Name
2010
  • No Po'Lice Terror

    09/24/2021 - 09:21 by Anonymous (not verified)
    Original Author
    Tiny
    Original Body

    Debajo en Espanol

     

    Our family of POOR Magazine poverty, race, migrant, disability, youth and indigenous scholars hold in our collective hearts the pain of Oscar Grant’s mama and all the mamaz and daddys and tio’s y tias, y abuelas y abuelos who have lost children to the culture of deadly force, abuse and murder called the Police in Amerikkka.

     

    Brother Oscar Grant, along with Ayana Jones, Idriss Stelley, Amadou Diallo, Sean Bell, their families and so many more victims of Po’Lice terror are honored on our altar of ancestor heroes in resistance at POOR Magazine. We send our prayers of healing and deep love. And with the utmost respect for the mama and families, we also stand in solidarity with many thousands of families and community members who are collectively screaming Enough!. No more killing of our babies, racial profiling and harassment of our communities No more lies about protection, and service. No MORE po’lice terror EVER!.

     

    So is a world without para-military occupying soldiers, rooted in white supremacy, trained to kill, armed with weapons of mass destruction and sworn to loyalty to each other's protection above all else, possible?

     

    For the masses of corporate media propagandized, born and bred into the cult of independence, institutional and structural racism and the bootstraps mentality it might not be.

     

    US dominant culture works hard to separate and alienate our elder’s scholarship and traditions from our youth’s minds, our cultures out of and away from our communities and our ancestors teachings crushed and replaced by lies of wealth and privilege for all. We are taught  that our own personal happiness is of the utmost importance, that everything needs to happen immediately, and simply and our happiness is tied to how much we have and own not how much we know and how many people we are caring for.  We do nothing as a society to truly care, protect and hold our women and mothers and children so there is NEVER abuse of a woman or a child by someone so lost in their own struggle and or addiction that they perpetuate violence on the people they love.

     

    Can we envision ourselves collectively, interdependently, dreaming and holding our ancestors teachings?

     

    How does this happen. It begins with us breaking through the hypocrisy of our own lives on the daily. Recognizing our own impulse to resort to po’lice calls in situations of struggle cause it’s easier and faster to solve a “difficult problem” But of course it’s much deeper than that

     

    As an indigenous people-led, poor people led, family created, arts organization, launched by a landless, indigenous mother and daughter in poverty POOR Magazine practices ancestor worship, eldership, care-giving and interdependence with a mandate of no Po’Lice calls ever. We have implemented a Community Council process based on our indigenous teachings which includes a meeting of all peoples involved in a conflict meeting for as long as it takes to hear everyone’s perspective with ground rules of respect and love and care-giving and inter-dependence.

     

    And this process is always lengthy and messy and sad and strange and revelatory and beautiful. It’s not perfect, and always extremely difficult. But why shouldn’t it be. Why would or should solving human personal and organizational struggles ever be easy.

     

    As a mother of a young child, and a survivor of both domestic violence and child sexual abuse, I am most concerned about how women and children aren’t protected in this society and I realize that we have much to learn about caring and protecting all of Creator’s peoples.

     

    POOR Magazine’s Community Council is only one humble, in-organization example of people-led accountability, there is much to learn from other people-led accountability projects such as the Audrey Lorde Project , Alwaysasafespace and CUAV, as well as revolutionary concepts and ideas from groups like Critical Resistance and Incite.

     

    But it really begins with re-thinking all of these things and the ways in which so many of us have been informed, taught, racialized and lied to about the notion of  safety and security itself. And how security has been equated with guns and walls and batons and tasers and then this concept of so-called security is used by multi-national corporations like Halliburton and Blackwater to make money on the backs of our fear and our desire for a simple answer to that fear.

     

    Finally it is most important to remember that we are people, with culture, spirit, love and care and protection hard-wired in us. We must work harder, think deeper, dream bigger, love stronger to care for each other inter-dependently. Always.

     

    En Espanol

     

     

    Nuestra familia de prensa POBRE los pobres, raza, migrantes, discapacitados, jovenes y academicos ind’genos guardamos en nuestros corazones el dolor colectivo de la mam‡ de Oscar Grant y todos las MAMAZ, PAPAZ y tias, tios, abuelas y abuelos que han perdido a sus hij@s a la cultura de la fuerza letal, el abuso y el asesinato llam— a la polic’a en AmeriKKKa.

    Nuestro hermano Oscar Grant, junto con Ayana Jones, Stelley Idriss, Amadou Diallo, Sean Bell, y sus familias y las demas v’ctimas del terror de la Po'Licia, honrados en nuestro altar de los heroes de la resistencia a los antepasados en Prensa POBRE. Enviamos nuestras oraciones de sanaci—n y amor profundo. Con el m‡ximo respeto por la mam‡ y las familias, tambien en solidaridad con miles de familias y miembros de la comunidad que son colectivamente gritando Basta!. NO mas  matazon de nuestros bebes, los perfiles raciales y el acoso de nuestras comunidades No m‡s mentiras sobre la protecci—n y servicio. NO Mas terror POÕlicial.

    As’ que es un mundo sin soldados ocupantes para-militares, enraizada en la supremac’a blanca, entrenados para matar, armados con armas de destrucci—n masiva y jurado lealtad a la protecci—n de los dem‡s por encima de todo, es posible?

    Para las masas de la propaganda de los medios corporativos, nacidos y criados en el culto de la independencia, institucional, el racismo estructural y las botas que mentalmente no pueda ser.

    la cultura dominante de los EE.UU. trabaja duro para separar y alejar al ensenamiento y sabiduria de nuestros mayores de las mentes de nuestra juventud, nuestras culturas y de fuera de nuestras comunidades y nuestras ense–anzas antepasados aplastados y sustituidos por las mentiras de la riqueza y el privilegio para todos. Se nos ense–a que nuestra felicidad personal es de suma importancia, que todo lo que tiene que ocurrir de inmediato, y simplemente y nuestra felicidad est‡ ligada a la cantidad que tenemos y no propia de lo que sabemos y cu‡nta gente nos est‡ cuidando. No hacemos nada como sociedad para realmente se preocupan, proteger y mantener a nuestras mujeres y madres y los ni–os por lo que NUNCA es un abuso de una mujer o un ni–o por alguien tan perdido en su propia lucha y / o adicci—n que perpetœan la violencia en las personas que aman.

    ÀPodemos imaginar colectivamente, de manera interdependiente, so–ando y la celebraci—n de nuestras ense–anzas de nuestros antepasados?

    ÀC—mo sucede esto? Comienza con nosotros romper la hipocres’a de nuestras propias vidas en el d’a. Al reconocer nuestro propio impulso de recurrir a las llamadas a la POÕlicia en situaciones de lucha que causa m‡s sencillo y r‡pido para resolver un problema "dif’cil". Pero por supuesto es mucho m‡s profundo que eso.

    Como un pueblo ind’gena liderada por los pobres llev—, la familia creada, organizaci—n art’stica, iniciada por una madre sin tierra, ind’genas y su hija en la pobreza prensa POBRE culto ancestro pr‡cticas, ancianos, cuidado de la entrega y la interdependencia con el mandato de no llamar a la POÕlicia nunca. Hemos implementado un proceso de consejo de la Comunidad sobre la base de nuestras ense–anzas ind’genas, que incluye una reuni—n de todos los pueblos que participan en una reuni—n de los conflictos durante el tiempo que sea necesario para escuchar la perspectiva de todos con reglas de juego de respeto y el amor y la prestaci—n de cuidados e interdependencia.

    Y este proceso es siempre largo, sucio, triste, extra–a, reveladora y hermoso. No es perfecto, y siempre muy dif’cil. Pero Àpor quŽ no habr’a de ser. ÀPor quŽ o deber’a resolver humanos personales y organizacionales luchas nunca ser‡ f‡cil.

    Como madre de un ni–o peque–o, un sobreviviente de la violencia domŽstica y abuso sexual infantil, estoy m‡s preocupado por c—mo las mujeres y los ni–os no est‡n protegidos en esta sociedad y me doy cuenta de que tenemos mucho que aprender sobre el cuidado y protecci—n de todos de los pueblos Creador.

    El Consejo de la comunidad de Prensa POBRE es s—lo un humilde, en la organizaci—n de ejemplo de la rendici—n de cuentas de personas dirigidas por, hay mucho que aprender de otros proyectos de la rendici—n de cuentas de personas encabezada, como el Proyecto Audrey Lorde, el espacio siempre seguro y CUAV, as’ como los conceptos revolucionarios y ideas de grupos como Resistencia Cr’tica e inciten a ella.

    En realidad comienza con repensar todas estas cosas y las formas en que tantos de nosotros hemos sido informados, la ense–anza de la raza y mentido acerca de la noci—n de la seguridad y la propia seguridad. Y c—mo la seguridad se ha equiparado con armas de fuego y las paredes y palos y armas Taser y luego este concepto de que la supuesta seguridad es utilizado por empresas multinacionales como Halliburton y Blackwater para hacer dinero a costa de nuestro miedo y nuestro deseo de una respuesta simple a ese miedo.

    Por œltimo es muy importante recordar que somos personas, con la cultura, esp’ritu, el amor y el cuidado y la protecci—n hard-wired en nosotros. Tenemos que trabajar m‡s, pensar m‡s profundo, sue–o m‡s grande, el amor m‡s fuerte para cuidar a los dem‡s cosas-dependiente. Siempre.

    Tags
  • (Wrongful) Use of Force

    09/24/2021 - 09:21 by Anonymous (not verified)
    Original Author
    PNNscholar1
    Original Body

    POOR columnist and police brutality survivor, Marlon Crump tells about his legal battle against the SFPD.

    Marlon Crump

    PNN Tuesday, November 20, 2007;

    "There is nothing more frightening, more scary, more terrifying than someone opening and coming through your door..........unannounced."

    Last year the San Francisco Chronicle ran a month long series entitled "Use of Force" in which they chronicled past events of misconduct by the San Francisco Police Department. At the time, my case was still being investigated by the police oversight agency, the Office of Citizens Complaints (O.C.C) so nothing was written regarding my own brutal encounter with S.F.P.D members.

    Just last month, the two-year anniversary of my worst police encounter occurred. On October 7th 2005 a dozen members of the S.F.P.D. stormed the AllStar Hotel, single room occupancy on 16th/Folsom Streets, where I still live. It was almost midnight. I was in my room, preparing to leave to pick up some food from the store with my food stamp card when suddenly my door lock clicked opened.

    The next thing I knew, I was staring down the barrels of numerous guns carried by a squad of officers yelling obscenities at me. This is an image that will be forever seared into my memory and one that still haunts me to this day. One of the officers was a young short Filipino man, with a receding hairline named Officer Angel G. Lozano, I would later learn he had falsely prompted his assisting fellow officers and their commanding personnel of his "possible location of a black male armed robbery suspect, wearing a long black leather coat" at the AllStar.

    Prior to his "capture" of me, he was with another fellow officer, a short Chinese man with a dark crew-cut named Raymond Lee.

    Both officers swore to the AllStar Hotel Resident Manager, Robert Williams that I was a suspect in a robbery and that they needed a spare room key for my unit. By this time, nearly a dozen officers had arrived onto the premises. Despite the protests by Mr. Williams, he finally relented and relinquished my spare room key to the officers.

    All of this was occurring as I sat inside my room preparing to go to the supermarket, unaware of the near-death experience that awaited me and forever changed my life. After a negative identification by the witnesses and victims of the armed robbery incident that took place in the area, Officer Angel Lozano was ordered on his walkie-talkie to let me go, and he gave me back my spare room key.

    The very moment the police stormed my SRO, I knew that every single police procedural protocol was shattered--civil and privacy rights. Everything in my life was torn apart in that instant, just like the rip inside of my long leather black trench coat. I needed to seek retribution from a legal perspective, as I wasn't the type to always march with a picket sign, or violently fight back.

    Justice doesn't ultimately mean having to resort to illegal or violent means. I would speak out against the injustices I endured by speaking truth, even if it meant a long hard struggle. After making a complaint with the Office of Citizen's Complaints, I filed a California Government Tort Claim against the City and County of San Francisco, on October 14th, 2005.

    An investigator named Sandra Garcia was assigned to my claim and about two months after the initial filing and the incident, it was denied. "I spoke to a sergeant of the Mission District Station and they stated there was probable cause to detain you and no officer did any damage to your coat. He recommended that your claim be denied, Mr. Crump." I really wasn't surprised by this initial denial.

    Throughout my ordeal, I've learned that just about any city government agency and police department will go through any lengths, even if it's a violation of state or even federal law to conceal any of its member's wrong doings, and ultimately, to discourage a complainant from demanding accountability.

    I began attending a weekly meeting at San Francisco City Hall held every Wednesday by seven members of the Board of San Francisco Police Commissioners, which governs the SFPD and the Office of Citizen's Complaints. I also learned that unwarranted intrusions into an S.R.O tenant's room happened frequently and I decided to raise this issue to the police commissioners.

    During the next two years I frequently attended, my case of unwarranted action by S.F.P.D members was sustained last year, and I pursued a civil action against San Francisco as a pro se litigant this year. I was also anticipating some sort of disciplinary action to be brought towards Lozano, Lee, and the rest of the officers of the Mission District Station that took part in that course of action.

    Unfortunately, because of last year's right-wing/patriotic U.S. Supreme Court ruling of Copley Press in San Diego, a ruling that prevents a citizen from accessing a police officer's complaint history, or being present at a police review hearing during an intended disciplinary action upon an officer accused of misconduct; I may never know what discipline, if any was ever imposed upon Officer Lozano and his assisting personnel officers. This very ruling still causes a great controversy. I did, however, discover that Officer Angel G. Lozano has a past history of misconduct.

    After viewing an old archive last year on S.F.GOV website, I found out that there was possibly disciplinary action against him in May and December of 2001, but of course, with Copley Press and certain provisions in State Law and the Peace Officer's Bill of Rights, I was able to access very little.

    It took me nearly seven months to even obtain a police report regarding the officer's conduct upon me. I received the practiced responses over and over again. "Oh it's a slow process", or it might be "privileged information" or "your case is still being investigated". It was only after constant complaining at the police commission hearings that I finally received a copy of the original from Hall of Justice.

    After examining the document, I was even more certain of Officers Lozano and Lee's lying. A huge paragraph in the "Narrative" section of the report, regarding the dialog between Lee, Lozano, and resident manager Robert Williams was blackened out. Why? Because there was something of an improper procedural protocol and of an incriminatory nature they tried to desperately conceal, and this was confirmed after I received another copy of the same police incident report before the year 2006 ended.

    This particular report showed the paragraph in which the "sworn" statements by Lozano and Lee were that the suspect was wearing a brown jacket, tan pants, he stood about 5'7-5'8 tall with a baseball cap, which was completely different of my description as I stand 6'3 wore a long black leather coat, white dress shirt and black slacks.

    The report also failed to mention that the key was demanded repeatedly from Mr. Robert Williams. The common denominator between myself, and this robbery suspect was only the color of our skin. Officer Angel G. Lozano apparently has a history of brutality and misconduct according to insider sources. Lozano's lack of proper procedural protocols is a potentially dangerous threat towards every citizen, but particularly for those living in an S.R.O Hotel, or in a community that is considered "poor" or of "color."

    The brutality I endured at the hands of a poorly trained, highly unprofessional, and possibly violent police officer could have happened to anybody and with fatal results. That is why I continue to fight against this injustice by representing myself. I cannot risk turning over my case and my humiliation to the City, state or some unconcerned lawyer. I urge all of those who have suffered a similar fate in our criminal injustice system to speak out and fight their own battle. We cannot continue to allow our safety, humanity and well-being to be threatened at the hands of law enforcement officials.

    Tags
  • From Public Housing To Homelessness

    09/24/2021 - 09:21 by Anonymous (not verified)
    Original Author
    cayley
    Original Body

    A single mother relates the horror story of displacement out of San Francisco Public Housing into Homelessness

     

    The deep sounds of never ending, mind-numbing,headache generating traffic bombarded the weather-beaten glass of the 6 motel (not to be confused with the pricier Motel 6), as I sat with displacement survivor and former Valencia Gardens tenant Linda William.

    Driving up highway 80 East I kept referring to my friend and fellow PNN writer's careful directions, " Its sort of near Vallejo" she had said quietly on the phone, the weight of her horrendous dilemma flooding her voice, " I couldn't actually afford a motel in Vallejo, they were too expensive and all the cheap ones were filled" , she concluded wearily

    It had been almost two years since Linda took the "sweet deal" offerred by Housing Authority to move out of her long-time residence at Valencia Gardens in San Francisco, Valencia being one of many hundreds of public housing projects in the Bay Area and across the nation labeled "bad" and targeted for "redevelopment" which resulted in the massive displacement of low-income tenants from public housing to essentially "a piece of paper" i.e., these tenants were handed a section 8 voucher and alot of promises of available market rate or privately owned low-income housing projects but ended up, like Linda, homeless, or as those of us in the know say; public housing was better than no housing, "they gave me a section 8 certificate and said I could go anywhere with it, of course I had always had a dream of moving out of the city with my 2 kids and I thought this was my big chance"

    As Linda spoke the hairs stood up on the back of my neck, I, too, was relying on a pending section 8 certificate to stabilize the ever unstable housing of myself, my mother and my 9 month old son, but from all the recent reports out of the Bush administration, this "stable housing" might remain a dream.

    "So with that certificate I started the search for housing in Vallejo, Fairfield and Marin, "Linda continued her story unphased by my uh huhs and head nodding, "well whaddya know, I found closed wait lists on almost all the low-income housing units in all of those places and all the rest of the landlords wouldn't even return my calls when I told them I had section 8" As Linda continued to explain how she transferred her certificate to Alameda County hoping for better luck in Oakland, I remembered the hideously classist and racist experience of trying to find an apartment when I told landlords that I was on section 8, "Ohhhhh noooo, I don't think so" they would say, dreams of welfare moms dancing in their collective land-holding heads.

    "Eventually, I found a place in the middle of so much gang-mess, that one of my babies almost got shot last month, so I gave up and moved to this motel and now my section 8 worker is telling me that it doesn't matter anyway, cause due to the Bush-inspired cuts they probably won't have any money left in the section 8 program to fund another apartment for me anyway…and I'll end up homeless….." her voice trailed off into sadness and the whoosh of the highway filled the rooms silence

    Linda was referring to the very serious cuts that the Section 8 program is facing due to the Bush Adminstrations' cuts to the program of 1.6 billion causing places like New York city to lose millions of dollars for existing section 8 vouchers and Alameda County not having enough money in May to even cover the rents of vouchers already in use.

    "and now I hear that people are being offerred more sweet deals by housing authority to move out of the Bayview so rich people like Newsom and his buddies can make big bucks redeveloping the Bayview…."Linda paused to hold back an onslaught of tears, " all I can say to those folks is; Don't be fooled.. Hold onto what you have… Valencia Gardens had its problems, but it was still my home…it was still housing…"

    To tell your story of eviction or displacement call PNN at (415) 863-6306 , to get involved in fighting the redevelopment effort of the Bayview call Bianca Henry at Family rights and Dignity (415) 346-3740,

    Tags
  • Covert Electronic Abuse Protest

    09/24/2021 - 09:21 by Anonymous (not verified)
    Original Author
    PNNscholar1
    Original Body

    Marlon Crump reports for PNN on Victims of Covert and Electronic Terror Rally at City Hall for the first time.

    Marlon Crump
    Thursday, October 22, 2009;

    “Stop Group Stalking!”

    “Stop Electromagnetic Weapons!”

    “Stop Defamation of Character!”

    “Stop Electronic Torture!”

    “Restore Human Liberties!”

    The voices of victims resisting the above covert acts of terror took to the front entrance of San Francisco City Hall on a humid October 14th, 2009 afternoon. Their voices finally began to penetrate the voluntary deaf ears, from the above said protest signs, handmade.

    One of the signs given to me by a fellow protestor spoke its own voice, in big black bold letters: “STOP ORGANIZED TERROR!” I was also given a button that said, “Freedom from Covert Harassment & Surveillance.”

    There was a visibility from fear, anxiety, and isolation of resistance in the air towards the acts of terror; covertly occurring upon them by the steps of the very city officials, who have the authority to aid them.

    “This event means to expose crime committed against humans, by U.S. Government Agencies.” A protestor stated to me. He later told me that he produced a documentary film regarding “brain implants.”

    My presence at this rally was my duty, without question. Being a reporter for my family of POOR Magazine/POOR News Network, I’m committed like my comrades to re-port and sup-port for the unheard voices intentionally silenced by corporate mainstream media, locally and globally.

    I’ve been on numerous marches and protests since living in the Bay Area of San Francisco, for the past five years. Many of them pertained to the issues of poverty, racism, oppression, police brutality, budget cuts, etc, etc. These issues are always at the root core for the resistance within our work at POOR.

    Today’s protest rally, “International Alliance Against Covert Electronic Abuse Global Human Rights Protest” was the first of its kind that I’ve ever re-ported on, and sup-ported for, to date.

    This was not just a local crisis call to end an injustice for T.I (Targeted Individual) victims in cities, such as New York, Los Angeles, Philadelphia, Cincinnati, and here in San Francisco. This was also global crisis call to action from victims to end the terrorism that appeared to be “too far-fetched” for “media coverage.”

    T.I victims currently have a movement to end this crisis in the United Kingdom, India, and three cities in Canada.

    “We protested in front of the Legislative Assembly Building and near Medical Science Building of University of Toronto on the 14th of October. We started at 10.30 A.M. There were 5 people in front of the Legislative Assembly, and I, Galina Kurdina.” Galina, a T.I. said to me via email, in detailing “People approached us and we distributed about 10 fliers.”

    Unfortunately, Galina also stated that a women attempted tactics to implement a scanda upon them. Eventually she was scared off when one of the protestors offered to take her picture, and she fled the scene. The rally continued on.

    “One student of University of Toronto, sweet boy, said to us that, in his opinion, these experiments were disgusting, another person wished us to continue our struggle.”

    In front of S.F City Hall, a C.B.S 5 News crew of two bypassed us, as we were numbered neared twenty. An undisclosed source later told me that they were told to ignore us. No corporate mainstream media coverage of covert terrorism intended to capture this event. “That doesn’t surprise me, everybody.” I yelled to them.

    “That’s why we do what we do at POOR Magzaine because of them!”

    In “Electronic Harassment” and “Targeted Individuals” (featured on www.poormagazine.org) many of the voices heard in both stories have often been covertly covered, ridiculed, discredited, harassed, with the end result leading them into fearful, faithless isolation.

    An “Enough is Enough” stance from everyone at today’s rally was an awareness to the public regarding the categorical use of advanced deadly technology, organized stalking, microwave, directed energy, electromagnetic and mind control weapons often used against them.

    This action was to be the first of many in the future. This one was the beginning to the demise of a bizarre seemingly invisible means of covert terror meant to control, harass, intimidate, and even experiment from persons or persons unknown. It didn’t matter to all of us who, what or where they were on this October 14th, 2009 Day.

    It wouldn’t matter to everyone on whether or not any of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors and Mayor Gavin Newsom would listen from the inside. I didn’t even matter if the organized perpetrators, themselves would appear to intimidate everyone in covert fashion, and “support” the cause.

    The unheard voices of the International Alliance Against Covert Electronic Abuse needed to finally be heard on the outside.

    After I was picked up by Anti-Organized Stalking Activist, T.I Organizer, Christine Lynn Harris a T.I, (Targeted Individual) and director of ISARC (Idriss Stelley Action Resource Center) mesha Monge-Irizarry, my comrade we soon found ourselves across the street from S.F City Hall before we knew it.

    The three of us stood alongside of each other, as we awaited the arrival of the other unheard voices, victims of covert terror. For Christine, this event was nearly a year dragged into the making.

    Hit with strange severe sophisticated technology. Stalked by suspicious individuals (some possibly S.F.P.D Officers) during her daily activities. Emergency hospital admission on numerous occasions for severe radiation damages to her organs. Individuals appearing at her home costumed as phone technicians.

    Ignorant and disbelief from people questioning the level of her sanity, despite documented proof supporting her claims. Consumed with constant physical and mental torture, while being forced to be attentive to her surroundings anywhere she goes. (Tactical component covert acts used by what some are calling, “The Crazy Makers.”)

    Not to say the least, her very life threatened with a marked C.D, and even her car illegally towed in retaliation for speaking out.

    “All of this over a f!@## piece of paper!” Christine often exclaimed to me. She previously sent the attorney general's office a letter concerning misdeeds of the president of the homeowners association. A short time later, Christine received an ongoing onslaught of electronic attacks, and covert stalking after voicing her concerns.

    The sun scorched us. It pushed away rainy clouds, but it failed to prevent T.I (Targeted Individuals) voices from joining the rally.

    They arrived a short time later, eager to get their unheard voices underway. Some of them were from California cities, such as Modesto, Fresno, Marin County, Oakland, and Berkeley.

    “This makes me feel that I am not the only one going through this.” A T.I protestor said to me. She began to explain to me, (while fighting back tears and showing expressions of hopelessness) the horrors of harassments by S.F.P.D Officers, false accusations made towards her, and the removal of her driver’s license and car. “My father died when I was eighteen from electromagnetic weapons.”

    After some pleasant verbal exchanges with onlookers, passer bys, an S.F.P.D Officer, a media crew from S.F. VID (who interviewed Christine) and a couple of S.F Sheriff Deputies, during the first few hours, we all went to the side of the street curb, and waved our signs to oncoming motorists.

    To our surprise, many of them cheerfully honked their horns in support. For four straight hours in the heat, some of us (including myself) wearing black, we received horn honking praises from the oncoming drivers.

    “Today feels very exciting because this is groundbreaking from victimization of T.I.s, towards a proactive grassroots effort all over the world.” mesha explained to me.

    “I think it was a mission accomplished because we had about twenty people show up for the protest, a reporter from S.F Vid, and the rain cleared up for us today.” Christine said to me. “I think that we got the acknowledgment we received.

    "God sees everything!"
    Revelations 18:21

    Tags
  • 94 and Still Homeless

    09/24/2021 - 09:21 by Anonymous (not verified)
    Original Author
    PNNscholar1
    Original Body

    A family in poverty, Larry, Bessie and Charlie, vs. the System and Poli-tricks

    Marlon Crump/Poverty Scholar/POOR Magazine
    Tuesday, October 24, 2006;

    The walls are covered by a collage of pictures of people who have fallen as a result of San Francisco Police Department (SFPD) violence; mostly black youth and youth of color whose lives were stolen and cut short. Set within the walls is a feeling of revolution and liberation and also a deep sadness.

    The Idriss Stelley Foundation (ISF) is a safe haven as well as an underground railroad for people who have been brutalized by the SFPD.

    Idriss Stelley was shot and killed by SFPD at the Sony Metreon on June 13 2001, "48 shots, 9 officers, as he stood alone in an empty theater." A shrine to Idriss is set in one part of the room. Mesha Monge-Irizarry, mother of Idriss Stelley started the Foundation. Mesha is a phenomenal woman. She is truly a privilege to be around.

    For the past month Mesha, myself, and many others have been meeting to plan the march on October 22nd against police brutality. It was at these meetings that I first met Bessie Berger and her two sons, Larry and Charlie Wilkerson. Bessie is 94 years old, Charlie is 59, and Larry is 57. They are living homeless in San Francisco. Bessie and her sons had come to the meetings to voice their concerns and tell their stories of harassment by the SFPD.

    Like Bessie and her family, I have dealt directly with police brutality. This past Saturday marks the one-year anniversary of a traumatizing assault committed against me by the SFPD in my own home. On October 7th 2005 twelve armed police officers broke into my room at the All Star Hotel. The All Star Hotel failed to protect my rights as their tenant, which is a part of the long legal battle that I am currently caught up in. The SFPD wrongly accused me of a crime I did not commit and entered my room in the early hours of the morning. This is only one example of the kinds of police brutality that I, and many others, living in Single Room Occupancies (SRO's) have had to endure. The stories Bessie and her sons tell are all too familiar.

    Mesha and Myself met with Bessie, Larry, and Charlie at the Idriss Stelley Foundation to hear their story.

    Bessie is in a wheelchair and is in dire need of a new one. She has trouble seeing and hearing. Both of Bessie's legs are severely swollen. Bessie is a small, gentle woman of incredible spirit and she does not let her age slow her down. Bessie was well respected by the motorcycle gang, The Hell’s Angels, who referred to her as "mama." Bessie's family tree extends from a nineteenth century U.S. Navy Admiral named Allen Schley to Edgar Allen Poe.

    Larry and Charlie are both silver haired men. Larry speaks from the heart and he has a stern voice. Charles has a more joking character and ads a comic sense here and there. Their voices contain anger and frustration. They are both tired.

    Larry and Charlie are true examples of one of The Ten Commandments "Honor thy mother and thy father." Larry and Charlie's great concern is the well being of their mom. Bessie is bathed daily by her sons either from The City's resource facilities for the homeless or from a one night hotel room that they obtain from the little money they have. They continue to care for her even while under the pressure of the harshest of times economically, socially, and politically.

    Larry and Charlie are both strong, capable men. They are able to care for their mom but they too are having health problems of their own. They are unable to care for themselves because most of their money goes towards the care of their mom. Bessie only receives a combined total of $800 a month, half of which goes towards her Medicare, she is left with only $400 a month.

    Larry, Charlie, and Bessie have only been back in San Francisco four months. They briefly lived here in 2001 during the administration of Mayor Willie Brown.

    Four months ago they lived in Palm Springs, California. Both Larry and Charlie worked industrial jobs to support their mom, each making $6.25 an hour. They worked opposite schedules so that while one was working the other one was taking care of their mom.

    They lived in Palm Springs and faithfully paid their rent on time. They paid the standard cost of first and last months rent, and the security deposit that totaled over $1200. The building attendant took their move-in deposit and rent, never submitted a receipt, and never turned the money into the management. As a result of the building attendant's criminal conduct they were evicted by the property management. Bessie and her sons immediately brought a legal action upon the management, but they were unsuccessful and the case was mysteriously ruled out.

    The All Star Hotel's handling of my situation on that fateful night last year was similar in its complete disregard for my wellbeing. Being evicted from your own home or having twelve unannounced police officers with guns burst into your room are experiences no one should ever have to endure.

    Losing practically everything they had Bessie and her sons sought food and lodging from relatives. Bessie in the past had always welcomed family into her home and cared for them in their times of need. Now in need herself, Bessie asked her relatives for help. The same relatives she had always housed and fed would not take her and her sons in. Larry recalled their situation with anger.

    "They did not care for one of their very own who had cared for them when they all had nothing! It really breaks our hearts but we've managed to survive this long. Someone will help us, I hope," Larry concluded sadly.

    The family also endured a heart shattering loss of a loved one. In 2001 while staying in Lake County, Bessie's great grandchild, eight year old Tyler James was killed by a drunk driver, named Mark Shifflet. Shifflet struck down Tyler while driving at 70 mph. A California Highway Patrol (CHP) officer arrived at the scene and astonishingly allowed Shifflet to leave the scene of the accident. The accident occurred on Highway 175 in Middletown. It was later discovered that Mark Shifflet had previous D.U.I arrests. But on this tragic night Shifflet was never given a sobriety test. The release of Shifflet was criminal negligence on the part of the CHP officer. The family lost the case in court and Mark Shifflet and the CHP officer walked away unscathed and unpunished.

    I am also waiting for the day in court where I will see legal action taken on my behalf for the criminal conduct that was committed against me by the SFPD at the All Star Hotel.

    Bessie, Larry, and Charlie have had to endure much harassment and abuse. In 2001, Bessie and her two sons approached Mayor Willie Brown, to seek his help in obtaining services. According to Larry and Charlie "We did nothing wrong, we didn't provoke him, we weren't aggressive. We just wanted him to direct us to the right facility to care for our mom because we were all homeless. He says he didn't like the way we looked and he immediately called security to escort us out. That really hurt us a lot, because we felt he could really help us."

    Shortly thereafter, the family caught sight of Mayor Brown at an event in front of City Hall. They again asked for his help and Mayor Brown showed the same discourtesy towards them as he had done before. They have not received any different treatment from the current administration.

    They recently tried to seek refuge at the Salvation Army but the director refused them entry because of Bessie and her age. Larry and Charlie told the director, "Look, she's 94 years old, ma'am. We'll be damned if we have to separate and put her in some nursing home. We know all about the evils of neglect in those kinds of places. She is our mother and we are not leaving her to be mistreated!" The director looked at all of them, with a cold and scornful glare, then replied, "I don't care, ok? She's not our damn problem or fault. She should be in a nursing home and not with her sons."

    The response by the director of the Salvation Army towards Larry and Charlie is a prime example of the "Western" notion and belief in individuation. Dr. Wade Nobles, a tenured professor in the Black Studies Department at San Francisco State explains individuation in POOR's fourth issue, "MOTHERS" in the article "The Nature of Mama."

    Dr. Wade Nobles says,

    "I believe that capitalism and much of the construct in Western psychology emerge out of the same philosophical grounding, and that philosophical grounding is based on the idea of separateness, distinctness, domination, fear, and exploitation. So, capitalism is just the economic system that parallels individuation as a psychological system. It's not that it promotes it, it certainly does reinforce it and allows for it to exist, because individuation would never challenge some of the precepts of capitalism. Capitalism says I've maximized my profits, minimized my loss; in order to do that, I have to exploit others. I won't exploit others if I believe that others and I are the same. So if I believe in individuation, then I certainly have a free license to exploit others."

    Larry and Charlie are committed to staying with their mom and caring for her themselves despite what the dominant response is,a committment which like my editor Tiny says, is supported and practiced in POOR Magazine's indigenous family organizing model for poor, and/or homeless families trying to survive and thrive in the US.

    Bessie and her sons have been living out of their car. Their car has countless miles on it and they dread the day that it will no longer work. If their car breaks they would be forced to find storage for all of their personal belongings or lose everything.

    Since our meeting an unfortunate event occurred. On Sunday October 15 their car was broken into, the registration, all their ID papers, and social security information is gone. This is an unusual theft and they are devastated.

    They have continually been harassed in Golden Gate Park by the SFPD. The SFPD have intimidated, verbally assaulted, and insulted them. On one occasion an officer yelled, "No you are not suppose to know or do anything, but be like you people already are, poor and uneducated!"

    Bessie, Charlie, and Larry have had to struggle to be triumphant against the criminalization of poverty. As Tiny Gray-Garcia at POOR magazine said, they are Poverty Heroes.

    In closing the interview Mesha and I asked what they wanted San Francisco to do to aid them in their needs. Bessie replied, "I only want the city to please help me and my sons out. I also want the city and the mayor to order the police to leave us alone, because we are not hurting anyone. We just want to be helped and not disrespected."

    Since the time of our meeting with Bessie, Larry, and Charlie on September 30th at the Idriss Stelley Foundation a short video was created of their situation, and can be viewed at

    http://www.current. tv/studio/media/13670557?

    You can view Mesha's article about Bessie and her sons at the Idriss Stelley Foundation's website:

    http://mysite.verizon.net/vzeo9ewi/idrissstelleyfoundation/

    The Idriss Stelley Foundation (ISF) will be hosting a benefit, after the November elections, for Bessie and her sons, which will help to purchase Bessie a new wheel chair.

    You can make donations to Bessie and her sons by sending a check to:

    ISF, 4921 3rd Street, SF,CA, 94124, attn:Justice4Bessie

    ISF also donated a cell phone to the family. You can call Larry Wilkerson at (415) 368-2261 (415-DOT-CAMI). You can also log on to Justice 4 Bessie Berger, set up by ISF, to show your support, by emailing

    Justice4Bessie-subscribe@yahoogroups.com,

    http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Justice4Bessie.

    Tags
  • I have the best lawyer - God!

    09/24/2021 - 09:21 by Anonymous (not verified)
    Original Author
    cayley
    Original Body

    A life-long Mission resident fights eviction for all of us

     

    "I will continue to fight! I'll bring this all the way to the supreme court if necessary.." Jose Morales' voice was loud and clear, seamlessly moving between English and Spanish as he outlined his refusal to be illegally evicted from his residence of 40 years in the Mission district of San Francisco.

    Jose Morales, is a Latino elder, a migrant, a Mission resident, a worker, an advocate. But, perhaps most importantly he is a human being. And the so-called laws that govern property in the US are inhuman. Jose has been fighting eviction for the last 14 years with landlords who use the laws with impunity. Their most recent tactic included an Ellis Act eviction, claiming they , the landlords, want to move in to his unit and therefore he must leave.

    As I watched the powerful, almost superhuman Jose, speak at a vigil in his honor held in front of his residence on Sunday night, his voice and spirit moving effortlessly past his body which was almost completely bent over at the waist due to his disability,I realized he was speaking for all of us, moving for all of us, fighting for all of us; for the Salvadoran migrant elder who was recently evicted from his residence of 40 years on Harrison street in the Mission and who now cant even afford to take care of his disabled wife in Laguna Honda, for the families who right now face eviction from their homes in The Bayview due to Lennar Corporation removing people for so-called redevelopement, for the elders in the California Hotel in Oakland who were threatened with eviction when the housing developer mismanaged their property, for us, POOR Magazine, and all the small businesses and non-profits who work in our building and face eviction from the new developer who bought our building and three others down the street for the sole act of speculation and so-called redevelopment and for all the poor people of color who are endlessly displaced, gentrified and removed from our homes, our neighborhoods, our land.

    As a houseless and evicted child, struggling with my poor mama in eviction court to stay housed and throughout our loca vida there was never a time that I felt strong like Jose. I was terrified, I was demeaned. I was tired. And I was only a teenager and young adult.

    "Speculation is an act of urban terrorism," James Tracy, a revolutionary poet, researcher and housing advocate spoke at the vigil and went on to encourage the crowd of over 50 people huddled around Jose's rickety steps leading up to his small flat and papered with the "documents that prove Jose's landlords' guilt" to realize that it is necessary sometimes to "stand in the way" of the laws and systems like the Sheriffs department to ensure that our communities don't completely get destroyed and dismantled. He went on to describe seeing Jose on the bus in the City always talking optimistically, never considering giving up the fight and saying one of his favorite comments, " I have the best lawyer, God!

    "Everyday Jose pushes us to struggle more," Eric Quesada, one of the organizers of Sunday's vigil, spoke about the struggle to encourage and fight for Jose's case Eric went on to explain that the advocates have gotten an extension but only for a week and they are hoping for more. He concluded with a request to people in the crowd to contact Sheriff Hennesey's office to demand a longer extension for Jose Morales's case

    St Peters' Housing Committee, Delores Street Communitiy services, Mission SRO collaborative organized the vigil while other organizations like POOR Magazine and Planning for Elders committed to being there for Jose as long as it took.

    Luscious tamales and chocolate were served by organizers with candles to the shivering but determined crowd. At 7:00 pm the Canal 14 (channel 14) truck arrived and the cameras zoomed in on Jose. He stood up again- his small frame rising up above the crowd in the twilight, "Sigue Adelante- Continue moving forward- i Will Not give up !" Jose's voice traveled up into the heavens, directly into his lawyers office.

    Tags
  • El Paso Chronicles

    09/24/2021 - 09:21 by Anonymous (not verified)
    Original Author
    PNNscholar1
    Original Body


    The long black gate  8/27/10

    People are breaking in
    And theres people trying to escape
    Our cargo weight
    Selling shit  sold  about
    And contain shit that stakes place
    It’s a see through wall
    It ain't to far past you see those bombs
    It’s a war I was told
    The people, the cartels
    And the border police are so cold
    Driving downhill daily
    You just see these clouds of smoke

     

     

    Border Bros.  8/28/10

    Back, black en la frontera
    More cameras with droids
    We like pizza slices
    Capitalism is the noid
    Classist people to me are hemroids
    U.S. is a playgrounds for us toys
    At the boarder searching to be free
    Stopped again by sellout motherfucking police
    They separate themselves, you and me
    But the wealthy run through just vacationing

           

     

     

     

     

     

    Crystal Rey    8/29/10


    With all the bullshit at the front gate
    The community still danced the Crystal Rey
    Ninas y ninos took over the stage
    Know one dared leave until it rained
    You could feel the tension, seen in the face
    Killing our culture on a daily base
    And 600,000,000 more that they pay
    Juarez, El Paso, soon all the U.S.A

     

     

     

     

     

     

    La mujer obrera(the woman worker)  8/30/10

    In the 40’s and 50’s industrial age jobs were shifty
    We laced the whole boarder factoridly
    Disorderly, historically
    La mujer el trabajo, toda via abajo
    Working the line with much unpaid overtime
    From the fields to the factory
    Puro pinche pecos ella stackidly
    Bodies were shifted cog in the wheel
    Made of wood, cotton and steel
    There ain't so room to heal
    Women organized as they always do
    Mother abuelita y me tia too
     

    Tags
  • Ronald McDonald House Poetry

    09/24/2021 - 09:21 by Anonymous (not verified)
    Original Author
    mari
    Original Body

    Our Indigenous Peoples Media Coordinator Our Indigenous Peoples Media Coordinator, Mari V. went to Denver with a group called the Visionaries that is doing a community project with the Ronald McDonald House Charities of Denver. She along with Marjorie Davis, and Louis Chapoose (White River Ute) held Art and Spoken Word workshops. The Spoken Word Workshops are based on POOR Magazine’s curriculum of the Slam Bio. The youth also recorded their poetry pieces and make a spoken word CD.

    Slam Bios are short versions of a poet’s biography

    Hayley Long, 9

    Poetry Purple,

    Sweet N Tangy

    Fluffy like a teddy bear

    Smell like a pretty flower perfume

    Dog with baby cats

    Ladybug

    Playful Mind

    Small town

    Scottsbluff, Nebraska

    Mexican

    I live with my mom, 2 brothers, and 1 sister

    My room has two beds.

    My bed has Winnie the pooh stuff on it.

    I struggle with making friends.

     

    Malik Turner, 11

    Black and red

    Smooth as polished wood

    Smell like axe cologne

    Taste like mixed berries

    I'm hunting like a tiger stalking his prey

    I am from Denver where everybody loves me

    I come from a comedy family where everybody loves me

    I struggle with math because sometimes it's hard

    Also, I struggle with my dad drinking alcohol

     

    Michael Churchill Jr.

    Red

    Soft as a teddbear

    Smell like axe cologne

    Taste sweet as sweet tea

    Lion in the forest

    I'm from a group of people that always love me from Denver

    I live with my mom mostly and my dad helps me on the way and they both love me dad lives in an apartment, and my mom lives in a condo

    I struggle most with my grandma smoking around me all the time


    Jenessa Walgren, 5

    Blue
    Soupy
    Smooth
    Flowers

    Brown Dog

    Nebraska

    Big Mountain

    Workers

    Muesum

    Saying Echos in the Tunnels

    The only word I remember saying is Gracias from my Dad.

    My house is white and blue.

    It is heater house.

    There are 3 rooms.

    My room is filled with Toys.

    My grandma, mom, aunt and dad.

    I like elevators.

    I struggle with learning to ride my bike.

    Tags
  • CLIPPED! THE NEW AGE OF CORPORATE TRANSIT

    09/24/2021 - 09:21 by Anonymous (not verified)
    Original Author
    cayley
    Original Body

    What do electricity/gas/water utilities, public transit systems, and department store/supermarkets have in common?  We the people have been and are being sold on paying bills and fares digitally, on-line, whether we want to or not.

     

    Safeway and other chain store shopper cards, Fast-Trak, and Smart Meter—systems that can follow a “customer/consumer’s” use of power and other necessities, purchases and movements around a city, county, or region—came first.  By May 2011, four Bay Area counties will have removed fare boxes from public transit systems.  First called Trans-Link, the new way to pay for a Bay Area bus, light rail or commuter train ride is called the Clipper card.  Bay Area bridges were first, with the installation of the Fast-Trak system.

     

    San Francisco Supervisor Ross Markarimi, the Board of Supervisors’ representative on the MTA (Metro Transit Authority) Board, which oversees all Bay Area transit systems, knew about Clipper before anyone else on the Board of Supervisors.  Despite this knowledge, there was no discussion of it on the Supes’ Transportation Committee or MUNI’s board.

     

    The card has been a two-year experiment (that Thornton Kimes thought would die a quiet death because of corporate news media reports that the company involved was having huge problems getting the system going elsewhere, as well as in the Bay Area).  Honk Kong, with some mainland Chinese cities following, began using the “Octopus” Card in 1997 according to Wikipedia.

     

    Golden Gate Transit was the first system to try TransLink/Clipper.  A.C Transit followed suit, with MUNI next and other systems deciding they had to do it too.  Wanna jump in a lake?  Don’t mind if I do!!!

     

    All these systems, going through incredible economic trials and tribulations these past few years, collectively spent $1 million to have a consultant tell them that the phrase “TransLink” wouldn’t go over too well with the public, thus the “Clipper Card” was born.  It is true that there used to be “Clipper ships”, but that was back in the day.  That was then, this is now—while the actual scanning machines are still called TransLink, we now have this unexciting name for a card we will all have to use.

     

    Or, Thornton supposes, “Clipper” is actually a good name!  It tells you exactly what’s being done to you every time you use the thing!  Why do I and Bruce feel this way?  Because the Clipper Card clips the poor.

     

    Bruce feels scammed.  San Francisco is, of course, one of the populations being scammed, but at least the card replacing MUNI’s current hodgepodge of payment methods will be good for a month and not suck money out every time a rider swipes.  We can thank Ross Mirkarimi for that much, at least.

     

    This is not true outside of San Francisco!   Commuters, whether they work in San Francisco, or not, will have to pay attention to how much money is left on their cards.  They will have to recharge their cards, just like FastTrak, just like a BART card.  BART is switching to Clipper too.  There’s no escape!

     

    The A.M.I. (Average Median Income) in the Bay Area is $100,000.  This may seem like small potatoes to folks making $40,000 and above, but anyone making poverty level (or less…) is gonna feel the burn.  There will be Adult, Children’s, and Senior/Disabled Clipper Cards, plus the San Francisco card(s).

     

    Folks in the Bay Area unable to watch tee vee because they couldn’t get a digital converter, or are otherwise engaged in the never-ending-struggle to survive (with not much time to read a newspaper, etc), will get an unpleasant surprise when the Clipper Card goes Full Time, All The Time.

     

    The Digital Divide between rich and poor, as we have noted in previous POORmagazine articles (“Give A Sister A Break” {a.k.a. the iPAD story}…and others), continues and is getting worse.  MUNI’s website obliges a Spanish-only speaking and reading person to navigate English-language web-pages to get to the translated-to-Spanish section.  Clipped!

    Tags
  • Another World Defined by Community - Not Corporations

    09/24/2021 - 09:21 by Anonymous (not verified)
    Original Author
    Tiny
    Original Body

    The empty buildings stood, eyes covered in plywood glasses, cast down. Their clapboard, stucco and brick arms, bound by eviction, foreclosure sale and demolition notices.

    A small group of poverty and indigenous scholars from POOR Magazine, bleeding internally from our own wounds of eviction, landlessness, budget genocide, racism, po-lice brutality, incarceration and violence arrived in Detroit on a hot Saturday in June to attend the US Social Forum and Allied Media Conference.

    We drove silently through almost-empty streets to arrive at our tiny rented rooms encased in what seemed like a protected, pre-gentrified zone of silence created for the nearby Wayne State University students. We rode past thousands of dreams deferred, homes and jobs had, then lost, businesses and communities built and un-built, peoples removed, displaced, dismantled and there never-more.

    “We are realizing a community not defined by Ford, Chevrolet and General Motors, but by the people, ” General Baker, a union leader, community revolutionary and long-time Detroit resident spoke about the history and present of the post-capitalist city known as Detroit. He and the powerful elder revolutionary Grace Lee Boggs addressed hundreds of organizers and poverty skolaz from across Turtle Island and beyond gathered to celebrate a community rooted in peoples struggle, not corporate thrival.

    Detroit, called dead and gone by corporate media who define life by the existence of thriving capitalism, corporation – funded employment and rising property values. Detroit, home to the “Detroit rebellion of 1967” , Detroit Summer, Invincible, and the Grace Lee Boggs Center. Detroit, land of people resisting as community, not defined by corporations.

    “We provide direct services, counseling and vouchers for hundreds of African-American, Vietnamese and White fisherman whose livelihoods have been destroyed by the BP drilling disaster,” said, Tap Bui from MQVN. a New Orleans non-profit launched in the crisis of Hurrican Katrina. POOR’s poverty skolars, media producers and cultural workers came to meet with, teach with, and be with other folks struggling with the corporate poison of their homes and economies from BP oil in the Gulf, indigenous peoples struggling with the lies of border fascism and resistance of tribal soverignty in Arizona, Peru, Canada and Mexico and mamaz fighting the lies of welfare deform in Wisconsin, Detroit, New York and California. We dreamed with other poor people led revolutionaries from Picture the Homeless, National Welfare Rights Union and El otro campana del barrio in New York and many more who all came to offer workshops and presentations at the US Social Forum.

    We also brought our own forms of cultural work, scholarship, art and education on poverty, race, linguistic domination and resistance in several workshops and performances throughout the week.

    But in the end, we met with Detroit, a post-capitalist city of humble conscious peoples re-finding themselves as humans capable of their own created economies, care-giving, and people-based labor, that actually works to care for all peoples and pachamama. We spoke with empty streets, and closed up stores and abandoned homes and closed parks and open lands and expanding weeds and living museums.

    Underground Railroad as theatre

    “We provide living tours through slavery by appointment,” The first day we arrived in Detroit we came upon the Underground Railroad Living Museum which was housed in the First Congregational Church of Detroit. When I first heard about their fascinating “tours” , I was nervous, and had no idea what to expect, how is it right, I pondered, for me to go through this and respect the ancestors and the herstory of oppression and destruction. Was it enough that my melanin-challenged,-looking like my colonizer father self, was the daughter of an African-Boricua-Irish Mama in struggle who had dealt with the post-traumatic slave syndrome and the many fallouts of race and class oppression in Amerikkka. Did this qualify me to go through this life changing experience. I wasn’t sure..

    All hues of our POOR Magazine poor people of color contingent arrived to the day of our appointment with anticipation and wonder in our hearts. “Wear these,” one of the docent actors in the theatre piece handed each of us a band to wear on our wrists that said simply, “SLAVE” we clipped it on and the river of metaphors for each of us began. A video on the herstory of slavery and kkkolonization started to play and two by two we were led out of the room into, literally, an underground series of trails and rooms, led by an all volunteer group of actors who helped us empath with the blood-stained history that is slavery in the US.

    In the end it was one of the hardest and most beautiful things I have ever been led through and I would recommend it highly. It was not a “tour” through slavery, but rather a piece of very revolutionary peoples history told through popular education theatre by a small group of dedicated volunteers.

    We spoke with the beautiful and spirited Elaine Watts, teacher, care-giver and guide after the tour about the work of the 1st Congregational church of Detroit, led by one of the first African Descendent female pastors in Detroit, Lottie Jones-Hood, herself a survivor of substance and recovery who in addition to the Underground Railroad project, launched the amazing Babes Program, an education and arts project for children of addicted parents.

    Taking Back Land Through Art

    “This art is medicine,” said revolutionary artist and sculptor Tyree Guyton of the Heidelberg Project of Detroit. Everything and everyone we met with in Detroit were powerful and important, but our trip to the Heidelberg project was nothing less than life-changing. “I am speaking for Him, I am channeling the Creator’s gifts for all of us to see and feel,” Tyree concluded in a conversation with POOR reporters and solidarity board who landed on his street on our second day in town.

    One of POOR’s goals with this journey to Detroit was to do research for POOR’s HOMEFULNESS Project, a sweat-equity co-housing model for landless, indigenous families in poverty which includes art, education and micro-business and is a model of self-sustainability. In this search we found ourselves back where POOR had begun.

    POOR Magazine featured Tyree’s beautiful re-visioning and re-birth through art of his post-capitalist, abandoned neighborhood in our 1996 issue of POOR Magazine Volume 1 entitled: HOMEFULNESS. This magical place contained messages for all of us, pages out of each one of our lives, out of each one POOR Magazine’s literary and visual art and resistance media.

    Dr Dee is In

    My Mama Dee, who passed on her spirit journey in 2006, hasn’t sent me a sign for awhile, and when she does, it often includes her ironic sense of humour that saved both of us through so many years of pain and struggle in our lives of poverty together. She had a pointed message for us at the Heidelberg Project.

    In the middle of one of the beautiful mixed media art installations on everything from addiction to child abuse scattered throughout a two block area of abandoned houses was a sign that stated simply Dr. Dee is In. I knew my mama was with us on this trip, but I didn’t know til then how much she wanted me to gleen from this magical place of displacement, art, public land and community.

    The Last Blessing

    Finally, it was the end of our journey, the day we had to return to our temporary locations on Pachamama, the plantation, as my fellow welfareQUEEN Queennandi Xsheba calls them; our underpaid or once-in-while jobs, our budget kkkuts, our Single Room Occupancy hotels, criminalized neighborhoods. Po’lice terror, public and private non-profit philanthro-pimped housing, all by-products of the many systems of capitalist oppression that keep us endlessly chasing our own tails, and turning our pain and landlessness into products to be case mis-managed, our neighborhoods and bodies endlessly speculated on, deconstructed and dismantled. Our lives centered around what we didn’t have and what they didn’t want to give back to us. Scarcity models defined by the man who stole our resources and land and cultures only to funnel us into his education systems ghettos, jobs and prisons.

    “You know Tyree built a home for his mama right next door to his on that street in the Heidelberg project where they still live to this day.” While in rite-Aid in Detroit, the last skoolin came from a young woman working behind the counter of the local drug store,

    In the US we are all conditioned on the capitalist notion of independence which demands separation of families from their elders, children from their parents and youth from their cultures. Demands put in place covertly through land use, formal education, Non-profit industrial complex and the capitalist driven workforce.

    The companion message is the fake dream of a job and a career, which most of us are conditioned to believe should be our guide and shape our lives, yet these aren’t jobs that make our children eat better, learn to read or fish, farm or make art, our families love each other, our elders or our bodies healthier or Pacha mama cleaner or happier. Our work as mamaz and fathers and grandfathers and grandmothers aren’t honored or considered, our abilities to grow our own food, build our own houses, or comfort our folks, practice our traditions, honor our ancestors, take care of our elders. These aren’t considered “legitimate” forms of labor, or real forms of work.

    One of the key aspects of POOR Magazine’s poor people-led.indigenous people led message is our deconstruction of the roots of capitalism and our constant real time practice of a different world- a world that practices intergenerational education, arts love and inter-dependence, love like the Malawi people that believe if I have met you I am responsible for you, that if one person accumulates wealth and keeps it just for themselves something is wrong with that person, or like almost all indigenous peoples believe and practice, no-one lives alone and isolation and alone-ness are not barometers for sanity, like they are in this twisted society. Tyree practiced these acts of love and care-giving with his community, neighborhood and family. In Detroit. In a neighborhood purported to be abandoned, destroyed and lost.

    Going Back.. Back Back to Cali Cali…

    “Whose to say that the weeds are not the roots and the roots are not the weeds…” Al Robles,

    poet, community organizer and POOR Magazine board member We drove in silence to the airport. Again we passed the empty homes, silent neighborhoods, and shuttered businesses and yet this time I saw something else. The empty buildings looked different, they seemed to sway and move in tandem with the wind, their plywood glasses covering their resting eyes while they thought and considered and dreamed. Their wood and stucco skin was massaged by the weed fingers of their mother, Pacha-mama, mother earth, her leafy arms whispering dreams of liberation from corporations, real estate speculation, and endless gentrification. Her rain bathing over their dusty crevasses with the water of real change and land reclamation not rooted in capitalism ownership.

    To watch Part 2 of POOR Magazine in Detroit on PNN-TV: Click Here

    To Watch Part 1 of POOR Magazine in Detroit on PNN-TV: Click Here

    Tags
  • Who's the Mack?

    09/24/2021 - 09:21 by Anonymous (not verified)
    Original Author
    Lola Bean
    Original Body

     

     

     

    Generational Culture Pimping: Hollywood and the Young Non-White Male’s Upbringing

    The arguments my father and I had about race and identity, would stay locked in my mind for years, keeping his demanding ideas of how I needed to "assimilate to white culture not act too black" as a reminder to myself what i could never become or tolerate, living as a young NON-WHITE male.

    I thought about how he carried his self when he was my age, did he hear and see the racism I tasted on the daily, poisonous spoonfuls being served up by teachers and store clerks alike, that I would vomit up in an intense reactionary response at their feet. Even though we had a serious generation gap between us did he contain fear in these moments and end up being a racist, hating what they didn't like about him. I thought about this as, we battled for the 1000th time about school and what I was becoming, in his eyes, a failure, a future bum on 7th street wasting away life by the Oakland Pier.   

    Fear of who I am brought me here, unable to understand why I, why we don't love ourselves, planted in our thoughts, toxic seeds,

    bursting through like uncontrollable weeds,

     pushing past our true roots,

    got me writing fuck Amerikkka inside of my Social Studies textbook

    as my pops supervises me like a correctional officer, he’s waisting his time.

     instead of 8th grade cirriculum, I was writing rhymes,

    the puzzle pieces to our fucked up times,

     thick is the silence, cuz we used up all the words,

     all the verbal violence

    over how one should act,

     he says white, but mothafucka

    I'm black, my spirit’s not like that.

     

    Around the time I was born, a Hollywood film company came to Oakland CA to film a movie based on a script written by Robert J. Poole, about a young pimp's trials and tribulations. The director, Micheal Campus chose Oakland as sole film location because of it's notoriety for pimping as he learned from stories actors had told him about legendary men of leisure who drove luxury cars and had stables of women statewide. Bringing along Max Julien, a young actor, who in turn brought his friend, a then unknown ,Richard Pryor, and they made history with the highly influential classic, The Mack."Traveling to Oakland, Julien and Campus sought the help of the Ward brothers, four men who ran Oakland's criminal world"."Trouble came when Huey Newton and the Black PANTHER PARTY-who ran  the political side of Oakland-felt the production had infringed on their turf. Julien was friends with Newton, but before filming completed Frank Ward was shot in the back of the head and killed. "The film crew wrapped up the rest of the movie in L.A and even included the conflict in the storyline with pro black freedom fighters kidnapping pimps and dealers led by the main character's brother who delivers the classic lines sampled by Dr.Dre in the intro of lil ghetto boy off his 1992 album THE CHRONIC.

    Watching this film as a 9 year old I only picked on the scantly clad women and the violent revenge seeking hero killing all the bad guys. Rediscovering it as a teenager, I saw the revolutionary conflicts and the redemption of a lost soul that I missed the first time I viewed it. I even saw how these elements were small in comparison to the highlighted, overemphasized imagery of the pimp game, but were enough to insure this movie wouldn't be the next blockbuster for mainstream audiences when it was released in the 70's.I wasn't sure if my dad had seen The Mack, but when I first saw it I mentioned it and he dismissed it as crap "you lil niggas shouldn't be watching." He then began to be concerned about what I was watching and listening to, especially when he found my Prince and The Time cassettes with songs like "Annie Christian" and "My Drawers." At 9 years old, I didn't fully understand much of the meanings of this material, but I understood one thing my pops and I were like two different families, that didn’t want to eat at the same table, when it came to culture. He despised hip hop, which at that time in it's infancy was non-white unlike the radio friendly, suburban Emimen, Justin Bieber, Depeche Mode, sell your soul to Madison Ave, sound of today's modern rap artist. After arguing about what I was gonna do after flunking out of 7th grade, my answer was rapper. He said no son of my is gonna be a rapper, eventually cursing me from ever securing a multi-million dollar deal for these dope rhyme skills i got, B. By the time I saw The Mack again was convinced my father was not from Oakland, he was never a pimp, and most importantly he was never a revolutionary. Truthfully, he was born and raised in Oakland, and every man in Oakland was not either a pimp or a revolutionary, but how could you not be affected by these 2 different movements being black and alive during this influential time period in such a soulful, independent locale such as Oakland. His family and most black families migrated to Oakland in the early 1940 segregated days looking for freedom and opportunity from the South, where my 3rd generation descendant changed his slave name Duplessis to the more French sounding Trevigne to gain access into the military as white man to fight in the first world war. Was this legacy my father, wanted us to carry on? Was I the fool for thinking our legacy was Eldridge Cleaver, Nat Turner, and Marcus Garvey? A dummy for thinking our legacy was Huey Newton, Harry Allen, or Krs 1. Even stupider for acknowledging the Philipino side of me in joSE Rizal, Agueda kahabangan, and Bonifacio and the Katipunan, WHO helped defeat the Spanish enslaved us with christianity. The same philipino BLOOD of my grandfather, whose final words on his deathbed to my father were "fuck you nigger."

    Eye caught on that it was deeper, a factor for his poor health,

    that underneath all his complicated layers, he hated his self.

    his inner self destruction washed away my innocence

    and kept me not present through life like he had been

    our difference was while he despised his own people

    i was one of hip hop and black anger's son screaming fuck white people

    breaking the cycle with a mind so lethal.

    no movie cameras to record our acts

    the system must hoe up and let the people be the Mack

    and drive off into the sunset in liberated cadillacs

    ...CHURCH

    Check out these articles and more on our sister sites at Real Change and the International Network of Street Newspapers: INSP Vendor Blog: http://www.insp-blog.org/ INSP Main Website: http://www.street-papers.org/ Real Change Blog: http://www.insp-blog.org/realchange/ Real Change Main Website: http://www.realchangenews.org/

    Tags
  • WELFARE BLUES

    09/24/2021 - 09:21 by Anonymous (not verified)
    Original Author
    PNNscholar1
    Original Body

     

    WELFARE BLUES:  A.K.A. WHAT DO I WANT TO DO WITH MY LIFE?

     

     

    Part 1

     

    YESTERDAY

     

    ‘''For us old bleeding-heart liberals who were on the streets in the 60's, the idea that Lockheed, of the military-industrial complex, would be in charge of welfare is out of somebody's nightmare fantasy,'' said the director of the JOBS program in a Northeastern state.  Then he begged not to be identified, ''We may end up working with them,'' he said’

    --From a 1996 New York Times article (“Giant Companies Entering Race To Run State Welfare Programs”)  by Nina Bernstein

     

    I first navigated the deep, murky, living-body-choked waters of San Francisco’s Welfare Whirlpool in 1989, though there was more walking than swimming.  You go to 8th and Mission Streets to sign up for a Welfare General Assistance, or G.A., check.  I went to a check cashing place near 20th and Mission Streets to get that check because my last name begins with the letter K.  EVERYONE did Workfare, sweeping streets.  I met other street sweepers, and our boss, at 5th and Market Streets.  That is barely scratching the surface of that deep, living body-choked Welfare Whirlpool, 1989 or 2010.  

    Does anyone remember when food stamps were paper?  I do, but the beginning of the EBT (Electronic Benefits Transfer) plastic card era was 1990, when Texas billionaire Ross Perot’s then-$12+ billion Electronic Data Systems company was fighting with various other small and large opponents (including Lockheed!) for the right to change the way poor folks get their crumbs from the Welfare system. 

    Darwin Deason of Affiliated Computer Services, Inc (ACS), with the help of IBM and the State of Maryland, invented the EBT card and beat Perot out of a five-year contract to computerize L.A. County’s food stamp program.  ACS zig-zagged in and out of this swamp, getting out of the electronic welfare benefits biz until 1994, just before Bill Clinton pulled a fast one on the Republican Party and everyone on Welfare in Amerikkka.

    ACS teamed up with Walter Patterson, director of the Arkansas Department of Human Services when Clinton was Governor.  The company didn’t think there was much demand for EBT cards, etc., but so many states were getting into the cost-cutting-of-welfare-budgets bandwagon it was clear there really was money to be made…

     

    TODAY

     

    Would you like to know about the confusion, craziness, waste of effort, money and time that is the San Francisco Welfare System?  The SF Coalition On Homelessness recently thanked supporters for helping dramatize the quote “Amazing Runaround”, unquote--the struggles homeless folks go through to get access to shelter beds.  Everyone in the Welfare system goes through an Amazing Runaround rat race every day.

    When you check a box saying English is your only language you should never get an insert in Welfare Snail Mail asking if you need an interpreter.  Waste of paper and money?  Check!

    A bigger waste of money and time?  Make people spend time solving problems already dealt with once, problems that almost got them kicked off Welfare.  The Computer, It Wrote Me A Letter, is the title of one of my poems.

    How to waste even more money, paper, and time?  Mail lots of people notices telling them to meet with a man who knows less about Welfare and what it does and doesn't do than they do, pay him to tell us, the real experts, what is what and that we're going to get more mail identifying the real expert, our employment specialist case monster, for the next round of Welfare Games—the very employment specialist case monster I've already met during an earlier round of confusion, inside-out appointments for this and that...the employment specialist case monster who already knew she couldn't work with me yet because my Welfare therapist counselor has had the real power to make my case move fast or slow through the system for a while (or, at least, that was how it looked to me...).

    I've met the employment specialist case monster more than once.  The situation could have been less crazy, but neither of us has the power to shrink this circus to less than 3 rings.  If reading this litany of looniness makes your head hurt, hey!  I lived it.  I'm still livin' la vida loca—The Crazy Life.

     

    Part 2:  System? System? Do We Even HAVE A Steeenkeeeng System?

     

    The other times I’ve been in the San Francisco Welfare system, I endured less craziness and got back on my feet—though I admit to settling for what I call “just any old job”.  That isn’t a good thing to do, especially if you don’t have the advantages people with money have—double especially if you grew up middle class (me) but didn’t get the Horatio Alger American Dream Hard Work-a-Mania thing really truly thumped into you so you believed it and lived it and made it work for you.

    If that was what my parents were teaching me by example, I was watching a different channel.  Just any old marriageable guy/person, the nuclear family, divorce.  I mean, c’mon!  Oprah wants us to Live Our Best Life!  Have you noticed that the poor don’t get to indulge in all this stuff people with access and money do? 

    We’re told, by the experts, “do what you love and the money will follow!”  Repeating the phrase “Do you want fries with that?” has never been my idea of doing what I love, especially since not much money’s gonna follow me around doing that.  I was asked, once, by an employment specialist my second time through Goodwill Industries, if I would consider getting a fast-food job so that I could have some money coming in while I looked for something better.

    I said no.  I’d rather be homeless again, and start over from scratch--again.  Working full time in the fast food world, in the food world in general, is mostly a young person’s game to begin with, but combining an on-your-days-off job hunt with personal stuff like buying food, doing laundry, having a life?  Um, no, I want something better than that and I want the damned experts to help me get there!  Is that so much to ask for?  Apparently it is, but they didn’t ask me that question again.

    And, anyway, I stumbled across POOR just after getting caught up in the system again, so the vision of “What Do I Want To Do With My Life?” (the title of one of Po Bronson’s non-fiction books, one of two I like a helluvalot) has changed “somewhat”.

    So, this time through the system I only had to endure 5 weeks of PAES (Personal Assisted Employment Services) GEPS—I don’t know what that acronym stands for, except for several hours of boredom one day a week—instead of 12 weeks, but the choices offered at the end amount to the same thing always:  start looking for work immediately or choose the pathway to getting the system to pay your way through a relatively short school training program to pick up a new skillset and go after something better (you hope) than what you did before you needed to use the system again.

    I tried St. Anthony’s programs and found myself in a sort-of honor system two hours one day a week geographic data entry training program unlike anything I’d ever tried to learn.  We were supposed to have a classroom to ourselves, with a door shut between us and relatively normal levels of noise, but somehow that room was always not-for-use, even though it was empty when we left.  We endured much noise, including one mass invasion of people going on a tour of the building, because of being in an open around too close to the front desk.

    My original plan was to sign up for St. Anthony’s “A+ Certification” program (which turned out to be via City College) in computer hardware maintenance and repair.  I was talked into the other program until the City College thing happened in Spring 2009.  I never got a case monster, I mean manager.  I was so frustrated with the data entry thing I quit, and later found out no one had me listed as even interested in the City College thing.  So much for one of the 500# canaries of the local non-profit eco-system!

    After doing PAES Workfare for the Coalition on Homelessness (I was startled to find them on the alternate workfare list.  The COH?  Doesn’t the city hate them?  Yes, but there they were…) I got into RAMS, INC.’s counseling/therapy services—I had chosen that option, with the intent to go after some advanced computer training (computer graphics like Photoshop, and web design or webmaster stuff) available through their HireAbility/iAbility program. 

    San Francisco budget cuts killed the iAbility program the summer of 2009.  Though iAbility was resurrected, it only offers basic computer skills.  Been there, got that.  I got involved with HireAbility anyway that summer, partly out of boredom and wanting some extra dollars in my pocket.  Minimal dollars.  HireAbility trains people to be janitors, baristas, helps with more general job hunts, and pays piecework rates for work done on-site in a warehouse.

    There was another option, going through the State of California’s “Department of Rehabilitation” (DOR) to get to City College or some other thing like, say a massage school or some other program.  Budget cuts made me wait for that, until DOR got someone to replace someone who was laid off or fired.  Are you feeling that headache déjà vu from Part 1? 

     

    Part 3:  Road Trips

     

    RECENTLY

     

    Poormag had barely been in its new space when I started watching a PBS series that took young Americans and Australians on road trips to try to figure out what to do after college.  “Career-wise”.  One man said something pretty wise to the Aussies:  he had no clue what he wanted to do, to be, until after turning 40.  He zigged and zagged, made mistakes, had a lot of jobs he hated, but managed to figure out what he wanted to do after all that.

    How many employment experts in America watching that had heart attacks?  The Welfare System People want us to take tests, stick us in boxes with ribbons tightly tied around our throats, mark us down as successfully employed (“Want fries with that…?”), fire and forget, rinse and repeat, the wheels of the bus go ‘round and ‘round—and other ways of saying the same thing.  I briefly thought that warehouse work might be my thing, but temp agencies and, ultimately, Goodwill Industries, cured me of that.  Who wants to be in one of the bellies of the beast, just another wad of chewed cud, endlessly swapped between the bellies spitting out all the stuff we are told we need?

    Of course, that narrows down the choices, decisions, and what-not. 

     

    Part 4:  Rat, Race--Just Another Rat in the Race Going Nowhere (a.k.a. Book Him Danno!)

     

    NOW

     

    Slowly, DOR got somebody new, and RAMS, INC., dumped a bunch of us folks on that person.  Later, I found out that my case monster, I mean manager, Christine Randolph, is new to the game of social work.  It took a while for her to get to me. I met with her two or three times face-to-face. 

    She needed to find out if DOR could even take me on through this program, meaning “how screwed up is Thornton Kimes?”  Not screwed up enough to be on SSI (possibly debateable…), but was I screwed up enough to get on the waiting list?  The head shrinker thought so, and that interview happened faster than I expected. 

    After that Christine asked me to do research on what I wanted to do, and then asked me to narrow my list to the top 2.  I did both, and heard from her that she had to talk to her boss about a Yes or a No.  I never heard back from her on either Yes/No.  Communication broke down, and became a frustrating game of Phone Tag, among other things.  

    Part of the communications breakdown was some strangeness going on with my Poor People Phone Service through AT&T.  I was getting charged for someone else's phone calls, or someone hacked my identity.  I never did find out which.  I did cancel the service.

    Christine wanted me to go back to HireAbility! 

    I was really confused about this, especially because the person I was supposed to talk to at HireAbility sounded like she was expecting to become my new case manager and I would have to start all over from scratch with something I knew wasn’t for me.  I protested, and the communication breakdown turned into being thrown under a bus, being kicked out of DOR’s program. 

    My RAMS, INC. counselor/therapist suggested (along with other people going to bat for me) getting the employment specialist—Tamara Yalgolnitser, based at the unemployment facility at Mission and Chavez Streets—to help.  Christine visits/visited that building every Wednesday, thus there was more than one good reason to go this route.  I got what everyone in Welfare calls a “Remedy”, usually a one-time appointment arranged to try to solve a problem.

    I should have known better.  Many people in the Welfare system, who run into a problem (or problems) with what they are trying to do to get out of the system, get blamed for the snafu (officially, it’s never the case managers’ fault.  Never), they pay the price and have to do what the case managers tell them to do (or take the least nasty of, usually, two choices) to fix what’s broken.  I and my RAMS, INC counselor/therapist hoped for more, but what I got was Tamara playing by the Welfare systems’s rules,  which don’t allow for much, if any, flexibility. 

    “By The Book” means having the attitude that everything was my fault.  By The Book meant that Tamara said that this chain of events meant that obviously I was not ready to work and that some kind of going-back-to-the-drawing-board action needed to be taken.  RAMS, INC. disagreed, especially since Tamara seemed to want them to start over with me.  My time with them is supposed to be ending, things are up in the air and I didn’t go to circus school to be a juggler.

    Rat, race, just another rat in the race, sniffing the air, wondering if I can climb over the wall and go somewhere else.  Been here and there, done that.

    Various people need to here from you if this “irks” you as much as it does me.  I’m not the only person getting hosed.  I’ve spoken with other people in the same boat, being asked to do things that don’t make sense—because if they do THOSE things…why do they even need DOR??????  The Gav.  Gavin Newsom.  San Francisco’s Mayor.  The Human Services Commission, the Board of Supervisors, the State of California’s Department of Rehabilitation--they need to hear from people. 

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

    Tags
  • I Come from Poverty Pimps that Came from Poverty Pimps

    09/24/2021 - 09:21 by Anonymous (not verified)
    Original Author
    Lola Bean
    Original Body

     

    Disaster strikes as the phone rings, I don’t want to answer it cause I know nothing will be the same afterwards. My thoughts fall away.  My abdomen starts to cramp sending up tiny little knots slowly making their way up to my throat as I anticipate the news I’m about to hear. The feeling is familiar, the voice on the other end of the phone trembles.  The tremble triggers my body reacts like second nature.  I already know what coming next.  The cancer is back, the job isn’t available, the notice on the door says we owe money, something didn’t work out.  All these things flash through my brain scanning for the most plausible scenario that could cause this voice to tremble so.  Every time I hear that voice the process starts.  Before I can push it all down deep inside like it doesn’t exist this is what I feel.  The few seconds of time I have to really feel what’s happening inside before I have to suck it all in and be strong. This is what happens.  Disappointed, frustrated I can’t take hearing one more loved one call and give me bad or broken news, hope crushed, plans changed.  How many let downs, doors  slammed,  can one life have?  I’ll be there no matter what.  Restless night tonight, sweaty chest turns to itchy red rash, stomach constantly rumbling, never leaving without my Tums in my pocket.  Sleeping with heating pads to soothe my anxious insides even through hot and sticky nights.  Hands trembling and heart in throat I strive to find time and words to defend those I chooses as family to those I was given as family.  The judgment in their eyes feels like daggers penetrating my pride with shame and resentment.  Hate and rage fills me up until I feel tears welling up in my eyes.  I want so badly to not care what they think or what they judge, but my body lets me know that won’t be the case this time.

    I come from people who have no land.  I come from people who stick together because when you don’t have land people are the next most stable thing.  The one thing that will never leave and you can never leave behind is your brain, your intellect, your thoughts.  My relatives came from Eastern Europe in a time and a place where Jews lived in constant fear and trust was only reserved for those who shared your same history because anyone else might kill or rape you and burn your house down.  There’s stories of my great, great, great, great grandfather killing a soldier and his horse in order to prevent a rape during a pogrom.  He then buried both the soldier and his horse and fled never to be heard from again.  These were stories my family recited with pride; stories of rebellion and revolution.  There were many Jewish pogroms in Russia around 1917 during the Russian Civil War: an estimated 70,000 to 250,000 civilian Jews were killed throughout the former Russian Empire; there were an estimated 300,000 Jewish orphans.  In 1938 there were 214,000 Jews left, by 1942 only an estimated 2-5,000  Jews existed in the area my grandparents were from.

    As far back as 1244 Jews were living under what was called the Bill of Rights for Jews.  This official document placed Jews in the profession of tax collectors and the money lending business.  This was forced onto the Jews, but with a history of being exiled and a nomadic people Jews often found themselves working with what no one could take from them, their mind.  “In a Europe where Jews were always considered resident-aliens, subject to expulsion or expropriation at the whim of the political class, it made sense to have a livelihood not tied to the ground.” (fff.org) Common professions for Jews became teachers, doctors, lawyers and accountants.  These could easily be practiced and moved on very short notice with very few resources.  These were also professions that eventually would earn them favor with the powerful and elite of society.  Since, these were the types of services only they could afford and use most often they found it in their best interest to protect the Jews and keep them in good close by.

    “The landlessness of the Jewish people is the source of its malady and tragedy.” (Ber Borochov, 2010).  A Zionist who believed Jews needed land in order to finally be safe.  Palestinians also a landless people, ones we should feel some empathy to are now suffering the same atrocities as Jews, but by hands who should know better.   Jews have become the ultimate pimp.  They became what the powerful and prestigious wanted Jews to become.  They played right into their plan.  My uncle owned a pawn shop connected to a liquor store in  one of the most poverty stricken neighborhoods in Dallas, Texas.  A place were Jews weren’t allowed to practice their religion until 1821.  A place where they were forced to resettle in the Government created program to stop the “crowding” problems on the East Coast.  I remember a dinner when my family was joking about how good of an idea and how genius this business venture of  my uncles was.  I wasn’t laughing;  I was mortified and these conversations are what finally what found me excommunicated from my family’s home and gatherings. 

    I come from Poverty Pimps who came from Poverty Pimps who came from Poverty Pimps that can traced back as far as almost 800 years ago.  What happened to my great great, great, great, great grandfather and all those others in my family remembered for their bravery in standing up to evil and oppression no matter the cost?  Why aren’t those stories the ones we liken ourselves to and dream to emulate? Why doesn’t my family see in me what my great, great, great, great, great grandfather saw in himself?  Why do I have to be a Poverty Pimp to be validated and not judged in the Jewish Community?  Legacies of Poverty Pimps litter Jewish pasts displacing and polluting the representations we have of ourselves.  We do not have to be these poverty pimps anymore.  No one will kill us or exile us if we don’t.  I choose not to be and I pursue all paths and people who will keep me on my toes and call me out if I fall into those traps again.  

    Religion is often used by the political elite to control people and push their own agendas.  On the local level Christianity today is a clear example.  many politicians claim to be devout Christians and support swing vote issues such as opposing same sex marriage and pro-life, but in the reality of their own lives they do not live by these ideals.  We all are aware of the many homophobic politicians who are bent on withholding rights from the LGBTQ community, only later to be discovered as gay themselves or active in the gay community.   There are also politicians who claim "family values," while soliciting underage prostitution or using illegal drugs at the same time.  This is just on a small scale, fringe issues.  It is easy to see at the international level as well. Financial support of Contras and wars in the name of religion are being funded by governments and banks.  Genocide and racist coups are able to happen in most cases because politicians are funneling money to be used by these passionate zealots to fight wars that will win them land, resources, and power.  Religion has served the elite well and the religious poorly and my family is right smack dab in the middle, a perfect place for finding pimps.

    Check out these articles and more on our sister sites at Real Change and the International Network of Street Newspapers: INSP Vendor Blog: http://www.insp-blog.org/ INSP Main Website: http://www.street-papers.org/ Real Change Blog: http://www.insp-blog.org/realchange/ Real Change Main Website: http://www.realchangenews.org/

    Tags

Latest

test