RTP-area local music and culture

[Ruby Sinreich <ruby AT lotusmedia.org>]

Todd, it's a little annoying that you are responding to my blog post  
here instead of on my blog (where there have been a number of good  
comments), but I'll bite.  If others want to follow along, you can find  
what Todd is responding to here:  
<http://www.lotusmedia.org/blog/ 
2004_09_01_archive.html#109525643573590930>

First since you're curious: I didn't mention either of the Indy letters  
in my post, so I don't see why it matters that one was by my boyfriend.  
 Also in answer to your question, we have no idea who the other letter  
writer was and were very happily surprised to see that someone else  
independently had the same concerns.  I have enjoyed seeing movies at  
the Starlite many times, but never without some inner conflict about  
the guns at the snack bar.  Whenever I see a gun, my day usually gets  
worse.

I didn't say everyone was burying their heads in the sand, but some SOS  
organizers have responded to concerns about the gun shop by saying they  
didn't know how the finances worked and they didn't want to know.    
They didn't say, as you did Todd, that they have "long supported the  
right to buy and sell guns."  If they do, they should say so.  If they  
don't, well that's something to think about, isn't it?

Although many of you seem to presume it to be the case, I have seen no  
evidence that the gun shop is needed to keep the drive-in open.  The  
article that Jason posted was interesting, but as Duncan pointed out,  
it doesn't seem to prove that the drive-in is necessarily subsidized by  
the guns.  It seems that the guns, and the videos, and the drive-in all  
support each other.  I can imagine a number of other part-time  
businesses that could help sustain the Starlite.

But I'm not here to tell anyone what to do.   If he wants to sell guns  
legally, I'm in no position to stop him.  All I've said is that I don't  
personally want to give money to an institution that puts more guns  
into my community.  It's against my religious and my political beliefs.  
 I'm not gonna do it.

= Ruby


On Monday, September 20, 2004, at 09:08  PM, Todd Morman wrote:

> Brian:
>
> "To me the *main* point of the two letters in the Indy is to let anyone
> who is donating money and time to the 'Save the Starlite' cause that
> their money &/or time MIGHT be used to support a business that sells
> guns."
>
> Fair enough. I just want to know, Brian, if you knew that the gun shop
> supported the drive-in (rather than the other way around) *before* you  
> wrote
> your letter. From what you and Ruby have written about this, it  
> doesn't seem
> like either of you got that before you complained. I'd also like to  
> know,
> just out of curiosity, if you know the letter writer from Durham. It
> surprised me that Ruby blogged this without mentioning that her  
> boyfriend
> (you, right?) had written the first Indy letter. Note that I'm not
> discounting your point; I'd just like to know if the two letters were  
> also
> linked in some way. I was also mildly annoyed by Ruby's unfair framing  
> of
> the debate (not all of us are "burying our heads in the sand," thank  
> you,
> but have long supported the right to buy and own certain guns), but  
> that's a
> separate issue.
>
> Regardless, what you're asking for here, it seems to me, is a boycott  
> of
> anyone who sells guns in America today. That's fine, but why not be,  
> er,
> transparent about it? Have you and/or Ruby been to the Starlite in the  
> past?
> If so, how did you justify giving the owner money at the time, since  
> you're
> obviously opposed to "a business that sells guns"? And would you  
> attend in
> the future? These aren't snippy questions; I'm really trying to sort  
> this
> out intelligently.
>
> todd glad you and Ruby started this conversation morman
>
> -- ch-scene: the list that mirrors alt.music.chapel-hill --
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--
Ruby Sinreich :: ruby AT lotusmedia.org :: http://lotusmedia.org/blog
"Instead of hating the people you think are the warmakers, hate the  
appetites and the disorder in your own soul, which are the causes of  
war. If you love peace, then hate injustice, hate tyranny, hate greed,  
but hate these things in yourself, not in another."  -Thomas Merton