Kellia Ramares, of Oakland, CA, has been a member of the KPFA News Department since 1999. She turned 54 on July 31, 2009. She has a BA in Economics from Fordham University in the Bronx, NY, and a law degree from Indiana University in Bloomington, Indiana. She did not become a lawyer, going instead into legal publishing and then into journalism. She views legal education as good training for investigative reporting. She is capable of dissecting bureaucratic reports and legal issues and is quite at home interviewing a lawyer.
During this decade, Kellia has reported frequently for Free Speech Radio News (http://fsrn.org) and Women's International News Gathering Service (http://wings.org); she have written written for the web, most frequently for Online Journal (http://onlinejournal.com). You may have also seen my writing on the websites of the Centre for Research on Globalisation (http://globalresearch.ca/), and Speaking Truth to Power (http://carolynbaker.net/), and Atlantic Free Press (http://www.atlanticfreepress.com/), among other places.
Her broad areas of interest are: How science and technology impact our heath and civil liberties; alternative economics; how peak oil and the long term energy crisis will affect our lives; and environmental factors affecting public health. But she doesn't consider herself to have a beat, hence the name of this publication: Broadcaster At-Large. A lot of things interest Kellia and she thrives on variety.
Despite her presence on WINGS and the fact that she considers herself a straight ally of LGBTQs, Kellia hates ID politics, and prefers to stay away from most stories that are rooted in race, gender, sexual orientation, immigration status, religion, etc. (She has done stories on same-sex marriage but she looks at it as a civil rights and constitutional issue rather than as a "gay" issue).
She also has no use for the touchy-feely human interest story. Ordinary people serve as an illustration of a larger issue for her; they are not the point of the story. Likewise, she has no use for ambiance for the sake of ambiance, and she believes you can have fine documentaries that don't have music. (She's done several).
KELLIA HATES MARKETING. She doesn't want to pitch ("I'm a shortstop," she says.) She doesn't want to shoehorn stories into ever smaller newsholes as newspapers, what of them are left, become advertizing circulars. She doesn't want to spend time selling. There isn't enough time to do the news! ("Damn it, Jim. I'm a journalist, not a salesman!") She longs for the old days when there was a firewall between the business and editorial sides of a newspaper, TV station or radio station, when news was thought of as a public service and not as "infotainment" and just another profit center on a conglomerate's balance sheet.
Kellia will not tailor her approach to news and public affairs to achieve popularity. BAL was formed on the belief that, with the right technology now available, its natural audience will find it. Changing the format a bit so that people can access the information using the technologies of the day is one thing, but softening the information for the celebrity-crazed culture, shortening it for the ADD generation, or dumbing it down for the idiots who say "I don't want the government interfering with my Medicare" is not Kellia's style. If something is too long, just take in what you can and come back as often as you need to. But know that this is a place for people who can "handle the truth." And if it's not hard-hitting enough, keep BAL honest by telling us where, why, and how we can do better.
Sunday, October 11, 2009
What’s with the orc, and why is he pointing a sword at me?
Hello, my name is Tokkar, and I…I play World of Warcraft (breaks down in tears, receives a lot of pats on the back and “Hello, Tokkar” from the others sitting in the circle).
Okay, go on, groan…but World of Warcraft, while a fun game and a great time-waster (not to mention a wonderful release of pent-up frustrations after a day gone otherwise sour…just picture your boss being that big, evil…ahem) is, for me, an open door toward something else: storytelling and animation.
I am a writer, a digital artist, a musician, a gourmet chef (well, I did hold the title, even though I never went to the school) and now an amateur animator. So why am I writing news articles for a leftist blog?
Why not?
Okay, that’s not much of an answer, but it does tend to be in keeping with the central theme of my life. You see, I’m queer. No, I’m not homosexual, bisexual, intersexed or transgendered. I’m just…queer. Queer in that I don’t fit into any mold, and this is the way that I like it. People should be unique, not cookie-cutter versions of what someone else wants them to be.
I am one such unique person. True, it won’t get me far in the financial realm, but there are more things in heaven and earth than money. Money merely makes the journey easier in today’s world that seems so focused upon its acquisition, even to the detriment of the planet and its inhabitants. Truth be told, it’s not needed…or at least it wouldn’t be needed if so many people weren’t so blindly willing to trample the rights and freedoms of others to obtain the most of it that they can.
This is me in a nutshell.
Queer.
Yeah…it fits.
And toward that end, I provide my own perspective upon the world. Some people may not like how I see it, but I’ve never really been one to couch my phrases in such a way as to please everyone. Understanding this, it just naturally falls that I should find myself posting upon a leftist blog. After all, if you want to see the world as it really is, you need to first strip away the corporatist backing and the blind patriotism…and if you are able to freely do that and, what’s more, relate to it in such a manner as to want to address it, improve it, bring it to the attention of our nation’s people and our world leaders, then dare I say that you’re not exactly a poster-child for the conservative party in the US.
So, I’m here, I’m queer, and I doubt I’ll be welcome at any presidential dinners.
I’m cool with that!
