For anyone who has been reading Erika’s gorgeous, soul-searching articles of late and wondering: where does she find the balance between inner fire and inner calm that would allow her to write like that, we trust this picture raises far more questions than it will ever answer. Spread the love
Category: A Piece of Our Minds
#ActLoveGive-A Request from Erika
by Erika Grumet This weekend will mark the fifth anniversary of the shooting at the Pulse nightclub in Orlando, an unimaginable and heartbreaking tragedy targeting our LGBTQ+ family, and in particular BIPOC members of our LGBTQ+ family. We’ll bring you a longer piece about that over the weekend, but I have a request this week,…
That’s it. I’m done with Stradivarius Violins
Stradivarius is a Scam I’ve never been a violinist; I don’t remember doing more than picking up (with their permission) a friend’s violin and trying it with the bow. I probably made a sound like a Tuvan throat-singer, and alas, not in a good way. But I have played piano for going on 30 years,…
The AIDS Epidemic: Fortieth Anniversary
Forty years ago today, the first reports of the “pneumonia” that we would eventually know was AIDS broke. I felt so strongly that I couldn’t just let this anniversary pass without acknowleging it in some way. HIV has cast shadows in my life for so long, as a Gen Xer, as a queer person. And…
Antivax Racists are Trying to Repurpose the Yellow Star of David
By Erika Grumet When I was a kid, I would occasionally encounter people with numbers tattooed on their arms. I don’t remember a time when Nazis and what they had done to Jews (and by extension, my own family) weren’t a part of my consciousness. I heard the stories first hand from the survivors, in…
Mass-Grave found in Canada Dates from only about 45 Years Ago
By Adam Katz It gives me little pleasure to write this article, but I could not see failing to respond. Throughout most of the 20th century, Canada ran “Residential Schools” meant to deprive the aboriginal population of their culture. Yesterday, Friday, May 28, 2021, a mass grave was found beneath one of those schools. This…
You Don’t Look a Day Over 200
By Erika Grumet It’s birthday time here. Mine is this week, although I am nowhere near 200, but we’ll also be celebrating Walt Whitman’s 202nd birthday with this weekend’s episode of The Ivory Tower Boiler Room. I think it’s hard to grow up where I did on Long Island and not have at least a …
Nikole Hannah-Jones Gets a Seat at the Table. Maybe. For Now.
The 1619 Project was co-founded by Nikole Hannah-Jones. in addition to being a massive effort of journalism and scholarship, was a serious headline grabber in the last couple years. Despite inevitable arguments in a project this big, it isn’t so much controversial as it is a target for people who do not want to acknowledge…
We Stand with Fran’s House
Recently, 20 members of a disbanded franternity at Bucknell university attacked and harassed the residents of Fran’s House, Bucknell’s LGBTQ+ house, while campus safety officials did nothing or next to nothing to help. These students were minding their own business in their own home, which the university had provided for them after the building’s previous…