2004

by Joe B.

New Year, Day, Now What?

Friday,January,2,2003. Have you made your new year’s resolutions? Began exercises or been kissed by some strikingly pretty girls?

(oh,pardon me that’s what I’ve been up to It’ll be explained in minutes.)

Last year to do more than recite ‘Po Poet slam bio’s,manning tables where most of the time if one had urinary urges one could not leave the merchandise,writing a book full of stories not at all relating to Poor

Magazine’s main theme: solving working poor’s problems with bottom up solutions and not from the top down.

Remember former President B.Clinton’s Off-Welfare-On-To-Work in 1996? Better know as:
[ The Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996.]

Certain problems remained in the rush of getting people of welfare and onto work like Child Care,Education or reeducation/vocational opportunities,and time for study for both jobs, career opportunities.

Those problems still remain,the war in Iraq, Selected President Bush’s 2 stunts one in an air force jet the other on Thanks Giving in Baghdad, and former President Saddham,Hussein’s recent capture.

The best gift ever would've been for S-Prez to bring all the troops home while utilizing internatioal gray/black opts operative to speed up the already undermined leadership in Baghdad.

But surprizing the troops makes greater news copy "buzz" doing little for suffering,starving American’s but this only one poor slob's opinon.

Distant and recent past.

Pre New Years learned Salsa,Meringue, volunteered to help prevent the spread of HIV/AIDS Virus,and publicly in a church begged for a date stating my single,heterosexual, and availability status also wanting to have my dates in the City and not travel all over Berkeley, Oakland,or San Leandro for dates.

Folks it does pay to advertise.

One woman I have exchanged phone numbers, email addresses,and so far so good while at the same function a well dressed elderly gentleman wants to introduce me to his daughter.

My mother moved to another part of town into a gate community and I’m thinking of moving to Berkeley going on Section 8 because San Francisco’s too expensive,has less S-8 stock,and if I could find a kitchen/bathroom inside and apartment I’d be able to stay in the City and invite more friends there.

Funny,my pay is so low I cannot afford credit, write up business cards for a one person business, or take time to go to school because if it interferes with the media job guess what goes?

I’ve tried doing standup comedy,singing, learning to play the piano all this in the space of a few months because I had to do something other than transcribe letters,reply, letters sent by very creative prisoners also I wanted if I must reply and transcribe letters is to get them equally from women prisoners as well I’m sure they have a need for self expression also so far it has not happened.

Yet a silver lining shows itself it my regular offbeat,strange,unusual columns.

If I can find employment where I’d have this much freedom writing columns on a daily basis (2-3) times a week or in radio (Yes,my voice is on radio announcing KPFA's morning show in Berkeley every or near the last day of the month)

I have tidbits of stories mostly humorous however if one listens to P.N.N. Poor News Network well,lets say its politically left oriented, that is as it should be but for me it have very little humor.

As for Myself I’m not left, right, or centrist leaning but ‘ya gotta have some down time from all that stuff and have a breather,some air, before diving deep into political undercurrents.

Being Apolitical in a deeply political non profit organization isn’t hell but limbo in that I’m so near where I want to be though not quite close enough.

I use to have there female editors constantly taking columns out hence a column, or maybe a book on "Forbidden Columns" formed in my head but I don’t who’s publish them?

On New Year’s Eve my thoughts on partying was to stay at home,have Trader Joe’s Honey laced, buds heavier eggnog,or Silknog or soynog, a lighter,softer tasting at least to my palate.

That third female editor is with family, friends and I miss her face, our outing as she took me out to multi ethic Quisiene not her political arguments I don’t argue with because she always has facts, figures to back her up sometimes she’d get so angry with me when I say "What was here before politics-people – what will be here long after politics is gone, people." She helped me see alternatives to basic American foods.

In a funny way I accused her of forcing me to increase my life span I’d say "Look at what you’ve done to me,your making me lose weight,eat less, and eat healthier."

"So, Its my fault you may be living longer Joe?"

My mouth is moving and nothing was coming out because my brain is saying "shut up Joe your an idiot."

She won’t have to 3rd editor anymore because after I delved in comedy, singing,poetry,at the Hotel Utah my column writing is less angry about certain seemingly fundamentally unfair social constructs.

The Utah closed hopefully temporarily as of New Years its to be across the street from the Guitar Center.

Mr. Simms of the Procrastinators New Years party.

It was slow going at first not far from my home and I left thinking it might rain any second.

It did but before New Years is christened.

There's music,various kinds of food,people coming,going,and returning.

It’s a slow night with singing and very pleasant without the desperate have-to-be-at-a party-get- high by drinking or having a toke thing.

When New Years did come a set is playing and someone had to announce it along with outside noise.

Before I said my good byes a four more women had entered the building and one bold one kissed me.

"There,I kissed a total stranger on New Years."

I myself kissed more unknown females before leaving without getting phone numbers or emails that’s why I’d make a lousy reporter.

The four young women are all pretty and fearless I may not ever see any of them again but it was nice to know I’m a kissable,likable,non threatening kind of man.

A short walk in the rain using the Bart train station as temporary shelter from the rain.

Then called mama, thought of calling a new girlfriend or former 3rd editor friend but knowing she might be busy with family obligations, catching up with long missed friends.

Gunfire,fireworks from formally known Candle Stick Park.

I forget what the place is called now.

I go to bed sober, healthy,no stress,ready to do nothing except Yoga and piano practice on January 1,2004.


Donations C/0 Poor Magazine

1448 Pine Street #205

San Francisco,CA 94103

Email: askjoe@poormagazine.org

by Staff Writer

The GLOBAL WOMEN'S STRIKE was born in 1999, when women in Ireland
decided to welcome the new millennium with a national general strike. They
asked the International Wages for Housework Campaign to support their call,
and we called on women all over the world to make the Strike global on 8
March 2000.

The Strike came out of a long grassroots history, starting in 1952 with a
little
pamphlet called A Woman's Place and continuing with Power of Women and
the Subversion of the Community, now a classic, in 1972, and Sex, Race and
Class in 1973.* All three made the case that the work women do for wages is
a second job, that the work we do in the home and in the community without
wages, producing all the workers of the world, and our struggle to change
the
world, were invisible but central.

Since then, we have been campaigning to get RECOGNITION and WAGES
for all the unwaged work women do, as well as for PAY EQUITY-- these are
JOINT LEVERS against women's poverty, exploitation and discrimination of
every kind. According to the UN, women do 2/3 of the world's work: from
breastfeeding and raising children to caring for those who are sick, older
or
disabled, to growing, preparing and cooking the food that feeds families,
communities and continents (80% of food consumed in Africa is grown by
women), to volunteer work and to work in the informal economy as cleaners,
seamstresses, street sellers, sex workers, as well as work in the formal
economy. Here again women's work is often caring for people, in hospitals
and schools, as domestic workers, childminders, personal assistants . . . or
in
sweatshops - jobs where men who do comparable work also get low pay. But
women get the lowest, and often face sexual and racial harassment.

Although in every country all this work is basic to the welfare and even
survival of humanity, it is devalued and ignored by the Market, and women
get
only 5% of the world's assets in return.

In Beijing in 1995, the International Women Count Network which we co-
ordinate, supported by more than 1,500 organisations, won a major UN
decision. National accounts were to include how much of their lifetime
women
spend doing unwaged work and how much value this work creates. Trinidad
& Tobago and Spain have put this into law; other countries are carrying out
time-use surveys and increasingly consider unwaged work in court decisions
and government policies.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Women in over 60 countries

Since 2000 the Strike has been a great success. It has brought together
women in over 60 COUNTRIES, including grassroots organisations with
impressive track records, who also demand a world that values all women's
work and every life, and who have achieved much. They are now part of an
international network of Strike co-ordinators.

In Venezuela, we are working with the women who are building a caring
economy and won Article 88 of the Constitution, which recognises housework
as an economic activity that creates added value and produces social welfare
and wealth, entitling housewives to social security. The Strike has been
spreading news of such momentous victories, supporting the revolutionary
process there in which women from the grassroots are the most active
participants.

The Strike is part of the movement against war and occupation not only in
Iraq
but in Palestine, Chechnya, Colombia, Congo, Kashmir . . . Our priority has
been to highlight the struggle that women make and the direction this gives,
from which the whole movement benefits but which is often as ignored as the
unwaged survival work we do. With the theme INVEST IN CARING NOT
KILLING, we demand that the $900+ billion now spent on military budgets is
used instead for basic survival needs -- clean accessible water, food
security,
healthcare, housing, education, safety from rape and other violence,
protection of our planet -- and therefore for women who are the first carers
and the first fighters for the survival of loved ones. We claim for a start
the US
military budget -- over half the world's military spending -- with which
"Corporate America" imposes its economic and political interests on the
whole
world (including on people in the US).

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

The contribution of those sectors most discriminated against

Those sectors of women who are most discriminated against - all women of
colour, including women of Indigenous, African and Asian descent, single
mothers, women with disabilities, immigrant women, sex workers, lesbian
women . . . use the Strike to spell out their contribution to every economy,
society and struggle. The Strike insists that more powerful sectors
acknowledge this contribution.

We also demand recognition for the contribution of men who actively support
our struggle because they agree that INVEST IN CARING NOT KILLING is
the priority of all workers and all humanity. Not only do men owe women
their
daily survival -- from breastfeeding to cooked meals, clean clothes and
emotional support -- but they also depend on women prioritising survival to
oppose the values of the Market, values which now threaten the survival of
the world. The web page of Payday, a network of men,
www.refusingtokill.net,
is an important contribution to the movement against war, and to the
recognition of all those who risk their own life and liberty in defence of
everyone's life and liberty.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
A framework for unity

We are often told that in order to win we must unite, but we don't hear much
about how to do that (except from political parties that want to lead us).
We
use the Strike as a framework for unity -- among sectors of women, between
women and men, within and among countries -- because it is based on each
sector accepting and enriching the independent struggle of every other. The
Strike is not party political, nor is it separatist. It is ambitious for
the
movement for change but it stands against personal ambition that undermines
mutual accountability.

The Global Women's Strike has extended from taking joint action every 8
March. It is now a global network that strengthens the ongoing daily
struggle
of grassroots women (and men). We attach what Strike coordinators in some
countries say about what they have achieved with it.

The Strike establishes that as carers, waged or unwaged, we are always
WORKERS, and that we have the power to bring the whole economy to a halt.
That's what women did in Iceland on 24 October 1975. They said: WHEN
WOMEN STOP, EVERYTHING STOPS. We add: STOP THE WORLD AND
CHANGE IT.

Selma James and Nina López, 17 January 2004

womenstrike8m@server101.com www.globalwomenstrike.net

*Until then, it was assumed that only those who did waged work, mainly men
in industrial countries, were 'real' workers, and that only they could
change
the world. The Wages for Housework Campaign broke with this sexism and
racism, establishing autonomy as a new basis for organising and unifying.

Strike demands

* Payment for all caring work - in wages, pensions, land & other resources.
What is more valuable than raising children & caring for others? Invest in
life
& welfare, not military budgets & prisons.

* Pay equity for all, women & men, in the global market.

* Food security for all, starting with breastfeeding mothers. Paid maternity
leave, breastfeeding breaks & other benefits - stop penalising us for being
women.

* Don't pay 'Third World debt'. We owe nothing, they
owe us.

* Accessible clean water, healthcare, housing,
transport, literacy.

* Non-polluting energy & technology which shortens the hours we work. We
all need cookers, fridges, washing machines, computers, & time off!

* Protection & asylum from all violence & persecution, including by family
members & people in positions of authority.

* Freedom of movement. Capital travels freely, why not people?

* Visibility and respect * Wider networks *

* Grassroots women's anti-racism *

* The largest women's anti-war event in our history * We've all changed
*

ARGENTINA, Santa Fe

"For more than 15 years we struggled in isolation for the huge amount of
work
we women do caring for others to be recognised with a wage and a pension.
Trade unions, civil servants, political parties and many feminists, said we
were
"backward and mad".

With the Strike we found there were women like us on every continent. This
has strengthened our organisation. We have made a great leap forward
locally and nationally. Now they look at us with respect.

We have been able to reach more grassroots women, encouraging them to
form autonomous women's networks.

We know we are not alone and that in the face of any attack women in other
parts of the world will raise their voices in our defence."

Sindicato de Amas de Casa de Santa Fe
_______________________________________

GUYANA, Georgetown
"Sometimes Guyana is a country at war - when the tension and conflict that
the British and American governments first helped create between Indo-
Guyanese and Afro-Guyanese explodes into violence. Then there is the
violence against those of us who are Indigenous Guyanese, whose interests
are just thrown aside.

In the last two years the Strike helped us to make our opposition to the
racism
and violence whose main victims are grassroots women and children visible.

Every year we put forward practical demands - especially against the higher
prices we're paying for water and electricity because of privatisation. But
our
main demand has been for an end to racist violence.

We have begun to feel we're part of a global movement. We feel as if
something happens in Guyana the Strike will fight with us internationally."

Red Thread
________________________________________

IRELAND, Galway

"The Strike has given us a way to come together across many divides. Irish
women are not expected to unite with English women, who come from the
country that waged war and occupied Ireland so many centuries ago. The
religious divides between Protestant and Catholic that are a legacy of this
have plagued us on this island, and now the new rift the warmongers have
stirred up between Muslim and Christian is added to that.

We have been able to use the Strike to organise against war and occupation,
bringing women together from North and South of Ireland, Catholic and
Protestant, Muslim, Christian, atheist."

Wages for Housework Campaign
______________________________________

PERU, Lima

"With the Strike we have related to other women's organisations which fight
with great courage and determination for our fundamental rights as women
and as workers who care for the whole of humanity.
The Strike has helped us to accept ourselves as we are, so that, for
example,
our sisters can have free sexual choice. Before the Strike we were
prejudiced
because of our machista and patriarchal culture. Lesbian women are able to
organise autonomously and make their situation visible.

We have learnt to be self-critical about our mistakes. "

The Strike is part of me because the demands of the women of the world are
my demands. I feel that we are invincible because we are the great majority
and they are my sisters in struggle."
Centro de Capacitación para Trabajadoras del Hogar
_______________________________________

PERU, Puno

"The Strike gives us visibility, a space where rural women can participate
and
speak out about the issues that affect our daily lives. With the Strike we
have
won over more women's organisations such as mothers' clubs, craft groups,
soup kitchens, as well as the support of men.

The income that rural women contribute through Andean crafts is for the
benefit of the family - its education, food, housing. We now hope to reach
an
international market with our produce and cut out the middle men."

Centro Aymará "Pacha Aru"
_______________________________________

SPAIN, Barcelona

"The Strike has transformed us, helping to break us free of the habit of
relating and prioritising one sector of women over others, to move beyond
our
neighbourhood and region, to act locally - in our neighbourhoods, plazas,
markets, schools, workplaces - but with an international perspective, and to
widen our networks. It has made visible the contribution of those of us who
are immigrant.

The mass Strike actions brought together women's opposition to war and
globalisation."

Campaña por un Salario para el Trabajo sin Sueldo
________________________________________

UGANDA, Kaabong

"We are neglected and discriminated against because we are poor. BUT the
Global Strike has changed our lives. We have gained free medical services,
no cost sharing. The Land Act also allows women to own land and properties
and inherit the late husband's properties. The Strike has helped to express
our point of view in a more effective way. Like we say, Invest in Caring Not
Killing. Wars will never bring peace in the world.

Our major demand for this year's Strike is: we need accessible clean water.
We have the source of the river Nile in Uganda. Why shouldn't we take the
water for agriculture, so that women have enough food for their families!

Kaabong Women's Organisation
_________________________________________

USA, Los Angeles

"The 2003 Strike was the largest women's anti-war and International
Women's Day event in LA history, with an estimated 3-5,000 participants. It
brought together grassroots women, with the major anti-war networks, and
activist celebrities.

The Strike helps those of us in the US, no matter how poverty stricken we
may be, not to scab on our sisters in the South who are in much more dire
straits. It has helped open our eyes to the leadership offered by those
resisting US domination outside of the US and to be strengthened by it."

Global Women's Strike/LA
Women of Color in the Global Women's Strike
_______________________________________

USA, Philadelphia

"The Strike gained visibility, prominence and respect for women's voices and
demands in the massive protests against war in Iraq.

We won't allow the disabilities and illnesses created by war and weapons
pollution, in countries attacked by the US as well as among US vets and
their
families, to remain hidden.

The Strike brought together the most diverse multiracial crowd. We have
been a crucial voice for mothers and grandmothers against military
recruitment programs in school. A Black woman raising her grandchildren said
what we oppose: 'Billions for war and not a dollar for a child.' "

Wages for Housework Campaign
WinVisible - women with visible and invisible disabilities
_________________________________________

USA, San Francisco

"Our strength has been the organizing for the civil and legal rights of
women
in the sex industry. Many of us are lesbian, and we have a wealth of
experience based on organizing against the discrimination women, especially
'sexual outlaws', face from the police, courts, judges, in both criminal and
family law. We used the Strike to press City Hall on a resolution to end
violence against sex workers.

The Strike has helped us to extend our network to other sectors,
organizations and neighbourhoods."

US PROStitutes Collective
Wages Due Lesbians

_______________________________________

Global Women's Strike Co-ordination
ENGLAND
International co-ordination
Crossroads Women's Centre
230a Kentish Town Road, London NW5 2AB
Tel: 00-44-20-7482 2496 Fax: 00-44-20-7209 4761
womenstrike8m@server101.com
Website: www.globalwomenstrike.net
Co-ordination of men's actions and support:
Address above payday@paydaynet.org
Website: www.refusingtokill.net

ARGENTINA
SAC, Francia 3036, 3000 Santa Fe
Tel: 00-54-342-453 0216 & 496 0868
izanutig@gigared.com; amadecasa@gigared.com

GUYANA
Red Thread, 72 Princess & Adelaide Streets, Charlestown, Georgetown
Tel/Fax: 00-592-227 7010
thread@sdnp.org.gy

INDIA
Chhattisgarh Women's Organisation
Pithora, Mahasamund, Chhattisgarh 493551
Tel: 00-91-7707 71107
sharmanand@yahoo.com

IRELAND
10 Galway Bay Apartments, Salthill, Galway
Tel: 00-353-91 520269
maggie.ronayne@nuigalway.ie

PERU
132 Wakulski, Cercado, Lima
Tel: 00-51-1-423 1958
ccth@terra.com.pe

Jr. 20 de Julio No 159, Urbanización Fernando Belaunde Terry, Chanuchanu,
Puno
Tel: 00-51-51-356 808
pacha_aru@hotmail.com

SPAIN
Centro 'Las Mujeres Cuentan', Radas 27 Local,
08004 Barcelona
Tel/Fax: 00-34-93-442 2304
huelgademujeres8m@teleline.es

TRINIDAD & TOBAGO
NUDE, Mount Pleasant Rd, Arima
Tel: 001-868-667 5247
domestic@tstt.net.tt

UGANDA
KWO, PO Box 9344, Kampala, Uganda
Tel: 00-256-41 271012, Fax: 00-256-41 346456
akulum@hotmail.com

USA
Los Angeles Crossroads Women's Centre
PO Box 86681, LA, CA 90086-0681
Tel/Fax: 001-323-292 7405
la@crossroadswomen.net

Philadelphia Crossroads Women's Centre
PO Box 11795, Philadelphia, PA 19101
Tel: 001-215-848 1120 Fax: 001-215-848 1130
philly@crossroadswomen.net

San Francisco Crossroads Women's Centre
PO Box 14512, SF, CA 94114
Tel/Fax: 001-415-626 4114
sf@crossroadswomen.net

by Joe B.

Int. Women’s Day Pt.2

As I left the story from the youngest of infants to old men were dying in forests,under earth,and sea becoming part natures design as they accidentally find anti male preserves for women.

Meanwhile new kinds of males are created who can bare and nurture children a feat that for many women felt completely secure and now the very foundation of womanhood is threatened by genetic manipulated proof that being a woman no longer mean automatic superiority of life and death.

Its all hypothetical women bare children,both right and left sides their brains work in tandem solving problems,they are mentally,emotionally if not physically stronger than most males and ultimately have the power to bring forth or end life once begun in the womb.

I have to stop for a moment when mentioning right/left brain communicating with other is not purely a female trait those all if not most women think this way men can and do to an extent I use myself as an example.

Early Monday,I’m on a crowded bus heading for work when the bus turns a Geary and Polk Street people rush to get of before the bus stops one of rusher is behind telling to move which I cannot because I standing with backpack on back.

"Move.

"He says this tall mixed race well muscled man looking angry muscled.

"Go,Go,Go On already!!"

He pushes by me like some enraged bull.

Once off He’s screaming come out,lets have it out now.

"Go,Go,Go,I'm screaming back at him as people still get out and sneak in the rear doors of the bus.

Then it happened! Words,thoughts are going through my head in crystal clear split second clarity.

Long ago lessons of pressure points on carotid artery,adam’s apple,sides of the ribs,belly,flat- back hand,or kicks,some can kill,stun, incapacitate,or knock out a person.

The sutures on my teeth hurt I feel salty-sweet blood on upper left roof of my mouth,550 dollars!

A dental appointment and housing authority on the same day,my job is not my career path,I want to jump a mudhole it the guy I don’t care how big he is all I see is blinding red rage.

I had to leave a new girlfriend and I’m horny abstaining from sex for lent.

My mind saw all these thing going on at once and looking at the guy still screaming to get out and fight him rationality like a cool wet cloth told me what to say next.

"I gotta go to work" I hollered at the man.

The rear door close and I’m off the bus at few stops away still in the throws of angry,pissed but in control heading for my job.

All men are not blinded by rage some man as women do think,proces through as we’re feeling our testosterone tunneled rage.

Maybe more men do this than women expect but since they are convinced from what they’ve seen,experienced they may be blind to those that do process through anger's red-green-blue sheen differently as women. Or it could be I've been with a few that I'm tuned in and can automatically think through emotional turmoil.

Though it does seem that women too have blind spots.

Another beef I’ve got on post International Women’s Day is an article in today’s The Mix (Tuesday’s March 9th Examiner) on Club life & marriage can mix.

Straight men over 30 are seen as sad and pathetic when going to clubs yet single woman are not.

Yes,women still earn less than men but conversely they are creating more small businesses and corporations.

As for clubbing gay men who are single can be any age and there’s no negative consequence.

Being the backbone dollar boys helps that perception as long as they pay the bucks.

I’ve gone clubbing danced,enjoyed myself but when it came to asking women individually or in groups to dance the old rejection bug hit and instinct told me this could be a regular sure enough ignoring first impressions I do more going to other venues and it happened over and over again now I know why men pick and chose carefully because in groups or alone women for any given reason have to yay or nay power and many of them chose to be asker than the askee.

It could be they sense that one I found a women and we dance,got to know each other better 1 to 1 settling down is my motive and they're still in wild woman,untamed,never settle or settle down frame of mind.

I’ve stopped because of economics and being a social drinker doesn’t help.

One other phenomenon: "The Girls Night Out Game" We all know boys night our with men going out on the town singly or in groups to basically get laid this can be straight or gay,guys will be guys going after either glory holes.

Questions Anyone?

Donations C/0 Poor Magazine

1448 Pine Street #205

San Francisco,CA 94103

Email: askjoe@poormagazine.org

by Joe B.

Comedy,Song,And Passion

It’s a new year,my resolutions are simple do yoga,keep apartment, person clean neat so women can enter feeling safe, comfortable and not in a no-womb-land kind of place.

Last year I did embryo comedy on relationships of men,women,gay,lesbian or myself trying to figure out where I fit it into all this stuff.

Meanwhile trying to do more audio pieces on radio in a comic vein which means cutting most of column written material to immediate on air universal situations or making a serial of parts each month making it much easier than creating a piece each month.

(yep,I’m a lazy guy I became that way by coming up new things each month then finding it couldn’t be used because of time.)

Have to think of school,class,time, exercise and engaging the world.

I don’t know if I can sing because of minor throat injury in my youth or if self taught piano playing will help me compose songs running in my head.

Eclectic passions cause havoc when their so much one likes to do but knowing time is a thief and nature is a cruel mistress.

Tonight,with a few props,words,and common human foibles that may garner a few chuckles, titters,and outright guffaw’s of laughter.

Comedy,singing,song writing,playing a musical instrument is still new causing inner awe in me.

The Mars Mission so far a success is as challenging as a human finding ways to be,do more than originally thought possible.

I’d like to be a colonist on Mars,raise Mars/Earth children but first I must live long on old Gaia and this means life extension, rejuvenation, regeneration,or youth revitalization processes that seems only speculative fantasy now.

Few know what the future holds and don’t trust the experts who believe and pronounce what here and now stays we know once so called experts do this their credibility begins to widen into an ever widening gap.

Now to figure out comic sketches for tonight and have and share few laughs at my expense.

Well, all you have your own ways of dealing with this new time plus its an election year to boot.

Take care on and off liners don’t get too entangled on line that y’all rarely take eyes, fingers, voice box from flickering energies of PC’s with the Net surrounding your senses.

Take time off,date, bike,hike in mountains, forests, rivers, deserts, icy climates,or walk around the block connecting to all life forms both animal and human.

As you can see I still don’t trust this connective collective-Borg minded-love-technologies until we’re independent of it and have choices of being on or off it as we chose. Remember the blackouts?

Its way past time to disconnect from a weak technological electromagnetic grid which S-‘Prez Bush Jr. wants to repair,patch up so it can happen again.

The more disconnected from certain technologies the freer we ultimately become so brown and blackouts will no longer happen as frequently as it has been becoming a normalized thing.

That’s it more me,take care,be safe, stay independent and free,also Live Long And Prosper this from a certain fictional character that may soon sadly may leave us.

Any Suggestions, Questions or Answers?


Donations C/0 Poor Magazine

1448 Pine Street #205

San Francisco,CA 94103

Email: askjoe@poormagazine.org

by Martrice Candler /Youth Po Poets Project

Man we have to change to survive

Language is an important factor

Niggaz try n’ to stay alive

Streets talking: What’s up nigga?

Could b a lil’ different

Hello would be nice

But that’s how shit is when you trying to Get it

I’m sorry

Unacceptable in the hood

My bad nigga, it’s all good

That’s niggaz making a peace treaty

Woo Coooooo

Excuse me would have been nice

Words will make ya heart Jell-O

Wooooooo coooooooooo

Will make the situation most mellow

He gives:

“She’s my ma fucka”

I receive:

I love you

I love you’s in his life has been scarce

It’s hard to articulate I love you

When it’s been scarce in ya life

I love my nigga

He my ma fucka

This is the art of language

When I say what’s up to my niggaz that’s a proper greet n’

It’s called s’language

Martrice Candler's new book; Disconnected published by POOR Press© is available through the POOR Press Catalogue order form. See below to order on-line.

by Joe B.

Hmmm,go to Get-a-Way ’s?

Sometimes life is good we just don’t realize it.

I thought of Wonder Woman,Her Sister Amazon’s of Paradise Island in the straddling Pacific or Atlantic Ocean’s.

Yeah,Paradise is first human’s (the people’s who originally lived and thrived in pre America before was stolen by means most foul.)

Paradise or Hunting ground would have Amazon women hunting,laming (breaking legs of men before mating then killing them,don’t know if cannibalism was also part of their herstory or if men to ornery to tame are killed while their son’s were spared to be work slaves and or lovers?

Amazon’s wasn’t all myth but today’s equivalent are all around us from protester,COYOTE (Call Off Your Old Tired Ethics) Founded by Ms. Margo St. James an ex-prostitute and former candidate for San Francisco's Board of Supervisors.

There other heroine’s and hero’s in the ongoing struggle of women’s rights.

But I digress,my thoughts are on the few who after achieving fame, fortune,marriage, reproduction,and even after love or marriage has failed may have found places by accident or design.

In an early March newsprint like The Globe or other tabloid bought in drugstores or the corner store had a story of a hidden vacation spot BEDROOM BEACH.

The article hinted of a South Sea hide away where women who’ve have no need of male money or companionship visit for purposes of re-energizing, rest, and being away from adoring fan,crowds for a bit of recreation and fun.

Men though not expressly banned are few in number because this is mainly for women.

But if men by accident or if invited to said mystery place he no matter what his station,looks, will be made to feel welcome.

Its because after finding a place where women can be themselves, let hair down,and relax for weeks or months at a time there will be a for want of a better expression a "Horniness" factor that is revved up a few notches and any man who may be their as their female counter part rest and recreation may find their interrupted by amorous women who’s sex drive have returned to them with a vengeance!

I myself would after achieving a modicum of fortune if not fame by my writings (as a new or established novelist) and had enough money to travel for the purpose of rest and re-cooperation.

If by sheerest accident of kismet landed on this hidden beach land on sun, sand,surf,and sauce which I indulge less and less of.

An various kinds of women began interacting with me,there’s only one thing I can do and this would be as Oscar Wild famously said "Give into temptation."

To ensure return visits I’d always have a bungalow maybe or more modern type home there.

And as one of the invited few it would remain my duty to remain silent so those who are forever in extreme need this balm of earthy heaven should have it as their due.

Secrets only remain so if kept to ones self.

If any of you were lucky to have visited said places,Please tell me about it and other places of rest and fun.

because I need to get away from civilization, shed my urbanity and just breath free for a few months before returning a so called normal life again.

Pt.3 of Post Women’s DAY musings continues Friday.

Donations C/0 Poor Magazine

1448 Pine Street #205

San Francisco,CA 94103

Email: askjoe@poormagazine.org

by Tiny/ POOR Magazine/PoorNewsNetwork

3 days to pay rent or quit , Unlawful detainer for non-payment off rent, Judgement for back rent, homeless shelters and then the Sidewalk Motel, these places and spaces were constants in my vocabulary throughout my childhood. In a capitalist society like Amerikkka the fact that you don't have enough money for rent is enough reason for you to become homeless.

Of course there are many other reasons that people become homeless, such as gentrification, greedy landlords, racism, redlining, and on and on.. many of which my family and I have experienced, but none so clearly as the inability due to poverty to pay the rent. If everything went ok , if doctor bills weren't too high, if I was able to make any money at my part-time micro-business, if I was able to get work that didn't interfere with my care-giving of family if the utilities didn't run too high, If ..if,if if then the rent would be happily handed over to the landlord

So sometimes the rent was paid and sometimes it wasn't and when it wasn't we were outside, served with the pleasureable farewell of the requisite eviction, unlawful detainer and all other related paperwork of poverty.

And then one day a miracle happened, or at least a miracle within this capitalist reality, We got a section 8 voucher. Now come to find out the whole section 8 thing is no easy deal when the landlords equate Section 8 with tired old stereotypes of folk on welfare (I've been that too!) but notwithstanding that classist hurdle, it is still pretty wonderful, allowing hundreds of thousands of poor families across the nation to become homeful when they used to be homeless. Enabling my family to actually pay the rent is in fact, some form of a miracle, or at least economic justice.

The Bush Administration was alarmed at the rising cost of Section 8 vouchers and will take steps to make sure that no more are issued In Bushs'budget for 2005 he is planning to rein in domestic spending i.e. steal from poor folks to feed his endless war machine (87 billion approved for more war costs) Among other things he aims to make veterans pay more for health care, eliminate job training and employment programs but worse of all, make cuts to the already meager section 8 voucher program. Now a lot of us economic justice organizers have been worried about the gutting of the Section 8 program ever since Bush got in office. The amazing part of these proposed cuts is the fact that Bushs alarm at so many vouchers being issued is due in large part to HUD's gentrification program ordered by the federal government which began in the 90's and included the demolition of several thousand units of so-called blighted project housing causing thousands of new families to rely on section 8 vouchers after they were evicted from their long time residences.

So what to do, once again it is urgent that you write to your local legislator be they roll over demican or republicrat as well as Bushs office and express your horror at the proposed cuts to Section 8. If we don't argue, fight and scream the sad fact is families like mine will once again face housing instability forever and ever

To read more about the roots of homelessness and gentrification get a copy of The Houzin Project Words, Art and Resources on eviction, gentrification and homelessness published by POOR Press -you can buy a copy on-line by clicking on the POOR Press button

by Alex Flynn/Poverty Studies Intern, Dee Gray/Mentor

As I sit in my living room on this Sunday morning, I am having trouble remembering who my personal heroes were. When I was little I didn’t get wrapped up with questions like “what is a hero?” as I am apt to do these days. My heroes were probably the kind that most people think of: brave, determined, and untouchable.

The idea of who gets the “hero” title has evolved over time. In the Greek tradition, a hero was a famous person who after his or her death was worshipped as quasi-divine. In classical English literature, heroes were created as mythical warriors capable of bravery and gallantry. In the United States, Hemingway created the idea of a hero as a man who lives correctly following the ideals of honor, courage, and endurance amid chaos, stress, and pain. Our society reveres those who fit these classical definitions of “hero,” people like Martin Luther King, Jr. and Rosa Parks, usually after they have died or changed public opinion, but not while they are in the process of enduring.

“The Tokyo Godfathers” is a film about two different meanings of heroism. Set in Japan over a week-long period between Christmas and New Year’s, the anime movie follows the lives of three homeless characters as they try to find the parents of an abandoned baby. Our heroes are Gin, a middle-aged alcoholic man who lost his wife and daughter; Hana, a transvestite who escaped her life in a brothel; and Miyuki, a teenaged girl who fled her family out of shame for having stabbed her father. When Hana finds a baby on Christmas Eve, she decides that she can’t return her until she tracks down the baby’s mother. Hana was also abandoned as a child, and she needs to understand from another parent how such a choice could be made.

As I sit here typing out this review, those I admired are trickling back into my consciousness. As silly as it may sound, I remember Drew Barrymore being a hero for me when I was little. Like many others, I found Drew’s portrayal of “ET”’s Gertie enchanting. But she became super human when I discovered that she was struggling with alcoholism and drug addiction. I found it incredible that, at age 13, she was trying to find a way out of misery.

Our “Tokyo Godfathers” heroes are, like many others, putting the pieces of their lives together. What sets them apart is their ability to help themselves and others, even while struggling to survive without food or shelter. In the first part of their journey, they save a wealthy man’s life and end up as guests at his daughter’s wedding. There they get their first clue as to who the baby’s parents are and later get separated when a shoot out occurs. Miyuki ends up at the shooter’s home with the abandoned baby; Gin comforts an old homeless man in his last hours; and Hana returns to the brothel where she worked before she became homeless to confront her mother. After Gin is attacked by a gang of young boys for no reason other than that he is homeless, he goes to the brothel because he knows that Hana will find him.

When I was a young teenager, Nelson Mandela was released from prison and shortly afterwards became President of South Africa. He was – and remains – a personal hero. I have always found it amazing that he could spend such a long time in prison without becoming embittered or self-destructive, that he remained firm in his belief that he had grounds for dissent. For decades, he had the power of an entire country against him, but didn’t waver. I don’t know what I admire more: that he had such a strong sense of survival or that he could stand by his convictions.

For most of the film we are seeing heroism in its first sense. Gin, Hana, and Miyuki have saved lives, survived attacks, and endured frosty winter nights. At the same time, we are learning more about them. We find out that Gin lost his wife and daughter not because they had died (which was the story he had been telling), but because of a gambling problem that led him to seclusion. Even though she had food and shelter, Hana left the brothel because she couldn’t face the ridicule of those who knew she was a man. Miyuki stabbed her father because she thought that he had let her cat (the only creature who she could rely on) disappear. The film is showing Gin, Hana, and Miyuko as “poverty heroes.”

There is a kind of hero that goes beyond the traditional Greek, English, and American definitions. This hero is one that withstands overwhelming obstacles -- like having civil rights denied, living in poverty, facing evictions, and surviving without a living wage or adequate health care -- and still manages to survive, raise children, create art, and form friendships. A “Povery Hero” is where the heroism is survival itself.

Gin, Hana, and Miyuki’s adventure leads them to the people they believe are the baby’s parents. While Hana is handing the baby to the woman she believes is the mother, Gin is finding out that the baby had been taken from the hospital by a woman who had lost her child at birth. This is when the second kind of heroism steps up, the “Die Hard” style: in leaping off careening trucks, balancing on steep roofs, and bypassing intolerant but determined officials, our characters risk their lives countless times to save the baby. And, like the heroes of our imaginations, after it is all over, our heroes are recognized by everyone else for their bravery and selflessness.

As I sit here on my couch, I realize that my heroes tend to be those who take life’s challenges and confront them with honesty and optimism. I guess that is what I admire about Nelson Mandela (and even Drew); this ability to believe and try and trust, as hard as it is to do. I am in awe of those who are in the process of confronting, not simply those who have succeeded in the traditional sense.

“The Tokyo Godfathers” is a film that presents both traditional heroes and poverty heroes. Gin, Hana, and Miyuki are ultimately acknowledged as traditional heroes by the wider community when they return the baby to her parents after speedy car chases and falling off of tall buildings. But the film points to poverty heroism too. At one point Gin says, “I guess I’m not an action hero, just homeless.” Our heroes didn’t see the many lives they have saved (like the wealthy man’s), touched (like the dying homeless man’s), or shared (like each other’s). The power of this film is that it shines a light on poverty heroes, those who survive and reach out despite being cast out, even if they are never acknowledged in a history book or with a medal.

by Joe B.

Int. Women’s Day Pt.3

But for girls night our singly or in groups.

A woman or women in groups have decided to go out leaving boy friends or hubby’s behind.

Now this is this where men and women really differ in perceptions.

As young women go clubbing as women most go in for free,first drink free.

The woman,women dance provocatively enjoying their affects on males for new men they like they give their numbers (it may not be their’s but it’s a number this is especially for men they don’t like, know,or feel odd or bad vibes from.

At the end of all the dancing,drinking,and sweating most of the women go home with their friends full of numbers from men they might or might not see again.

The game part is men themselves get ego and physically ready to for bud tumbles but its all fun and games for the women who really only wanted to dance and show them off in look,drool, but don’t touch and sometimes get offended if men come on too strong yet knowing that men are their to bed them.

It’s a sad set up of a game many straight men enter willingly for close contact but after days or weeks of frustrated dry humps and blue balls some leave the clubs for a while going to strip clubs where at least you see women nude and semi nude they may still go home blue but without being danced out tired.

Here’s an idea guys. Adopt attitude of having a good time but don’t stay in your favorite place change up, find new places and you dance first before asking and after there or four good looking women answer no then you be a courteous gentleman and slowly make you way out of the club heading to another one planned out.

You spend less money in one,find other women more willing and eventually no matter where you go there will be a few women waiting for the stranger who’s not always at the same dance club/bar which is exactly what women watch for if there are the same men they tend to quickly leave for other places.

Men like having a regular waterhole place while most women do the "been there seen him route" until the man does something different-say has on or many women around him few women find one man along interesting enough to even talk to let alone take to bed,men should take a few pages from their book of rules and change them slightly to their advantage.

Women can give birth, abort, or otherwise kill their or other children.

Women only have power because we as men acquiesce to them.

Women say it all the time "Most of us don’t dress for men we compete with each other,the best lover to a woman is another woman,and the old "We no long need men to procreate,we don’t need father’s.

But as a certain late night radio talks show med/psych doctors says "Young girls abused by their father's neglected,or not knowing their father have devastating effects on young girls that stunt, twist,and hurt their psyche for years to come.


Donations C/0 Poor Magazine

1448 Pine Street #205

San Francisco, CA 94103

Email: askjoe@poormagazine.org

by Erik Todd Dellums/AFROCENTRIC NEWS NETWORK

My name is ErikTodd Dellums. I am a Black man, a professional actor and a semiotician and film lover. I am therefore underemployed, under-appreciated and an afterthought in Hollywood.
I am also a man who rarely sees an accurate depiction of Black people and American History in film and on television. It's something I've grown used to, but now I'M MAD AS HELL AND NOT GOING TO TAKE IT ANYMORE!

I am calling all people that truly care about honest representations of American History in Hollywood to standup and boycott the heavily promoted film, "Cold Mountain." At a cost of $80+ million dollars and sporting a stellar cast and crew, this adaptation of Charles Fraizier's acclaimed bestseller opens Christmas Day everywhere and is being touted as the film to beat at the Academy Awards. It has generated glowing reviews for Disney, Miramax and all involved. It is also a sham; a slap in the face of African Americans everywhere, whose ancestors gave their lives in the Civil War, fighting for true freedom (Sorry, President Bush!) from the most heinous slavery system known to modern man: the American Slavery System. How could a 3 hour film depict life in the heart of Virginia and North Carolina during the Civil War use 30 seconds of Black people picking cotton as its total reality of slavery during this period?

In an article in the Washington Post, the film makers have said that slavery and racism were simply "too raw" an emotional issue to present in their film.
In other words, who would want to see a love story with the beautiful Jude Law and Nicole Kidman set in the reality of the Southern monstrosity of slavery.

The film depicts one of the more important battle decision in the Civil War; a battle in which the Union trained Black Soldiers to tunnel under Confederate lines; a battle in which Blacks suffered their highest rate of casualties of any Union division in the fight!

This is the great battle that opens "Cold Mountain." You tell me if you spot ANY Black actors in the film fighting. It plays like "Saving Private Ryan" another film in which Black contributions to history -- namely the Battle at Normandy -- are completely excised from a major film. Shame on you, Hollywood. Shame on you!

The Weinstein Brothers (owners of Miramax, the distributors of "Cold Mountain" are smart, astute business men with keen cinematic sensibilities. They should know better. I ask, could you imagine "The Pianist" or "Schlinder's List" ever being made with but 30 seconds of the reality of The Holocaust? Of course not. A film with such a gross misrepresentation would never make it past page one of a screenplay! And in reality, isn't The Holocaust, which occurred a mere two generations or so ago, "rawer" emotionally than slavery?

Every year, the Academy Awards give a documentary about "The Holocaust" it's award and every year Hollywood releases sumptuous, hauntingly beautiful films about "The Holocaust." And every year I go. Why? Because I love film. And I love the truth. But there must be some reciprocity somewhere. I have attempted to sell stories to Hollywood -- true stories -- from our history as Black people during the years of slavery. The response from Hollywood, "I saw something like that already in "Roots". What an insult! Why are we as a people always an afterthought? We must let Hollywood know that we deserve respect. How do we? By not giving them the pleasure of our dollars.

Let a boycott of "Cold Mountain" begin our response to Hollywood: tell our stories; tell the truth and we will come. And if Hollywood has a problem with that, simply say, "I'm not going, because I saw a film like that already!"

Erik Todd Dellums

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by Jia-Rui Chong, Times Staff Writer(courtesy of Michael Novick)

Capping a two-week effort to demolish a homeless encampment near the
Harbor Freeway, Los Angeles police arrested 25 people early Friday morning
and knocked down more than a dozen makeshift tents along James M. Wood
Boulevard.

The action, part of the LAPD's effort to remove homeless encampments in
parts of downtown, was criticized by homeless advocates but applauded by
businesses leaders pushing to clean up the streets.

"This is something that has progressed over the last couple of months into
a serious public safety issue," said Rampart Division Capt. Charlie Beck.

Police officials said they had recently noticed an increase in
prostitution, drug use and burglaries from vehicles as well as more
citizen complaints. Beck said he also worried that cars coming off the
freeway could jump the curb and hit homeless people sleeping on the
sidewalk.

"I tried as best as I know how to get people into services," Beck said.
"We tried to alleviate the problem without making arrests, but if people
won't respond to our efforts to comply willingly to the law, then we
enforce the law."

On Dec. 29, police scattered about 100 residents camped out on a Golden
Avenue cul-de-sac near the Dome Village homeless shelter. On Jan. 10,
police visited a cluster of tents that had sprung up about a block from
the old encampment and waited until residents packed up.

Officials at the Los Angeles Housing Authority said they had tried for
months to get people living near the intersection of Golden Avenue and
James M. Wood Boulevard into shelters or public programs. Few accepted.

On their last visit Wednesday, Housing Authority officials persuaded one
man who had left a shelter to return, but everyone else turned down their
services, said program manager Jeannette Rowe.

According to witnesses, a caravan of police cars drove in at about 5:30
a.m. while most of the homeless residents were sleeping.

"I was sitting on the curb and 10 police cars swooped up," said a
43-year-old woman who declined to give her name because she feared police
harassment. "They told people to get out of their tents and handcuffed
them.

"They tore everything down," she added, "and told people they were taking
them all to jail for sleeping on the sidewalk, and me for sitting on the
sidewalk."

All of those at the encampment was taken into custody, she said.

Pulling a citation slip out of the pocket of her loose-fitting black
jacket, the woman said she was the only one released from jail. A doctor
authorized her release, she said, because she required medication for
blood clots in her leg.

Bob Coffman was cleaning his motor home, parked a block west of the
encampment, when he saw the police cars pass. "It looked like a parade,"
he said.

Coffman, 50, said he and his wife, Maggie, had been visiting friends at
the encampment the night before and cooked them soup on a propane stove.

The couple backed out of the street when police arrived, but had returned
around noon to pick up friends' belongings. They had planned to store the
items at Dome Village until their friends returned.

"Look, there are already other homeless people scavenging," Coffman said,
pointing to a handful of men and women who were loading up a shopping
cart. "They're not from here. This always happens after a sweep."

Homeless advocate Lisa McLaughlin Strassman was taking pictures and
retrieving Bibles, purses, photographs and other items left behind by
police.

"It's a pitiful sight," she said. "They're cleansing the city, making it
trendy and making it hip for the loft district. What happens to the
homeless people on the streets? They've got to go somewhere."

Strassman was working with Ted Hayes, who has been trying since last May
to establish a legal homeless encampment outside Dome Village and on other
vacant land around the city.

Hayes condemned city officials for selective enforcement of the law.

"Homelessness is going on all over L.A., but this is a high-visibility
area," he said.

A sweep here might look good, he said, but it won't solve the root
problems of scarce affordable housing, health insurance and jobs.

"Someone might take assistance but in two to three days, they're back on
the street," Hayes said. "They're either in someone else's neighborhood or
back at the same site they were evicted from."

Some cheered the latest action, however.

Few would tolerate homeless encampments in Westwood or Brentwood, said
Carol Schatz, who heads a downtown business group. "So why is it tolerated
downtown?" she challenged.

"It is absolutely inappropriate for people in a civil society to be living
on the street," said Schatz, president and chief executive of the Central
City Assn. "And it really violates everyone's right, including those of
the people living on the street, to be living in their own waste in very
unsanitary conditions.

"Public right of ways are for everyone, so it is, in our view, appropriate
for the police to be making the sidewalks safe," she said.

by Joe B.

Int. Women’s Day Pt.4

But for girls night our singly or in groups.

A woman or women in groups have decided to go out leaving boy friends or hubby’s behind.

Now this is this where men and women really differ in perceptions.

As young women go clubbing as women most go in for free,first drink free.

The woman, women dance provocatively enjoying their affects on males for new men they like they give their numbers (it may not be theirs but it’s a number this is especially for men they don’t like, know,or feel odd or bad vibes from.

At the end of all the dancing,drinking,and sweating most of the women go home with their friends full of numbers from men they might or might not see again.

The game part is men themselves get ego and physically ready to for bud tumbles but its all fun and games for the women who really only wanted to dance and show them off in look,drool, but don’t touch and sometimes get offended if men come on too strong yet knowing that men are their to bed them.

It’s a sad set up of a game many straight men enter willingly for close contact but after days or weeks of frustrated dry humps and blue balls some leave the clubs for a while going to strip clubs where at least you see women nude and semi nude they may still go home blue but without being danced out tired.

Here’s an idea guys. Adopt attitude of having a good time but don’t stay in your favorite place change up,find new places and you dance first before asking and after there or four good looking women answer no then you be a courteous gentleman and slowly make you way out of the club heading to another one planned out.

You spend less money in one, find other women more willing and eventually no matter where you go there will be a few women waiting for the stranger who’s not always at the same dance club/bar which is exactly what women watch for if there are the same men they tend to quickly leave for other places.

Men like having a regular waterhole place while most women do the "been there seen him route" until the man does something different-say has on or many women around him few women find one man along interesting enough to even talk to let alone take to bed,men should take a few pages from their book of rules and change them slightly to their advantage.

Women can give birth, abort,or otherwise kill their or other children.

Women only have power because we as men acquiesce to them.

Women say it all the time "Most of us don’t dress for men we compete with each other,the best lover to a woman is another woman,and the old "We no long need men to procreate,we don’t need father’s.

But as a certain late night radio talks show doctor’s say young girls either abused,neglected, or even not knowing their father’s have devastating effects on young girls that stunt,twist,and hurt their psyche for years to come.

Donations C/0 Poor Magazine

1448 Pine Street #205

San Francisco,CA 94103

Email: askjoe@poormagazine.org

by China Internet Information Center

If you can afford to raise a dog, you don't need welfare.

That's the controversial argument that has stirred heated debate around the country over the last several months, with both the central government and various city authorities jumping into the debate.

Earlier this week, the Ministry of Civil Affairs issued a statement saying it is acceptable for welfare recipients to raise pets.

But the central government doesn't decide who is eligible for payments and who isn't, and those who do decide often consider pet dogs the type of expensive luxury that proves a family doesn't need financial help from outsiders.

In some cities, the rules are clear. Nanjing, for instance, issued a regulation in March saying dog owners are ineligible for public subsidies.

In Shanghai, however, the rules change depending on which neighborhood you live in.

Families living under the poverty line in Shanghai -- meaning those with a monthly income below 290 yuan (US$35) per member -- can apply to their neighborhood committees for a government subsidy of up to 290 yuan a month.

But different committees have different thoughts on whether or not the poor should own a pooch.

"As the subsidy is granted to people living under the poverty line, it is certainly improper for subsidy recipients to have an extravagant living style, such as raising pets," said Liu Biqing, a local resident.

If they can afford to feed their pets, they don't need help to survive, Liu said.

Many local residents and committee members share that view, noting that it costs 2,000 yuan (US$241.92) a year to license a dog.

By the end of last year, Shanghai was home to 89,000 licensed pet dogs and even more unlicensed canines.

Many neighborhood committees in the city won't approve subsidies for families owning "expensive properties" such as cell phones, motorcycles and some pets.

"Sometimes, some jobless people with extravagant possessions will come to us to apply for financial assistance, but they are usually immediately rejected," said Xu Yonghong, a local neighborhood committee official.

Others in the city, however, say dogs shouldn't be considered a luxury item.

"Living is a larger concept than just survival," said Ma Qianfeng, a psychologist at Fudan University. "It is natural for people living below the poverty line to have some psychological needs, such as raising pets."

Some poverty-stricken seniors would rather skip a meal here and there, he said, than part with their furry companion.

Xia Jianmin, an official with the Shanghai Civil Affairs Bureau, said the decision to grant a subsidy should be made on a case-by-case basis.

"As situations vary a lot and it is too difficult for us to define what kind of pets are extravagant," he said. "The only criteria we should stick to is whether the family's monthly income is really below the city's poverty line."

Currently, about 400,000 families in the city receive monthly subsidies.
(eastday.com November 27, 2003)

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Copyright © China Internet Information Center. All Rights Reserved

E-mail: webmaster@china.org.cn

Tel: 86-10-68326688

by Ace Tafoya/PNN Community Journalist

Statewide protests and a mass rally was held on the steps of the State of California building at McAllister and Van Ness in San Francisco, Tuesday, February 3, 2004. We all know that the case against Kevin Cooper is filled with holes, but we we’re there because we believed. And I’m sending this story to Kevin as a gift of hope with well wishes, thoughts and expressions from people at the rally with photos.

“Having lost my child to law enforcement in such horrible conditions 2 years ago, my heart really goes out to him. We are determined that we’re gonna work so that there are no more stolen lives at the hand of law enforcement in the prison system. He’s such an inspiration to us,” expressed Mesha Irizarry with a fire in her voice. She’s host of the radio show on 103.5 FM called ‘No Pigs in the Hood’.

I’ve had relatives, friends and ex-lovers in prison, but I just don’t understand how the state can violently execute someone. Will the rallies ever stop?

“Stay strong. Fight to the very end; don’t go gentle into that goodnight. Know that people out here are praying for him,” John Crowder said to me as I watched City Hall in the distance. “He’s been an inspiration to all of us.”

“This is just a symbol for our struggle. It’s not about just one person,” voiced JR Valrey of the San Francisco Bayview Newspaper at the podium. “It’s not about what we do right here at this rally, it’s what ya’ll do after this rally!”

Close to 200 people were there at the rally. Many of them are concerned about Kevin and his plight. Amanda Maystead wanted to “Thank him for providing us with way for voicing what the struggle’s about. And he’s done that!”

Dee Allen, a member of POWER (People Organized to Win Employment Rights) wanted to tell Kevin to “Be strong, Mr. Cooper. You have the whole entire state of California behind you…We’re all right behind you, we’re gonna make sure this entire execution will be overturned.”

As I was leaving the rally, Curtis Stovall shouted, “Hold on, he’s very strong. He’s like a martyr.” And I wanted to tell him to stay strong, look up and live life.

by Joe B.

Int. Women’s Day Pt. 5

Men are important in the lives of children maybe not in their mother’s now ex wife’s but certainly more than women first thought.

Women like men can be as chauvinistic in their rabid dogmatic mantra or drone against males.

Its more than proves to this hapless male even though men can be blamed for 60 to 80% of problems we’re changing but 40 or 20% of women keep the process going in their rush to be always right.

Why do you think men seek eternal life?

The answer to outlive the whining screech of women with constant blame in their eyes,on their lips,and voices because after 40 or more years of male bashing it sounds more like pure revenge for revenge sake.

Ms. Lorena Bobbit cheered for castrating her husband,John,Wayne, Bobbit,sending chills to all men mistreating women especially their wives but I’ve noticed women tend escalate violence towards men.

Yes,he mistreated her, abused her physically and emotionally but it seems castration was like Lorena saying "Your mine,its mine,you won’t use it on me or anyone else; especially pleasuring anyone else."

Ownership? I guess that’s the ultimate a woman can do to a man take is stem or de-ball him physically.

Wayne was lucky science and technology came to his aide but as for being in porn films I would want to many females seeing my drumstick re attached because some other angry women might try for a more permanent solutions as in the use of a blowtorch.

When men’s feeling gets hurt most of us don’t immediately lash out but go to a gym,talk to friends,or have a drink but women are taught its alright to publicly humiliate with a thrown drink in the face,food poured over head and lap or be told off how really bad in bed he was lie or not most people will take women at their word and the man has to take it, swallow pride,not physically fight back which society says is wrong.

If the man does protests its more word play if silent he’s condemned ether way its no a no win.

Its why men walk away in throttled silence.

Women play underdog perfectly,taken advantage except when they’re in the wrong using tears to escape,men cry and it is a ploy or they’re wimps or gay.

Lastly all the good men are either taken(married), gay,or mutants(that’s from a Mutant X episode).

The truth is good men have been burned along with the bad because women don’t distinguish between them its hard to find guys who really love women and want to marry,settle down, and have children.

When they do it’s the women who flee to enjoy their endless free passes using men as deserts to waste.

All the so called good men tire of find one tired of playing the single game and another man is out of circulation for the duration.(I sure want that to happen to me).

I’ll tell you one thing if you’re a straight guy hardwired to cherish, appreciate women,its almost an anathema to them thinking freedom is single-hood only.

I can tell you its 50% either way. Straight guys haven’t figured out straight girls,women who’ve been abused emotionally,physically or both by boy-men friends, bi women swinging both ways,lesbian doing the same for a thrill,trans sexed men-women,gay men made up so good that they fool men and again lesbian who are strikingly pretty or beautiful playing the game of getting straight men to fall for them only to say "Sorry,I didn’t know you loved me,I’m lesbian sugar,didn’t you know?

As a guy with no gay-dar(unable to spot gays or other sexual orientations).

Living in San Francisco or anyplace where being a regular,ordinary,straight guy is like being a foreigner in alien country.

Yeah,Ladies,women, Girls,Wymin,Wimmin,or Grrrr’s I’m on a roll argue on your B Board sites(You know just what I mean, hot ‘n angry or hot ‘n horny whatever dialog what this crazy jack-a guy is talking about,I dare you all to come to an agreement.
(Joe)


Donations C/0 Poor Magazine

1448 Pine Street #205

San Francisco,CA 94103

Email: askjoe@poormagazine.org

by Josh McVeigh-Schultz/Mentor; Dee Gray

I never new my grandfather, Joseph McVeigh, but the pall caste by his death still lingers over our family gatherings. He was larger than life and relentless about his connections to people. He was someone who absorbed everyone he met into his ever-expanding world. My grandmother likes to tell me that when he died there were forty different people who came to her and swore he was their best friend.

I have felt his absence throughout my life. At every family gathering, someone will tell me how wonderful it would have been if I had known him, if I had been able to soak up his zest for life.

My grandmother never remarried, and we assume it is because she still adores him and still feels the weight of his absence. My four uncles and two aunts try in vain to replace his presence, but their performance of his personality often degenerates into ugly competitiveness and jealousy. Even the grandchildren want to be Joseph McVeigh and we vie for the family’s attention, failing to realize that what made him special was not the attention he received but the attention he gave to others. In many ways, I have yet to apply this lesson to my own life, and my solution to my extended family’s competitiveness is to ignore the game altogether. This is the strategy of silence.

A new film, The Station Agent, explores the theme of isolation in our modern society and celebrates the relentless pursuit of community as a form of resistance and salvation.

The film follows Fin, a train enthusiast who inherits a small plot of land in rural New Jersey. This property includes an abandoned train station that once housed a “station agent�—a sort of jack-of-all-trades: shopkeeper, depot manager, and barber, who once served as the social focal point for small rural communities.

We get the sense that station agents are throwbacks to another era in American history. Like passenger trains, they are an institution of American life that has already seen its day and now must recede into the background of historical minutia.

But throughout the film, the idea of the station agent emerges as a key metaphor. In particular, the waning of this social institution suggests a more profound trend in America: that the complex web of human relations that makes up our society is falling into disrepair. Without community focal points, without anyone to play the role of “node� within a social network, we are becoming more and more isolated. And strands of the web that once connected whole communities together, now hang aimlessly like cobwebs in an old abandoned building.

The protagonist of the film, Fin, is metaphorically caste in the unlikely role of “station agent.� But his laconic, anti-social personality makes him an awkward fit.

Outside his new dwelling, Fin encounters Joe, an extremely gregarious Cuban American who has left the city to help his ailing father and run the family’s hot dog stand. Though Joe’s first attempts at striking up a friendship with Fin fall flat, his relentless friendliness eventually wears down Fin’s protective barriers.

In many ways, Joe would seem to be the real “station agent� of the story because he is so outgoing and engaging with everyone he meets. His relentless pursuit of social contact makes him something like a community savant.

He is also the only character who is involved with his family. His obligation to his father and to the family’s business, shows that he has not succumb to the pressures of capitalism: he does not consider his own life to be an economically independent entity severed from the life of his parents.

And yet, there is nothing surprising here. It is Joe’s Cuban American background that ensures his close family ties. We get the sense, then, that ethnicity and culture have a part to play in resisting—or perhaps in other cases, exacerbating—the disintegration of social webs into tattered cobwebs.

However, Joe is not universally successful at creating social contacts in this small rural community. His “in your face� Cuban American attitude rubs many people the wrong way. Joe not only struggles to win the friendship of Fin, but he also has trouble getting the female lead, Olivia, to like him. Moreover, in a broader sense, his unabashed confidence contrasts with the understated, meditative mood of the film. It is as if he doesn’t fit the mold the generic indy-film character: slightly wounded, slightly offbeat, and slightly empowered by his own quirkiness. Instead, Joe is just plain empowered. His unmitigated persistence in pursuing social ties makes him something of an uber-friend.

Perhaps ironically then, it is Fin who becomes the unwitting catalyst for a three-way friendship when Olivia hurdles into his life with her lumbering SUV. The lesson here is that there is no ideal personality or “type� that best fulfills the role of social networker. Olivia’s bad driving is what triggers her connection to Fin. And Fin’s stubborn reticence is what leaves the door open to Joe’s friendship.

If this were a Hollywood film, Olivia and Joe would develop a romantic connection, with Fin as their surrogate child a la Ralf Mineo in Rebel Without a Cause. But director Thomas McCarthy wisely keeps these three characters on equal footing despite their vast differences. The juxtaposition of their disparate voices, in fact, becomes a key device for dramatic tension and humor.

But, like the characters in Felini’s La Strada, the one thing these three characters share is their common experience as misfits. They are all outsiders in a foreign environment. And they all struggle with feelings of isolation.

Joe, the fast talking urbanite, is clearly a fish out of water, and the endless calls on his cell phone suggest that city-life beckons him to return. His friendliness makes him powerful, but it also belies a sense of loneliness and vulnerability.

For Olivia, isolation comes in layers. She and her husband originally bought a vacation home in the small rural community in order to isolate themselves from the pressures of the suburbs. But when their son died at a young age, she retreated to the vacation home in order to escape her husband while she nursed her grief. Now, her rejection of middleclass suburban culture is not so much a lifestyle decision as it is a defense mechanism: everything in the suburbs, including her husband, reminds her of her son. In this sense, she is like the classic bohemian, who escapes bourgeois culture for psychological reasons that then map, post facto, onto political ones.

The source of Fin’s isolation seems obvious at first. He is a dwarf living among taller people. But his defining characteristic is not his height but his unbridled passion for a dying institution: trains. Ironically, the very thing that made trains revolutionary—i.e. their ability to connect people and places over vast geographic expanses—is what Fin seems to find least interesting in life. In fact, he goes out of his way to avoid other people, so that he can spend more time focused on his love of a machine that was designed to connect people to each other.

The actor, Peter Dinklage, plays Fin with the poise of a dramatic stage actor, but his real strength comes across in the way he conveys so much with awkward pauses and silent evasions of human contact. He says himself that he is a simple man. But his misanthropic tendencies and his tragic love of a dying institution (trains) belie some deeper current to his inner world.

Fin is a dwarf, and this fact is central to his character if for no other reason than that the cinematic gaze is unaccustomed to his body-type. It would be silly to try and ignore it, so instead, his size becomes a prominent piece of the story.

However, director and writer Thomas McCarthy allows the character Fin to exist beyond the limits of a Hollywood cliché. Even though dwarves and midgets have played countless characters in TV and film, their roles are usually fetishized or exoticized as with the munchkins of the Wizard of Oz or with Mini-me from the Austin Powers movies. But in The Station Agent, it feels as if we are able to forget about Fin’s size for certain moments, especially when he is protected from the gaze of ogling locals. On the other hand, when he feels exposed, his size comes to the foreground again. But it’s the way that Fin deals with the issue of being looked at and treated differently that makes the story and his performance so strong.

I feel there is delicate balance that has to be struck. On the one hand, minorities are often type-caste in Hollywood films, so when they are seen in challenging and unexpected roles it allows them to branch out and be taken seriously—which seems positive. But on the other hand, assumptions about what it means to “branch out� can have biased undercurrents. For example white critics will sometimes compliment a black artist for transcending race and finally making a “normal� film, or writing a “normal� novel. But, here “normal� is really a code word for ‘white.’ It is as if the idea of art being racially charged cannot exist as a default category.

In another highly acclaimed and beautifully photographed film called George Washington, young black actors delivered incredible performances, but the issue of race was completely ignored by the white director and I think this detracted from the film. In the dialogue, white and black characters interacted as if there was nothing separating them. It was as if they lived in a color-blind society, yet the gaze of the film was still white. Black families dealt with their problems as if they were mimicking a white cultural model. And the protagonist of the film dreamt of becoming a great “hero� like George Washington, but there was no thought given to the possibility that a young black child might have a more sophisticated understanding of white power in American history.

In an interview, the writer/director, David Gordon Green, remarked that the reference to George Washington is purposefully meant to sound naïve and childlike. But whose childhood is he really talking about? It seems more likely to be his own. Interestingly, the look and feel of this movie was very “indy� with long drawn out shots, quirky dialogue, and a droning minimalist soundtrack. These accoutrements all contribute to the white gaze of the film, though, and I was left thinking that maybe a white director shouldn’t have made this one.

So what about Station Agent? There are some similarities between these two films. The look and feel of The Station Agent was very “indy� as well, with long drawn out shots, an emphasis on lush cinematography, and a minimalist score. Moreover, just as the writer/director of George Washington is not black, the writer/director of The Station Agent, Thomas McCarthy, is not a dwarf. And the main character, Fin, seems equally misrepresented. He avoids contact with other dwarves and midgets. His best friend in the beginning of the film is a taller man, and his only romantic encounters are with taller women. And yet, for someone who has always lived among the tall, he seems incredibly bitter and maladjusted to his role as minority.

The actor Peter Dinklage, by contrast, comes across as extremely confident and well adjusted. On a recent episode of Jay Leno, he strutted around the stage declaring to the audience: “look at meâ€| I am so sexy.â€? The audience roared with laughter and adulation.

But I am left with questions. Which is the more telling portrayal of the experience of a dwarf? Is Thomas McCarthy’s character inaccurate? Is it unlikely that Fin would be so repressed and bitter that he avoids all human contact until it is forced upon him? Or is Peter Dinklage the exception? Has he existed so long as an entertainer that he had to learn how to turn the fetishism and exoticism into ironic humor? And is he unique in this capability, or do all dwarfs find themselves relying on humor to undermine the "gaze"?

Maybe I am overlooking the obvious, though. Maybe the answer is simply that the actor, Peter Dinklage, and the character, Fin, are two totally different people who shouldn’t be confused or conflated just because they inhabit the same body.

But putting aside the issue of dwarf/midget identity, how would the story of The Station Agent have been different if Peter Dinklage’s personality had replaced that of Fin? Would Joe, Olivia, and Fin have become such good friends? Or would they have been less compatible? Would Joe have been threatened by Fin’s confidence? Would Olivia be less eager to pursue a friendship with Fin if he displayed an overtly sexual sense of humor? Would either Joe or Olivia have found Fin so intriguing if he wasn’t so quiet and enigmatic? Maybe the three wouldn’t have been such good friends after all.

The point I am making is that communities come in many shapes and sizes, and there is no one “type� of person that best connects people to each other. In the end, the role of station agent seems almost arbitrary. Anyone can be a successful station agent if circumstances allow. And perhaps the most important trait to have is not a wild and relentless loquaciousness, but rather, a sincere love of people and a willingness to let the community exist beyond the boundaries of ones own sense of self.

Fin’s strategy of silence and enigma eventually gave way to a genuine interest and caring for other people. In some ways, his silence facilitated this connection, because it gave him an aura of empathy. In other words, when you keep your own personality at bay, others can fill in the blanks and imagine that you somehow relate to them on a profound level. Eventually this fantasy grows into a reality. My own strategy of silence within my extended family has sometimes had this effect.

But at other times, my laconic performance comes off as morose, and probably scares people off. I have a theory about this, though. My hunch is that morose times call for morose community leaders. And so maybe I’ll have my turn at station agent yet.

When Grandpa Joe died, my grandmother fell ill and almost passed away a few days after her husband. She survived, but she had to stay in the hospital for months. During this time, the family’s oldest daughter, Jane, left college to care for her younger siblings. At the time, Jane was quiet and sensitive, but her older brothers stopped teasing her as much after this show of heroism. The new station agent of the family was my mother.

by Tiny/PoorNewsNetwork-PNN

"We have been Florida for a long time" a small circle of civil rights activists, media and concerned citizen's formed a tight circle on the steps of City Hall last Thursday as Willie ratcliff, publisher of the SF Bayview spoke at a press conference exposing the frightening allegations of voter abuse that occurred in the recent San Francisco mayoral race, "I am really glad to see this come up - we have been trying to get this story out for a long time - this is nothing new"

As Willie spoke myself, and my fellow PNN reporters Joseph Bolden and Clive whistle shook our heads in frustrated agreement. Clive mumbled, "maybe the truth about A. Phillip Randolph Institute (known as APRI, or Willie Brown's voting machine) will finally come out " Within minutes several representatives from the newly formed, People of color electoral coalition approached the microphone, demanding redress and accountability from the City Attorney, Ethics Commission and Secretary of State if need be, for over 150 incidents of documented voter abuse. This press conference and coalition building was inspired in part by the recent allegations of the nine street cleaners who were pressured to vote for Gavin Newsom and walk precincts for the Newsom campaign. As the testimonies were spoken, I remembered back to the year 2000 and the odd experience of having to tell homeless people who were expecting their "payoff" from APRI, for voting, that there was nothing we could do (we shared an office building at the time). Later, that year I heard from Clive that he, as a homeless shelter resident was approached several times to "vote for the right person" and then in the last election as reported in Clives' SF Bayview Op-ed that he was aggressively "courted" by Newsom supporters coming to and fro his Sunnydale apartment

"When I went to vote I had a poster of Matt Gonzalez on my truck -and I heard a man scream at me, " Alvin Jones, you can't vote here," Alvin Jones from the Bayview Project Area Committee (PAC) and Community activist for the Bayview was speaking nervously into the mike, " I didn't know what to think so I went down to the Matt Gonzalez headquarters, and there I saw all these young folks outside, threatening people, intimidating people, saying things like, "you gonna lose your homes if you vote for Gonzalez"

"The worst thing I witnessed was in our district (dist 10) especially on election day," After Mr. Jones left the mike Community Activist Majeid Crawford (who was profiled in a PNN/SF Bayview article by PNN youth in media writer Martrice Candler on October 21) "The newsom people were blocking the entrance in front of our office - slamming our doors open and shut - intimidating people, bumping into people - telling us they were gonna come down shooting. If people had Matt Gonzalez stickers and posters on their cars they would snatch the posters and rip them off the cars -so on election day when we needed to walk the precinct our staff was inside the office intimidated, it got so bad that we had to bring folks down just to protect us" Majeid went on to relate the story surrounding an event called "pop yo collaz for Matt gonzalez" in which a "newsom supporter showed up threatening the organizers with violence if they promoted Matt Gonzelez on the mike

"I am a true believer of civil rights - my family fought for the right to vote", Bianca Henry from Family Rights and Dignity of the coalition on Homelessness best expressed the basic tenets that the grassroots coalition claimed as their founding principles; To preserve and protect the voting and civil rights of communities of color. and is why as well as an investigation of the hundreds of abuses of voters rights, the coalition is demanding that the City Attorney also deepen their investigation to initiate pro-active steps by the city to ensure that an on-going, permanent voter fraud unit be established by the Department of Elections as well as fund and publicize a city wide multi-lingual voter fraud reporting hotline.

"What I still can't understand is the plantation mentality that informs an election like this one," Clive was still mumbling under his breath next to me, " galvanizing all these poor folk of color to vote for this rich white boy (newsom) backed by all these other rich white power brokers only to promote more and more gentrification and decimation of poor communities and communities of color like the Bayview"

"Something stinks in City Hall", Riva Enteen, civil rights attorney and part of the Matt Gonzalez voter fraud unit, revealed the levels of corruption plaguing this last election,
" There were over 400 reports of voter fraud reported to Gonzalez volunteers who were monitoring polling places as well as 150 incidences of abuse such as Power outages, harassment by newsom volunteers, and newsom campaign staff walking door to door with provisional ballots. Riva continued with a shocking revelation that the director of the Cities' Ethics commission demanded that members of the ethics commission destroy documents disclosing how newsom campaign money was supposed to be used, and that luckily the commission staff refused to destroy the documents.

The conference ended with inspiring words by Coalition member, Ana Maria loya exec director of La Raza Centro Legal, "San Francisco is not Florida - we are here to demand that the most basic civil right of people to vote be protected and that steps be implemented so the next election in San Francisco is fair and free and safe"

by Joe B.

While walking down the street to buy a tall bottle of Crystal Geyser water I see a small, black,dirt and rust encrusted grime.

Curious,I lift the tilted lid saying aloud "this little,bullet shaped Bar-b-Q grill if cleaned, emptied could be useful."

Bought the water, re-crossed the street walking back to my job.

Passing by nothing registered that is the dirty little grill is gone as I looked back seeing an after image memory of what wasn’t there.

Someone either the owner or persons unknown picked up to throw out or maybe reuse.

It tells me to keep my thoughts to myself in case I wanted to rescue the thing for my own use.

Just as with today’s swearing of Mayor Elect Gavin Newsom.

He is supposedly bringing in a new era of change,help not harm homeless,working poor individuals and families with fingerprinting, shelter-payer program and other assorted help-the- poor solutions.

People have already been arrested near City Hall.

I don’t know if this is incidental or the beginning of what’s really in store for we the have not folks in San Francisco.

Add two sharpshooter’s on City Hall’s roof [is that a standard or a new crimp of post 911?]

Its an ominous sign on his,[Newsom’s] inauguration day arrests begin to mar this special city wide occasion.

I don’t want to think of being in some paramilitaries cross hair scope because of my lack of designer label’s.

Is America, Rome reborn and the we are the Gaul’s if not original ancient German Barbarians at the gate?

As history shows it wasn’t the Gaul’s sacking Imperial Rome but corruption of the most inner circle from highest God-Emperor,Senate to richest Patrician and merchant citizen brought the first City State Nation from its elevated heights to low fire and rubble not ordinary citizens and slaves, prostitutes who were honored vestal virgins before their elevation to Goddesses of Eros and Sacred Sex.

Is Rome’s historic doom being repeated by America’s City of Lights then spreading across the country with poor folks being blamed for what so called leaders mistakes?

Folks,you know facts abound now,I’m not the only one seeing history seemingly going backward or a retarded future as the highest office’s in our land go for temporary band aid fixes with outdated applied sciences.

Its almost gone back to middle dark age where new emerging applied sciences can help us but fears, cost,and just old fashion mule headedness keeps us from moving forward delaying our better lives however I may have to wait for facts to say what I’m writing is true or just half baked rambling.

I could be wrong as a former colleague and true reporter of facts Kaponda would say "Gather your facts before jumping to false conclusions."

What invariably happens is after announcing my view without a shred of facts everyone laughs at ‘po Joe’s odd,warped observations.

Then a couple of weeks or months later on radio, T.V.,or human source would repeat near word for word my suspicion’s then Kaponda,student interns and one of my employer’s look at me strangely like:
"How did he,you know such and such would happen?"

Whatever readers believe or think tell me what’s really going on.

Donations C/0 Poor Magazine

1448 Pine Street #205

San Francisco,CA 94103

Email: askjoe@poormagazine.org

by J.Damu

You’ve got to hand it to Haiti. Not only was it the world’s first country of enslaved workers to stand up and demand their freedom and independence; now they are the world’s first country to stand up to their former slavery-era master, France and demand the return of its stolen wealth. Everyone say “Amen.”

Haiti’s president and other government officials claim their country was held-up at gunpoint in broad daylight in 1825 and now they want the admitted thief, France, to replace the stolen wealth to the tune of $21.7 billion. This, despite massive attempts, well documented elsewhere, by the United States and world lending institutions to destabilize and overthrow the democratically elected government of Jean Bertrand Aristide.

Government officials also say due to forced efforts to hand over its wealth in a timely manner to France, the coerced payments so distorted and stunted the economy Haiti feels the effects this day. They also say due to those efforts, Haiti became saddled with a form of class oppression that resembles racism.

In a soon to be published booklet provided to a U.S. reporter by the foreign press liaison to President Jean Bertrand Aristide, Haitian government officials dissect the 1825 “agreement” that initially forced Haiti to pay to France 150 million francs in exchange for liberty.

The booklet, as is Haiti’s restitution claim, is based largely on the research of Dr. Francis St. Hubert, a member of the government’s Haiti Restitution Commission.

“I did most of my research in New York at the Columbia University Library and the Schomburg Center,” Dr. Hubert said by phone from Port au Prince.

“We are pursuing this case from three different angles. We are doing publicity and educational campaigns. We are pursuing our claims through the diplomatic community and we are preparing a legal case,” he said.

“Haiti’s claim is not really for reparations for slavery,” said Ira Kurzban, Miami immigration attorney and Haiti’s chief counsel in the U.S “but for restitution specifically that happened in 1825. It is based on the French government’s efforts to extract 150 million French francs (which is equal to $21 billion today) from an economy the French knew couldn’t afford it, through the use of force. This is impermissible under international law.”

“I can’t tell you how we plan to proceed legally,” he said by telephone. The Haitians will make their own announcement when they are ready he said.

According to the booklet, which will soon be published under the name of the Haiti Restitution Commission, following the 1804 revolution that expelled France, Haiti was divided into two districts, northern and southern, but was re-united following the death of Henri Christophe in 1820. Under the new president, Jean Pierre Boyer, diplomatic notes began to be exchanged with various French functionaries on the diplomatic recognition of Haiti.

Finally in 1825, France, which was being encouraged by former plantation owners to invade Haiti and re-enslave the Blacks, issued the Royal Ordinance of 1825, which called for the massive indemnity payments. In addition to the 150 million franc payment, France decreed that French ships and commercial goods entering and leaving Haiti would be discounted at 50 percent, thereby further weakening Haiti’s ability to pay.

According to French officials at the time, the terms of the edict were non-negotiable and to impress the seriousness of the situation upon the Haitians France delivered the demands by 12 warships armed with 500 canons.

The 150 million franc indemnity was based on profits earned by the colonists, according to a memorandum prepared by their lawyers. In 1789, Saint Domingue (all of Haiti and Santo Domingo) exported 150 million francs worth of products to France. In 1823 Haitian exports to France totaled 8.5 million francs, exports to England totaled 8.4 million francs, and exports to the United States totaled 13.1 million francs, for a total of 30 million francs.

The lawyers then claimed that one half of the 30 million francs went toward the costs of production, leaving 15 million francs as profit. The 15 million franc balance was multiplied by ten (ten years of lost revenues for the French colonists due to the war for liberation) which coincidentally totals 150 million francs, the value of exports in 1789.

To make matters worse for Haiti the French anticipated and planned for Haiti to secure a loan to pay the first installment on the indemnity. Haiti was forced to borrow the 30 million francs from a French bank that then deducted the management fees from the face value of the loan and charged interest rates so exorbitant that after the payment was completed, Haiti was still 6 million francs short.

The 150 million franc indemnity represented France’s annual budget and ten years of revenue for Haiti. One study estimates the indemnity was 55 million more francs than was needed to restore the 793 sugar plantations, 3117 coffee estates and 3,906 indigo, cotton and other crop plantations destroyed during the war for independence.

By contrast, when it became clear France would no longer be in a position to capitalize on further westward expansion in the Western hemisphere, they agreed to sell the Louisiana Territory, an area 74 times the surface area of Haiti, to the U.S. for just 60 million francs, less than half the Haitian indemnity.

Even though France later lowered the indemnity payment to 90 million francs, the cycle of forcing Haiti to borrow from French banks to make the payments, chained the Black nation to perpetual poverty. Haiti did not finish paying her indemnity debt until 1947!

According to the Haitian government’s reparations booklet the immediate consequence of the debt payment on the Haitian population was greater misery. The first thing President Boyer did to help pay the debt was to increase from 12 to 16 percent all tariffs on imports to offset the French discount.

The next step Boyer took was to declare the indemnity to be a national debt to be paid by all the citizens of Haiti. Then he immediately brought into being the Rural Code.

By Haitian First Lady Mildred Aristede’s account in her book “Child Domestic Service in Haiti and its Historical Underpinnings,” the Rural Code laid the basis for the legal apartheid between rural and urban society in Haiti. With the Rural Code, the economically dominant class of merchants, government officials and military officers who lived in the cities legally established themselves as Haiti’s ruling class.

Under the Rural Code agricultural workers were chained to the land and allowed little or no opportunity to move from place to place. Socializing was made illegal after midnight and the Haitian farmer who did not own property was obligated to sign a 3, 6 or 9 year labor contract with a large property owner. The Code also banned small-scale commerce so that agricultural workers would produce crops strictly for export.

The Haitian Rural Code was all embracing, governing the lives not only of farmers but of children as well.

The Rural Code was specifically designed to regulate rural life in order to more efficiently produce export crops with which to pay the indemnity. The taxes levied on production were also used predominantly to pay the indemnity and not to build schools nor to provide other social services to the generators of this great wealth, the peasants.

Leading Haitian activists in the U.S. claim between 1804 and 1990, when President Aristide was first elected, a grand total of 32 high schools were built in Haiti, all within urban settings. Since then more than 200 have been built, they say, most in the countryside.

To this day the discrimination between rural and urban areas takes the form of color discrimination by light skinned blacks toward darker skinned blacks and it remains intense.

St. Hubert and the national bank compute the exact amount Haiti is demanding from France as $21,685,135,571.48 at 5 percent annual interest.
“France is getting off easy,” St Hubert told a U.S. newspaper. If Haiti charged 7.5 percent interest on the money, “France would owe $4 trillion today and much more tomorrow.

“The French can debate whether they want to pay as long as they like,” he said, “but at 5 percent interest it will cost them $34 per second.”

For more information about Haiti or to learn what you can do to support Haiti please contact the Haiti Action Committee (510) 483-7481, write them at HAC, P.O. Box 2218, Berkeley, CA, 94702 or visit their website at www.haitiaction.org.

J.Damu is the acting Western Regional Representative for N’COBRA-National Coalition of Blacks for Reparations in America. He can be contacted at jdamu@sbcglobal.net.

by Alexandra Flynn/Mentor; Dee Gray/COURTWATCH-PNN

Kelly, one of my best friends, was 17 when she had her first of her four children. As I had just started university in the same city that she lived in, and neither of us had friends or family close by, so we spent a lot of time together.

Kelly lives in Quebec, Canada. About two weeks after her first baby was born, a nurse knocked on their door to see if everything was okay. It is standard in Quebec for nurses in each community to visit new babies and help parents with any concerns that they have. My friend was also informed that, if needed, she could drop the baby off at a provincial day care for $5 a day. All of this was on top of baby bonuses that gave her a little extra money when each of the kids was born. There is no question that these services have been immensely helpful in alleviating the normal, everyday strains that Kelly has had.

Mary X*, an African-American mother in Oakland, hasn’t had Kelly’s experiences. She lives in a state where government assistance for childcare and emotional support are expensive and difficult to obtain. Without friends and family, and without a government-sponsored help network, she has been completely alone in raising her five children.

The aloneness is basically what led to her involvement with Child Protective Services (CPS). One day, when her oldest child was five and her youngest a year old, she left them at home and went to the store to pick up the family’s groceries. She knew that the trip would be far faster and much less stressful on the children if she quickly hopped on the bus herself. As Mary puts it, "I don’t have nobody to help me. I don’t have any friends to keep my kids while I went to the store. I was out there mainly by myself." She made the best choice she could at the time.

CPS authorities didn’t agree with her choice. They apprehended her kids and, even though the incident occurred in 1995 and she has completed countless programs, she still doesn’t have all of her children home. Authorities are even trying to have one of them adopted. "That’s a big business. That’s money they all making," Mary said, "Just to go and talk to my son I think this [CPS psychologist] get $89 an hour."

Mary’s experiences with CPS have been dehumanizing. "They talk down to you in front of your kids," she mentioned, "They make you feel low." Once, in court, she asked that CPS officials speak to her alone, so that her kids didn’t have to hear her being chastised. When the CPS official mentioned this to the court, Mary was reprimanded. "If you say anything to CPS," Mary said, "they’ll say ‘Oh you’re hostile,’ ‘Oh, you’re angry,’ ‘Oh, you’re mad,’ ‘Oh you’re not supposed to talk back.’" Mary’s kids have also had many difficulties while in foster care, including having been misdiagnosed with ADHD, beaten, and given antidepressants.

For my friend Kelly and others in Quebec, the services they get are an indication that someone out there cares about their family. That, ultimately, even if they need help, the priority is to keep the family together. This is one thing that Mary wishes she’d felt in her dealings with CPS: "Instead of them coming and taking your kids, they should send you to family counseling with your kids for six months."

According to the Casey Family Programs, a Seattle-based organization that help parents strengthen families at risk and prevent foster care, notes that the foster care population in the U.S. has nearly doubled over the past two decades. To address this growing trend, Casey acknowledges that the root causes of family crises must be addressed: "We know that poverty is the primary cause of family instability. And we believe that family support is a powerful and cost-effective way to keep families together."

Mary needed affordable childcare, help from friends or family, and the support of her community. She didn’t get any of these. Eight years and thousands of dollars later, Mary and her children have reams of bad experiences behind them and many battles ahead. CPS and the government could make different choices; they could, like the Quebec government, give emotional and financial support to families, which made all the difference for my friend Kelly.

* Names have been changed to protect identities.