Ugh, I can't believe this bill has made it this far.

Here's text from an e-mail going around among grad students at ASU:

The Arizona State Legislature is about to vote on the Concealed Weapons Bill!

Senate Bill 1214 concealed weapons; school grounds
would allow a person with a valid concealed carry weapons (CCW) permit to possess a concealed firearm on the grounds of a community college or university.

Currently, the bill has passed the the judiciary committee and both caucuses in the Senate. It is now awaiting a full vote in the Senate. Once it passes the Senate, it will go to the House! If it passes the House, then it will be sent up to the Governor for her to sign! We need graduate students to help spread the word that this bill is not good for Arizona Colleges and Universities!!

Please join us in contacting your legislators and let them know that Arizona Students DO NOT support Senate Bill 1214!!!!

If you need help finding your legislator or need the contact information of your legislator, click on the link below: http://www.azleg.gov/alisStaticPages/HowToContactMember.asp

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This bill frightens me. After the recent shootings on the U of Illinois campus, I've spent a lot of time thinking about safety on campus, and about what I would do if such a thing were to happen at ASU. I definitely think that more guns are not the correct answer--they just create the potential for escalation. Instead, what we really need are much better social support systems (i.e. a way to actually address concerns about mental/emotional problems instead of just documenting their existence), and at the very most we need better self-defense training/preparation. NOT more guns. The whole thing has gotten to the point where I've considered leading a discussion in my lab sections about safety and community--because if I don't talk about it with my students, who will? Who will they go to when they really, desperately need help? Enormous, anonymous campuses are what really create the potential for such disasters, in the same way that anonymity in large cities can promote violence.

Art Museum; Sacaton

Last night I walked through the art museum one block from my house. It was peopled by neo-mimes, the people in all-white who alternately pose and move. They make money on street-corners where once mimes held sway. One offered me a marshmallow; I ate it. Another one, perhaps the same, followed me down the middle a staircase. A performance artist-in-residence (if he can be called such) put together an installation in one museum gallery based on an im conversation held with his wife: he put a shaggy rug on the floor, along with two comfortable chairs, two plants, a beta fish, a mirror, and two windchimes. He painted the wall purple. Another part of the gallery appears to be his office. There were a few funny posters hanging in his office, but I cannot remember them anymore, except for the picture of the bum holding a cardboard sign that said something like, "Ninjas killed my family, need $$ for kung fu lessons."

One of the photographs from the New American City series is still up--it's a field that was sold to be turned into a housing development. The man whose family has farmed that land for years has sown different crops across it so that it resembles the impending development. The photograph is an aerial picture that illustrates in great detail what the development looks like. I saw it and thought about the land, its changing use, how it changes hands, and who cares for it.

Today I rode my bicycle out past Sacaton, to cheer on a friend who was riding in an MS-150 bicycle ride (100 miles today, 50 miles tomorrow). Interestingly, if I had ridden all the way to cheer at the finish line, it would have been the 50-mile mark for me for the ride from Tempe. Instead, our meeting point was at around 40 miles for me, 50 miles for him. The ride out and back covered one of my absolute favorite stretches of road from the Tempe-to-Tucson ride, where the road stretches out flat alongside the railroad track. I now have a lopsided sunburn to show for my 80 miles of effort.