The Adoptee Rights Demonstration

And I come with some incredible news!!!

The protest was AWESOME! We have been going non stop since yesterday and I have so many updates to give everyone.

We met downstairs in our hotel at 10:15 with everyone and we packed up the ice chests and water into Dons car which he drove to Lafayette Square for us. About 20 of us marched over to the Square spread out chanting and holding our signs high into the air! ( pictures coming soon )

It was incredible, it was healing, it was empowering. The force and strength we created, together as a team, for OPEN RECORDS was the greatest power I have ever felt. So much has gone into this protest and to see it come together like this was more than I ever imagined. It makes EVERYTHING so worth it!

We stood along the sidewalk of the park on the busiest side and in single file line, spread out we held our signs and were given many honks and support cheers in return. We waited an hour or so for some others to come and held our signs up high in the process of doing so.

We then began our march from Lafayette Square to the Ernest Morial Convention Center and it was AWESOME! The Times Picayune had a press photographer follow us the entire time and document it. As did we with our own cameras which will be posted up in the near future.

Once we arrived to the Ernest Morial Convention Center I went in and checked us in for our Exhibitors booth and got the badges so we could begin setting up after the protest. We then split up and continued marching infront of the two major entrances of the convention center. We had business cards ( thank you Dory,) flyers ( thank you Michelle ) and incredible signs ( thank you to all who attended the sign making party the night before.) We handed out over 500 of each and had amazing feedback.

There were thousands of people at the convention center and many were interested and supportive. A reporter from the Times Piscayune came out and interviewed Michelle, CathyOBCforME and myself. We spoke for a good 45 minutes and got our message clear. Some things were lost in the article that actually came out and I’m going to be calling the editor after the Exhibitors booth is done to express some corrections that I have. I’ll post more about that later.

We marched for hours until we were beat, sweaty, out of flyers and cards and ready to get a bite to eat. We put the signs inside the booth and went out for lunch with everyone to celebrate.

A HUGE thank you to all who came from across the country to march with us. It was powerful, and the beginning to some thing VERY BIG. This isn’t stopping here. At lunch we discussed how to improve it, how to make it as effective as possible, this was our starting point and we are only going to get stronger, larger, and continue to grow.

The Exhibitors booth today was incredibly successful. We have Cathy, Heather and Jim there now. They are networking with other exhibitors ( there are 1000 ) and thousands of legislatures are there as well. We are getting their positions ( if any ) talking open records and if they want more information we’ll be sending it to them. If they’re supportive we are keeping their information for future contact for open records bills in their said states. We have 2 more days for the Exhibitors Booth and I’ll be in it networking tomorrow so there won’t be any more updates until Friday. At which point I’ll post the articles, the updates and progress.

In total this demonstration and exhibitors booth has been POWERFUL and WELL WORTH the work we put into it. Thank you Ron for the idea of the Booth it worked, is working, and we’re going to move some mountains thanks to it.

How COOL is it that a group in Rochester protested! A HUGE thank you to you! Rock on!!! Theresa from Ungrateful Little Bastard called us last night and played the video over the phone for us and we all heard it on speaker phone and cried and rejoiced. Its really happening. Many of us are activists and doing one hell of a job. We are speaking out and making it happen. We are going to achieve open records for all, i can see it now.

More to follow soon…

Tags:   adoptee rights · new orleans · open records · the adoptee rights demonstration14 Comments