Good morninggggg. The weather today is expected to be “showers then chance showers,” according to the National Weather Service. Also for tonight, “showers likely.” So what we’re talking about here people is rain, drizzle, sprinkles, and other sky water synonyms. High of 53 degrees. (However, I see no rain as of this moment, so I apologize if I steer you wrong.)

Strippers take Olympia: Strippers Are Workers and members of the LGBTQ+ community showed up at the Washington State Capitol Monday to rally for a bill to eliminate the rules against lewd conduct in places that serve alcohol. The bill has already passed the Senate, but supporters fear House lawmakers present the biggest hurdle. However, after a series of raids on several Capitol Hill gay bars, they may finally have the coalition they need to allow bartenders to serve drinks in jockstraps and to create liquor licenses for strip clubs. 

Show up to protest surveillance: Seattle City Council Member Joy Hollingsworth plans to hold a community safety meeting tonight from 6:30 pm to 8 pm at the Seattle Prep Great Room, 2400 11th Avenue E. Representatives from the Mayor’s office and the Seattle Police Department also plan to be there. The City has given the public fewer than 30 days to submit comment on three pieces of police surveillance, so why not show up to voice your opinions at every opportunity? Or check out this great guide by Seattle Solidarity Budget about how to submit public comment. 

 
 
 
 
 
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A post shared by Seattle Solidarity Budget (@seattlesolidaritybudget)

Homelessness connected to high rents: Seattle Times columnist Naomi Ishisaka wrote the goddamn truth yesterday when she pointed out that researchers have linked high rents to people living unsheltered. We Heart Seattle, a nonprofit that picks up trash at encampments, then posted on social media a WILD response, saying people live on the street because men don’t want to work to pay child support. A 2017 paper by the Washington Department of Commerce identified rising rent costs and stagnating wages as the most significant factor. 

Speaking of bad versus good takes: When did KING 5 land the Uber and DoorDash sponsorship? As Hannah pointed out on x.com, the news station has given an excessive amount of airtime to the idea that the Seattle City Council wrongly forced delivery companies to pay drivers a living wage. KING 5, I know you want to act as if prior to this fee drivers made plenty of money to survive in Seattle, but in 2022 you literally ran a story talking about how delivery drivers could be left with $20 after working for eight hours. Maybe contextualize your stories better, the way Hannah and Charles did, by pointing out how notoriously unpredictable these jobs can be and that it’s far too early to make guesses about how the fee could affect workers.

Spokane cops killed more people in two weeks than in all of 2023, according to the Spokesman-Review. The City now leads as second in the country for police killings by population.

Madonna recovers after fall: A dancer fell while dragging Madonna in a chair during a Seattle performance of the singer’s Celebration tour, causing the singer to tumble out of the chair, according to the Seattle Times. 

Putin hanging on to Alexei Navalny’s body: Navalny, an outspoken opponent of Russian President Vladimir Putin, died recently in a Russian prison, according to government officials. Navalny’s mother and wife have demanded the immediate return of his body. Russian officials have told Navalny’s family that the government will not release his body for at least two weeks, according to the BBC.

Shine bright like a black hole devouring a sun: Astronomers found something in the universe outshining our sun, literally calling it 500 trillion times brighter, according to the Associated Press. They called it a “quasar” and I searched for what that meant and honestly didn’t find the answer all that illuminating, but basically it just sounds like a really bright thing in space. Either way, it’s showing up our sun, so I say we go kill it.  

United Nations Security Council considers Gaza ceasefire resolutions: The US plans to veto a resolution proposed by several Arab countries, but we have a draft of our own ceasefire plan, according to the Washington Post. The plan calls for a six-week pause in fighting, phased release of hostages, and it states the US’s opposition to Israel’s planned incursion into Rafah. The vote on the Arab-backed ceasefire plan is scheduled for today.

When no one pays attention, go dark: My favorite album write-ups continue to come from The Line of Best Fit, which just wrote up Allie X’s new album, Girl with No Face. In the review, Tom Kingsley points out that Allie X’s “mixed commercial success” has resulted in her trending more dark and bizarre. I love the strategy that when people ignore you, you just up the creep vibes.

 

Ashley Nerbovig is a staff writer at The Stranger covering policing, incarceration and courts. She is like other girls.

12 replies on “Slog AM: Strippers and LGBTQ+ Community Hit Capitol Steps, Madonna Tumbles in Seattle, UN to Vote on Gaza Ceasefire Resolution”

  1. All the Spokane shootings appear viable at 1st blush, especially #3:

    Spokane County Sheriff’s Office deputies shot and killed 55-year-old Richard Rogissart after Rogissart reportedly swung an ax at deputies during a standoff on Jan. 30 in north Spokane.

    The next night, Spokane police officers shot and killed 43-year-old Craig Anglisano after investigators say Anglisano raised a gun at officers on the South Hill.

    Then early Monday morning, Spokane Police officers shot and killed a man with a gun who had shot a woman multiple times as she was on the phone with 911 dispatchers calling for help.

    The fourth happened downtown near the STA Plaza when officers shot a man who police said held a knife to a person’s throat and tried to hurt a bystander.

  3. Quasar was also a brand of Motorola TV introduced in the late Sixties. It touted its transistors instead of heretofore tube technology. This was back when we used to make TVs here in the States. Huh, imagine. (I just heard Rocky in my head say, “Thank you, Mr. Know-It-All!”)

    The UN is the best thing we have, unfortunately, as a World Congress. You get to be heard there irrespective of what you have to say. But two-thirds of the nations represented are as anti-Semitic as they can be without actually loading people into cattle cars. There’s even a big red stripe of it through several European countries. It’s why the General Assembly has historically passed some obvious condemnations of Israel no matter who is in charge in Tel Aviv. In order for me to trust the Arab States, I’m going to have to see more daylight between their governments and the Jihadists, who use children as suicide bombers.

    I know it’s a different time, and my morality isn’t your morality, but I don’t get celebrating that women still have to use their bodies to excite men for sustenance.

  4. @4: “…I don’t get celebrating that women still have to use their bodies to excite men for sustenance.”

    As a cis-het’ male who has a lifetime record of one visit to a strip club, I celebrate anything which allows women of college age to make literal fistfuls of tuition money in mere hours or days, instead of weeks or months.

  5. Yeah, I see your point, Tense, and different strokes, but I gotta tell you that your statement will hold more water when you have to wib-wobble your ass in some creep’s face in order to attend college.

  6. “And if gig companies biz model fails under the most basic labor law, that’s not an acceptable biz model.”

    This is such a wild take. If the government doesn’t like the economics of your business model they have the right to put you out of business even if the people doing the work are willing to do it under those terms. There is no compelling reason here for the minimum wage other than the city council just feels they should be paid more so they are willing to literally put these people out of work on principle and that is somehow a good thing. Wow.

  7. @#4,6. No one, male or female, “(has) to” work as a stripper. It’s a choice. But you already knew that.

    Women can take out student loans just like men. Women can choose to work jobs that don’t involve stripping just like men. But you already knew that.

  8. @ 8 – You’re right. I knew all that. I also know that women who choose that line of work do so quite often when choices are few. I guess it’s possible – we’ve all learnied in the past decade or so that most anything is possible – that a little girl might say to her mommy, “Mommy, when I grow up, I want to put tassles on my nipples and make them whirl in a club full of gawking men drinking $16 beers,” but I doubt it happens very much at all.

  9. Preface: I totally support the minimum wage for gig workers. In fact, I totally support more stringent standards on temps and gig workers to force businesses to classify them as actual employees. That being said…

    This WILL raise prices. The Seattle/Stanger willful ignorance here is just silly. It reminds me of my college gig in OH, working at a department store. Major union city, UAW everywhere. This really happened in the Men’s department at the higher end, and now eaten by Dillards local store.

    UAW button and flare-laden woman: “Excuse me, but where are the American and Union Made clothes?! What’s wrong with you? This is all union-busting crap made in China and other slave labor countries.!”

    Me: “I’m sorry Maam, I don’t have control of the buyers here. But we do have Cross Creek shirts over there. I wear their turtlenecks myself. Also a few others over on those racks. I know all of those are made in the US, no idea if they are union or not.”

    UAW Flare Woman: “Well, you should be complaining to your management to buy USA and Union only! I’ll see about those!” (Walks off to racks)

    Me: (Bemused smug college kid enjoying the irony of UAW Flare Lady berating a lowly sales floor kid instead of complaining to store management.)

    UAW Flare Woman: (Storms back, full-on rage) “OKAY! Where are the INEXPENSIVE US Union-Made products?! You just sent me to the expensive stuff!”

    Me: (Fed up, and aware I only was working another month before leaving town for grad school) “Good Union wages cost good union prices, Maam.”

    UAW Flare Lady: (Demands to see my manager)

    Same crap. We demand high wages, but we want someone else to pay the cost.

  10. A quasar is an extremely luminous active galactic nucleus (AGN), aka a supermassive black hole surrounded by a gaseous accretion disc (gas in the disc falling towards the black hole heats up and releases energy in the form of electromagnetic radiation).

    The term quasar originated as a contraction of quasi-stellar radio source as they were first identified (1950s) as sources of radio-wave emissions of unknown physical origin.

  11. @3, @6, @9: You’re perfectly free to go tell any of the women who actually do this work that they shouldn’t. (Go ahead, we’ll wait, watch — and laugh at the results you get.)

    Meanwhile, the topic of this post was actually about how women who choose to do this work should be paid well for it, and protected whilst working. Spending several comments crankily saying they shouldn’t ever be working such jobs at all doesn’t exactly make you sound like you support paying and protecting these workers.

  12. @9 “I also know that women who choose that line of work do so quite often when choices are few. “

    There are a lot of choices, it is just that the other choices are worse. Most jobs (for men or women) are not a lot of fun or lucrative. Fast food, janitorial work, cleaning vomit and feces, construction. These jobs often pay poorly, and are back-breaking work. I really doubt any kid says “Mommy, when I grow up, I want to wash dishes for minimum wage” and yet people do it. Should we somehow then not respect the rights of these workers?

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