What's Going On?

Backsliding, bullshit, and bad behavior. Welcome to Trump's America

The Cleveland Gazette, an African American newspaper, suggested in 1886 that the Statue of Liberty's torch not be lit until the United States became a free nation "in reality":

"Liberty enlightening the world," indeed! The expression makes us sick. This government is a howling farce. It cannot or rather does not protect its citizens within its own borders. Shove the Bartholdi statue, torch and all, into the ocean until the "liberty" of this country is such as to make it possible for an inoffensive and industrious colored man to earn a respectable living for himself and family, without being ku-kluxed, perhaps murdered, his daughter and wife outraged, and his property destroyed. The idea of the "liberty" of this country "enlightening the world," or even Patagonia, is ridiculous in the extreme. More about The Cleveland Gazette

Speaking of Liberty — speaking of statues, The Statue of Liberty is only a short distance from the Dunkin Donuts Office of Immigration Troublefixing near Journal Square in Jersey City, New Jersey. So, pull up a chair and grab a dark roast, Emma Lazarus, I got a scene for you. There’s a Dunkin Donuts near the Journal Square Transportation Center, as the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey calls it. The Port Authority is the rogue that charges high fares and gives bad service for people traveling between New York and New Jersey. Dunkin Donuts is the working person’s coffee cafe on the outer perimeter of the station complex across from a huge, ugly Beaux Arts bank building that stands in ridiculous contrast to the workday world around it. The entire complex is undergoing a metamorphosis that promises to offer more comfort and access for commuters. We’ll see. In Dunkin' Donuts, there are plastic seats and small tables, seriously jostled for. This is the spot for the tired catching the crosstown bus and taking a blow inside until it comes, or the poor snagging a hot cup of joe and a donut on a budget. The huddled masses yearning to be free are huddled here at the plastic tables, too. They come to meet the low overhead, sympathetic immigration lawyer/fixer who waits at a table in the back. They come in looking nervous, often brought by a friend, and introduced to a middle-aged man with an attaché case and papers spread out on a table. He tells them to go get a coffee at the counter and they do. Maybe they get a muffin or donut. He has a coffee and a donut on the table before him as well. They fix up their coffee and sip and tell him details in Spanish and there is a lot of conversation and there is hand shaking.

People who are waiting for people having physical therapy at the facility around the corner are nursing coffee here, too, and are looking around at folks, though they try not to seem to be. These folks take pains not to appear too vulnerable to snatch and grab. People who’ve just done the therapy come into Dunkin Donuts afterwards for a coffee pick up and a beloved donut before getting on the bus or the senior citizen jitney. There’s stiff competition for the precious plastic seats and tables. The immigration fixers at the back take up several seats and one large table. They are inviolable. The Indian American franchisee of this location doesn’t want to change anything in his spot. He knows this is a Dunkin Donuts of distinction. It is a landmark. You can say to someone, “Meet me in front of the Dunkin Donuts near Journal Square, across from that bank.” Yes. People know that if they have immigration trouble and know somebody who knows this fellow who meets people at Dunkin’ Donuts they go there. I guess he doesn’t charge a lot because he doesn’t keep an office. The people he speaks with, who talk to him, seem less worried when they leave. Not all are Spanish speakers. Some converse in creole. Our community and our DD are diverse. The women, who are still a bit youthful, are getting plump and are not pleased about it. They have a peculiar way of eating the dry, tasteless donuts they buy to go with the coffee, to seem to be in Dunkin’ Donuts for some reason other than to meet the fixer. Still, these donuts taste like sand, though it is a donut and who can pass on a donut when you’re on a diet and you get a chance to have a no guilt donut because you have to seem to be there in Dunkin Donuts for the coffee and donuts.

Some DD locations are senior citizen meeting spots. A store near me had a very elderly woman working at the counter alongside several Indian immigrant women with poor language skills. Things were generally friendly and smooth until the day a couple of elderly men started arguing and began throwing cups of coffee all over. The young women shrieked, and the elderly woman called the cops who did not hurry to respond. By the time they got there, the chief instigator had crept off to the parking lot and driven away at ten miles an hour.

I like their coffee, especially the dark roast. I like their gritty ambience. But I’m putting them down now. Lucky for me, Jersey City has gotten hipper, has got more coffee shops and restaurants. My brunch posse and I have got lots of choices. I feel betrayed by DD. They used to be a “for the people” franchise, or so I thought. They were never as chic and pricey as Starbucks. They specialized in basic, tasty regular old joe (and strangely tasteless donuts). They’ve rolled back their Diversity, Equity and Inclusion programs to curry favor with the oligarch in charge. They’ve betrayed the people who felt comfortable enough in their plastic precinct to discuss their immigration problems there. They’ve betrayed the Indian American residents who fought back against discrimination and violence in the Journal Square area in the 1980s, perpetrated by a group known as The Dot Busters.

And they’ve betrayed the seniors who’ve passed the time nursing a donut and coffee alongside their neighbors. We’ve come a little way toward diversity, equity and inclusion in Jersey City. When corporate giants decide to disavow policies that support these concepts, they betray all the people who’ve spent their hard-earned bucks in their establishments, who made them successful. You don’t need us? WE DON’T NEED YOU. The sad part is that we often boycott a business and our neighbors who depend on these businesses for a paycheck as well. That’s heartbreaking. I wish everybody got a livable wage and that these corporate entities would see that their customers are making choices and WILL decide where they spend their money. WE’VE GOT THE POWER!

As you probably know, I’m one of the Hobart Festival of Women Writers organizers. We’ve begun planning for our annual Festival weekend on June 6, 7, &8th. This is our twelfth year of programming and platforming the work of women writers in the small town of Hobart, New York, the reading capitol of New York State. Home to seven independent bookstores, The Hobart Book Village has hosted our yearly festival. This year, we’re facing a real headwind in funding. We didn’t receive support from some of our regular sources. Programs that feature diversity, equity and inclusion are under increasing attack. We are reaching out to friends, neighbors, colleagues, and all readers, writers, and lovers of language to give whatever amount they can spare right now to aid us in producing this year’s Festival of Women Writers.

Check out our GoFundMe here, watch the video, and visit the Hobart Festival of Women Writers blog for more information on our writers. Thanks in advance.