by Mike Mosher

Pink Vs. Orange.

This issue #33 of OTHERZINE incorporates the DNA of another San Francisco Bay-born radical publication, Bad Subjects. This is its issue #92 too, settled in to occupy some of Other Cinema’s comfy seats here until its own website undergoes reconstruction. We hold hands as the movie unspools.

Viva Pink, standing up against Orange! In the January 2017 Women’s March, Pink Pussy hats asserted female leadership and activism. The 2016 Presidential campaign of pinko (OK, socialist Democrat) Bernie Sanders excited and involved many voters, especially millennials. President Donald Trump, his hair and skin alternating between various shades of orange/lemon yellow/yogurt pink, has galvanized American and global opposition to his policies, his insults, his general demeanor. And as “Orange is the New Black” reminded us, incarceration is always a risk for the disobedient and, perhaps, dissident.

Kristin Cato pushes us into the righteous anger and heated celebration of the San Francisco Women’s March in January, 2018.

Leslie Ludgate gives us a first-hand account of Confederate Flaggers Rebel-rousing in Richmond, Virginia.

Steve Martinot reports on disturbing police militarization in California in two pieces, on Twisted Thinking by the Berkeley City Council, and Force and Violence in a Can, evidently the Council’s policy on pepper spray upon citizens.

This Trumpestuous past year has ignited women’s activism and the speaking of truth to power, beyond the two memorable January marches. Christi Griffis attended the inspiring Detroit Women’s Convention.

Alice Yang compares resistance to walls, and peoples’ pressure against them.

Mary Ellyn Cain recounts a story of a menacing moment of sexual harassment five decades ago.

Mike Mosher contemplates sexual impropriety, and moments of his own, as every man should.

It’s been hard to keep up the fight, to know how best to muster and channel activist energy. Innovative oppositional narratives and/or images continually appear on the screens of the world. Cinema, drama, artworks and performance that embody and express resistance, resentment, renewal deserve our celebration.

Gerry Fialka, a frequent past contributor to OTHERZINE, collaborates with Will Nediger to poke at Jordan Peele’s “Get Out!”

David Cox spins a Moebius Strip of helpful philosophy around the topology of the present and looming future.

Bad Subjects prison poet Colin Scholl contributed to his cell block’s theatre piece.

Glenda Drew and Jesse Drew rustle up community in California’s agricultural country with their Open Country Film Bar.

Clint Enns shares some vivid Post-Cinematic Explorations.

Finally, the anti-refugee, anti-immigrant, anti-Muslim traveler, build-the-wall Trumpustules bursting in our land make us all the more appreciate John Douglas’ “Homeland Security” photo series.

Pink, gray, a lot of colors gather together in 2018 against the onslaught of cheater’s Cheeto orange. Take heart, people, and enjoy the show, and your part in (and against) it.

And further occupy yourself in Other Cinema’s Spring offerings.

This issue’s editor Mike Mosher <mosher@svsu.edu> teaches at Saginaw Valley State University, and for many years has mucked about in Bad Subjects and OTHERZINE from the illusory safety of mid-Michigan. Thanks to In Choi, Craig Baldwin &Molly Hankwitz for editorial assistance. Photo © Christi Griffis, from 2018 Women’s March in Lansing, MI.

