Bruce Sterling and Jasmina Tesanovic Request Your Moral Support

[ellen_datlow]

This one of the dumbest things our government has tried to do yet:

The "Exotic Enemies Do Get Married" Campaign


I've never actually seen the couple together (in fact, I hardly ever see Bruce at all these days) so I can't help, other than to spread the word to those who have met them. For anyone reading this who has met them as a couple, please write a letter as per the plea and send it on to them to use for immigration.
You'll be doing a good deed and it costs you nothing but time.

Comments

[upstart-crow.livejournal.com]

I haven't met them either, so I can't really help :(

That is a nasty situation, though! Hopefully one that US immigration will catch up with in a few years? It seems our government is now just getting used to the idea of the Intrawebz!

[n5red.livejournal.com]

There were some interesting comments about this problem from a young lady from Eastern Europe. Basically, they totally screwed up in dealing with Immigration. The rules and requirements are very well documented and they just blew them off.

Yeah, it's not fair, but it shouldn't be a surprise to them.

[fishsanwitt]

Unfortunately, I can't help in any way, but I wanted to say that not *all* couples have joint accounts, etc. My husband and I don't.

I hope Bruce and Jasmina are able to get the support they need.

[al-zorra.livejournal.com]

I just had to write a letter to the INS testifying why I KNOW the marriage of one of my oldest friends to his Haitian wife is a genuine marriage. It infuriated me that I had to do this -- that THEY have to do this, go begging to their friends to witness that they have a 'real' marriage. Especially when I have witnessed so many 'real' marriages that are no marriages at all.

Can't help Bruce though as I haven't seen him the flesh either lo these many years.

Love, C.

[inf-matrix.livejournal.com]

Thanks for posting this, Ellen. John and I can each write something for Bruce and Jasmina.

Constanza, you're right, as usual.

[docbrite.livejournal.com]

Would Jasmina have been with Bruce at a 2004 SF con (can't remember the name of it right now) in Nantes, France? Because I hung out with Bruce there, and I seem to remember him introducing me to a lady who looked something like the one in the picture on his blog, but so many of my pre-8/29/05 memories are kinda hazy these days. I've lost Bruce's e-mail and cannot ask him myself, but if that was Jasmina, I'll be more than happy to write a letter for them.

[fastfwd.livejournal.com]

Done.

[fastfwd.livejournal.com]

I've seen Bruce and Jasmina together a few times, and I've written a letter on their behalf.

As I understand it, the idea is to keep Jasmina from being deported from the US; there was no mention of anything about a green card or citizenship. As a US citizen who married a citizen of another country, I am familiar with some of the problems you can have with the government. Sometimes, it's smooth going. But sometimes, you run into a bureaucrat who decides there just isn't enough being done to investigate these marriages properly--that too many green card marriages are sliding by unnoticed. Especially if one of the people in question is from some country "we" don't like--e.g., Serbia.

Some of these bureaucrats can't imagine why married people don't own property, have joint bank accounts, or do any of the other standard middle-class things that "normal" people do.

I think Bruce and Jasmina just ran into one of these bloody-minded by-the-book people who thinks that one writer is just doing another writer a favour by "rescuing" her from Serbia. My opinion.