Would Someone Remind Me to Think Twice Before I Talk to the Mainstream Media Again
I’m not in a real good mood this morning, courtesy of the Dallas Morning News who misquoted me this morning. I happened to run into their reporter at the Women’s international Peace Conference yesterday while he was going around breathlessly asking if we were scandalized by Betty Williams’ remarks about President Bush the night before (see earlier post). I told him that I thought it was quite brave to talk about impeachment in the state of Texas and I was glad that she had said it and that impeachment was an important tool for defending the Constitution and Democracy. The reporter, with the unlikely name of James Hohmann, proceeded to make it sound like I supported her unfortunate comment about killing the President, a comment that he took far more seriously than the Secret Service who declined to interview Ms. Williams.
There is always the risk that when you talk to reporters you will be taken out of context and had I known at that point that this particular newspaper had run a very patronizing editorial about the conference earlier in the week, I probably would have declined. I also think it is important to point out that besides the Dallas paper, there has been virtually no media coverage of this conference. Personally, I think that when you have an international conference attended by 3000 women from around the world talking about peace in a time of many conflicts and wars, it is news. That the media, alternative and mainstream alike, does not seem to get this is a pretty damning statement.
More later, feeling like a one-woman media machine at the moment, I’m off to go do what I can to cover this conference.
Postscript–Mr. Hohmann just responded to the note I wrote to him telling him that I thought he had taken my comments out of context. He claims he didn’t, but since his entire piece was about Williams’ slip of tongue and not her more substantive comments about impeachment, my remarks most definitely appeared to refer to the former. But he very nicely wished me a good rest of my stay in Dallas and a safe trip home. Don’t ya love southern hospitality!
Filed under: Uncategorized, Commentary
I presented at the 3rd Women’s World Peace Conference– What I learned from attending the conference was the communicating in sister kinship language or Mother Tongue modeled by the 13 Indigenious grandmothers and Betty Williams keynote address.
Betty Williams described the horrors of hearing little children speak of rape and being murdered. The tiny grandmother spoke a female rage, a mother and grandmother’s fierce and ferocious love to protect and preserve life—sharing the universal sense amongst peaceful loving women, grandmothers and mothers about our abilities to give form to life and to have life thrive in peaceful connecting responses.
Betty Williams said she could just “kill Bush,� or anyone for that matter that brings unwarranted death and destruction upon children.
The powerful prose of grandmothers and mothers and daughters ferocious love and female rage, Betty Williams offered the peaceful dimension of her female gender speak that included a serious question, “Why hasn’t Bush been impeached?�
A scattered standing ovation rose grandmothers and mothers from their seats—the female way of killing with ferocious love. Not all the women stood-there were pockets in the ballroom seating arean that lacked solidarity with “not my husband, son or brother� to “what about the men� while the super conductive viral hatred and violence towards the female gender is loosed unbated with their demure “tsk, tsk,� towards Betty Williams.
I thought this is why this grandmother won a Peace Prize- her courage and Amazon ancient grandmothers spoke a female’s reality and truth of her lived experiences “shattering the world as we know it,� lo and behold gave out a consequence to the ruling war gods that most women worship, service and blindly follow HIS rules in earnest.
I wrote my current Blog on this topic- CloudWoman- located on my website www.kolocollaboration.org
I enjoyed your truth telling and insight on the situation…