A Democratic Right.

Frances Villar, 2009 NYC Mayoral Candidate, and the Party for Socialism & Liberation, standing in solidarity with LGBT peeps at this year's PRIDE Parade.

I was a bit behind on my emails, but today when I caught up I found this newsletter from the PSL, who has been working their tails off on Frances Villar's mayoral campaign. Apparently, she didn't show up on the ballot in a few spots.

Here's what the e-newsletter said:

"Don’t let them steal our vote!

Vote Frances Villar!
Socialism and Liberation

In a massive effort, tens of thousands of Frances Villar flyers demanding “Put Poor and Working People First!” are going out across the city. Volunteers across the poorest neighborhoods of the city are reporting a good response with people excited to vote for a candidate who will stand up to the city’s billionaires.

The Frances Villar for Mayor campaign has received several reports of going to the polls and receiving ballots that did not have Frances’s name! If you encounter any difficulty, please send a report with all details, including the polling place, to nyc@VotePSL.org or call 212-694-8762.

A voter from the Bronx reported, "It was around 7:50 am when I went to vote at the 143rd St Community Center and there was a "problem" with the polls: Frances's name wasn't there. After I protested about her name not being on the ballot, they told me, 'she probably didn't make it on.' I knew that was wrong and kept telling them that Frances is supposed to be on the ballot. Finally, they got out the paper ballots -- and her name was there."

“The attempt to try to silence the voice of poor and working people is a crime and a slap in the face of democracy,” charged PSL campaign co-coordinator Yenica Cortes. “We will challenge any attempt to commit fraud against us in the courts and in the streets.”

PSL volunteers collected 14,000 signatures in two weeks in July, more than twice the number required to get on the ballot. The France Villar campaign was the first independent candidate to file petitions, and is supposed to appear on Column F, immediately after the parties registered in New York State.

“The billionaires and ruling elite in this city might try to silence me, but it won’t work,” France Villar said. “This campaign is about fighting back.”

Call the New York City Board of Elections (212) 487-2170 and tell them that we will not allow this fraud to go unchallenged.

There is still time to vote! Don’t let them silence our voice!

Vote Frances Villar * Socialism and Liberation"

Regardless of whether or not you support the socialist cause is aside from the issue. This country is a Democratic Republic, meaning that it is run by a government that is for and by the people. If a legitimate mayoral candidate is shut out of the debates and not showing up on ballots, how can this country be called a democracy? The point is is that it is not. If you want to run as a politician, your bank account, race, class, and gender matter. Hence all the old rich, white men who run for office and win.

Last night I bumped into more Union workers (it was a wood-worker's union) who were handing out Bloomberg flyers even though they definitely did not support him. Again, I took their flyers for them and threw them in the trash. I'm seeing more and more of a "cool" callousness and carelessness in our community that is widespread and dangerous - if you are only concerned with your everyday life and not much outside that circle, what role will you play in society? Some people say, "Oh, I don't vote." Whether they realize it or not, their inaction becomes a part of a mass movement of inaction across the country. If we can only extend our consciousness to what is in our world and with only the people who we care about in it, and we don't recognize and respect the existence and quality of life of others, then who will stand up for us when a crisis reaches our front door?

I am proud that I pulled the lever for Frances. It feels good on my conscience that I voted for an alternative who will stand up to bankers and billionaires and represent the true working class of New York City. When people ask me why I voted for Frances, I know exactly what to tell them, and it won't be, "Oh well, I voted for the lesser of two evils."

Here are a few slideshows from the mayoral campaign:
Frances Villar for Mayor, at Grand Concourse, Bronx:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/vanissa/sets/72157619413761866/show

Frances Villar for Mayor, at Fulton Street Mall, Brooklyn:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/vanissa/sets/72157620805377370/show

Frances Villar for Mayor, at the PRIDE Parade, slideshow: http://www.flickr.com/photos/vanissa/sets/72157620677609581/show

RATS! The greater of the two evils won...

Well. Bloomberg won, which totally rains on my parade. I'm not sure why, because if Thompson would have won, it would have been the same thing. I'm sure mayoral control of the schools would continue.

I took a few photos from last night's flyering at Broadway Junction, but have not edited the photos yet.

So, until then I'm putting a cute picture up of Nico, my beloved German Shepherd/Doberman Pinscher mix. You can see the rest of his set here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/vanissa/sets/72157622689959652/

Marathons and Werewolves.

This will have to be a quick blog, although I hate to rush posts. I'm about to head out of work to volunteer flyering for PSL's Mayoral Candidate, Frances Villar @ Broadway Junction (find out more about her at http://www.votepsl.org). I'll be documenting that, so I'm looking forward to it.


This past weekend was filled with activities including Chicken Grinding, Werewolf scares, and documenting misled marathon runners.

I had the privilege of taking two of my students to the Halloween Parade in Greenwich Village. Unfortunately, it was a bit rained out, but the kids still had fun. I didn't take as many photos as I would have liked because I was supervising the whole time, but I did get a few of the kids documenting the parade themselves, which was great. I love watching kids with cameras -- getting them started early with visual expression is a goal of mine, which hopefully one day I will get to see the fruition of my efforts.

To protect their identities I'm only posting photos of the kids that have an unidentifiable quality to them.

Sunday morning while doing laundry I realized that the NYC marathon was happening right on my block, so I grabbed my camera and took a few shots. I got this one shot of an old man in a batman mask wearing a, "Barack Obama, President Forever," jersey. Must be inspired by, "Batman Forever," or something like that. Anyway, I know it's unpopular to dislike Barack, but I have more reasons than one to not be in his fan club. Not standing up for the Palestinian is enough reason for me to dislike a politician, but his stance on the escalating wars in the Middle East, Education, charter schools, and merit pay for teachers (and wanting us to work on Saturdays?!) is enough for me to use a photo of him for dart practice.

Enjoy.

J. utilizing her point-and-shoot as a video camera during the Halloween Parade so she can show her family back at home.

I. pretending his Coke bottle is the steer to his ship. Halloween, 2009.

I was jealous of this baby's costume.

Scary werewolf that almost made me scream. :-O

A somewhat daunting message...shouldn't it be a wonderful thing, rather than something threatening? Subway, Halloween, 2009.

Chick & pals!

Enthused Batman Barack-Lover.

Families sit at the sidelines on 4th Avenue and 86th Street in Bay Ridge to cheer on the marathon runners.

Sitting, eating a severed foot.

Last year I got a bucket of eyeballs for my students, but this year they only had packages of various body parts. And also, candy costed a million dollars this year.

I'm exhausted after a long "Character Day" at work. I spent most of the day face painting. By the end of the day I was speed-face painting, lol. Right now I'm literally falling asleep at the computer. But, I have to blog, I made a vow. Lol.

This weekend it looks like I'm going to photograph some of the Halloween Parade, which should be fun. Might see some severed body parts.

Anyway, here are a few photos from today of the little faces I painted on.

VERITAS

I had the privilege of photographing my old friend Thai's rock band, VERITAS, an "operatic" Seattle-based rock band consisting of three lovely females and two Asian boys with mohawks. Not only are they aesthetically yummy, but their music is pretty awesome too ;). You can check them out at: http://www.myspace.com/veritasband

You can also check out my growing set of them here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/vanissa/sets/72157622543085625/

This particular photo I'm fairly proud of. The night and lighting was just perfect for experimentation. I felt like a director, and liked it. :) I hope to do more creative work with artists like VERITAS to explore more visual concepts.

Frances Villar for NYC Mayor!

Frances' two adorable babies, Justin and Jana.

Jana posing with my keffiyah.

Danny ripping up an LGBT supports Bloomberg sign, because we know conscious LGBT peeps know Bloomberg's a wormy little bastard.

Frances posing with Danny at NYC PRIDE, 2009.

Frances speaking at a PSL Socialism Conference in DC.

To counter my Bloomberg post, I thought I'd go ahead and talk about PSL (Party for Socialism & Liberation)'s mayoral candidate, Frances Villar. Frances is an Afro-Latina from the Bronx who is a young, single mother of two beautiful children, a student, and a community activist who stands up against Obama's wars, stands in solidarity with Palestine, Cuba, Venezuela, Bolivia, Honduras, and the rest of the international working class. She rejects capitalism, colonial-type wars, zionism, and evil private corporations that like to suck dry natural resources of our country and others while profiting off of them. Basically, she kicks ass.

You can read/find out more about Frances at: http://www.votepsl.org.

I had the honorable opportunity to photograph her over the summer and help collect signatures for the campaign, so I'll post a few photos that I took. Also, when you go into vote on November 3rd, be sure to check the ballot for her name, and if you're a supporter, go ahead and vote for her. NYC Councilman Charles Baron (who I have also had the privilege of photographing) supports Frances, and so do I!

Bloomberg in Bay Ridge

So a few weeks ago, Bloomberg appeared in my neighborhood. I was literally in the middle of doing my laundry when I noticed that we had a street fair here in Bay Ridge.

So, I was like, "Eh, whatever..we have street fairs all the time," and then I saw like a swarm of people around one person, and then I saw his face, and literally, my stomach turned.

He had a distasteful yellow shirt on, and a dinosaur for a face..yes, it was indeed, our billionaire of a mayor who has nothing in common with the people of NYC, who continues to serve the interests of the rich, and the Zionists, who went to fxxking Israel after the attacks on Gaza a year ago to defend Israel, whose mayoral control of the public schools has suffocated both students and teachers, forcing our hands to prep kids for culturally-specific exams, and setting us all up for failure..but oh look, what great colors he chose for his campaign...Let me, the responsible American, go vote for him because his team put together such great color schemes and not at all be aware of what he really does for NYC and it's people...Yes, I'm a bit angry and bitter.

So, when I saw him, I had mixed feelings..should I grab my camera or not? I figured I'd take the opportunity, so I went back home and grabbed my camera.

I held onto these photos because I wasn't sure what to do with them, because it's pretty obvious how much I hate Bloomberg.

So, I thought I'd just attach my opinion to them, just to make sure people know how I feel.

Bloomberg = Asshole (Zionist Pig)

View set: http://www.flickr.com/photos/vanissa/sets/72157622523506917/