So I’m back on the facebook. I’m not a big fan of the facebook. But a former professor of mine started a facebook group, told me it was turning into a nice little network for writers. This group. Not facebook. He’s full of shit. There are no writers in this group of his. So now I have this stupid facebook profile with twelve or fifteen faux friends. Friends I never see or hear from.

Anyway.

I was on facebook the other day. Checking out my ‘networks.’ I’m a member of three networks. East Bay, CA, Iowa, and Cal Arts. I don’t know why the CCA network is called Cal Arts. My understanding is that Cal Arts is a famous art school in Los Angeles. Not what CCA is. Which is an un-famous art school in San Francisco.

But the East Bay network is very upset by this whole Jenna Six thing. Because it’s the East Bay and we’re all very liberal and righteous out here in Berkeley.

The Jenna Six, as I understand it, is a group of boys, six boys actually, who’ve been jailed for attempted murder. Or maybe not. Maybe just assault. The Jenna Six are black. It’s a whole thing. It’s been in all the papers. At some high school in Jenna somewhere in the south. Louisiana? I think Louisiana. I could Google it, but I don’t feel like it. You Google it.

But there was a tree where all the white kids hung out. Some black kids wanted to hang out under the tree too. Well, the whites couldn’t have this. So a noose was hung from the tree. There were some bad feelings about this and some fights and a kid went to the hospital and other kids went to jail. Just another day in America.

(BTW, the tree was cut down. What the fuck? Poor innocent tree. What did it do to deserve that?)

So.

Here in the East Bay. In this bastion of liberalism and equality. The facebook crowd wanted to express their displeasure at six black boys being locked up by the white government, for the inherent injustice of the whole thing. Okay. Fine. I can get behind that. I guess. I won’t pretend to know enough about the whole thing to say for sure with any kind of certainty. But it sounds like these kids are being railroaded. White prosecutor, white judge, white grand jury. Just another day in America.

Two groups were set up on the facebook to show support for the Jenna Six. October 2nd was set for a protest. But they weren’t going to strike. Weren’t going to march. Certainly weren’t going to riot in the streets or fight the police or burn buildings down. They weren’t going to do anything that might get any kind of attention. Get them in trouble, prevent them from getting a high paying gig in some office building some day. Some day soon, hopefully. They were going to wear T-shirts, or just shirts, maybe even ties or suits, of a specific color. And here’s where it gets confusing. Well, more confusing at any rate. One group urged everyone to wear green, another wanted everyone to wear black.

So the Jenna Six are still in jail. And cocktail liberals, cocktail socialists, can’t decide what color shirt to wear to show their disapproval.

Berkeley sleeps well tonight. And every night. And Burma burns and blacks are jailed and Mexicans deported and soldiers killed and Arabs disappeared. I won’t pretend to be surprised anymore. I’m going up to Telegraph. Look for some pot. I understand they still have that here at least.