Author Archives for Moya Watson

Dear Charles Cooper: We could be friends

Dear Charles Cooper;

I think I started to like you when Leanne pointed out your cuff links at yesterday’s trial.   To watch the trial, I was sitting in the overflow room behind a personal hero of mine, Kate Kendell, executive director at National Center for Lesbian Rights, and I know she has been known to sport some pretty excellent cuff links as well. I, too, like cuff links. It’s really silly, I know, but I get excited when I think: This is something we all have in common!

Sitting behind Kate Kendell and Melanie Rowan of NCLR

Sitting behind Kate Kendell and Melanie Rowan of NCLR

When we left the overflow room shortly after the hearing ended at noon, we walked up the hallway to the real trial room to just peek inside.  At that exact moment you were walking out of the room. You looked tired – you had obviously been working hard.  We ran away to sort of hide – then we were concerned we might be in the same elevator as you on the way down.  You instead went to the Men’s room first so we were spared that situation.

My view of Charles Cooper on the video from the overflow room

My view of Charles Cooper on the video from the overflow room - terrible phone picture I know

Afterward I felt guilty:  running away is silly.  I wonder what it would be like to talk with you.   I would have tried to shake your hand and I would have asked about your cuff links and probably found some nice things to say.  Maybe we’d later have a drink together.  I could show you San Francisco from some of my favorite views. You’d meet our beautiful daughter…

I’ve dreamed this sort of thing before.  I just wanted to dream it out loud a little longer.  For the sake of my daughter’s future — our future. It could happen.

Thank you,

-m

PS: Here are the rulings from the trial, out today (the following day). You lost on both counts. How I wish I could help you know it’s going to be OK.

Jon.

jon klinkroth

jon klinkroth

Our friend Jon died on Friday the 13th, in May.

I have not been able to make but a whit of sense about it but the amazing Becky (on the left, above) has written poignantly about it. I’m pretty sure I did my own “sink low” interpretation since learning about his death over a week later, only a couple days after Lisa (to Jon’s left, above) herself heard about it.  That night I got on the phone with Sheila, the excellent redhead above, and made sure the news was complete.

Though the picture was taken at Leanne and my wedding in 2008, which I think is the last time I saw Jon, the row of us above met in late 1982 on the 8th floor of the dorm called Ida Sproul in Berkeley.  We were charmed ever since then. It is a measure of the time and of our unique bravado that over 25 years later so many of us are still fast friends.

Funny. I still say Jon is a friend.

Jon and I used to scream our bikes in the dark of night through the streets of Berkeley and Oakland.  Not safe; not by the book — Jon never wearing shoes.  Jon was brilliant — but moreso, kind and gentle.  Was he fully misfit? Clearly he was addicted, but how did he die?  Was he hellbent on destruction in the world, or in a world hellbent on destruction, was he an honest precious being?

I didn’t answer any of this, so I instead thought of a playlist of what we used to listen to.  It goes something like this:

1) This Charming Man — the Smiths — (long version)

2) Wild Child — Lou Reed

3) Kometenmelodie — Kraftwerk

4) Some Song by Phillip Glass which I forget but he swears they sing “Call Lisa” in

5) Atrocity Exhibition — Joy Division

6) Lou Reed — Perfect Day

7) Lou Reed — pretty much forever. Lou Reed forever.

Jon, Jon.

This Week in Video and Politics

I’ve been working on an internal video sharing platform at work for over a year, and now everything from music to politics to diversity to news to family and more directly seems to relate to video sharing platforms.

This week, two videos in particular have caught my interest at the intersection of Video and Politics. Let’s start with Charlie Crist:

[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s4k13LmlcUE%5D

A colleague passed along the news story behind this to me: Crist, Byrne settle lawsuit over campaign song.

We know a bit about the potential issues of music copyright infringement through our work on our video project, so it’s surprising that this video was ever made. Charlie Crist should have known better when he used the Talking Heads’ song Road To Nowhere in his campaign ad, but in the realities of political campaigning he (or likely his campaign) could well have realized a “cease and desist” order might not have even taken effect until the campaign was long over.  Seems anything goes in the fast lawless heat of political campaigns.

On the other hand, Prop 8 proponents are targeting Judge Vaughn Walker over his public use of videotapes from the trial in the long long journey of Prop 8 through the courts. Seems back on February 18, at an event on courts and new media in Arizona, Judge Walker delivered a session called Shooting the Messenger: How Cameras in the Courtroom Got a Bad Wrap, and during that session he showed pieces of the videotaped trial, including testimony from a Prop 8 proponent.  C-SPAN was there to record it, which amounted essentially to “broadcasting the testimony on TV,” which is of course what the Prop 8  folks never wanted in the first place.  Since a stern motion about this apparent “illegal” release of videotape was delivered today, you should watch it there while you can (I can’t get a version with embed strings but will come back and embed if I find one).

The Ninth Circuit Court later had no problem showing the Prop 8 trial live on C-SPAN. You can watch it in its entirety to this day:

[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tO_HoF1EBfw%5D

Beyond Walker’s district court however there are no live witnesses to testify. All records of people’s motivations are preserved back in the district court.

For the moment let’s ignore the the obvious question “What do Prop 8 proponents continue to want to hide?” I used to think that The Law was one of the next biggest areas of disruption in the “Web 2.0” space. Now that I’m involved in a video project, naturally I think video is the current huge disruption in politics.

Of course — none of these things are new, but whereas Law seems to be purposefully designed to be slow in a fast-media world, Politics is far from it.  A quick campaign ad released the day before an election can change its course.  Thankfully, checks and balances are however still in tact. A targeted attack on a meticulously prepared, thoroughly researched and fairly tried case (or the relevance of the case’s judge’s sexuality) will amount to nothing except passing fancy in the “court of public opinion.”

Video however? Video can reveal to anyone who cares to see the real motivations behind Prop 8 as revealed in the courtroom from its proponents under testimony, and you can try to pull it down, but the record is cast. The Internet will continue to remember. And we’re here to see it.