Tulsa
Nothing too exciting to report the last couple of days. Yesterday morning we went to Oral Roberts University. They had made it quite clear that they did not want us there. We gathered across the street from the gigantic praying hands and big spaceship looking prayer tower with the flame on top and held a vigil in the freezing cold. It was 37 degrees without windchill. I couldn't hold the banner without shaking. Several people decided to cross the line and were arrested. They ended up spending most of the day in the courthouse, as a representative from ORU had asked the police to hold them as long as possible.
After the vigil we went to lunch at a food court (we do that a lot; with so many people with different food needs it's the easiest option) and part of the group ran into students from Oral Roberts in Panera. They told them that the Equality Ride website had been blocked from the campus servers, and that a filter had been put on their email and facebook accounts as well, and that they had been forbidden from approaching us on or off campus. Totalitarianmuch?
Last night 4 of us went to a local Borders where we'd been told students might be able to meet us, if campus wasn't on lockdown. I spent a pleasant couple of hours reading up on fundamentalist education and eyeing any potential students or gay kids that came near. Unfortunately we didn't actually talk to anyone, so it was a bit of a wash.
Today is a break/work day. I've spent most of the morning being lazy and doing laundry (a good thing, as I was down to my last pair of socks). This arvo we have media training with some representatives from GLAAD, and then I've got some work to do on Azusa. Tomorrow is a short trip over to Oklahoma City, where we're staying in a fun area, and then a busy couple of days at Oklahoma Baptist. It looks like the administration is again going to go back on their agreements of giving us space to present and have our planned drum circle and things. Apparently there's at least on DVD of us from Liberty and Regent circulating ahead to the schools farther down the line and our notoriety might be scaring some people off.
After the vigil we went to lunch at a food court (we do that a lot; with so many people with different food needs it's the easiest option) and part of the group ran into students from Oral Roberts in Panera. They told them that the Equality Ride website had been blocked from the campus servers, and that a filter had been put on their email and facebook accounts as well, and that they had been forbidden from approaching us on or off campus. Totalitarianmuch?
Last night 4 of us went to a local Borders where we'd been told students might be able to meet us, if campus wasn't on lockdown. I spent a pleasant couple of hours reading up on fundamentalist education and eyeing any potential students or gay kids that came near. Unfortunately we didn't actually talk to anyone, so it was a bit of a wash.
Today is a break/work day. I've spent most of the morning being lazy and doing laundry (a good thing, as I was down to my last pair of socks). This arvo we have media training with some representatives from GLAAD, and then I've got some work to do on Azusa. Tomorrow is a short trip over to Oklahoma City, where we're staying in a fun area, and then a busy couple of days at Oklahoma Baptist. It looks like the administration is again going to go back on their agreements of giving us space to present and have our planned drum circle and things. Apparently there's at least on DVD of us from Liberty and Regent circulating ahead to the schools farther down the line and our notoriety might be scaring some people off.
posted by Di at 11:26 AM
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