDING CELLSTHINGS WP DO CARE ABT:RAWR FEMINISM! 77 CENTS!

— Mongrel Coalition (@AgainstGringpo) August 21, 2015

#MONGRELMONDAY TO-DO:SHARPEN CLAWZRAISE HACKLESLIPSTICKDIVEST FROM WHITENESSABRAZA A TU GENTEHUSTLEKEEP DOING EVERYTHING BETTER

— Mongrel Coalition (@AgainstGringpo) August 17, 2015

[thewriterscaravan]

BEST THING ON THE INTERNETZ.

[bebegargoyle]

"The function, the very serious function, of racism is distraction. It keeps you from doing your work. It keeps you explaining, over and over again, your reason for being. Somebody says you have no language, so you spend twenty years proving that you do. Somebody says your head isn't shaped properly, so you have scientists working on the fact that it is. Somebody says you have no art, so you dredge that up. Somebody says you have no kingdoms, so you dredge that up. None of that is necessary. There will always be one more thing." 

- Toni Morrison, via Meri Nana-Ama Danquah

[allisoncobb]

But here’s a piece of hope

I keep having encounters with older white male poets who feel free to confide that the reason they never got [tenure, a big prize, the recognition they deserve, etc.] is because of women and minorities taking these things instead. Then there is the older white male poet who has suggested that instead of focusing on instances of racism in contemporary poetry, it is more important for us to worry about the Anthropocene.  

 But the Anthropocene, racism, and misogyny are fundamentally linked phenomena arising from a system based on exploitation. As Naomi Klein has pointed out, this is clear every time nations of the world gather and decide again to do nothing about climate change, despite pleas for action from those already suffering and dying—as when Naderev Sano of the Philippines wept before his fellow delegates at the UN climate talks in Warsaw in 2013 while Typhoon Haiyan, the strongest in history, devastated his country.

 This kind of callous disregard seems to arise out of a sense of profound disconnection from our related fates on this planet, the deep belief (perhaps unconscious) that the world exists in order to fulfill one’s own desires. This necessarily includes the view that some forms of life, including other human lives, have less value, are disposable. As Anne Boyer puts it, this is a top predator’s conception of the world in "eye-to claw-to beak relation." 

 The predator's position is one I myself too easily and comfortably adopt, because of my white privilege. But as a woman, I also occupy the position of prey. It's a pathetic doubling of the kind Anne highlights in her allegorical essay: I find myself welcomed into the company of hunters, but some of them are eyeing me for dinner.

 It’s hard to even acknowledge, much less relinquish, the privilege that race confers. It’s easier to strike a pose of solidarity than actually work to dismantle an economic and social system built on racism, especially when one benefits from that system. The Mongrel Coalition Against Gringpo has called out white poets for just this behavior—for lamenting their own privilege while continuing to sit down to dinner with the predators. 

 But here's a piece of hope. The predator view of the world has a fatal flaw, as Anne points out—it understands only a narrow slice of existence: "The bird of prey makes only acquisitions: its knowledge is a series of kills.  The bird of prey understands a kill to be the world in its entirety when, in fact, a kill is only dinner, and dinner is not the entire world."

 Dinner is not the entire world: Those who are subjugated within this system perhaps of necessity acquire a broader perspective that sees the self in a more complex and dependent set of relations—for most there has never been a chance to understand the world as an unlimited abundance delivered to fulfill their desires. 

 I believe that, as ever, fundamental change is going to come through mass social movements from outside of dominant culture—and that this is already happening.  A grassroots and diverse climate justice movement has succeeded at blocking fossil fuel development in several places around the world. A few examples: Indigenous leaders and local residents, including poet Stephen Collis, delayed a Keystone-like tar sands pipeline in Vancouver. In my home state of Oregon, indigenous leaders and local residents also joined to block a major coal export terminal. Movements in Bolivia, Ecuador and other places in South America have arisen as models for combining the concerns of social justice and climate. And in China, though we hardly ever hear of it, thousands of people regularly take to the streets to protest the pollution that is killing them. Activists at last year's UN climate talks in Lima made clear the connection between social and environmental justice when they staged a #BlackLivesMatter die-in.

 I've been thinking and writing a lot lately about the fact that everything has already died. That is, patriarchal racist global capitalism is a system built from death, bent on destruction. So it seems like the task before us is to find an entirely new way to be alive. To recreate the world. Not in a vague "let's hope for a better future" kind of way, in a way that understands that these are the stakes of our collective survival.  I don't know exactly how to do this, but I trust in the gathered and gathering brilliance of these building movements.