victim

I smoked weed before it was legal: 1 Chicano, BD (before dispensaries)

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By John Edward Rangel

Smoking cannabis became a regular form of medication for me when I was 15 years old. That was in 1977. Back then the U.S.A. was still reeling from the Vietnam War, Watergate and something the media referred to as “The Generation Gap” (we called it arguing with our parents).

These were trying, confusing times (much like now), and for a teenaged Chicano in East L.A. who had to deal with the added effects of institutionalized rascism (big white cops called us “Pancho” and beat us with gusto) it was sometimes overwhelming. Getting numb helped me cope.

Almost every adult I knew medicated on something.

Mas…I smoked weed before it was legal: 1 Chicano, BD (before dispensaries)

Steubenville: I was 16, drunk and stupid too, but not morally bankrupt

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I remember being 16. I was stupid…but not that stupid.

I keep thinking about the Steubenville rape case and I can’t get the phrase “What the fuck is wrong with you people?” out of my head.

People aren’t sure who to blame, whether it’s a larger problem that encompasses the parents, the football culture, the entire town. You can chalk it up and say, “Oh they’re just young teens being stupid,” but the truth is, by the time you are 17 you are grown-ass-up enough to know right from wrong.

Mas…Steubenville: I was 16, drunk and stupid too, but not morally bankrupt

Women beware: You might be guilty of ‘walking with ovaries’

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Stand-up comedy? It's a man's world.

Several years ago, I was driving through the backwoods of central Florida trying to find the home of a distant cousin. Desperately lost, I called my mother, but my abuela answered the phone.

I asked her, “Hey, do you know Annita’s phone number? I’m trying to find her house.”

My grandmother’s response: “Go home. A woman shouldn’t be driving alone.”

I can’t help but feel my grandmother’s Old World values have a residual grasp on modern society — the notion that a woman’s role is in the private sphere, that she should not be out in public.

Often while walking the streets of Manhattan I’m subjected to stares that deem me guilty of a crime: guilty of walking with ovaries.

Mas…Women beware: You might be guilty of ‘walking with ovaries’