The School's Out Edition
 BARE KNUCKLES: JEFF WINBUSH on history's cycles in "Death & Texas."
 STONEWALL VIEWS: In "Pompous Circumstances," PHIL MARTIN talks about what gay grads can do when School's Out.
 IRISH EYES: A Special "Bloom's Day" feature from JOE O'NEILL.
Your HOUSE OF CARDS has an all new Joke of the Day.  POWERSSOUND: PREMIERE! Our (ever-more-roving) reviewer, BOB POWERS, adds music to his quiver.
 TRIO: RADIO RAHEEM thinks school should be out for adults, too!
Your HOUSE OF CARDS has an all new Joke of the Day. IRISH EYES: A special editorial on the aftermath of the Irish vote from Joe O'Neill.
 ON DRUGS: ADAM J. SMITH talks about "Medical Marijuana, Summits & Balloons."
Another update of Your VOX POPULI page: WALLY WORTS is accused of dropping the ball; more kudos for THOMAS HART; more mail for CARLENE; and ADAM SMITH is called upon to do more research... DON'T READ ME FIRST!: ROD updates us on the latest changes at the magazine.  HOT LINKS(Not From Louisiana): RADIO RAHEEM updates our Silver Surf and gives another Best of Web award.
The Let's Dance Edition  BarnesandNoble SEARCH: If you're like us, you like good writing. Use the Barnes and Noble Search Engine page to find great savings on good books, delivered right to your home or office!
For rapid response, use The Message Board |
SAN FRANCISCO - 12 June, 1998: It's not often you get *two* "Insiders" from me in one week, but this has not been a typical week.
I had hoped to be completely focused on the upcoming Bloom's Day events around the planet, and The Plan was that our cover reflect the celebratory mood fitting for this international event. But reality has intruded again, and we are not feeling very celebratory at the G21 as this week closes.
HATE CRIMES. Reporting on crimes based in ignorant hatred is usually scant, because of the fears of the people who usually find themselves the targets of this kind of violence.
Hate crimes don't make good copy for newspapers or magazines, because among the readership are some of those very haters that you need to report about, and advertisers would rather have the newspaper or magazine run pictures of kittens or infants than the gay person, the person of color, or any other type of victim. On Monday, here in San Francisco --- a city all-too-willing to trumphet its *reputation* for "tolerance" --- a group of reportedly twenty(20) white youths jumped, beat and harassed two African-American couples --- AND AN ELEVEN MONTH OLD INFANT --- in the Haight-Asbury district. The youths are reported to have to used knives, chains, and skateboards in the attack. They are alleged to have told the assaulted people to get off "the white block" of the neighborhood. This same week, a group of white men in Jasper, Texas, committed a heinous assault and murder of an African-American. The details are so gruesome that simply reading about it, as you can in JEFF WINBUSH's column tonight, makes ones hair stand on end. And in my e-mail box today I found the complete transcript of actor Charleton Heston's speech this week, in all its vitriol and self-righteousness.... The transcript was from David Duke's site, and gave me pause as I prepared to edit PHIL MARTIN's advice to gay graduates for tonight's issue. Thinking of Heston's exhortation about the "cultural war" and then going to Phil's piece, I had to wonder if I should have encouraged Phil to be more cautionary, rather than upbeat. I reflected on the fact that, though a certain segment of the visitors here were more-than-willing to chastise Jeff Winbush about his commentary on Reggie White's speech in Wisconsin, *narry a word* has been typed to us about Phil's openly gay advocacy on this site.... And I shuddered. 7 June, 1998 - Much of the focus in building the magazine, and its roster, over the past couple years has been on making it broad. We cover politics in features like IRISH EYES, G21 SOUTH AMERICA, and POLICY MATTERS/ON DRUGS; society in BARE KNUCKLES, LONDON CALLING! and most of TRIO; humor is the mainstay of many of our columns, but most specifically HOUSE OF CARDS; human rights and self-awareness issues in STONEWALL VIEWS and TRIO; your opinions can be aired, and your feedback offered, on the MESSAGE BOARD and the VOX POPULI page; SEA OF DREAMS and PLANETARY MADNESS bring you dream interpretation and astrology, respectively; G21 WORDS offers poetry, serialized novels, and the occassional homage to the great artists of our times; POWERSBOOKS & TRENDBENDS do book and movie reviews, with the former also bringing author-interviews here online; CRUNCHTIME brings you sports coverage. In each of the writers, we have tried to present as broad a spectrum of outlooks, writing styles, writing and journalistic experience, as possible. I now feel comfortable in saying that we have succeeded in that mission and, as I've implied since our 100th issue, it is time to move on. The new focus of our efforts, during this summer, will be to go deep. By "depth," I mean that our new goal is to offer features which augment and support the ones you have already grown familiar with. An example of this approach is our new IRISH COFFEE feature. Though it can stand alone, the intent of IC is to be a supplement to IRISH EYES. If it achieves its mission, it will broaden your perspective on our Ireland coverage, give you sidebars in its resource section to some of the issues raised, and spotlight Irish and Irish-American cultural events and trends. In short, add value to your experience of the IRISH EYES column. This week, you'll also see a deepening of our review "Section" as Bob Powers produces the first of a new series of MUSIC reviews. The column title is TBA, but it expect it to have an tie-in relationship to the existing POWERSBOOKS. In addition, we're auditioning a new Sports columnist to add depth to our sports coverage. My gut feeling is that the combination of depth to our already broad coverage and edgy approach to online journalism and commentary will produce a different type of web publication, one that both you and I will delight in returning to day after day. Expect to see a lot more strategic moves along these lines over the next sixty days.... IN THIS EDITION: We're glad you're here. As you can see from the nav' bar to our upper left, we have a lot to offer this(and EVERY) week. Stick around. More importantly: TELL EVERY SINGLE ONE OF YOUR FRIENDS. We want you here EVERY DAY. WHY? Because we like you.... Be Good to Each Other,
Rod
ROD AMIS is also a Contributing Editor at Suite101.com, where he writes the " 'Net Publishing" feature when not busy with publishing chores at this site, and answering sixty -to- one hundred e-mails a day.
CREDITS || AWARDS|| SEARCH ENGINES
VOX POPULI, The Reader Response Page for Those Too Timid for the Message Board
Copyright, 1998, GENERATOR 21.
Our Editor does listen!