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Clink on the link in the story to RSVP.
CLICK THIS LINK if you plan to attend the memorial tomorrow from 2 to 4 for our friend and mentor Amin David. And you should.
The long awaited public memorial celebration of Amin David’s life has finally arrived. If we have to sell the notion of attending to you, don’t come. If you liked or loved or appreciated Amin, then please do.
It would not be surprising if there were some protests at the event, because everything that happens within 40 days of an election tends to be political. So here’s this list of (unapproved, coming only from us) DO’s and DON’Ts:
- DON’T rise to the bait. If anyone tries to provoke you or insult you, laugh at them and walk on. Pointing and laughing is also fine.
- DO show a lot of enthusiasm if you feel it. This is a great chance for the community of people who loved Amin to feel the power of being together.
- DON’T use the event to slag people whom you think that Amin would oppose. That just creates sound bites for people who want to portray social justice fighters in a negative light. We all know the sorts of candidates that Amin would like. (And if you don’t know, OJB will be reminding you!) And if Amin had had something bad to say about a candidate, he would probably say it with grace.
- DO register voters, if you’d like! THAT is a great tribute to Amin in this first year of District elections in Anaheim!
We’ll see you there!
(We’ll also add some more stories below as they occur to us.)
This is your Weekend Open Thread. Talk about that or anything else you’d like within reasonable bounds of decency and decorum.
Okay, I’ll bite. Who on Earth would be protesting this event (except possibly the racist James Robert Reade)?
People similar to the racist James Robert Reade.
And anyone who wants to beat a “lookit how ill-behaved these people are” drum with selectively edited footage.
I expect that you were not on my side of this one, but I still hurt when I think about what Minnesota Republicans did with the politicization of Sen. Paul Wellstone’s funeral. THAT sort of thing.
Hard to imagine, Amin was pretty uncontroversial toward the end of his life.
I have no idea what you’re talking about.
Well then look it up, scholar.
I was being disingenuous.
I understood you perfectly. You tried to create a stupid issue to look important and when you got called on it you then tried to describe me as the kind of person that would cause trouble at a dead man’s funeral.
You obviously know nothing about me.
I didn’t have you in mind as a potential troublemaker at all, David. You’re conservative, but within that category you’re pretty much the opposite of Reade. Why you got the sense that I was calling out you or anyone you associate with is mystifying — “what the hell is wrong with you?”-level mystifying.
When you wrote that you didn’t know what I was talking about, I presumed that you were probably addressing my reference to Paul Wellstone’s funeral. A lot of people nowadays were too young to remember it; most of those who are old enough probably were not paying close attention. (I’d expect you to have been an exception.)
For those who don’t know, Sen. Wellstone (a Bernie Sanders type whose success may have helped embolden Sanders to run for Senate) died in a suspicious small plane crash in northern Minnesota in the late days of his campaign for reelection in 2002. Former vice President Walter Mondale was hurriedly recruited to be the Democratic candidate against former “business Democrat” turned Republican Norm Coleman. Wellstone’s funeral turned into, at points, a Roccus political pep rally; Republicans depicted it as being an extremely poor taste, and with massive media hype it contributed to Wellstone’s seat being won by his more or less opposite within the Democratic Party (when Coleman had been part of it.)
As I said, it is one of my absolutely worst political memories.
Yesterday’s memorial, in contrast, was not particularly political, and absolutely beautiful. And yet, I am sure that parts of it could be cherry-picked by any detractors present and order to present a picture of it that might alienate those who were not present. If and when the Cunninghams Angie world do try to use images from it to alienate voters from candidates who are more or less in the mold of Amin David, probably with many images of the impressive native dancers, I expect that you’d be among those sneering at such coverage, possibly even enough so to publicly denounce it.
If you haven’t noticed, Zenger, I tend not to take pot shots at you.
Alright you two knock it off. It was a really wonderful celebration of life. I was moved to tears with the timeline of Amins work in the community. Ive known him for no less than 18 years and I as the list of his accomplishments from his efforts was read off I realized I hardly knew the man. Im probably nor the only one who felt that way. His earthly form as like that of an iceberg. The true depth of him was hidden beneath.