They speak in "lolcats" terminology. They use terms like "lulz" and "epic win." They claim that members who have been found out have had their pets killed. They wear "V for Vendetta" Guy Fawkes masks. They are Anonymous, and they're gathering in Millennium Park this weekend for a gathering that's one part protest, one part flash mob, two parts performance art. Who are they really? Who knows. That's the point. Anonymous will be out tomorrow......

Photo by Matt.Hintsa. American Airlines has cancelled another 200 flights today, bringing the week's total to nearly 3,300. Were you one of the folks stranded when American Airlines cancelled over a thousand flights after grounding their fleet of MD-80s for inspection? Were you calling the 800 number to reschedule your flight, only to get a recording saying representatives are busy, so call back later? If so, the Allied Pilots Association is inviting you to......

The protesters who interrupted the Easter mass at Holy Name church yesterday were in court this morning and held in lieu of $25,000 bail for five of them and $35,000 for one with a record. They all face two counts of felony criminal damage to property and two counts of simple battery for allegedly squirting fake blood on parishioners. Donte D. Smith, Ephran Ramirez, Jr., Ryane J. Ziemba, Mercedes Phinaih, Regan Maher and Angela Haban......

This just in. As Cardinal Francis George was beginning the homily at Holy Name, six people poured a blood-like substance on themselves and parishioners. They have been arrested. [Trib] 5:32 Update: The Trib is reporting: The group—whose female and male members identified themselves as Catholic Schoolgirls Against the War—stood up at the beginning of Cardinal Francis George's homily and shouted their opposition to the conflict, which marked its fifth anniversary last week. As security guards......

South Side Irish Parade spectators. Photo by Devillibrarian. Who wouldn’t want to support an organization that raises money that helps sick kids? At least one South Side Catholic high school expressed concern that proceeds from the South Side Irish Parade will be going to the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation, which supports embryonic stem cell research in hopes of a cure for Type 1 diabetes. After talking with the JDRF, the high school decided not to......

Yesterday's worldwide Scientology protests had a local presence outside the church's center on Lincoln.......

Of all the egregious things the city can do to property owners, from jacking property taxes to the current favorite, the misuse of TIFs, none seems more unfair and ripe for abuse as eminent domain. For the uninitiated, eminent domain allows the city government to seize ownership of private property, paying the owner whatever the city deems as "market value". It's supposed to be used for the "greater public good", such as the expansion......

Eeeeheeeheeehehehe. More snow is on the way tonight--maybe another four inches. Anybody got some good boot recommendations? Mama needs a new pair of shoes. Speaking of shoe shopping, Anthropolgie? We vehemently disapprove of the term "shootie." Please join us in this protest. "Shooties" appears to be catching on, so the time to act is now. No to shooties! The term and the shoes, now that we think about it. Loyola is buying Gottlieb Memorial......

It's part of our national schizophrenia as Americans. Every year we bemoan the exploitation of Christmas, and every year we spend more and more money that we really don't have to buy crap to give to each other "in the spirit of the season." There's a great movie to be made about the overcommercialization of Christmas; What Would Jesus Buy? is not exactly that movie, but it still offers a lot of food for......

We were downtown at work yesterday when a co-worker said "What's with the protest outside? There's someone chanting for justice or something." Knowing from the "Saturday Plans" post that The Lady herself, Paula Deen was appearing, this was a head-scratcher. Who could be so upset at a TV chef? Besides the obvious, of course. Well, fans of Food Network's favorite Southern mother probably showed up at the Chicago Theater Saturday expecting the use of a......

We reported on Wednesday sales have been sinking at the flagship State Street store--nostalgic epicenter for Field’s lovers. Meanwhile, Field’s Fans continue to protest. A group of concerned Field's Fans showed up on Saturday to “protest against Macy's business practices here in the Chicago area.” They have scheduled special “leaflet” events on the Friday and Saturday following Thanksgiving, as well as another rally “Under the Great Clock” at noon on Saturday, December 2. Wednesday’s Trib......

Mayor Daley had some harsh words for Back of the Yards residents yesterday at a peace rally where community members gathered to mourn Leticia Barrera's death and protest neighborhood violence. Barrera, four months pregnant, was shot and killed outside her home on Halloween. Police say she was caught in gang gunfire. Daley told everyone, "You know who did it. Don't be blaming the police. Look in the mirror and say, 'I can do better.' ...If......

If you're in Greektown this morning and see a bunch of people milling about at the Halsted/UIC Blue Line station, just go about your normal business. Those folks are from the Think Outside the Bottle campaign staging a protest demanding that Coca-Cola reveal the sources it uses for its Dasani brand bottled water. Bottled water has come under intense scrutiny lately, from a proposed tax on bottled water by City Council being considered to bridge......

This is the final week for the CTA as we know it, unless state funding kicks in. To highlight the upcoming doomsdsay, the CTA put on a quite a little show. There's a Wicca school in Rossville, and boy are some close-minded residents not thrilled. Quoth a local youth pastor, "The school closed. This is a popular place for meth. We're like, 'Great, now a witch school.'" Yeah, meth and witches. Totally comparable. The......

Gone largely unnoticed among the other notable tax increases proposed by His Elective Majesty to plug the gaping hole in his 2K8 budget is the whopping $13.1 million increase to the liquor tax. The proposed increase will add 8¢ to a six-pack of beer, 7¢ to a bottle of wine, and 24¢ to a liter of hard liquor. Fittingly, this isn't sitting well with the beer wholesaler lobby. The Associated Beer Distributors of Illinois are......

As it gets closer to Halloween for LAist, a contributer recollects her tale of staring down the serial killer, Richard Ramirez, otherwise known as the Night Stalker. Must think happy thoughts -- okay, free organic chocolate chip cookies for Los Angeles -- now that's a happy thought. Other happy Los Angeles thoughts include an interview with Jack Kehler of The Big Lebowski (he was the Dude's landlord), a beautiful and magical photographic moment in......

Middle school can be a rough time. Hormones rage, cliques form, and the general craziness of living a teenager's life in the double-naughts can close in. There are bullies to dodge, nerds to befriend, and that one goth-chick with red eyes who is never seen without her crusty duct-taped headphones on. And then one of your friends comes along, gives you a hug as you say hello, and suddenly the world is OK. But not......

Englewood residents held a demonstration yesterday on 74th and Green, protesting the city's lack of effort to curb drug dealing and prostitution in the area. And the Defender reports that Englewood has some of the worst air quality in the city and the highest incidence of lead-poisoning cases of any neighborhood in Chicago — 17.3 percent of kids tested in 2003 had elevated levels. Yesterday's protest was organized through the Chicago branch of ACORN (Association......

Protest over national vs. regional chains, the never-ending debate over the place of cars and bicycles in our metropolises, professional sports scandals, remembering a solemn day, and being issued a search warrant - it all happened across our sites this week! Another banner week at Chicagoist started off with daily reports from food writer Lisa Shames on her attempt to eat only locally grown and raised foodstuffs all week as part of a farmers market......

The debate over the Chicago Children's Museum plan to relocate to Grant Park has escalated since Monday’s neighborhood meeting at Daley Bicentennial Plaza. There, museum officials introduced plans for a more sunken, environmentally friendly design adjacent to the Plaza. The Museum’s growth has been remarkable. Founded in 1982 in two Chicago Public Library hallways, it’s since moved three times, most recently to Navy Pier in 1995. Twelve years later, they’ve apparently outgrown that tourist magnet.......

Former WKQX-FM 101.1 radio host Erich "Mancow" Muller filed a lawsuit Tuesday against his former employer, saying radio officials disparaged his show and blocked him from getting other work. We are getting pretty sick of the cell phone drivers, but we are always amazed at the cell phone bikers (not in a good way). Yesterday, an 19-year-old woman who was struck and killed by a garbage truck on the Northwest Side, was apparently talking......

While the evil empire from New York City (Macy’s) served complimentary slices of Frango Mint Ice Cream pie to the some twenty guests dining in the seventh floor Walnut Room, about 100 hard-core Marshall Field’s fans staged a protest underneath the the historic clock on State Street below. Today marks the one-year anniversary of Macy’s changing the name of Field’s after after gobbling up May Department Stores, which Field's had been a part of. Organized......

We told you a while back about the protests from DePaul students and teachers when professor Norman Finkelstein was denied tenure. The outcry continued yesterday as students marched in protest at the school's Lincoln Park Campus until Finkelstein addressed the crowd with news of his resignation. Students and others who supported Finkelstein throughout the debacle had varied reasons for doing so, ranging from his controversial beliefs regarding Israel to suspicions of shady politics at the......

As a boater on Lake Michigan, you're entitled to profanity-free air. At least that's what a group of 300 boaters and motorists, who came together to protest on Sunday night, are saying. They're, as the punny Trib puts it "honking mad" about the youth-infecting rap music that's been occurring at Northerly Island for the past two weeks. There were apparently complaints after the show on Aug. 26, which included Wu-Tang, MF Doom and Pharoahe Monch.......

One year after she took refuge inside a Humboldt Park storefront United Methodist church, immigration fugitive, mother, and unlikely activist for immigration reform Elvira Arellano announced that she would risk deportation by leaving the church to head to Washington, DC to lobby Congress for immigration reform. "If this government would separate me from my son, let them do it in front of the men and women who have the responsibility to fix this broken law......

From a public relations standpoint this has not been a banner couple weeks for the Chicago Police Department. First, the Reverend Al Sharpton opens a Chicago office for his National Action Network in order to address the issue of police brutality in Chicago. Days after Sharpton opened his office, 42-year-old Gefery Johnson died from injuries sustained after police Tasered and forcibly arrested him. Days after that, 18-year-old Aaron Harrison was shot to death by police......

With the news reports of the Taser death of Gefery Johnson not even a few days old, this was the last thing the Chicago Police Department needed. Police shot and killed a recent Manley High School graduate last night in the North Lawndale neighborhood and wound up having to quell a near riot as residents took to the streets in protest. Witnesses to the shooting said that 18-year-old Aaron Harrison was just hanging out with......

Phil Vettel, in a post late yesterday to the Tribune's "Stew" blog, wrote about how restaurants around the area are joining in on a boycott of Canadian seafood to protest that nation's ongoing annual seal hunt. The boycotts range from simply not offering Canadian snow crab - many crab fisheries are also involved in the seal hunt - to not buying seafood from a specific region or not buying any Canadian seafood. The boycott, sponsored......

Last week we heard that a bulk of the city's cab drivers are starting to consider forming a union. That sentiment may be put to the test when we see whether any drivers heed a flyer calling for cab drivers to stay parked tomorrow. The protest is aimed at the city, which some drivers say have ignored the seriousness of their situation. The last time Chicago cab drivers saw a fare increase was in 2005,......

Music festivals are lots of things to lots of people: to the City, they represent quality of life and revenue draws from tourism; to music fans, they can be a great way to see many of your favorite bands all at once, while checking out new music; to some, they're like a vacation in your own town. But to activists and social movement groups, they're also an opportunity to reach out to people that might......