Salt Lake community writers come together to share personal stories and feelings about civil rights

I love attending community events that give me something to write about. But sometimes, it can be really nerve-wracking. Once, I tried bringing my 1-year-old daughter to a debate, and was greatly embarrassed when we were asked to leave. On another occasion, after attending a civil rights conference, I was chastised by the organization head for not revealing my "journalist" status during registration. She tried to coerce me into not publishing my report on the event. I found it odd that a civil rights org would try to intimidate someone out of their first amendment rights. It's not like I'm discouraged about doing what I do here. But I have developed an edgy gut that finds me when I walk into events I plan to report on.

Community Writing Center exhibit panels set up
in the Sorenson Unity Center lobby 

I entered the Sorenson Unity Center, Thursday, Jan. 12th with that same edgy gut. The SLCC Community Writing Center was hosting a reading of the Utah Freedom Writers publication they recently put out. This is the civil rights writing project I participated in a few months ago. I was pleased to discover that over the course of the evening, my anxiety was easily assuaged, and more than that, I quickly felt admiration and kinship for the other writers, as well as the CWC staff.

Mormon Ladies Discuss the Utah Undie Run and Gay Rights

Nov. 5, 2011. It was a tea party.

It was not the Tea Party, but a tea party.  We were 6 Mormon ladies sitting around a table in a living room in Orem, Utah. Mormons follow a code of health that allows for herbal tea, although not regular tea, but our host served hot cocoa instead. She told us she was holding the event because she had attended a quilting club meeting about the courses and customs that go into a traditional English tea. The hostess, and three guests (including myself) were of British heritage--the other two were Brazilian.

Our discussion of culture led naturally to a recent eye-widening cultural phenomenon. I paraphrase our host: "It was on our way to the General Relief Society meeting. There we were, a bunch of church ladies, just a few blocks away from the (LDS) Conference Center, we looked out the window and saw a huge group of men--they were practically naked!" She laughed as she told the story. What they had seen was the Utah Undie Run (Sept. 24-25.) According to the event website, the official purpose was to "protest against Utah being so uptight."

The Undie Run

2,270 runners participated, says the Salt Lake Tribune. The protest planners asked participants to

NAACP Conference: What everyone needs to know about employment rights

I attended the Saturday morning and afternoon portions of the three-day NAACP Tri-State Conference here in Salt Lake City at the Little America Hotel on September 24th, 2011. The group of conference attendees was much smaller than I anticipated. Although KSL advertised the conference as open to anyone, I gathered that most of the people there were those in leadership positions representing their NAACP branches.

Image taken from the web page advertising the NAACP Tri-State
Conference.

Some details.

The workshops were conducted in a room I estimated to be about 30x40 feet. Attendees came and went throughout the day, but there were usually about 35 people seated in the conference room at once. I observed that there was an equal number of men and women. Attendees and presenters varied in age, anywhere from 20 to 80 years old. Although the NAACP is historically an African American civil rights organization, they are interested in a wide variety of civil rights causes, and

Prayer in School

A dear friend, a life-long Utahn, whom I respect greatly, recently expressed a concern about the way local society has changed in the last few decades. She said something like this:

Life was so much safer here in the past, it was idyllic. And now, in this world full of evil, we can't even have prayer in schools.

This was not the first time I'd heard a Utahn speak passionately about the change Utah has undertaken in the past few decades. This change has come, in part, because of Utah's fast-growing population. I've also heard many Utahns express the fear that "minorities are taking over" in a way that suggests the freedom of the mainstream is diminished.

Before responding to my friend, I was carried away in a daydream. Students, circled 'round a flagpole before the facade of a three-story 1930s school building. They were holding hands, their heads bowed in prayer.

This was not a contrived, nostalgic image of the past, it was a memory, a real scene I recalled from my own high school days. In the late '90s, I attended Leon High School in Tallahassee, FL. Although the dominant religion in the community was, and still is Southern Baptist, I knew kids at school who were of various Protestant Christian denominations,  as well as Catholics, Mormons, Jews, and those not associated with a religion. I assume there may have been other religious groups I was unaware of.  Students sometimes met together to pray or discuss religion. In addition to the group I participated in (the early morning seminary program organized by the LDS Church), I knew of other bible study groups, and a club called The Fellowship of Christian Athletes. And then there was the group in my daydream. Anyone could join them in the prayer circle at the flag pole, and yet, students who did not share their beliefs were not offended by what they were doing.

I skipped to a second school memory. We were in the large music room. A choir mate had suffered death that weekend in a car accident. We cried together and a teacher called for "a moment of silence." Many eyes were closed in prayer.

Both my choir teachers were involved in music production at their respective Protestant Churches. Why had they asked for a moment of silence allowing for prayer, rather than simply having a group prayer? I had a few friends in choir who were Jewish. Had the teacher chosen to say a prayer (in the Christian manner of praying) my Jewish friends may have felt excluded.

Let's return to the text of the First Amendment