04 February 2017

Laugh It Off and Carry On

A blog about discrimination
I shrugged it off and carried on when I found out the entry level guy was being paid the same as me, when I was the award-winning lead graphic designer on a local commercial magazine. No point in risking my job, that’s just the way things are… Wouldn’t you agree?

I’ve laughed off a lot of gender demeaning comments in my lifetime. They were only joking, right?

I’ve laughed off dudes’ accusations that I must be “frigid" or a “lesbo” because I wouldn’t fall into bed with them… But, that’s just their stupid ego, yeah?

I laughed off men brushing too intimately up against me “accidentally.” That’s just boys being boys, isn’t it?

I laughed it off right up until I was assaulted.

I laughed off and continue to laugh off people turning their backs on me and calling me hateful names because I married an Iranian political refugee. That’s just their ignorance, just their problem, eh? 


We carried on when a woman cursed a blue-streak at my husband – who speaks six languages and graduated on the National Dean’s List – for refusing to hand a six-pack of beer to her elementary school-aged children with the pizza delivery, capping her tirade with “Learn to speak f*cking English or go back where you came from, towel head.”

When someone blocked the alley to our business rear delivery door, and he found the store they were in and asked them politely to move their car; the person followed him to the alley and cursed my husband with every low-class epithet he could spew against immigrants. We carried on. 

We carried on, after 9/11, when someone walked into our business, saw my Iranian-American husband behind the counter, walked up to him and said, I won’t do business with you people after what you did to us in New York.”

I admit my hackles rise when I can NEVER laugh off some ignorant adult calling my son a “sand nigger.” 


I cannot laugh it off when my Christian son is called “ISIS” and threatened that Trump will send him and his dad to the gas chambers by middle school school bullies. 

I did not laugh it off when my son was assaulted by those middle school bullies and left with a serious concussion from which he spent months recovering.

Should I just “let it go” and carry on? 


Should I keep on laughing?

Are you laughing?

When do we stop laughing it off and do something about it?

“Apathy is acquiescence is compliance is approval.” –MomzillaNC

“Hands and hearts and minds and voices committed to working for tolerance, peace and social justice everywhere, always.
” –MomzillaNC

Remember:
We, women and girls, have been told all our lives not to argue. Who told us that?

We’ve all been told all our lives not to discuss politics. Who told us that?

We women and girls have been told all our lives to “laugh it off” or “get over it.” Who told us that?

We’ve all been told all our lives it’s disrespectful to disagree with our elders. Who told us that?

The people who told us that also said “feminism” or “liberal” or “progressive” or “democrat” were dirty words.

The people who told us that are the very people hammering us with their “conservative” opinions and policies.

I’m sick to death of being told to hush! I’m beyond fed up with being silenced. Like the refrain from “Fight Song” says:

"And all the words I didn’t say…
Wrecking balls inside my brain…
I will scream them loud tonight!
Can you hear my voice this time!?”


We cannot – nay – we MUST NOT allow anyone to silence us ever again! I WILL NOT BE SILENCED!


by D. Denise Dianaty 
© 20 January 2016

Ra'qedyet -- A Poem

Ra'qedyet

A Poem by D. Denise Dianaty

An historical poem


“Ra'qedyet, or Râ-Kedet, was the original name of the city of Alexandria on the northern coast of Kemet, before it was renamed by Alexander the Great. Ra'qedyet is believed to have existed about 700 to 1000 years before Alexander even came to that site. The logic now is not that Alexander built his city on the same site as Ra'qedyet, but that he used an already flourishing city and simply expanded upon it!" -- From Ancient Worlds, an online website: http://www.ancientworlds.net/aw/Places/Property/1034345

Tell me more…
  I want to know…
  What came before…
  Before Alexander’s hell-bent stamp
  Upon cultures already ancient 
  when his own still cowered in caves
  Tell me about it…Tell me more…
  Tell me… tell me… tell me, please
  Of ancient Ra’qedyet

Like ill-fated Takht-e-jamshid
  where Alexander rested his feet…
  Yes… he rested his feet…
  His feet upon Xerxes’ table.
  Fair Parsa’s palace burned to ruin…
  it’s native name lost in time…
  It’s city recalled forevermore…
  by Greek arrogance… Persepolis!

Of all Carians, given up in fear…
  Given over by their Queen Ada.
  Anatolia laid wide… laid bare
  Before Alexander’s gluttonous march…
  His stamp left hither and yon… 
  A people entire… forgotten… gone
  Ground ‘neath his inexorable march
  His lustful ego used to erase Caria

Histories trampled, societies wasted…
  reaching farther, ever further…
  veneered by every raped culture,
  burying history 'neath his avarice
  from Anatolia to the Punjab
  where King Purushottama lost…
  lost even his name to Alexander…
  left a client king named Porus.
Grinding on… grinding down 
  like so many others…
  Anatolia, Achaemenid, Babylonia, 
  Egypt, Punjab, and more
  From Alinda to Babylon, Parsa, to Jhelum 
  and more and more and ever more.
  Never too much… never enough…
  Till death at last embraced his lust.

He built his city hailed through th’years…
  Crushing… o’erlaying atop Ra’qedyet…
  Ra’qedyet from ancient Pharo’s lines…
  Lost in Alexandria… stamped out.
  All that remains… a sad and silent jumble
  Ruins ‘neath ruins ‘neath a briny sea…
  At th’Nile’s mouth, it’s fate ’twas sealed
  So he might stamp his name ‘cross the world

A mighty nation prospered…
  before made a warning for the future…
  Now sad and silent jumbled ruins.
  In the ruins of ancient Alexandria
  lay ruins yet much older still
  ‘Neath th’magnificent capital of Ptolemy,
  Alexandria app Aegyptum… Alexandria Beside Egypt.
  It’s birth razing Ra’qedyet’s life…
  That long before haven of sailors.

Tell me of the histories lost…
  Tell me the stories of “the Great”
  How his exploits are to be lauded,
  ever to be praised and applauded…
  Of the lessons we should learn…
  the warfare that should burn.
  Tell me of the histories lost…
  lost in th’onslaught of Alexander… 
  Lost when he put them to the death.

Tell me more…
  I want to know…
  What came before…
  Before Alexander’s hell-bent stamp
  Upon cultures already ancient 
  when his own still cowered in caves
  Tell me about it…Tell me more…
  Tell me… tell me… tell me, please
  Of ancient Ra’qedyet

Tell me the glories of Alexander
  of his “Great” folly of death and debt.


Photo: ruins from Ra'qedyet (from: weburbanist.com/2007/09/12/underwater-urban-archeology-7-submerged-wonders-of-the-world")


and from: "2eyeswatching.com/tag/once-majestic-cities-that-sank-beneath-the-ocean"