Yo Nez! I just tagged you for a Thinking Blogger Award. You may or may not have already been tagged with that particular meme - I forget. All the same, you've consistently given me a great deal to think and rethink, and I have no doubt that you'll do the same thing at YearlyKos.

Look, that sucks period. But if a friend has done this, and that friend reaches out to you, I would offer that that would be one of those moments you speak so eloquently about here. The moment when we are asked to find energy and forgiveness to keep the dialogue open. If this was said by a friend, hear it from them directly. Trust but verify.

i don't understand. no friend has reached out to me but that one who has told me this is going on. i never shut down any dialogue.

Well, I guess I was projecting a hopefulness that the friend in question would reach out.

Well, I guess I was projecting a hopefulness that the friend in question would reach out.

well, what will be will be. i'm looking forward. that friend is still a friend, and my quarrel is certainly not with them. i'm really not about to get hung up on this. i just wanted to speak my piece on it. next post will deal with something entirely different. and so on.

and carmen, as i said in the post, it's hard for me to imagine a time when iw ouldn't be open to someone's sincere effort to reach out. but again, nobody has reached out. one friend has clued me in, is all.

Damn, I'm sorry to hear about all this drama, but congratulations on the awards to go to Yearly Kos (makes me wish I were going to be in Chicago then). Chicago's a great town; if they're having it at the Palmer House Hilton, you can go for a stroll around Millenium Park, check out the Frank Gehry piece there, maybe the Art Institute (but maybe you already know Chicago). I'm sorry to hear you're being denounced for all this stuff (all of which, the Feministe gig and the trip to YearlyKos, I think is great), but there is something kind of funny about being called a "sell-out." What's next, you used to be cool?

Personally I love being called a sell-out. It usually means that I'm selling something which is good.

jeffaclitus, thanks for the list.

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kai, i like your take on this. :)

Wow, posting on Feministe is selling out? That puts me in trouble, since my gig there starts tomorrow.

On YearlyKos I have almost no opinion, but I know I have a high opinion of you, so you going there must mean there is something good about it.

Anyway, shame on those people for fussing behind your back and not coming to you first.

gee kactus, so sorry to hear you'll be on Feministe. now, everything you've ever said, well, i guess it means nothing. seriously, enjoy yourself, i'll be checking out your posts.

i dont have a real opinion on the convention either. but i know what my opinion is on people who talk "unity" or "solidarity" but then use whisper campaigns to dissolve those things. eh, i am not going to waste energy on imaginary naysayers. as far as i'm concerned, until they come to me, they don't exist. i'm going to focus on the good energy that remains available, and keep on wit mah bad self. thanks for your vote of confidence, hermana.

It is your very efforts at building coalitions, where that is possible, that impresses me. If you haven't already seen this transcript of a speech by Bernice Johnson Reagon titled Coalition Politics:Turning the Century, you might find it interesting. She talks about the difference between a "home" of like-minded people where we are nurtured and a "coalition" which is necessary for our survival - but difficult.

I recently struggled with this issue a bit and wrote about it here in a piece I titled Some Questions on Means and Ends.

LET'S GET SOMETHING CLEAR. I'm hearing things from people...some people think I'm a sell-out? Or in some way I have turned my back on something or breached some phantasmic ideological contract I never signed with anyone—because I post on Feministe? Or because I go to YearlyKos?

What. The. Fuck.

That's totally stupid. When people start policing where you go, where you talk... that to me is no longer primarily about a political struggle and now primarily about some weird form of ideological purity. I've seen it happen in feminist circles too, where suddenly the wrong bedfellows make you a traitor to the Sisterhood. How exactly does any of that kind of policing help the cause?

the friend who told me what was being said insists it is only confusion, but i can't help thinking more base emotions are informing this sudden judgment. either way, it's their problem now. not mine.

ouch. i mean, i've got reservations (to put it mildy) about the whole Kos way of business, from pie fighting, DLC lovin' and the under the bus throwning antics i've seen go on there...

but it's up to you if you want to go, and if you think that you can gain something from teh experience. maybe i'm too cynical, and this is a chance to connect with some good folks, maybe even change some minds. i hope that your voice is gonna be heard, even if i'm too jaded to try.

blog drama sucks.

Lots of things you say and probably lots of things you do {the Kos deal isn't one of those} are not what I would do or say. But that is why I visit here. If we were exactly alike in thought and deed I would be wasting my time.
Best to ignore the static.
As another commenter noted, if I had known you were going to the KOS thing I would have actually considered going. If Gilliard were still with us and appearing there I would have gone too. The rest of the cast of characters don't have the same vibrations for me, but so what, other people like the invitees enough to invest over $1300 for a few days of thought exchange and the chance to see some Dem. pols up close. Admission, room, food, airfare 2200 miles, it adds up.
Next year, I hope you tell us early enough. And say hello to Mr. Holland for me. If you expect to be there next year, tell us soon so I can save up. It will be $25 a week I'll have to devote to the event. Is it worth that? I'm thinking!

RC, they called me three days ago!! Up until then, I had no plans on going. Even when they called me I was like "no, hadn't planned on going...i guess it could be fun if i could find some troublemakers." That was my response, verbatim. I only wish I could have let people know earlier so that we could meet up. I guess if I go next year depends on how this year goes, and what the time in-between teaches me.

Thanks for your words.

"Fear & Loathing At Yearly Kos" this could be legendary.

You see Nez, the blog slaving is finally paying off!

You were tapped to go to YearlyKos because your message is clear and Brown. And those who chose to fund you and others like you are trying be bring voices to the conclave. Is it likely that those voices will be well received and understood and will create great change? Probably not. But what could possibly be the point of REFUSING to take the opportunity to be that voice? Those who think speaking Truth to Power in Power's face is not a necessary part of the process aren't "in the struggle," they're "of the struggle. Don't look back. You're not going for those who would call you names. You're going for those left sitting in the back of the truck in the sun...silent...and in despair. F**k the dumb s**t. And to the namecallers: what.ev.er.

There is this theory going around the activist community that goes something like: "If X is wrong, if X has said offensive shit in the past, then X should be shut out and anyone that associates with X is a sellout, traitor, person guilty by association, etc."

Where is the logic in that? People can grow and learn. I see no problem with talking to folks over at feministe or whereever even if I don't agree. Their readership probably learned a lot from you. and that is the point, isn't it? Same thing with the kos awards. Why do we think that some people are sooo wrong that they are incapable of looking at things differently, why are some minds beyond repair? I guess we would have to work too hard if we had to dialogue with people we don't agree with. sheesh. Yeah, that's what I want--to sit around with people who agree with me all the time, so the movement can never get any bigger. but, seriously, you don't have to justify your reasoning to attend that dailykos to anyone (not that you ever thought that you did). If folks at the kos awards or feministe haven't taken the red pill yet, well then, I have no reservations about you spiking their cocktails.

Keep up the good work, Nez.

thank you luisa. i appreciate that. you are right with your reminder: i didnt have to justify anything. guess i had to get it out. high school drama. i quit high school when i was 16. keep tu clica.

yes, i think i have a different way of seeing life than these you speak of, those in such "Activist" circles. Or so it seems. that's okay. i understand that views diverge, paths part. that's life. we don't need to do it with hostility, we can accept this fact of life. i do. it's been all my life, hey.

there's a reason i made a point of saying, a while back, that i wasn't an "Activist®," anyway. i'm just a human. i write, i think, i speak up when i feel i should. i believe in stuff, sometimes i strike out or draw blood for those beliefs, sometimes i just keep them. seems this whole 'activist' gig comes with just the types of rules i imagined it might. but those rules wouldn't work for me, even if I did forsake the Convention O' Traitorism. after all, i'm someone who has been "wrong," who has "said offensive shit in the past," so there's no point in others shutting me out via proxykos! let's just ring it up direct. shut me out because i have sinned my way out of favor myself. who are these saints, i wonder.

thank you again, hermana.

Thank you James. Damn, is this meme STILL going around? Amazing.

thanks for el fuego, changeseeker. i appreciate it.

See, RickB? I'm sort of thinking like you. Although, really, I have no idea at all. I'm hoping to play it real loose and see what happens.

NL, I'm a check those links. Thanks for your words.

Nothing really to add to the excellent remarks by others here. Just wanted to say I'm sorry some feel this way. Me personally, I am enjoying watching your rise to SUPERMEGABLOGSTARDOM! and beyond. Way beyond, I hope. At least far enough beyond to say adios to the high school stuff forever. :)

gracias, YouKnowWho. :)

Well the way I look at it is like this.

I like Feministe and all, but it's pretty fucking whitebread. On the other hand, when they do make visible efforts to reach out and include others -- especially notable this year -- well it makes me reconsider some aspects about them.

Ditto Kos. It's so fucking whitebread AND mysogynistic half the time, but then hearing that they've invited you makes me pause. Now all they have to do is clean up their act with women (I can't tell you how much it pisses me off that these so-called liberal boyz are so anti-women when you do the barest bit of surface scratching. Geez.)

So anyway, go forth and raise some serious trouble at YearlyKos and let us know what you thought. I'd also be interested on your take on your guest blogging at Feministe, for that matter.

BTW, "BEG" significa "niña con los ojos morenos." I'm just saying.

ah, then I'd be a BEB of course. :) but i'll stick with "Nezua."

yes, i understand you. i guess that's what hurt about hearing this stuff about "friends" saying junk (personally i doubt these people were ever "Friends"). it's not as if suddenly i don't see those things about those sites or peoples.

i will write a post on my guest-posting at Feministe, good idea. yeah, i caught flak at Feministe from some people, i catch it here for talking to them... there will always be this flak, people thinking they know what you should do. people measure themselves by the mirrors around them. what i do, think, say, believe, it affects people. just as what you do affects people. so people get freaked out when you do soemthing they dont understand. it affects them, touches their views. makes them question. not a bad thing...

thanks, BEG. i plan to go forth and scoop up all that fate lays before me.

NL, Bernice Johnson Reagon is amazing. that article is like a bomb in the heartwaters. wow.

Nez:

I am sleeping in the doorways of far too many blogs, lately. All I can say is, WTF. Wait, that's not true. I can say that it seems like it's always okay with some folks to demand "loyalty" & "purity" of others, that they would never dream of offering . Too weird.

So glad you appreciated the Reagon article. Pretty amazing that she said all that more than 25 years ago. I read it over a year ago and it continues to surface for me every couple of months with some new truth.

Just so you know, I'm psyched kid oakland et al got you and others to go to YearlyKos!

Have fun but don't let them tokenize The Brown!

Thanks Donna. I'll look out for myself and the Brown™, you know it, hermana.

Oh man, the number of people I'm dying to meet and talk to at Yearly Kos keeps creeping up and up.

be careful what ya wish for.

I'm so sorry that you're getting grief for agreeing to share your ideas and your passions with us at YearlyKos in Chicago. Please take me at my word that we embrace you; I personally can't wait to meet you.

As one of the 6 women on the 10-person organizing committee I just want to take a moment to let your readers know that YK and dK are separate things. Our small group of committed volunteers has worked blazingly hard on this all year and if we haven't managed to live up to all our highest expectations, well that's a sure sign that we could use your help. I know us; our hearts are right. Please don't dismiss us until you've given us a try.

thanks, klio. i see Dkos and Ykos as two different things, too, or trust me, I doubt I'd be going. I see Ykos as a convention where tons of bloggers will be, some of whom i've talked to online, and would enjoy meeting, and mostly, an opening. saying "yes" to most unexpected openings in my path is the way i do. i've been making my way for a little while now, and i trust in my decision.

so, i do appreciate your words, but i wouldn't give it too much more thought. the way i see it, true friends who were concerned about me compromising my values would speak to me. thus, this reaction from anonymous sources can safely be summed up in a word known as envidia.

and if any readers feel this way, i trust they will come around, given time. or not! we're right on course.

mostly, thanks for your words and warm welcome. i look forward to meeting you, too.

An artist friend's motto is, "Not selling out is just an excuse for not getting anything done."

(Not that I think you're selling out. If someone offered me, as a brown girl, the chance to go to YearlyKos - and paid me no less, I'd be SO there to kick some ass.)

Good motto. Yes, like a glass of warm milk for comfort after you miss your high score.

If I try, I can logically understand a certain amount of concern. There is a line...such as if by accepting something I would change my writing. But even thinking that could happen is a joke. And if a person sees me going to YKos as a statement that I now think the Democrat party is the salvation for all the US's ills, then sure, that would be hypocritical. Or if I put up a free banner on my blog that said "Kos Rules!"...well, then, I'd puke before any of my readers had a chance to.

But again, I don't think honest concern for my values is what prompted the reaction. And in about five seconds, I won't even be thinking about it anymore.

Thank you for the backup, amiga.

I try to approach these things with the motto, "The more people I piss off the better job I'm doing." Of course, that's hard when you piss off folks who you like, but that's going to happen sometimes too. Sometimes your friends are right to be pissed; sometimes they aren't. Sometimes people are not really friends, just posers, that is especially true on line where people think they know people, but they really don't know them well.

Sometimes things get lost in translation and these are just misunderstandings, like the old telephone game we played as kids.

Just random thoughts..blogging can drain people, sometimes you just have to have the old I don't give a fuck attitude if you want to keep going. That's how I maintain.

keep up the good work!

thanks rachel.