A Guide to Pinball in Occupied Minneapolis
Whether you’re a paid agitator or just a normal person who doesn’t like racism – here are the pinball spots to try out when ur not locked up!
Hey! We’re a pinball magazine. We don’t normally cover nazi occupations. So it was a HUGE surprise to us when ICE decided to roll into our favorite pinball city (and really everything city), Minneapolis. While I don’t live in Minneapolis currently, I live about an hour away and use it as my primary pinball hub – and a spot until recently I was gainfully employed. Point being, it’s home turf.
Now let’s talk about ICE. Those guys suck fucking ass. They’re not from here. They don’t get it. They make everyone miserable. In fact, I bet they’re miserable too. They’re slipping and looking like dumbasses and everyone hates them. Like everybody here. But honestly, I don’t care if they’re miserable because they’re pulling people out of cars and disappearing them, they’re shooting people in the face. In fact, they’re shooting so many that it was only one when I started writing this article, but now it’s been two. Maybe by the time you read it that number will be even higher. I hope not.
If you think this is dramatic, or we’re doing this for clicks just know this – this is affecting everybody in the area. You definitely don’t know this, but one of our Nudge writers was one of the folks who was there witnessing (and thankfully filming) when Alex Pretti was murdered. Another Nudge-tangential dude was roughed up and arrested by Ice. These things are real, they’re happening in places just like where you live now.
But the good news is people are fighting back. And they using pinball to recharge their batteries. Here’s how, and also where ya can go if you want to come show some support while playing some great pinball! Let’s not forget that this city is one of the greatest all time pinball spots in da world. For real. Okie let’s go.
LITT + Protest = Hell yeah
Last friday something like 700 million Minneapolis businesses closed in a general strike against ICE. This was organized alongside a march of tens of thousands, who stood in sub zero temps to basically tell Ice to fuck off and go home.
One of those businesses was LITT.
If you read Nudge, you’ve seen LITT ads in almost every physical copy of the magazine going back to issue 1! They’ve rocked with us since the beginning. We’ve had similar visions for what building community looks like, and how inclusivity can work as a strength and not a weakness. So it was a no-frickin’ brainer when they invited me to come along with some of their staff to the protest and march.
LITT is like everywhere else in Minneapolis: a diverse crew that actually fucks with each other. Every week they have events in that go beyond the tournament, bringing in different sub cultures of minneapolis into the pinball space: Goths, comedians, even wacky ass pinball magazines. In short, they’re part of a community.
The weird part of this article is that I can’t be very specific about WHO is helping and HOW because even a lil’ old gossip rag like Nudge is getting doxxed occasionally online and I don’t want to bring them into it. But suffice to say: this crew rules and it was an honor to spend time in Negative 20 and getting to march all the way from Vikings Stadium to the Target Center. Here are a couple choice pics.
Back to Litt for lil’ pizzas and such
After the protest, we met back up at LITT where the owners and employees were nice enough to let us hang and warm up for a bit. It was still the general strike, so they wouldn’t be open for the rest of the day — but they brought us frozen pizzas and coffee so that we could have something to revive ourselves. Oh, and YES we did get to play some pinball.
My games? Well, let me say that I represented the Eau Claire contingent pretty well. I got to put my initials in Dune a couple times and then pretty handily beat a buncha LITT employees in Star Wars Fall of the Empire. They don’t call me Obi Wan Jacoby for nothing.
What you can do if you want to help: Get a group together and protest the next time there’s a march, then go to LITT afterwards at 2021 Hennepin Ave S and play your ass off. Play a frickin’ ton of new and hard to find games like Evil Dead, Dune, and even Bond 60th. Give them all your quarters.
Caffetto: Another gathering point for dope folks
Any of you who have followed Nudge for a while will recognize Caffetto from some of our promo pics. There’s a reason. Brent and his crew of coffee and pinball misfits have basically perfected the 90s alt coffee shop vibe and then added A SHITLOAD OF PINBALL TO IT. The upstairs is always full of kids and hipsters hammering away at their laptops and talking about their art projects and the downstairs… well that’s where us Pinball autists have a lil’ graffiti heaven all to ourselves.
Caffetto has been pretty vocal during these times. They’ve been a rallying point, a place to grab anti-ICE signs, and, well, a spot to hang out when you’re tired of dealing with reality. That’s something else I want to bring up. Even if your own loved ones aren’t being herded up (which is actually becoming less and less likely the longer this occupation goes on. It doesn’t seem like they care much if you’re actually a citizen or not,) being in the city these days takes a toll.
You drive by cars abandoned on the side of the road, small fires, memorials that stretch for blocks — it’s surreal and, for me, it really starts to wear on you. It’s almost unfathomable to think of Minneapolis as this place right now, torn apart by hate and revolution and federal overreach — isn’t that supposed to be Portland?? Just kidding. But for real, it’s sobering and, well, depressing.
That’s why it’s so important to have stops like this on your revolution route. Are you delivering groceries? Are you protesting at the Whipple Building? Make sure you take an hour or two for yourself so that you can charge your batteries.
What you can do if you want to help: Go find a local church helping with deliveries (There are tons out there or DM me, but I’m not going to dox them here) and DO THAT. When you get done, you’re gonna be full of good and wired up energy. Head over to Caffetto and lean into the spiral with a GIANT ASS coffee drink as big as your head and enough games of F14 to make you forget your own name. Trust me on this one. It’s the Jacoby special.
OddMart has homebrew arcade games
ICE isn’t just in Minneapolis, they’ve extended their reach further and further north and south as these operations have continued. Yes, Greg Bovino, the tiny lil midget gestapo, is gone, but his crew of flunkies and jokers still remain. So it’s important that we don’t make the fallacy that this is over already. It ain’t. It’s time to dig in.
For us that means collaborating with local businesses and pinball spots on ways to bring visibility to them while protesting an unlawful occupation. Doing this is just another example of Minneapolis is having to cope.
One quick story: a friend of mine and I went to a local Empanada restaurant when I had a spare hour in between taking pictures. She kept telling me. how amazing it was but how they’d also had a ton of trouble staying open since these raids started. I didn’t really understand why. Then we walked up to the door and I tried to open it, it was locked. There was a little sign that said, “Please knock and we will let you in.” This was to keep ICE agents from abducting their customers and employees.
When we went inside, there were only two other people in the restaurant during what should have been the lunch rush. One was a nice old white lady who took a big order to go, but the rest of the time we were there I probably only saw about $20 in sales. That’s what’s important to realize, this occupation is about intimidation. They’re trying to shut down businesses. They’re trying to tell us that they're bigger and more powerful than us.
They’re not. And there’s more of us than there are of them. It’s time to realize that.
You know what helps? Art. Yeah, I know. That sounds pretty dumb right? Like what? You’re going to stick your paintbrush into the barrel of their gun? There was that one lady who used her canvass to deflect nonlethal rounds , but that’s not what we’re talking about. Art connects us. It makes us feel not so alone. It inspires us to try harder and push further. Art isn’t just a nothing indulgence, it’s there to feed your soul. In times like this, you absolutely gotta do it.
What you can do: Make more art. Make it all the time. Make it about what you’re feeling, make it about what you’re seeing. Don’t be silent. If you need inspiration, you can go to OddMart on Hennepin. They’ve got an amazing collection of graphic novels, magazines, and t-shirts that will definitely inspire you to take action and create the art that we need in this ding dang world. Oh, and then go and play their homebrew reskinned arcade games in back. Trust me. You’re gonna love ‘em.
If this article is all over the place, it’s cuz I feel all over the place. But we got this, y’all. Stick to the plan: love each other. Stay safe. Fuck ICE.
Talk to ya soon.
