Revoked

Sunday, June 16, 2024

Via White Crane Institute \\ JAIME MANRIQUE

Exploring Gay Wisdom & Culture since 1989

1949 -

Colombian-American author, poet, and journalist, activist JAIME MANRIQUE is born on this date. His first poetry volume won Colombia's National Poetry Award. Additionally, he received a Guggenheim Fellowship to write his memoirs and has contributed to Shade (1996), a Gay, black fiction anthology. He has also produced the non-fictional book, Eminent Maricones which explores the works of Reinaldo Arenas, Manuel Puig and Federico Garcia Lorca. He is currently a professor in the M.F.A. program at Columbia University.

Today's Gay Wisdom

2018 -

TODAY’S GAY WISDOM

An Excerpt from Jaime Manrique’s Eminent Maricones

“A Sadness As Deep As the Sea”

The last days of the Cuban-born Reinaldo Arenas ("Before Night Falls") Reinaldo lived on 44th Street between 8th and 9th Avenues. He had visited my apartment many times yet had never invited me into his home. So when Thomas Colchie phoned in December 1990 and asked me to check on Reinaldo, I thought I'd better get in touch with him right away. Too many friends had died before we had a chance to say things we wanted to say. I called him, and we made plans for me to stop by late that afternoon. I climbed the steps of Reinaldo's building and rang his buzzer. The building was a walk-up, and Reinaldo's apartment was on the top floor, the sixth.

At the top of the steep stairs I knocked on his door. I heard what sounded like a long fumbling with locks and chains, which even in Times Square seemed excessive. The door opened, and I almost gasped. Reinaldo's attractive features were hideously deformed: half his face looked swollen, purple, almost charred, as if it were about to fall off. He was in pajamas and slippers. I can't remember whether we shook hands or not or what we said at that moment. All I remember is that, once I was inside the apartment, he started putting on the chains and locks, as if he were afraid someone was going to break down the door.

We went through the kitchen into a small living room. Besides an old-fashioned sound system and a television set, I remember a primitive painting of the Cuban countryside. A table, two chairs, and a worn-out sofa completed the decor. Reinaldo sat on the sofa and I took a chair. I felt that if I sat too close to him, I would not be able to look him in the eye. Stacks of manuscripts lay on the table--thousands and thousands of sheets, and Reinaldo seemed like a shipwreck disappearing in a sea of paper.

When I asked if they were copies of a manuscript he had just finished, he informed me that the three manuscripts on the table were a novel, a book of poems, and his autobiography, Before Night Falls. Reinaldo spoke with enormous difficulty, his voice a frail rasp. "The novel, El color del verano, concludes my Pentagony. It's an irreverent book that makes fun of everything," he mused.

"Leprosorio is a volume of poems. And Antes que anochezca," he pointed to the third pile, "is my autobiography. I dictated it into a tape recorder and an amanuensis transcribed it. It's going to make a lot of people mad.

It seemed to me absolutely protean the amount of writing he had managed to do, considering what a debilitating disease AIDS is. I said so. "Writing those books kept me alive," he whispered. "Especially the autobiography. I didn't want to die until I had put the final touches. It's my revenge." He explained, "I have a sarcoma in my throat. It makes it hard for me to swallow solid foods or to speak. It's very painful." "Then maybe you shouldn't talk. I'll do the talking," I offered, moving to the sofa.

"But I want to talk," he said curtly. "I need to talk." I said, "Reinaldo, if there is anything you need, please don't hesitate to let me know. Whatever it is...cooking your meals, getting your medicines, going with you to the doctor, anything." I mentioned the the PEN American Center had a fund for writers and editors with AIDS and offered to contact them. "Thanks so much, cariño," he said in the plaintive singsong in which he spoke. It was a sweet, caressing tone: melodious like a lazy samba but also mournful, weary, accepting of the hardships of life. This was a typically peasant trait. "There is a woman who comes to help three days a week. She does all my errands. Besides, Lazaro [Lazaro Carriles, his ex-lover who had remained his closest friend] comes by every day."

Just in case he wasn't aware, I mentioned other sources where he could go for help. He snapped, "I don't like those men who serve as volunteer. I can't stand all that humility." From where I sat I could see a bleached wintry sunset over the Hudson. "But if you contact the PEN Club that would be good," he conceded. "I would like to get away from here before winter comes. My dream is to go to Puerto Rico and get a place at the beach so I can die by the sea." To encourage him, I said, "Perhaps your health will improve. People sometimes..."

"Jaime," he cut me off, "I want to die. I don't want my health to improve...and then deteriorate again. I've been through too many hospitalizations already. After I was diagnosed with PCP [AIDS pneumonia], I asked Saint Virgilio Piñera," he said, referring to the deceased homosexual Cuban writer, " to give me three years to live so that I could complete my body of work." Reinaldo smiled, and his monstrous face showed some of his former handsomeness.

"Saint Virilio granted me my request. I'm happy. I do wish, though, that I had lived to see Fidel kicked out of Cuba, but I guess it won't happen during my lifetime. Soon, I hope, his tyranny will end. I feel certain of that." I knew better than to disagree with him when it came to discussing Fidel Castro. Once, in the mid-eighties, I had tried to tell him to put behind him his years of imprisonment and persecution, to forget Cuba, to accept this county as his new home and to live in the present.

"You just don't understand, do you?" he had shouted, shaking with anger. "I feel like one of those Jews who were branded with a number by the Nazis; like a concentration camp survivor. There is no way on earth I can forget what I went through. It's my duty to remember. This," he roared, hitting his chest, "will not be over until Castro is dead. Or I am dead." We talked for a while about the collapse of the communist states.

The last thing I wanted was to upset him in any way, yet I had to defend my belief in socialism as the most humanistic form of government. So I spoke to that effect. "On paper socialism is the ideal form of government," he said, not altogether surprising me. "It's just that it's never worked anywhere. Perhaps some day." Becoming thoughtful, almost as if talking to himself, he added, "Jaime, what a life I've had. Even before the revolution, it was bad enough the agony of being an intellectual queen in Cuba. What a sad an hypocritical world that was," he paused.

"Finally, I leave that hell, and come here full of hopes. And this turns out to be another hell; the worship of money is as bad as the worst in Cuba. All these years, I've felt Manhattan was just another island-jail. A bigger jail with more distractions but a jail nonetheless. It just goes to show that there are more than two hells. I left one kind of hell behind and fell into another kind. I never thought I would live to see us plunge again into the dark ages. This plague -- AIDS -- is but a symptom of the sickness of our age."

As night fell, the neon of the billboards of midtown Manhattan and the lights of the skyscrapers provided the only illumination. We chatted in hushed tones, more intimately than we ever had before. I was aware of how precious the moment was to me, how I wanted to engrave it forever in my memory. When I got up to leave, Reinaldo had difficulty finding his slippers in the darkness, so I knelt on the floor and put them on his calloused, swollen, plum-colored feet. We went again through the kitchen, where he mentioned he would have broiled fish for dinner. Then he unchained the numerous locks, slowly, one by one.

We didn't hug or shake hands as we parted -- as if neither of those gestures was appropriate. "Call me any time, if you need anything," I said. "You're such a dear," he said. As I was about to take the first step down, I turned around. The door to the apartment was still open. In the rectangular darkness Reinaldo's shadowy shape was like a ghost who couldn't make up its mind whether to materialize or to vanish.

The following day Reinaldo called to ask me if I could get him some grass. He said he had heard it helped to control nausea after meals. I told him that I would try to get some. I called a couple of friends and mentioned Reinaldo's request. Bill Sullivan suggested that I contact the Gay Men's Health Crisis because he thought Reinaldo sounded suicidal. I dismissed this possibility. Because his wish was to die by the sea, I thought he would try to make it to Puerto Rico if he received the grant from PEN.

The next day, around noon, Tom Colchie called to say the Reinaldo had taken his life the night before; that he had used pills and had washed them down with shots of Chivas Regal; that he had left letters -- one of them for the police, clarifying the circumstances of his death -- and another one for the Cuban exiles, urging them to continue their fight against Castro's rule. Reinaldo had died in the early hours of December 7, and his body had been found by the woman who came by to help with his chores. He was forty-seven.

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Via Ram Dass - Love Serve Remember Foundation \\ Words of Wisdom - June 16, 2024 💌

Every religion is the product of the conceptual mind attempting to describe the mystery.

- Ram Dass -

Saturday, June 15, 2024

Via Robert Reich // Trump’s plan to dismantle democracy… and our plan to stop it

Dear Daniel,

Have you heard about Project 2025? If not, you might want to sit down before reading the rest of this email — because frankly, it’s terrifying.

Project 2025 is a nearly 1000-page step-by-step playbook for Donald Trump’s second term that would literally turn America into an authoritarian MAGA police state and shred our most cherished freedoms.

But most Americans haven’t heard a word about it, because the mainstream media has almost totally ignored it. So we need to get the word out. Fast.

Inequality Media Civic Action is launching a major public education push through viral posts and videos on social media to alert the American people about Project 2025 and the dangers of a second Trump term.

Will you donate $5 a month to help get the truth out and warn the American people about Project 2025?

Yes, Robert! I'll start a monthly donation to help Inequality Media alert the American people about Project 2025 and the dangers of a second Trump term.

No, I'm sorry, I can't chip in monthly.

At nearly a thousand pages, Project 2025 is longer than most Stephen King novels, and a lot scarier. The Associated Press called it “a plan to dismantle the US government and replace it with Trump’s vision” — and if anything, they’re understating the threat.

Think I’m exaggerating? I’m not. In fact, you can go ahead and read it yourself, because the whole thing is posted on the internet.

Under Project 2025, a second Trump term would begin by purging nonpartisan civil service workers like EPA scientists and IRS accountants and replacing them with unqualified Trump toadies. These are the rank-and-file government employees who prevented some of Trump’s greatest excesses last time around, like having the military shoot protesters or seizing voting machines to overturn the election. Next time, they’ll all be gone.

Project 2025 then aims to strip Americans of our most basic freedoms by banning abortion nationwide, rolling back LGBTQ rights, banning books, and quashing free speech.

And then to enforce these attacks on our rights even in blue states, Project 2025 lays out a plan to turn America into a MAGA police state by using the Justice Department to prosecute district attorneys Trump disagrees with, invoking the Insurrection Act to shut down protests, and mobilizing red state national guard units against blue states that resist his authoritarian agenda.

There’s so much more in Project 2025 that I can’t begin to cover it all. Drastic rollbacks of environmental and workplace protections. The mass deportation of 20 million immigrants. The shredding of the separation of church and state.

But because the mainstream media is almost totally ignoring Project 2025, Inequality Media Civic Action is preparing to launch viral videos across every major social media platform to sound the alarm. And to make sure we have the resources we need to get the word out, I’m asking you today: Will you donate $5 a month to help us launch and scale up this program?

Click here to start your monthly donation and support our efforts to warn the American people about Project 2025 and the dangers of a second Trump term.

Or, if you can't chip in monthly, click here.

Thank you for joining with us,

Robert Reich
Inequality Media Civic Action

Copyright © 2023 Inequality Media Civic Action, All rights reserved.

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Heart Sutra- 般若心経 -Buddhist Mantra to remove all obstacles- Tinna Tinh

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Via Dhamma Wheel | Right Effort: Restraining Unarisen Unhealthy States

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RIGHT EFFORT
Restraining Unarisen Unhealthy States

Whatever a person frequently thinks about and ponders, that will become the inclination of their mind. If one frequently thinks about and ponders unhealthy states, one has abandoned healthy states to cultivate unhealthy states, and then one’s mind inclines to unhealthy states. (MN 19)

Here a person rouses the will, makes an effort, stirs up energy, exerts the mind, and strives to restrain the arising of unarisen unhealthy mental states. One restrains the arising of the unarisen hindrance of ill will. (MN 141)

Reflection

We all have the capacity for unhealthy states. This capacity was eliminated by the Buddha under the Bodhi tree, his awakening being largely defined as dismantling the mechanism by which such states as anger, jealousy, hatred, and cruelty arise. Pulled up by the roots, they can no longer occur. But for the rest of us, the issue is more about managing these states than vanquishing them, and this requires restraint.

Daily Practice

Restraining the arising of unhealthy mental and emotional states that lie dormant in the unconscious mind but have not had occasion to erupt into consciousness is an important practice. We learn to position ourselves and hold ourselves in ways that do not encourage these states to arise. If you do not ruminate about people treating you badly, for example, you will not be likely to feel ill will or hatred toward them.

Tomorrow: Establishing Mindfulness of Body and Abiding in the First Jhāna
One week from today: Abandoning Arisen Unhealthy States

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Via Daily Dharma: Survey the Landscape of Your Body

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Survey the Landscape of Your Body

As you survey the landscape of your body from within, see if you can find a place to rest your awareness—a place that feels neutral or pleasant.

Kate Johnson, “Making Friends with Yourself”

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The Four Noble Truths: Living Life with Purpose
With Lama Aria Drolma

A brand new Dharma Talk is available now! Join ordained Buddhist nun Lama Aria Drolma to discuss the core foundation of Buddhism, offering profound insights into the very nature of human existence.

Via White Crane Institute // 2020 - The Supreme Court ruled that a landmark civil rights law protects LGBT people from discrimination in employment

Noteworthy

2020 -

The Supreme Court ruled that a landmark civil rights law protects LGBT people from discrimination in employment, a resounding victory for LGBT rights from a conservative court. The court decided by a 6-3 vote that a key provision of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 known as Title VII that bars job discrimination because of sex, among other reasons, encompasses bias against LGBT workers.

The cases were the court’s first on LGBT rights since Justice Anthony Kennedy’s retirement and replacement by Kavanaugh. Kennedy was a voice for gay rights and the author of the landmark ruling in 2015 that made same-sex marriage legal throughout the United States. Kavanaugh generally is regarded as more conservative.

The Trump administration had changed course from the Obama administration, which supported LGBT workers in their discrimination claims under Title VII. During the Obama years, the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission had changed its longstanding interpretation of civil rights law to include discrimination against LGBT people. The law prohibits discrimination because of sex, but had no specific protection for sexual orientation or gender identity.

In recent years, some lower courts have held that discrimination against LGBT people is a subset of sex discrimination, and thus prohibited by the federal law. Efforts by Congress to change the law had failed.

The Supreme Court cases involved two gay men and a transgender woman who sued for employment discrimination after they lost their jobs. And while these precedents may make us feel warm and fuzzy all over, they are certainly in the gunsights of the current SCOTUS bench.

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