Back in the Loop!

So, my deepest apologies for the delay of absence, but I got caught in a bit of a whirl-wind of work after the big event at the DNC. We got some wonderful media coverage--it's amazing how much more attention they pay to you as an activist when you've got some plastic spinning around your waist. We met so many groups with a shared aim, including a great organization called the Axis of Friendship and the kind people at Hoop it Forward and World Hoop Day. MOST IMPORTANTLY....WE GOT OBAMA!! I couldn't be happy enough, and part of my excuse for not writing for so long is that I have been basking in his win. I still find the most stupid grin coming across my face every time I see him on TV or hear someone say President Obama. It was a hard eight years, and I'm thrilled to finally have a man in office who knows what he's doing--and can even pronounce full words!!!

That said, we can't just rest on our laurels, and there is still so much work left to do on so many issues regarding social justice. I want to assure you all that this was not a one time deal and HFP is a social movement that I hope will find its way to cities and villages across the world. With the help of some amazing hoopers, we can make this happen. I hope to see hoopers all over the globe pick up their hoops and spin them in protest and solidarity. Our causes will vary, but our message will be the same: love and education are the strongest weapons we have against oppression. And the aim of HFP is to spread love and education in its fight for social justice. I happily welcome all of your ideas and invitations to work in conjunction with other hooping groups with shared ideals. Keep on hooping, and I'll keep all of you updated on our upcoming events as they arise. If you want to create a local group and join in organized demonstrations through HFP, please email me, and I will get back to you. Thanks!!

Rocky Mountain News Coverage

I'M FINALLY IN DENVER! I hooped here in Denver yesterday (Sunday) at the Civic Center Park in front of the Capitol building amid a heavy crowd of venders, press, protestors, artists--you name it. I got about six hours of hooping in, only dropping my hoop once after the first two hours because a vendor who was driving his van through the park hit my hoop, which was a blessing actually given he didn't actually hit me! After that, I moved from my patch of lawn to the bottom of this huge flowerbed--hence the flowers in the foreground of this photo. I met hundreds of lovely people and did more interviews than I can remember as I was hooping and my husband, Matthew, was passing out flyers promoting our two-day HFP event. Check out the piece written about Sunday's events with my hula-hooping photo taking up half of an entire newspaper page in the print edition. Thankfully, the piece ran more than just the ridiculously large photo and did mention HFP, so God-willing, all that will translate into a sizable turnout tomorrow & Wednesday. I'll be busy hooping and won't be blogging much over the next week, but I'll give you all the lowdown once this week is over. PEACE!

ON OUR WAY!

HOOPING FOR PEACE IS ONLY A WEEK AWAY!
We're leaving Atlanta and headed to Denver-- we're taking a roadtrip and picking up hoops along the way. If you know of any great hoop stores or want to donate hoops and are anywhere on the way from Atlanta to Denver, we'd love to stop by and take the donations and we'd appreciate tips on any good toy/hobby/hoop stores on the way with super-cheap hoops in bulk.

I've been working hard sending out invites and recruiting speakers, and I'm happy to say that we will be having some fantastic speakers and panel discussions and open mics as well! We want you to share what peace means to you as well, so on Tuesday starting at 11am, we want you to tell us however you know how what peace means to you: a few words, a song, an interpretive dance, a poem--whatever!

I will be posting a link to flyers shortly, and I beseech all of you to print and hand out as many as you can before the event! And we need as many volunteers as we can get to hand out flyers before the event. The flyers will have a full schedule of activities for each day, and I will be posting that same schedule to the website shortly.

I welcome and appreciate all of the volunteers we can get to help with any of the numbered points below, which are listed in order of importance-

REMINDER: THIS IS A FREE EVENT, OPEN TO THE PUBLIC, MEANING

FREE ENTRY, FREE FOOD, FREE BEVERAGES, FREE HOOPS & FREE FUN!

This should be an easy sell for anyone who is passionate about peace and up for a good time!

1. RECRUIT PARTICIPANTS: Recruit hoopers, dancers, gawkers, anyone who enjoys a good time and is passionate about peace!
   THIS IS BOTH THE EASIEST AND MOST IMPORTANT WAY YOU CAN HELP, and there are so many ways to do it, for example:
   **You can volunteer to hit the streets, universities, homes and businesses of Denver and give out flyers--contact me!
   **You can focus on universities near Denver and hand out flyers at those and other universities around the country, wherever you live. Remember, many students are expected to attend the DNC this year, and they're coming from every state!
   **You can also just print out flyers yourself and hand out as many as you can.
   **You can attach or paste the flyer into an email and send it out to EVERYONE.
   
2. DONATE HOOPS: We're providing hula hoops, but we are still collecting them and will be collecting them up until the event and during the event as well. If you can bring one hoop for you and donate another (especially if they are of decent quality), we'd be hugely grateful. We'll be donating all the hoops to local schools and children after the event is over, so bring as many hoops to both use and to donate as possible! It would be horrible to run out of hoops, and I don't want that to be a possibility. We'll have hoops for backup, but they won't be great quality given we're buying a couple hundred!
3. DONATE FUNDS: Thus far, we have collected $250 through the website, and we are hugely grateful for every cent. Our costs are running about $4000 to stage the event (rent the space, tents, stage, speakers, microphones, etc), and we'll be providing free food and drinks as well, so that should also run a pretty penny. All of this is coming out of the shallow pockets of myself and my husband, Matthew, so what I'm saying is, we can use all the help we can get to cover the expenses (even if it's after the fact). I'm a full-time freelance writer and he works at a non-profit education think-tank while going to school. So, this is a big sacrifice for us, but we simply think that peace is that important. I know that you do too or you wouldn't be reading this, so if you can spare anything, we would greatly appreciate it!
   

THANK YOU!!!!!!!

To all of our donors of course, thanks so much. We've collected $250 and are grateful for every cent. All told, our costs should run around $5000 total for the entire event, so we desperately need and appreciate the donations--especially because we'll be paying out of pocket for whatever we don't collect in donations. So, thank you for your donations, and keep 'em coming!

WORLD HOOP DAY's founder, Annie O'Keeffe, has been an incredible support for me and has helped me make this event a success. She connected me with the hooping community, encouraged me and has been amazing all around.

HOOP IT FORWARD offered to donate several hoops, and we are hugely grateful. More than that, I am also grateful to Travis Roberts and Suzanne St. Martin of Hoop It Forward for being so kind and supportive over the past few weeks.

p.s.

Given yesterday's open letter and recent events, I would like to send one last message to Senator Obama in particular:

I want to make you and your family feel especially welcome (whether you come or not) for many reasons, but particularly now, because I know that you have been getting some undue criticism from the Muslim community. As a Muslim-American attorney, I understand that politics is a tough game and requires certain formalities and prerequisites, no matter what your name is. I respect that you have time and time again showed us that you are human and that you are open to new ideas and that, most importantly, you are not above apologizing when you feel it's warranted. I respect this in you as a man and as a leader.

I want my leaders to be well-informed, intelligent and open to the ideas of others. I want my leaders to veer toward peace and diplomacy in foreign and domestic affairs as much as humanly possible--and I don't care how much that leader courts any single religious group in an election campaign. I will be voting for you on rational grounds, not religious ones.

The only religious interest I have with respect to my leaders is that they honor the freedom of religion and the separation of church and state granted us in the U.S. Constitution. I feel that most Muslim-Americans would agree with me here, as well as most of my generation. I expect that you will not continue to curtail our civil liberties as Americans in the false interest of "National Security" as your predecessors have done. I expect that you will help us regain respect and admiration around the world by using diplomacy where your predecessors have used only threats, ultimatums and hateful epithets. I expect that you will further the cause of peace, and that is exactly why I (along with many other Americans) will be voting for you in November.

Peace,
Melody

OPEN LETTER TO THE OBAMAS

Dear Barack, Michelle, Malia, and Sasha,

I noticed from the People feature article on your family this week that you appear to have some adroit hoopers among you! As such, I am writing this open letter to invite all of you to join us in Hooping for Peace in Denver during the Convention. I understand that you will be quite busy, but should you or any of your representatives want to come and join us, we would be thrilled to have you. Details about the event will be posted on the website, and you already have all of my contact information, so feel free to contact me any time.

I fully understand that the chances that any of you will be able join us are minimal, but if anyone knows about beating seemingly impossible odds, it's got to be you. Hooping for Peace will take place during the two days leading up to your speech at Invesco Field. Should you see anyone in the crowd with hoops (although I highly doubt we'll be allowed to bring them in), you should know that it is us, and that we come in peace.

Peace,

Melody

Tabsir.net covers HFP!

See their coverage of HFP.

Hooping.org Coverage

Hooping.org ran a short piece on HFP in the news section of it's online magazine, which is a joy regardless. Check out our mention.

Michelle Obama and Daughter Hoop!

I'm generally not a reader of People magazine, but a friend told me the other day that I MUST pick up the latest issue (Aug. 4, 2008) and take a look at page 56. So, I came home yesterday with a copy of the magazine on my desk courtesy of my husband, complete with a post-it marking the exact page. So, I open it up, and to my joy and surprise, I find a photo of Michelle Obama hooping next to one of her daughters. There is a caption on the photo reading "'She's the best I know' jokes Barack as Michelle displays hooping skills in Butte, Mont." It appears to be no joke though--she's on one knee and doing a damn good job, so I'm hoping that maybe she'll come out to join in the fun sometime during the convention. The feature is entitled The Obamas Get Personal, and the Obamas appear in a big family photo on the cover (see the online version here).

Again, I am not an avid People reader, though I fully understand that it was a smart and strategic move for Obama to cooperate with the magazine so that it could run this article. Still, it perfectly exemplifies what it is that I can't stand about the magazine: I could care less about Obama's "personal" life--what I really want to know is what his positions are on issues that will affect us as the American people. And it turns out, I'm down with those positions and obviously am a huge Obama supporter, but not because he is handsome or his wife is pretty. According to People, Michelle works out 90 minutes every day; she thinks she looks healthy and toned as a result; Barack likes her better without makeup or styled hair; Barack used to do laundry from time to time............I JUST DON'T CARE ABOUT THIS SHIT, and what's so great about it is that I still understand why Obama agrees to do it--if he didn't cooperate, they may have done a story anyway, but a much less flattering one.

So, basically, I know what Obama's beliefs are regarding the war, healthcare and education. I support him because of those beliefs, not because he used to do laundry sometimes. But I guess this is part of the political game, and not playing may help you lose in the long-run. If I were Obama's political advisor, I would advise that he do exactly what he did here.....but I would also advise him that it would be greatly beneficial to his campaign and any efforts to further humanize him to bring the family down to hoop for peace with us for a little while.

I am going to begin sending them invites, and I hope that all of you loyal readers and supporters will email, fax, mail or call his office and spread the word that he and his family (along with anyone else on the planet who wants to come hoop or spectacle) are invited to become a part of HFP. And feel free to refer him to my website or mybarackobama page that I set up some time ago--so they should already have all my contact info ;) . Also, you can tell him that there will be one gift bag saved for him.......I'm sure that if I can bear to finish reading the article, I can find out what Barack and Michelle's favorite foods are.......then maybe I can lure them outside and down to ground level for a short while. All other suggestions are welcome. And yes, I know there is roughly a 0.01% chance that they'll stop by, but I've beaten odds like that before, so I figure why not at least try.

Radio Free Georgia

Nadia Ali and I discussed Hooping for Peace on Radio Free Georgia's Just Peace. To listen to the two-minute segment, which is part of a longer interview, visit my home page and scroll down to "Author Interviews and Commentaries."

Payvand

Payvand, a Iranian news wire, posted this notice about the Hooping for Peace (HFP) project.

HOOPING FOR PEACE MISSION STATEMENT

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I, Melody Moezzi, attorney, author and activist, am organizing Hooping for Peace (HFP), a 2-day long event that will take place in Denver during the Democratic National Convention, during which time I will be hooping, along with many others, in support of world peace.

I invite everyone to join in the fun for this vital cause. As a practical goal, world peace may seem outlandish, unattainable, or even just downright absurd. Nevertheless, attempting to achieve peace is crucial, especially today. Approaching any aim this ridiculously outrageous and admittedly idealistic requires persistence, hope, and creativity. As such, our Sponsors, Supporters and Participants are devoted to the cause of peace, as well as to the power of art and creativity to resolve all sorts of conflicts, and in doing so, to incite a wide variety of viable peaceful solutions to global, community and personal disputes.

Thus, the objectives of the Hooping for Peace project include the following:

1. PROMOTING WORLD PEACE: Specifically, as Americans, our part in promoting peace involves:
   • Opposing & denouncing all acts of aggression not in imminent and genuine self-defense, including the proliferation or preservation of any weapons (particularly nuclear weapons).
   • Opposing any current or ongoing invasions or occupations of countries that do not present any genuine threat to the American country and its people.
   • Opposing any future invasion or occupation of Iran or any other country not presenting an immediate and palpable threat inside of our American borders.
     
     
2. UNITING FOR PEACE: Uniting people across race, gender, sexual orientation, socioeconomic status, ethnic or national origin, age, disability, culture and religion in order to promote peace & to denounce hate and discrimination.
   
   
3. DEMONSTRATING OUR UNIFIED DEMAND FOR PEACE THROUGH ART: Hooping together to meet, learn from and befriend fellow peacemongers, and of course, to have fun in the process. We will be doing all of this with one final cooperative artistic endeavor in mind: the creation of a live art installation featuring the formation of a peace sign--visible from the sky and consisting of many individuals hooping simultaneously.
   
   
4. SUPPORTING OBAMA AS THE 2008 DEMOCRATIC NOMINEE: Supporting Barack Obama's call for peace and diplomacy, as well as his ultimate election as the next President of the United States of America.
   
   
5. BOLSTERING THE COUNTERSCAREISM MOVEMENT - replacing fear, ignorance, and bigotry with love, knowledge, and common sense:
   Promoting and expanding the growth of what I have been calling the Counterscareism Movement. This Movement consists of a growing number of devoutly patriotic Americans (myself included) who share the following commitments:
   
   • We are sick of watching our elected officials govern through fear, rather than through inspiration;
     
   • We refuse to accept the use of scare tactics as a valid or effective form of governance; and
     
   • We will persist in protecting and defending civil liberties, as it is these liberties that form the bedrock of any living democracy.

Thus, HFP is spreading the message that Americans are sick and tired of being governed by scare tactics and that we are ready and desperate for peace, hope and diplomacy. We firmly believe, furthermore, that we have found a leader in Barack Obama who is willing both to listen to this vital message and to govern with it in mind.

Finally, I wish to clarify one last point: Hooping for Peace is far more than some simple exercise in lighthearted frivolity. Nevertheless, I fully embrace the label "lighthearted," for we all must empty our hearts of fear and hatred in order to make space to let in the highest and most powerful of all human capacities: love. Unlike panic and bigotry, love is a "light" emotion in that it raises us up, instead of dragging us down.

So, my friends, RISE UP & JOIN THE HOOPING FOR PEACE PROJECT! Together we can ensure that our voices are heard and that our presence is felt. Together we can make a difference.

IN LOVE & PEACE,

Melody

Melody Moezzi
melody@melodymoezzi.com
www.melodymoezzi.com
www.hoopingforpeace.com

Details to come... Info regarding times, locations, supporters, participants, sponsors, and efforts for the live art installation are forthcoming.

For more information or if you want to join or assist Hooping for Peace in any way (as a Participant, a Sponsor, or a Supporter (in spirit or in presence), please contact me at melody@melodymoezzi.com.

DONATIONS: To help make HFP as successful as possible, please consider making a donation by clicking on the orange "DONATE" link to the right. This will allow you to donate through PayPal. If you wish to donate in any other manner, please email me, and I will try to accommodate your request.

All donations will be used for preparation, publicity, staging and clean-up for the event (including, for example, the lease or purchase of items, properties, and/or services related to the event itself). Should there be any funds left over from this, those funds will be used to prepare for future HFP events and to assist other charitable and/or educational organizations with the stated mission of promoting and protecting peace and human rights.

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