Brown Pride: A Letter to Cain Velasquez

Dear Brother Cain,

Congratulations on becoming the new UFC (Ultimate Fighting Championship) Heavyweight Champion of the World. I didn’t get to watch you, to see you perform your artistry, to see you live the spirit warrior dance flowing from your heart and mind. I didn’t see the moment when it all came together, the moment that came and went like a flash—blows raining down from the heart of a drum, the pulse of our ancestral rituals—inspired by love and struggle and the spirits of our indigenous ancestors. No, I didn’t see it and I surely didn’t see the years, the countless hours of work you put into training and preparation, embracing your craft, sweating and sacrificing and letting go of fear, standing up and being who you are.  I can only dream of the discipline, skill and determination it takes to compete in such a grueling sport.   What a great day it is. It means something. "Cain Velasquez…heavyweight champion". Those words keep echoing in my mind.

While you were in the octagon facing Brock Lesnar (who pronounced your name VELAS-QWEZZ), I was at the home of POOR Magazine reportero Muteado Silencio. Muteado is an indigenous scholar, artist and poet with Prensa Pobre, POOR Magazine—an indigenous newsmaking circle that makes revolutionary media, that is poor people and indigenous people led. Muteado is a powerful voice resisting racism, border fascism and linguistic domination—always there when help is needed, always ready to speak up for migrant Raza and communities of color. It was Muteado’s birthday and friends and family gathered in his small home in Oakland. Cain, you would have loved the gathering. The music was alive with Cumbia, hip hop, salsa, rap—the rhythms of resistance alive, tearing down the walls of confinement with the movement of our bodies and minds. Muteado’s mother was so warm and gracious and giving, her journey of motherhood and struggle swimming across her brown skin. Bowls of chicken, pork and vegetables warmed us. I think one of our reporters, Bruce Allison, ate 6 bowls. Muteado’s mother is a tough lady, mother of 13 beautiful children—even tougher than you, Cain—no joke.

The house was hers and the ancestors are alive, their voices alive in her movement, in her hands, her eyes, her voice—in everything she prepares. I saw an interview you gave where you spoke about your parents and how their struggle inspired you to become a fighter. You spoke of your father crossing the desert 5 times and being sent back before making it across to this country for a better life. You went to school and wrestled for Arizona State, earning honors in that sport while achieving a degree in education.  Tell me Cain, is Muteado’s mother like your mother?

Anyway, I wish I could have seen the fight but we didn’t have pay per view at Muteado’s house so we watched the Giants game instead. The Giants won! The room was alive—the Giants on TV, salsa in the speakers, pollo in our bellies and poetry on our lips. What more could we have wanted?

As the evening went on, I got a text message from my brother that read, "Cain beat Lesnar". I began telling people about your victory. "What?" they asked, the music blaring from the speakers. "Cain Velasquez…he beat Lesnar…he won" I repeated. They didn’t hear it but those words were music and it blended with the salsa coming from the speakers. The whole neighborhood heard it.

Since the night of Muteado’s birthday, I’ve read about the fight and have watched interviews you have given—including one interview where the host asked you about your brown pride tattoo—saying that some people think the tattoo indicates affiliation with a gang. We at POOR Magazine think the tattoo is beautiful. Also beautiful is the way you’ve spoken of and given respect to your father’s struggle as a migrant Raza man—his strength is your strength.

Brother Cain, just want to let you know that when you beat Lesnar, it was us beating the landlord, slumlord, boss. It was the kid that I was, afraid of confrontation, being able to confront fear and put it on its ass. It was our elders long ago and in the present who fought and are fighting for decent housing. It was for the dreamers who dreamed of doing what you did, to be able to stand up and look fear in the eye.

I read once that when Joe Louis was heavyweight champion, after each of his victories, the people in Harlem used to go wild in the streets in celebration. When I think of your victory, I feel those spirits moving from Harlem across the country to Arizona and to Muteado’s house in Oakand. And from there it goes through the desert where your father walked, planting the seeds that would become Brown Pride.

© 2010

Letter to Tim Lincecum’s Mother (Nanay)

By Revolutionary Worker Scholar

The speed of light

Is a vision

That looks right

Back at you

--Tiburcio Garcia-Gray

Dear Mrs. Lincecum:

We in San Francisco are very proud of your son for his hard work and spirit in helping bring the World Series title to the people of our city and to the entire Bay Area. The Filipino Community is proud of Tim not only for his excellence as a pitcher but for his humility and the graceful manner in which he has carried himself. Many words have been used describe your son—"The Freak", "The Franchise". Awards have been bestowed upon him—the Cy Young Award (twice) among others. There are many other adjectives that can be used to describe your son and the things he has and is yet to accomplish. Rather than use words that have already been said, let me just say that we are very proud of your anak, your son.

I read that your family is from Stockton, your family’s roots go back to Hawaii and Mindanao and Cebu. Much of this information is not known or written about, but to our community it is just as important as World Series titles. As you probably know, the connection between San Francisco and Stockton is deep in the history of our people. It is well known that Tim’s father taught him the mechanics of pitching, laying the foundation that would see him achieve greatness in baseball—unprecedented for a player of such a young age. He was told by major league scouts that he was too small to succeed but he overcame it and rose to be the best practitioner of his craft. Watching him pitch is a thing of beauty—the twist of the waist, the dip of the shoulders, the release. It is as if the movement of the Filipino workers of Hawaii—the Sakadas—who live in your son’s bones, is the wind pushing him forward in his dance on the pitcher’s mound. We dance with him and he dances in our minds.

I work as a volunteer at the Manilatown Heritage Foundation. The foundation works to preserve the memory of the manongs who fought their eviction from the International Hotel in 1977. As I sat helping elderly Filipino residents of San Francisco’s South of Market District complete affordable housing applications, the radio was tuned to a Giant’s game. It was towards the end of the season and the Giants were playing a pair of games with the San Diego Padres. The atmosphere in the office was alive. Let’s go Timmy! My officemates cried while working to find our manongs (elders) a decent place to live.

A professor recently wrote that Tim Lincecum’s family background is very much the story of Filipino American history. From migration to Hawaii as part of a generation of Sakadas—young workers recruited to toil on Hawaii’s sugar plantations—to Stockton where a once thriving Filipinotown is being reborn through the work of young activists who refuse to let it be erased from memory—your son’s achievement is a part of our achievement and struggle as a community in this country.

Again Mrs. Lincecum, thank you for all the time and effort you gave that has not been written about. I think of how Tim spoke of his Lolo (Grandfather) Balleriano, who passed away in 2007. He was having trouble in a game because his Grandfather’s passing lay heavy on his mind. He said that he looked to God and to the past and to relatives that have passed on for strength and guidance. To me, that said more about your son than any World Series title. It means more.

© 2010 Revolutionary Worker Scholar

Another Unarmed Black Brother, Derrick Jones, 37, a loved Oakland barbershop owner and father of an infant girl,
met a violent death on  November .8, 2010, shot and killed by OPD (2 white officers involved), while "fleeing", after they "thought" they saw a metallic object in his hand.

Another Unarmed Black Brother, Derrick Jones, 37, a loved Oakland barbershop owner and father of an infant girl, met a violent death on Monday night, Nov.8, 2010, shot and killed by OPD (2 white officers involved), while "fleeing", after they "thought" they saw a metallic object in his hand.

This OPD homicide occured only THREE days after Judge Perry sentenced the killer of Oscar Grant III, Johannes Mehserle, to 2 yrs in jail (less double credit for 146 days of time served = 292 days for "good behavior"), for "Unvoluntary Manslaughter".

This is the third OPD officers involved Homicide of People of Color in 2010.
Derrick Jones' grieving family has retained the services of John Burris, Oscar Grant's Family attorney.

"THIS INCIDENT HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH THE CASE OF OSCAR GRANT" (?!?)

Today Tuesday, I caught the end of a Channel 7 talk show,
during which a complacent African American conservative anchor contends:

"By the way, it is my belief that Oscar Grant shooting was ACCIDENTAL", and interviews a former OPD white officer and current prosecutor who exhorts the public not to jump to racially biased policing conclusion: "This incident has nothing to do with the case of Oscar Grant. Grant's killing was unvoluntary, while yesterday shooting was voluntary. You must understand that officers have to make split-second decisions when they have a reasonable belief that a suspect is armed and dangerous, and constitutes a life and death threat against themselves or others. Please you have to understand that it is the scariest scenario in an officer's life".

THE DAY AFTER THE SHOOTING, OPD's OFFICIAL VERSION OF THE KILLING KEEPS CHANGING.

The Corporate press trickles cautious tidbits of information throughout the day.
At first, the race of the dead Brother and of the shooting officers is hidden from the public.
OPD spokesperson reluctantly admits that Jones was UNARMED, and that a "confrontation" occurred. ..Note the constrained terminology ?

Police initial communiques usually emphasize:
"Suspect lunged at the officers who feared for their lives"
or "Suspect pulled out a gun, knife" etc.,
or "Suspect turned around and repeatedly screamed C'mon-M...-F...rs -Go-Ahead- 'n-Kill-me"
or "Suspect made a sudden furtive move".

Apparently there has been no physical confrontation in Jones' case.
Throughout Tuesday, the official party line keeps changing, from "confrontation",
to "appeared to reach for his waist band"...
to "officer thought they saw a metallic object in the suspect's hand".

THE HITLIST ON OAKTOWN' CONTEMPORARY PLANTATION CONTINUES TO RAGE ON.

Remember young Brother Laronte Sturdville, 15, shot by OPD in 2007 while fleeing and attempting to pull up his sagging pants?
Luckily, the child survived after 2 weeks in intensive care, scarred for life, shot in the back of his neck while running, the bullet came out of his chin.
Or, Brother Mac Jodie Fox Woodfox, shot in the back and killed in 2008 while "fleeing" ?
all by OPD, and the hitlist on Oakland' contemporary Plantation, the land of the-Proud-and-the-Free-OPD is endless amd continues to rage on.
(in one year, 2 months and 2 weeks, killer-cop Meherle is "eligible for release"....).

"HE IS PORTRAYED AS A MONSTER, AND HE WASN'T, THIS IS ALL SO SENSELESS".
FAMILY SAYS MAN SHOT BY OAKLAND POLICE WAS UNARMED
"Derrick Jones was unarmed and was not reaching toward his waistband when police opened fire"

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/C/CA_OAKLAND_POLICE_SHOOTING_CAOL-?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT
(exerpts)
"Family says man shot by Oakland police was unarmed,
Loved owner of a barber shop and killed by officers during a foot chase disputed police's account Tuesday that he appeared to be reaching toward his waistband for a weapon"...
"Family and friends of Derrick Jones, 37, called Monday's shooting unjustified and said witnesses did not see the Oakland man make such a move. They also said Jones was unarmed and that police used excessive force".
"My cousin is not the type of person to harm anybody," said Charles Jones..."It's outrageous for somebody to just kill him like that."
Police have declined to say how many times Derrick Jones was shot or whether a weapon was found on him, citing the ongoing investigation"...
"When officers arrived, Derrick Jones fled on foot, apparently to escape arrest for assaulting the woman Israel said"...
"But family and friends said Tuesday that Derrick Jones is being wrongly depicted as a 'monster' and was only trying to fend off an ex-girlfriend who came to his barbershop causing trouble"...
"the two officers repeatedly told Derrick Jones to stop and tried unsuccessfully to use a stun gun on him. He said the officers also saw Derrick Jones refuse to put up his hands, and he reached toward his waistband several times"....
"one of the officers saw a metal object in Jones' hand, Israel said"....
"An attorney representing Jones' family, John Burris, said Tuesday that witnesses he has spoken to said Derrick Jones was unarmed and was not reaching toward his waistband when police opened fire"
"Any time a human life is lost, the surviving family suffers the grief of that loss, so I offer my sympathies to the family of the man who lost his life last night," Oakland Mayor Dellums said.
"Family and friends said Jones is the father of an infant girl, has been a barber for more than 20 years and has owned his barbershop for the past eight years"...
"Scott Riley, 40, another childhood friend, said Jones served about a year behind bars for carrying a gun to protect himself after he was robbed at his barbershop"...
"He's being portrayed as a monster, and he wasn't," Riley said outside police headquarters. "This is all so senseless."

WHAT PART OF KILLED_UNARMED_BLACK_MAN = MURDER
DOESN'T OPD UNDERSTAND ?
TOO LITTLE, TOO LATE, ENOUGH !!!!

Is the Mesherle verdict ensuring OPD's license to Kill in all impunity ?
No correlation between the Murders of Derrick Jones and Oscar Grant III ?

Apparently, Civil Rights Attorney John Burris does not think so.
Neither do we....
or the 152 Oakland protesters arrested on November 5th after the public release of the Meherle' sentence.

Mayor Ron Dellum, today, slapped together hasty damage control "condolences" to Brother Derrick Jones' Grieving Family.

TOO LITTLE, TOO LATE, ENOUGH !!!!

Picture credit http://www.firstnations.eu/indian_land.htm featured online firstnations.eu. "No Justice on Stolen Land," protest placard. Photo: anon

Poem is dedicated to Indigenous Elder Scholar, Myron Standing Bear and his struggle to receive his housing that was stolen from him by members of the San Francisco Housing Authority . He went from #1 to #564 on the S.F.H.A. Housing Waiting List for being Indian.

“We don’t work with Indians!”

“Never have, never will!" Is what they told him!”

Housing, a human right.

Houselessness, a moral wrong

Landlessness and colonization on a waiting list

Housing, a human right, but under authority while poor

A Day of Displacement to a dying indigenous scholar

Landlessness and colonization on a waiting list

No love from the world, except from his two sons

With only a car to call a comfort zone

By day, by night, asleep, with a growing fear

That one day

"Should I fail to awake, and my heart fails to beat

"Who then to care for my two sons?"

Where will the little land I call a car will go?

Landlessness and colonization on a waiting list

Thanksgiving was Thanks-taking.

Taking from one race to the other, and others.

“You’re illegal! You’re lazy! You’re inferior!”

“This land is ours to own. This is only yours to rent!”

Not apart of, but in an apartment. Housing Authority.

Who should dictate where one must stay?

Must one decide, then dictate by race and class

Of where one must lay?

Landlessness and colonization on a waiting list

Keith Jones and I have a lot in common. Both Black both have CP, both are activists and into Hip-Hop. We also both recently have been targets of racial/disabled profiling at hotels Keith in ATL & Leroy in Oakland. Now we went into studios and recorded a song, Disabled Profiled, about their experiences of being profiled as Black disabled men. Keith on the beats and mixed it and Leroy spits his poetry. More to come. This track is on the Krip-Hop/5th Battalion Ent's cd, Broken Bodies PBP, Police Brutality Profiling Mixtape that came out 2012

Keith Jones was profiled in ATL at a hotel in which he was staying at for a Krip--Hop event. He was using the computer and the guard thought he was homeless that led to Keith had to prove that he was staying there. And peeps know about my experiences in the Bay Area and in NY where I was approach by NYPD and store manager that said I was taking too long and was making them nervous. Listen to this song.

Leroy Moore

Unfolding the Flag

By Revolutionary Worker Scholar

There’s a flagpole

Rag and the

Wind won’t stop

--The police, "King of Pain"

I work as a security guard and was recently sent to a new site. The site provided me with a view of wonderful clusters of trees and a wonderful perspective of the neighborhood skyline with its variety of residential dwellings against the backdrop of sky and its smear of slow moving fog. This beautiful vision was transmitted to me by way of an elaborate closed circuit camera system, providing a bird’s eye view of virtually every corner of the property—with the ability to move the cameras left to right, right to left, up and down, etc. This electronic representation of my natural (and sometimes unnatural) surroundings is, of course, provided to me via 2 video monitors—in black and white.

As part of their daily duties, the property maintenance department is required to remove--at the end of the day--the large American flag from its flagpole, prominently displayed at the front of the property. There are usually 3 maintenance persons to perform this duty but two of them were not available so the available maintenance man asked me if I could assist him in removing the flag. We both took a hold of the rope that dangled parallel to the pole and steadied the flag into our waiting arms. We walked the flag to the building’s lobby area as a cool breeze whisked over my face.

Although I am a security officer, I am sometimes not as cognizant as I should be in regards to protocols and procedures—mainly because there are more than a thousand of them. But I am trying to "G.M.S.T" (ie: get my shit together) in this area, as my job depends on it.

We walked the flag to the couch and placed it down. The maintenance man took me through the process of folding the flag—fold here, lift there, tuck there, etc. I was maintaining control but I lost my grip and the flag slipped from my hand. "Try not to drop the flag" the maintenance man said, gently. But it was clear that dropping the flag was to be avoided at all costs. I picked up my end and we finished our folding sequence. When we were finished, the flag looked like a tightly wrapped triangle.

We brought the flag into the storage room where it was gently placed in a drawer where it awaited a brand new day of waving. The maintenance man left and I assumed my position at the security desk.

I looked at the empty flagpole as the sun began to fade from the sky. I had dropped the flag. Then I thought about the way Oscar Grant was dropped to the ground, face down, unarmed and shot in the back at the Fruitvale Bart Station on his way home from work. I thought: It’s was ok for Oscar Grant to hit the ground but it’s not ok for the flag to hit the ground.

I went back into the storage room, door closed. I took the tightly wrapped flag from the drawer. I looked at it for a long while. Then a cool breeze shot through the window and stung my face as i heard something drop to the floor.

© 2010 Revolutionary Worker Scholar

What Homefulness Means to Me

When I think of the word “Homefulness” an idea model created in 1997 by my mentor, co-founder of POOR Magazine/PNN, “Tiny” Lisa Gray-Garcia, only two words come to my mind: Equal Equity. Living in “affordable housing” via a Single Room Occupancy Hotel for the past five years, I've come to the revelation that in order for one to actually have peace of mind, one needs an affordable, stabilized home...........as opposed to a room with a roof.

To have “peace of mind from those who would threaten my safety in the sanctity of the little room I call my home. Not to have twelve po-lice officers illegally come into the little room I call “home” ready to kill me; and/or have my “landlord” fail to protect my safety as its tenant. This was what I went through on October 7^th, 2005.

“Peace of mind” is not just a reality for me, but for all poor families that struggle to even get a bed in homeless shelters. The freedom to be collective as a community, and to share everything denied from us courtesy of non-profits financed by governments, and governments who’re financed by greedy land developers.

A lifetime of struggle for me, and my family in Cleveland, Ohio is a testament to that effect. No matter how much I worked, we lived on fixed incomes for our entire lives. Though my mom managed to get an actual house for me, my two brothers, and my sister, she never truly owned it. Capitalism was killing it everyday, and eight years later, it died leading to their displacement.

I came here to San Francisco to get from one capitalism system only to face another. My mom had to rent an apartment, was in a shelter for a while until she was able to get back to that apartment space with the very limited amount of income sadly she receives each month to house my little brother and sister.

For me, and for all poor communities around me, “Homefulness” is the freedom from being undivided and categorized from all forms of institutionalized race and class control. To be apart of and not being in an apartment.

Bird on a wire: A raven speaks out on the blue angels and other things

By Revolutionary Worker Scholar

Note: I was lucky to encounter the raven after many weeks of trying. I endured its laughter while trying to coax it from its wire with breadcrumbs. After 2 weeks of this, the raven finally granted me a much-coveted interview about the Blue Angels.

Q: What do you think of the blue angels?

A: I don’t stay up nights thinking about them

Q: Why not?

A: They don’t show me nothing. They’re gentrifying the sky. They want to convince people that they’ve been up there forever. Hell, I’ve been flying before those guys were in diapers. They make too much noise up there, dipping and diving and maneuvering. They’re basically showing their asses. They’re knocking themselves out trying to do what I do naturally…things I can do with my eyes closed. They’ve poured a lot of money into those wings but those wings ain’t as beautiful as my wings.

Q: You think so?

A: What kind of question is that? You sure you ain’t C.W. Nevius? Of course I think so. There are many people out there that agree with me.

Q: Who are they?

A: The people in the neighborhoods

Q: Which neighborhoods?

A: The TL…Bayview, Fillmore, some parts of the Mission. They look at my wings and they say, man…now those are some wings. Sometimes they just watch me and hum a little tune and on that tune, I fly higher. It’s hard to explain. But the blue angels ain’t really blue, you know? Do they really know the blues? If they did they’d be down here and not making all that noise. I can’t hear my jazz when they’re up there. But some of these crowds really eat it up.

Q: I sense some hostility on your part towards the blue angels

A: You’re perceptive

Q: Where do you spend most of your time?

A: Ocean Beach lately. I’m always on the lookout for food. All the stuff I get are scraps that are loaded down with sodium and fat. My blood pressure is soaring. But sometimes I get something good, like that whale that washed up a few weeks ago. That was good. It held me over for a few days. I get good stuff out here.

Q: What’s in store for you?

A: To hang loose and go with the flow. To share my laughter up there on those wires. Humanity is a laugh, you know?

Q: Any last words for our audience

A: Well, you know, fleet week, they make a big display of it. Anyway, I flew out there just to check it out. The folks were walking around in knit sport shirts and dockers. Jeeze…won’t someone tell those guys what their shirt sizes are? Nothing but gut and more gut. One of ‘em threw me a pizza crust so I guess he was ok. But still, you’ll never catch me dead in one of those awful shirts. I flew around the ships and I saw all those guys in military uniforms just looking into the sky. I thought they were possibly looking at the clouds or at my brethren. I hovered closely then landed on a nearby plank. I looked at one of the uniformed guys. His nametag read: Breedlove.

Q: Did he give you any?

A: Any what?

Q: Love

A: Are you kidding? He was breeding something but it sure wasn’t love. I laughed that mocking laugh of mine and he flicked a cigarette butt at me. I took off into the air but it was being invaded by the blue angels, scraping across the sky, my sky. But their wings still ain’t as beautiful as mine. Don’t you agree?

What Homefulness Means to Me

I was born in Berkeley and raised in Oakland. My mother, a black woman and a single mother, worked for a decade for the City of Berkeley. She eventually bought a house in Oakland, but she lost it. She bought property back when a working-class person could still buy land in the Bay Area, before gentrification fueled theft and speculation. The house she bought was a “fixer-upper” on 59th street between Telegraph and Shattuck, what used to be a working-class Black neighborhood; she always had dreams of fixing it up, but she was hardly a handyman, and she didn’t know anyone who was. The house was what was called “income property” because there were units to rent in back, but my mom was a bad landlord; if people could not pay rent she would always cut them a break, and when she began to get sick there was no money to pay the mortgage. When she lost the place I grew up in, there was no public outcry, no bailout. This was in the early 80’s. I was 9 years old.

When I say bought, I don’t mean bought. The property my mom had that I grew up in never really belonged to us; it was always the bank’s. My mother engaged in a gamble when she assumed the mortgage on our house, a gamble that she would be able to generate enough money eventually to get to the point where the house was not owned by the bank anymore. What I understand now is that this game was rigged from the start; a woman of color is likely to have less job security and more likely to have crippling health problems like high blood pressure or mental health issues that will exacerbate income instability, in addition to making less money when she is working. So the inherent racism and sexism of this country’s capitalist system played a large part in me losing my childhood home… but more than all that, I think isolation was to blame.

When my mom bought her house her plan was to do it all herself; she had moved away from her family, who all lived in San Francisco, she and my dad divorced, and as I got older she stopped working outside the house, relying on rents generated from the property in order to stay home with me, so she was quite alone in the world in many ways. She had tenants who liked and respected her, but the landlord/ tenant relationship is set up to be exploitative and hierarchical, not fertile ground for friendships or even reciprocity. When she started to get sick there was no one around to help either of us.

My mother passed away last year, after having been homeless for more than a decade. I am and will always be proud of her as a strong and independent woman, but the drive to be alone and safe, for the sister to do it all for herself and take no handouts, the way her ties to community attenuated to the point where she had no one to turn to in her deepest extremity of crisis, wrecked the latter part of her life and the early part of mine.

My mom, like many of us in the African American community, distrusted not only government
intervention and assistance in her life, but assistance from other people as well. She chose to “do it herself” because she thought it was safer not to rely on anybody, not even her family. I have found this to be a typical attitude in our carnivorous American culture. I believe that capitalism authors so many of this society’s great and small betrayals, and undermines the trust we have in each other; it comes between sisters, between lovers, between parents and children, between new neighbors, between a mother alone and her extended family that could have helped her survive. In modern American capitalism human relationships come in a poor second to the prioritizing of individual economic gain and the parasitic enrichment of wealthy elites whatever the cost.

If my mom had had a home community with which to share the responsibilities and burdens of home ownership, of child-rearing, of life, she might have lived longer. I don’t know why she chose to separate from her birth family, but as an adult I realize that family can mean the family you are born to, the family of circumstance you find yourself locked up/in school/workin/playing or on the street with, or the family you create. This is the beginning of beloved community .

HOMEFULNESS stands in direct opposition to the cancerous American profit ethic, the paradigm that sends individuals fleeing from each other in the public and private spheres, fearful that if one assumes the geas of caring for another, one’s security/retirement fund/college experience/life plan/ ”me time” might be lost or greatly reduced or altered in some frightening way beyond individual control. The donations of participants and allies buy the land for the project: owning the land HOMEFULNESS stands upon free and clear will insulate the community from the vicissitudes of rent and land speculation, but the heart of HOMEFULNESS is the idea of people banding together to create stability through shared sweat, assets, and commitment to being not only our brother’s keeper, but our brother’s daughter’s keeper, and our sister’s boyfriend’s mother’s keeper, and the keeper of the Paki grocery store owner down the block.

HOMEFULNESS is a vision of intention, rooted in the idea that taking responsibility for each other in love and mutual accountability is a radical act.

I wasn’t supposed to write this article- in fact, I was actively discouraged by someone I love in the deepest way. “You can’t write an article about (SF 49ers coach)  Mike Singletary’s firing," said Tony Robles, POOR Magazine’s co-editor and dedicated fan. I just didn't understand the basic tenets of football, winning rules all, i was informed. and he wasn't "winning".

Perhaps no. After-all US football is a multi-milllion dollar corporate enterprise fueled by  capitalist values of "in with the old- out with the new" and, "nothing matters except winning" There is no space, time or budget for feelings, loving your mama, your wife or your children. 

Which is why I feel so bad about his recent firing. How much is integrity and honor worth in the world of football? Very little, I guess. So I am  weighing in with a different football proposal. How about keeping him on as a coach and hiring a co-coach. How about bringing all the football scholars in the 49ers together and collectively thinking through how to win the next season and the next and the next. How bout bringing football closer to its indigenous roots of rugby and other early forms of football that were competitive but also operated with deep rooted cultural ideology and ethics

I know, I have seen those really mean, rock faced guys who are in the hall of fame and are seen as the “best” coaches of all time, but in a world where so many young folks are dealing with violence, peer pressure, drugs, and superficial pop culture empty-ness, how important is it to value, honor and uphold a man of color who struggled through  poverty and a racist US culture to become a great father, son, husband and dare I say it, a great human.?

Hello Peeps,

Krip-Hop Nation made it across the pond!  Got into Liverpool, UK from Belfast Ireland where I was invited by the coordinators of the 4^th Annual Outburst Queer Arts Festival to present about Krip-Hop Nation.  I like to thank the coordinators of the festival for inviting me. 

Although the festival started on the 12^th and lasted until the 20^th my two days there were amazing! I saw some cutting edge work by Brian Lobel, his one man play, Ball & Other Funny Stories About Cancer and Pete Edwards, in his play, FAT, about a gay disabled man falling in love with a fat man.  After two nights in Belfast, I flew to Liverpool, UK for DADA Festival, the oldest and largest Disabled & Deaf Art Festival in the UK and Europe where I and Krip-Hop Nation will be until Nov. 29^th. 

I barely made it on time getting out of a taxi in a different country walking down a narrow lane called School Lane where the venue, Bluecoat, is was like a rush.  A friendly lady guided me to Bluecoat, where The Powerhouse of Superman:  Does Gay Culture Exclude Otherness panel was about to start.  Yes, I was on the panel with a mixture of GBLT & disabled artists.  I hope my good alley listening and supporting skills were shinning plus shared what Sins is doing and my own experience as a Black disabled man.  Thank you my queer brothers, sisters and friends and the Sins Invalid crew for educating me.   I hope next time Sins Invalid crew will be here.

Sunday morning is the talk\poetry that I will do about Sins Invalid at 11am.  Krip-Hop members will be coming in on the 24^th I can’t wait!  Krip-Hop Nation is also connecting with peeps who can’t make the festival and we have invited everybody who are disabled and into Hip-Hop to share their stories with us by writing a one page about living as a disabled British artists/activists and we will post it here on www.POORmagazine.org and on Krip-Hop Facebook page.  Look for the 1st story by an North East of England disabled Hip--Hop artists/activists, PJ and his wife Scarlett Angel SilentKnight.  Of course the Hotel internet rates are high so we might have to wait to post some until I get back home but will try to do our best.

Krip-Hop Nation will also be in London on Nov. 25 to meet with supporters and hope will have some audio and pictures.

If you are in Liverpool come by on Sunday for Sins Invalid intro presentation/performance by Leroy Moore 11-1pm at Bluecoat, Liverpool, UK. & Krip-Hop Nation on Saturday 27 6-8pm Learn some of the Krip Hop Collective’s skills in this workshop, suitable for all. Krip-Hop Nation Networking Sunday 28, 1-4pm Parr Street Studio

Address:

The Bluecoat, School Lane, Liverpool L1 3BX

Tele:  +44 (0) 151 707 1733

www.dadafest2010.co.uk

In many ways the heart of homefulness is the struggle and fight for the International
Hotel. The “I-Hotel” was the epicenter for the fight for affordable housing in San
Francisco in the late 60's and 70's amidst a climate of business expansion and gentrification of neighborhoods—full-scale removal of neighborhoods, such as Manilatown, adjacent to San Francisco’s Chinatown, to make way for the expansion and voracious hunger for land on the part of the city’s financial district.
 

I grew up eating across the street from the I-Hotel, across the table from my father who
would order food from the waitress everybody affectionately called mama. “Mama, give
me rice, pig nose, Chinese sausage and oxtail”. I’d watch mama give the order to Jim,
the cook; a Filipino old timer whose eyes said everything his mouth couldn’t.

Mama would bring out the food and I’d watch my father pick it up with his hands—rice
mixed with pig, mixed with fish—against the backdrop of the I-hotel—the abandoned
brick building across the street from the Silverwing Café and Smokey Wong’s garage. It
was the heart of Manilatown, the place where Filipino and Chinese elders lived. It was a
place where artists and poets created their art for the community in place like the Kearny
Street Worshop. It was where young revolutionaries like Bill Sorro answered the call
when it was slated to be demolished--displacing its elder residents to make way for a
parking lot. I can never forget the image of Bill Sorro captured in the film, The Fall of
the I-Hotel, walking to the offices of Walter Shorenstein—billionaire landlord of the I-
Hotel, saying, “I’m here to speak to Mr. Shorenstein”. I thought, that’s the kind of man I
want to be, a real man.

I’d watch my father eat in the indigenous way, with his hands, while I used knife and
fork. What I saw as a kid was merely my father eating breakfast, but what I see as a man
is our ancestors from the I-Hotel, and the ancestors who preceded them, speaking through my father. The act of going back to Manilatown after it had literally been destroyed was an act of resistance—the act of being close to the I-Hotel, empty, but not abandoned
following the eviction of its tenants, was an act of resistance to the forced uprooting of
the Manilatown community. The act of eating with his hands was my father’s resistance
to the forced capitalist notions of what is decent and proper and acceptable.

What was not acceptable or decent was the eviction of our elders from the I-Hotel, elders
who had worked their entire lives to achieve the American Dream but were confronted
by the myths and lies that make up the layers of that dream. It was the community’s
dream—the community of poets, artists, activists, students, and ordinary people—to
have a place where our elders could gather with the youth and celebrate their lives. To
celebrate their struggle—which is the best part of our poetry—gathering together, eating
with their hands, and, as the poet Al Robles once wrote, “Taste the thick adobo tales of
their lives”.

Someone once wrote, it’s not what you look at, but rather, what you see. Capitalism
sees only more, wants only more. It has no memory beyond the latest sale or row of
figures. Capitalism cannot quantify the heart because capitalism has no heart. It will
not—cannot-- recognize work that has no paycheck and boss attached to the end of it.
Capitalism doesn’t concern itself with what you did yesterday, much less 10-20 years
ago. That’s why it was of no consequence—in capitalism’s eyes--that the elders of the
I-Hotel were discarded after a lifetime of work, their small rooms containing lifetimes
of memories of struggle demolished after a long and hard fought battle on the part of the
elders to keep their homes. In the eyes of capitalism, parking lots hold more importance
than people.

Homefulness is a dream that will become a reality. Homefulness is housing that is
not concerned with how much money you earn but rather is concerned with equity
and justice. Homefulness is about honoring our elders and youth and recognizing the
things one brings to the community that does not destroy the community: activism,
interdependence, eldership, art, poetry and the act of surviving an inhuman system
backed by corporate misinformation, ideals, the police and the non-profit industrial
complex. It is a dream that was planted long ago by the elders of the International Hotel
who knew that housing is a human right.

It was a dream that was honestly articulated by the poet Al Robles who said of the
Manongs (The Filipino elders of the I-Hotel) “They need a place because there is no
place for them”. Homefulness is that place, a place that is our own and not tied down to
one’s income. It is a place conceived by the poverty, disabled and migrant scholars of
POOR Magazine who see possibilities beyond the struggle to be housed and the unequal
dynamics that exist between the landlords and the landless. It is a place where we can eat
with just our hands, like our ancestors did. A place where we can say, “Mama, can I have
more rice”. And there’s enough rice for everybody.

© 2010 Tony Robles

My Name is Pj, I have autism and i live in the north east of England. My story is about discrimination in all sectors including that of hip-hop and the general music industry. 

I have had a discriminative past through my time on earth, i have been excluded from four primary schools, 3 high schools, 2 colleges because i fought those who discriminated against myself or others. I have been sacked from almost 30 jobs and only lasted one week per job, however i write in this section of the abuse particularly within hip hop and the music industry.
　　
My story begins in the year 2000, my dad just bought me a new computer, i have no social outlook or any kind of interaction with the outside world, new to the internet i wanted to reach out to people, the computer, was much like my best friend.
　
I got in contact with a girl who guided me to express my oppression and exclusion from society by writing poems, she offered that this would heal my internal pain, as i started to develop theses poems she sent me some music, a new kind of music to me, it was entitled "changes" from Tupac yes that's what i needed, change.
　
She said to me as i listened to this music "why don't you rap?" i thought was this what this guy was doing? Rapping? i liked what i heard i researched hip hop and i saw it stood for social justice, freedom and equality, based on love and not money, based on peace and not war.

I thought this would be a perfect example to reflect the internal pain out to the world. Sadly, i soon found out this was not the case, actually was the total opposite and seemed a world away from the creation of what hip hop was founded on.

 

I bought a small production software for my computer and decided to try out some new songs, i put them on a website called soundclick, within my first two week i was number one on the website charts, i never knew what type of reaction i would get next.　On the internet numerous of comments came flashing before my eyes "your wack" "you're sh**t" through hundreds of people, some good comments were given but however the sheer hate from these individuals paralyzed me in to distinction, my world on the outside was crippling me, now my own world was killing me.
　
I wrote to my local paper informing them on being number one on soundclick.com and soon had my photo and story across the whole town, eventually been ridiculed and tormented for expressing my past oppression, i stood silent, frozen wondering what am i doing? i must of been crazy ( more troubling than my own disability), i was saying to myself should i stop this and hide behind a rock? No i thought i shall continue.
　
After a few more exposures in the paper as a regular feature i was becoming a town star, numerous appearances within three years including the local radio station, eventually i had a call from a woman over the phone who informed me of her book about a disabled boy who had turned to hip hop.  She wrote that book based on me and i had given her the inspiration.   This made me continue. She asked me to come to the local town library where school children were there waiting for me. I was nervous and anxious but i knew i had to do this.  From where i started, in just over 3 years, i was becoming more known by the day.
　
I eventually wanted to create a hip hop group which at the time was creating a buzz, we was touring, playing at different events and supporting the local big names in our county. Then once again things turned horrid, group conflicts arised and the group disbanded, i was left alone again, with a status that was not as rewarding as i thought, sometimes on the bus minding my own business some strangers asked me are you that rapper in the paper? It wasn't fun or good anymore to be known.
　
Through the years I developed my lyrics, my rapping and my music and networked with the biggest names in UK hip hop, eventually producing my best track with a big UK hip hop producer.
　
In 2007 i met my now to be wife, honored a distribution contract and i eventually released my first song, i moved home and as i moved home with my wife to be i was getting hate mail from where i used to live, eventually i had to stop the producing, rapping all together to have a deep breath of fresh air and my wife realizing i needed closure and understanding about helping me understand my persona.  I eventually been diagnosed officially as having asperger's syndrome.
　
Once I found this out, i knew exactly why i had been ridiculed, i knew why i had wanted to make music and i knew then that nothing can stop me in my ventures, finding about my disability never made me feel weak, it made me or the first time strong, very strong.
　
This was a gift to me and i was going to use it, me and my wife set up an organization on a social networking site "stop discrimination against special needs" because i felt victimized, it was just a group i made because i was upset, it wasn't meant to be a group were thousands could join.
　
Over two years other disabled people felt my pain and a movement began, 3,000 people have joined this movement just in the UK, another 5 thousand in South Africa, 1,000 in Romania and two thousand in America which is still growing. As this started i began to think and i thought i need to go to London and voice this out, i need to bring every disabled person together to stop the discrimination which is so wide spread and nothing has been done about it.  my wife and I made a organization and we made a website www.nserd.org which combats all forms of disability discrimination and our aims and goals.
　

Since moving and being married i have been supported unanimously by my wife and her family and i am for ever grateful from the hardship i received not just in music but in general, i am now a fighter, an activist and advocate for disabled people, i am fiercely passionate about the people that care and the people that are disabled, i am fully focused on that issue.
　
Since i have become stronger i have met some rather uneducated rappers who have stated lines such as "I will fight disabled people, f**k em" "you need to sort your mental illness out" " disabled people should not rap" "neurotypicals should not be apart of disabled and should have separate groups....."
　
i was astonished but i thought well you're going to get a backlash of many who believe they know it all and are more powerful, it reminds me of a roman conquest were the Celts push them out of the north and are barracked by the Hadrian's wall indeed this is now where disabled people are at in this century.
　
We are fighting back and i am full runner to make a point.  I have always been rebellious, confronting, and yet i can sustain vulnerability. I am kind, gentle and i have an innocent almost angelic personality with soul of passionate fire.
　
People today want justice weather that be with the governments, the banks or the conspiracies of new world order however theses same people who want truth and unity are ignorant to who have suffered since time began: the undesirables.
　
Since ancient Greece or even before people with disabilities have been used, poked at and ridiculed, from medieval woodcut of witches to circus "freaks", what a lot religious people do not realize is that the majority of all prophets were disabled, any Muslim or Christen who laughs at a disabled person is laughing against gods own prophetical children, these same people are blasphemous against their very own god and prophet, i speak for god because god protects the disabled, disabled are the most valuable to god, not because they are weak or disabled, but because the disabled believe!.
　
One example of a disabled prophet is Mohammed peace be upon him and Moses peace be upon him, and shall we not forget Jesus loved disabled people like his very own.  Therefore I continue this trend today!  Stay Tune for more of my words right here on Poor Magazine/Krip-Hop Nation

By Pj DoubletheTrouble of Northeast of England

For me, ‘Homefullness’ is what life is meant to be…

To be free…raise my family…alongside my community…while thriving nutritionally…

To be thankful for all that we have while ‘having’ collectively…giving back to pachamama, to
plant that fruit tree…feeding nature…my baby…us…we.

No landlord…who can hoard…my money…jus’ wanna’ live by what our ancestors taught…don’t
need to be bought…sold out, pimped and played…so an oppressor, speculator, investor,
regulator, invader, infiltrator, hater, manipulator can get paid…

Jus’ need a safe-warm bed for my family…community…

All that are simply what represents humanity…

Not an individualistic existence of loneliness…

We must find interdependence within one another to become what is truly ‘HOMEFULNESS’.

Reflect Back

Would u do it the same?
It’s a lonely path
But no one is to blame

Started alone
1 turned into a few then many
But who really gets it

Is it too complicated?
Should I write more on it?
I can feel it, it’s right

Some can’t hold the politics
Others see I
Few can put the pieces together
To view the bigger picture

Music like any art has become
A lonely profession
Art movements long gone

Am I holding on to the past?
Internet, home studios & start-ups
Are double edge swords

Brought it back to the people
But now people are inside
In individual houses
To come back outside with individual products

Still getting ripped off by others
Self-determination is not only selling yourself
Yes, Ray Charles was a musical genius
He was also a brilliant businessman

Can we learn from Blues elders
Or do we see them as just old & bitter
Artists/activists get it

What is it worth
Preaching to the choir
But the choir gives strength
When you feel alone on the road

Is there social justice in music
Not just talking about lyrics
Or will it remain private

Artists hire to entertain
Make people clap and dance
But not to think

Immortal Technique
Is a one-man island
Back to I and getting mines

Is it a catch 22
How did they do it back in the day
Still no one to blame
Sad to see our art has turned into a game

Living off art
It was done
The question is what is living
With today’s cost of living

Forget about MTV Videos
Big cars big rings all of that bling bling
Just pay my rent
Keep me out of nursing homes when I get old

Spread the wealth
With good health
Not just another cooperate franchise
Pulling down neighborhood’s worth

Not moving to Beverly Hills
Taking money out of banks
And put it into the People’s Union

Will the ripple turn into a wave
Not in my life time
But the time is coming

Am I ahead of my time
Or do I want to blend old to new
Anyway we see it
One thing is true things will change

Reflecting back
Looking forward
Feeling supported in the present
To continue this work

Knowing the fruits will be eaten
Food for thought for youth
As they grow into adulthood

Leroy Moore
11/12/10

HOUSING FIRST: IF YOU BUILD IT THEY WILL COME ISN'T JUST A SLOGAN

Prensa Pobre/POOR Magazine

Proyecto de RECLAMMAR

La campana comunitaria Revolucionaria!

Reclamar el Acceso de Tierra Comunitaria por la inversion en la madre Tierra

 Your product, service or organization will have a unique reach to an extremely wide net of ages, backgrounds and cultures from very poor folks in struggle to conscious folks with privileged backgrounds. We have thousands of hits a day and we are read, watched and listened to locally and globally.

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La audiencia de prensa Pobre y futuros clientes tendrán un alcance exclusivo a la red extrema variada de todas las edades, razas y de situaciones económicas de las personas que luchan y son muy pobres a personas conscientes con el fondo privilegiado. Tenemos 100,00 visitas al día y nos leen, ven y escuchan a nivel local y global.

RECLAIM Project

The revolutionary Community Ad Campaign!

Reclaiming Community & Land Access (through) Investment In Mother Earth

GENTRIFUKATION TOURS

“R”

US

 (Aburgesamiento Gira

“Somos”

Nosotros)

“Coming to a Displaced, Dismantled, Redeveloped Neighborhood Near You”

“Viniendo a  un desplazamiento, Desmantelado, Barrio Rediseñado Cerca de Tí”

Mission Statement

We the people, communities of color, workers, migrants, grandfathers and grandmothers, mamas, daddies, elders, babies, young folks, indigenous ancestors and aboriginal peoples who have spent time and love and sweat and tears and prayers caring for, working, dreaming and loving this community, this barrio, this street, this tree, this garden, this flower, for generations, centuries and time beyond Gregorian, missionary calendars, have been displaced by the forces of money, power, real estate speculation, corporate theft, corporate government,  philanthro-PIMPING, redevelopment, criminalization, and gentrification and now only exist as a cultural memory, an “art-I-fact”, a reference, a brush stroke, a photo, an exhibit, a dream to be studied, theorized, painted over, documented and/or forgotten and erased completely as though we were never here.

GENTRIFUKATION TOURS “R” US exists to document the theft, reclaim & take back the stolen spaces,  memories, images, pictures, lives and dreams. To tour and document the default colonizers and 21^st Century Missionaries, the erased and colonized culture and cultural stealers, to re-insert ourselves in the stolen landmark and to reclaim what little of us might still be left 

Declaración de Misión

Nosotros la Gente, comunidades de color, trabajadores, migrantes, abuelos y abuelas, mamas, papas, ancianos, babes, jovenes, ancestros indigenas y los pueblos aborígenes que han pasado tiempo, amor y sudor y lágrimas y oraciones para  cuidar, trabajar, soñar y amar en esta comunidad, este barrio, esta calle, este árbol, este jardín, esta flor, para las generaciones, siglos y el tiempo más allá de los Gregorianos, calendarios misioneros, han sido desplazados por las fuerzas del dinero, el poder, la especulación inmobiliaria, el robo corporativo, gobierno corporativo, los chantaje filantrópico-, la reconstrucsion, la criminalización y el aburguesamiento y ahora sólo existe como una memoria cultural, un "arte-teologico" , una referencia, un trazo de pincel, una foto, una exposición, un sueño para ser estudiado, teorizado, pintado, documentado y / e olvidado y borrado por completo, como si nunca estuvimos aquí.

GENTRIFUKATION TOURS “R” US existe para documentar el robo, retomar y recuperar los espacios robados, recuerdos, imágenes, fotos, vidas y sueños.

Para visitar y documentar los colonizadores por defecto y  misioneros del siglo 21, la cultura borrada y colonizada y ladrones culturales, para volver a insertar a nosotros mismos en el punto de referencia robados y para recuperar lo poco de nosotros  que todavía puede ser recuperado.

TOUR #1 Sites: Gentrifyers on Stolen Land

1.The Redstone building- Sacred Ohlone shell mound site and home of revolutionary labor and community organizations in SF- Facing Con-DO removal

2. Grub 758 Valencia- post-gentrified site: hipsters grazing site on stolen land

3. The Summit SF- post gentrified site: - hipsters grazing and lap-top site

4. Spork 1058 Valencia post-gentrified site; hipster grazing site on stolen land

5.Herbivore 983 Valencia hipster grazing site on stolen land

6. Flour & Water 2401 Harrison hipster grazing site on stolen land

7. Farina 3560 18^th street – Hipster grazing site on stolen land

8. Gracias Madre 2211 Mission street – Hipster Grazing site with cultural theft on stolen land

9. Mamahouse: 1156 Florida st Home of poor mothers gentrified and evicted by real estate speculation.

©A Community Resistance PeopleAtion..

Serving silenced peoples and removed indigenous folks since 1493