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“5:11AM (The Moment Of Clarity)” – The Pros and Cons of Hitch Hiking
One of my very favorite people is someone I have never actually met, I know her only as Maggie. Maggie does something wonderful though, she organizes a brilliant web site called Violence Unsilenced, a place for “shedding light on the epidemic of domestic violence and sexual assault by giving its survivors a voice.” Of course my very favorite person is my Gina – who shared her own experiences and Spoke Out on VU in October of 2009. I can never really express how proud I am of her for doing that, or how much I admire her strength and courage. She is a superhero in every sense of the word. Violence Unsilenced is filled with strong people – men and women – who take the little chunk of the Internet that Maggie provides and fill it with their stories. Heartbreaking stories. Painful stories. But they are their stories, in their own voice, a voice no longer silenced. As VU celebrates its second year, Maggie assembled a video compilation to recognize the folks who spoke out. Like the one from last year, it made me cry – sad tears to acknowledge the atrocities that folks face in their lives – but also jubilant tears for seeing the strength in those that participated – a strength that comes from sharing their stories. I haven’t yet had the courage to share my story, in fact have only recently acknowledged to myself that there is a story. I can feel my voice stirring inside me though. I’ve always thanked Maggie for helping give Gina her voice – I think I can now come out and thank her for helping me find my own as well. Please support Violence Unsilenced by sharing it with your friends, supporting those who share with your comments, or by speaking out with your own story. sb Not sure if it’s harder to have kept it a secret for so long – or to finally have shared it.
One of my very favorite examples of a musician who uses Social Media well has to be Peter Frampton. Being active on both Twitter and Facebook I feel he does a great job of being interactive and actively connecting and communicating with his fans, and not just blindly broadcasting outwards like a lot of folks do. l’ve long been a fan of Mr Frampton. While not around for the early stages of his career I have collected and enjoyed his music for 35 years or so now. From Humble Pie to FCA through some criminally under-appreciated solo albums, I’ve always known him to be a tremendous musician. But through his use of these social networks I have also found that I enjoy his opinions on the music industry, recording, touring, celebrity, and dealing with fans and criticism – all with a great sense of humor. So with his accessibility I found myself comfortably responding to a tweet of his just a bit ago. I frequently will respond to celebrities that I follow, not because they are celebrities but because I have a response or something to share, as I would with anyone that I interact with via Twitter. It is after all about that interaction. But that doesn’t make it any less cool or awesome to have them respond back – as just happened.
Did you get that? I just had a conversation, albeit virtually and in less than 140 characters with Peter Frampton. Seriously – how fucking cool is that? Now I know I risk sounding pathetic and sycophantic with all of this but this isn’t a big deal just because he is famous, it’s a monumentally huge deal because he is, well – he is Peter Frampton. My new very best friend Peter Frampton.. (ok – just kidding about that part) |
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