Chile Thriller Protest

Personally I am a little jaded by Michael Jackson flashmobs, but this example from Chile in June 2011 takes it to another level of political protest with around 3000 students, many dressed up as zombies, dancing to Thriller by the Presidential palace in Santiago.

The dance off was part of the ongoing student movement about the funding of education, with zombies wearing signs saying 'died in debt'.

From Tehran with Love

One of the things I like about 'blogging' (like earlier fanzine production) is the possibility of direct communication with unmediated voices from around the world - rather than dealing with organisations and party lines. One such voice is Selma at From Tehran with Love. As well as being a fellow Leonard Cohen enthusiast, Selma has posted on being a woman in Iran faced with the religious police: 'the second before going out of the door every morning, you look into the mirror not asking yourself “do I look good” or “how does my hair look today” but wondering if what you are wearing is “legal” and fearing what if this manteau isn’t long enough (below knees, wearing trousers mandatory too) and if it is loose enough and if black is dark enough for them?'.

I noticed that in response to a government threat to crack down on blogs she posted these lines:

One day we’ll sing our freedom
One day we’ll laugh in our joy
And we’ll dance

Dance as synonym for freedom, right up my street, so naturally I googled to check the source and found out that they were actually from a song by... Sting ("We'll be together"). Let's just say I've never been a big fan! I've always had him down as very smug and comfortable, preaching platitudes from some tantric cloud. But actually, reading the lyrics, I thought it was quite remarkable that he'd written a song about the disappeared in Chile (murdered by the state in the aftermath of the 1973 military coup). Remarkable too that he'd structured the song around the image of the dance:

They're dancing with the missing
They're dancing with the dead
They dance with the invisible ones
Their anguish is unsaid
They're dancing with their fathers
They're dancing with their sons
They're dancing with their husbands
They dance alone
They dance alone

One day we'll dance on their graves
One day we'll sing our freedom
One day we'll laugh in our joy
And we'll dance

Even more remarkable that this song, written about events in South America thirty years ago, should inspire dreams of freedom in the Middle East today. And remarkable too that I should be moved to post about a songwriter whose work I have always dismissed out of hand. Another prejudice challenged. Still haven't listened to the song mind!

Mexico 'Emo' Bashing

Last week in Lancashire a 15 -year-old was convicted to 'stamping to death a young woman in a park because she was dressed as a Goth'.

Now from Mexico and Chile comes news of a wave anti-emo attacks. According to NME: "On March 7 around 800 young people in the city of Querataro amassed against emos in the city resulting in many violent attacks, and a week later a similar incident occurred in Mexico City. Emos in both cities responded to the attacks by marching peacefully through the center of the cities. Meanwhile, Chile is also seeing a wave of violence against emo, with TV station Chilevision showing an attack on a group of PokEMOns by skinheads. Emo’s in Chile are known as PokEMOns in different parts of the country."

As usual in incidents like these, sexuality is at the heart of the matter with so-called emos being targeted for dressing effeminately and wearing make up: "At the core of this is the homophobic issue. The other arguments are just window dressing for that," said Victor Mendoza, a youth worker in Mexico City. "This is not a battle between music styles at all. It is the conservative side of Mexican society fighting against something different."