pIts tough these days.nbsp; The economy has been rough for years.nbsp; Especially for low income residents of the city, mentally and physically disabled folk, and an under educated youth.nbsp; These are the people who have made up the back bone of the Cannabis industry for the last 10-15 years.nbsp; Many landowners, growers, and field workers in the Cannabis industry in Northern California are on government disability and use the cash economy to lsquo;cheatrsquo; the government so they can live a decent living.nbsp; Its hard to even get a space in a trailer park when your only income is from a disability check, and you#39;re legally not allowed to receive that check and have an additional income./p pThere is a huge cash economy that is happening in Northern California.nbsp; Landowners lease their fenced gardens to growers on a decent percentage of all the properties in the weed-friendly counties that make up much of Northern California.nbsp; There are thousands of growers who make their living growing outdoor crops, or sleep in their living rooms because the bedrooms are full of grow lights.nbsp; Thousands of college students and many urban young people get some extra cash from using up a closet or a bedroom and living a cramped lifestyle in order to keep up in a increasingly expensive city.nbsp; There are thousands who flock to Northern California for work, as trimmers, leaf pickers, soil mixers, security guards, cultivation experts, musicians, masseuses, electricians or as uneducated labor.nbsp; There is no reading requirement, no education requirement, no resume, cover letter, prior references or experience necessary.nbsp; The pay often is pretty damn good when compared to the other unskilled work that may or may not be available.nbsp; The young, disabled, economically advantaged and disadvantaged all have the ability to start entrepreneurial businesses with little or no start up./p p15 years ago myself I started with a borrowed grow light and a few bucks.nbsp; I moved up slowly, from a closet to a bedroom to my own apartment (where I lived in the living room), eventually finding full time employment and running large outdoor grows where I was responsible to nobody but myself. It put me through college, let me travel where I normally wouldnrsquo;t have been able to, and even helped me be able to serve and volunteer in my community when it was required because I worked for myself. I could take off the odd summer, travel around the Indian community, go to far-away ceremonies, travel internationally and take half a year off to volunteer in my community full-time.nbsp; I have watched as the price dropped from $3400, to $2800, to $2200, to $1500, to $1200 and now even to sub-$1000 prices for an outdoor pound.nbsp; It still costs the same to grow. But originally because it was a black market, it was highly illegal to grow, and people were generally scared of being caught, the price was inflated and high./p pAs the laws eased year by year, as the criminal penalties slowly got easier, as the public perception changed, and now as we have a good deal of the western states with full on legalization, the price is at an all-time low.nbsp; I knew it had come because my own Mom, who once used to be so embarrassed by my smoking weed, now had discussions over lunch with her friends about their childrens involvement in the various sectors of the Cannabis Industry.nbsp; The market is flooded with growers.nbsp; It used to be hard to find a property in Northern California that would let you grow, now its nearly impossible to find one that isnrsquo;t growing already.nbsp;nbsp; You can order herb on your iPhone and have it delivered in 20 minutes while paying on your credit card.nbsp; No more waiting for your local dealer to hopefully answer his phone.nbsp; The guy across the street can get a delivery before your dealer even sees the missed call./p pI recently attended the Green Rush Job Fair in San Francisco, a gathering of the growing and explosive Cannabis businesses and prospective employees.nbsp; There were all sorts of new budding businesses in the room.nbsp; Uber-like delivery services, Bud and Breakfasts like Air B-n-B, Edible companies, Sacramento Lobbying groups, and even Technology companies.nbsp; There were also all sorts of attendees, eager people from all sorts of backgrounds looking for a job in this growing market.nbsp; There were stoners wearing business suits, nerdy tech guys, closet growers looking to get themselves a job to get to their next harvest and fresh outtarsquo; high school kids with their favorite 420 T-Shirt tucked into their Khaki pants.nbsp; Itrsquo;s obvious that the city I can hardly afford to live in is growing and moving me out, and now my own business has grown so big that Irsquo;m no longer qualified for the positions they are looking for.nbsp; If you#39;re not willing to accept entry-level wages (even with a decade of experience), then they arenrsquo;t looking for you. They want the low payed security guard or the guy from the coffee shop to change jobs and serve you bud instead of coffee.nbsp; They are looking for Tech guys, Data Analysts, Sales and Marketing, College degrees and experience required. But not experience in the Cannabis industry.nbsp; Several employers said that that was actually frowned upon.nbsp; While our housing crisis may be kicking out families that have lived there for generations, the legalization and large scale ramp up of Marijuana is kicking out the employees and experts that the business has been based on for the last decade.nbsp; With the new legal situations come new employment situations./p pNo longer is it a business for societyrsquo;s castaways, the disabled, the unemployed, the under educated, those with little to no capital, or the poor.nbsp; Now its a business for the guys who are already employed.nbsp; Instead of working for SalesForce, Uber or the new big tech firm, now they can work in the exploding Cannabis industry.nbsp; Now you need corporate experience and a college education to be in the weed business.nbsp; But whatrsquo;s going to happen to the rest of the people who helped build this industry?nbsp; What is going to happen to those who are on government disability and have been taking part in California#39;s hidden green economy to get by? What about all the traveling under educated folk who come in and work for the summer or the fall? What about the public school teachers who work the summers because teachers donrsquo;t earn enough to survive in the bay area?nbsp; What about the youth who donrsquo;t have other economic opportunities due to failing school systems, lack of education, lack of career prospects, and lack of opportunities?nbsp; What does the guy who only has a few hundred bucks and some borrowed equipment do when he wants to start a business?nbsp; What about all the physically and mentally disabled folk who our society has thrown out, won#39;t employ, or who canrsquo;t find employment because of a failing mental health system?/p pA lot of folk in California have been finding extra work, or literally the only work that they can do, and they are finding that their job is disappearing.nbsp; Marlboro wants to do it now.nbsp; Uber-style delivery wants in.nbsp; Air BnB clones want a piece.nbsp; Corporate strategy is now taking over the good-vibe marketing that made California#39;s Green economy such a relaxed place and made us famous.nbsp; I feel like the San Francisco Cab driver who now is having to find other work now that Uber came to town.nbsp; Itrsquo;s back to the back of the line in the labor force and starting all over.nbsp; We had no stake or equity in the economy that grew around us. Counties have been changing their laws slowly over the past few years, making it tighter and tighter and more and more regulated.nbsp; Grows are shrinking or being outlawed all together.nbsp; They are becoming more regulated.nbsp; Itrsquo;s all paving the way to legalization.nbsp; To turn the 1000 acre almond orchards into grow sites.nbsp;/p pWhat all this entails is that the low-capitol entrepreneur is no longer going to be able to participate the same way that they used to.nbsp; Do you know anyone whorsquo;s leasing 100+ acres with Irrigation and tractors just to get from one side to the other?nbsp; Or do you have an uncle or an aunty who used to rent the corner of their backyard?nbsp; For most people its the latter.nbsp; Now you will need serious investment to take part.nbsp; You need financiers, several employees and a permit.nbsp; Whorsquo;s gonna get the permits?nbsp; I bet it wonrsquo;t be the hundreds of thousands of growers in Northern California who have been banking on this for decades and who are now being displaced.nbsp; The people who might have upgraded their truck, paid off their mortgage, or put their kids through college.nbsp; Sure, some might have bags of money buried or came up majorly on real estate, but for the majority of people it was a little extra income or the only income they could get.nbsp;nbsp;/p pOne of the problems of an underground cash economy is that yoursquo;re never really sure how many people are involved in it.nbsp; They donrsquo;t show up on the census, they donrsquo;t get counted by the IRS.nbsp; Trust me, Northern California depends on it.nbsp; Its the reason that half the houses have renters, the reason why rural areas where there is no real work have decent employment.nbsp; There are people who rely on it to pay their bills or their mortgages because it is the only employment in the most rural areas of California.nbsp; There are hundreds of thousands of people who are about to lose their part time or full time job.nbsp; But because its cash, because its black market, they canrsquo;t speak out.nbsp; Although you can buy almost anything with cash, you canrsquo;t buy a house these days with $100 bills yoursquo;ve been hiding in a shoebox, even if you have a big shoebox.nbsp; You also canrsquo;t go down to the bank and deposit the $500,000 that yoursquo;d need to start a legitimate business in the cannabis industry.nbsp; So our cash economy has left us out of the future of this ldquo;green rushrdquo; that we started.nbsp;/p pNorthern California property has had an added value the last decade because people were able to grow on it.nbsp; You could have a half dozen full time employees working on a single property that were only able to be there because of the grow.nbsp; There are billions of dollars that, because they are cash, havenrsquo;t made it into the banks. Instead they have been supporting the local Ace Hardware, the local cafe, better tips for restaurant workers, hiring people to do work for you because yoursquo;ve got a wad of cash in your pocket, more cash being spent because therersquo;s nowhere else to put it.nbsp; The economic impacts of taking so many jobs away from Northern California are going to be devastating.nbsp; Devastating to rural real estate, to small and rural towns, and devastating to all the would-be and soon-to-be unemployed who formerly had work.nbsp;/p pDe-criminilization of Cannabis needs to happen.nbsp; The drug war has gone on far too long and far too many people have suffered and had their futures irrevocably changed for the worse.nbsp; I myself was facing a handful of felonies for some weed.nbsp; 6-12 years of my life potentially gone.nbsp; Luckily I had the privilege of a lawyer, and bail.nbsp; That wasnrsquo;t something that many can afford, and unfortunately both of those things are rights that you can buy, and you get treated completely different in the system if you have them.nbsp; Decent legal representation and the right to have equal access to living in your own house while you await trial should be guaranteed rights, but unfortunately they are something you must buy, and they are not cheap.nbsp; Thinking back its hard to believe that I could have lost so much of my life.nbsp; My future would never have been the same.nbsp; My dreams would have been snuffed.nbsp; Legalization needs to happen, even if just to keep people out of prison, but what worries me most about the impending changes that are happening is what is going to happen to those who are already employed in the industry./p pEven those who built quite the resume out of the whole thing are finding out that their experience isnrsquo;t wanted or respected.nbsp; Selling weed and being a middle man isnrsquo;t the same as having Sales experience from a major corporation.nbsp; Agricultural companies wonrsquo;t hire you for all your lsquo;irrigationrsquo; experience but instead will offer you a low paid labor position.nbsp; ldquo;Amateur botanistrdquo; and a Botany degree from UC Santa Cruz arenrsquo;t the same thing.nbsp; Managing employees on the farm isnrsquo;t the same as management experience in corporate America. The school of hard knocks sure ain#39;t looked at the same as a college education. A resume full of experience that you canrsquo;t actually put a telephone number next to is turning out to be quite the road block.nbsp; This new Green economy is full of low-paid work for most of us, and new job opportunities for those who are now living in the house that we grew up in.nbsp;nbsp;/p pDonrsquo;t even get me started on the Green Rush/Gold Rush thing. nbsp;nbsp;/p

p dir="ltr"spanspanFour years ago I met the love of my life. As a 62 year old male bachelor/Hippie Madman, I met the love of my life.nbsp; We got hitched, Irsquo;ll just say our life together is perfect as a saltnpepper low income senior. With senior and disability problems.nbsp;/span/spanI am not saying we donrsquo;t debate. We do that. Quite loudly sometimes. Outside of that we get along great. As I say, she has spiced up my life./p p dir="ltr"I had to educate her about low income living after Wells Fargo kicked her out of her own house with her Service Animal Betty Bingo. As a writer for Poor and an activist all my life, I had to teach her the ropes./p p dir="ltr"Living in the most expensive City in America, our $3,000 combined income a month doesnrsquo;t go very far. With a $1,000.00 grocery bill a month (due to our weird low salt diet. Common Sense told us not to pay IRS Taxes with me getting $1,000.00 per month and her getting $2,000.00, it is not luxury living we are enjoying the rusty years with my wife from full body gout carpal tunnel, Arthritis in both ankles, hips, knees and shoulders.; sleep apnea, and so on. I have had Pancreatitis; Heart Attack; scoliosis./p p dir="ltr"Then a big surprise a few months ago in the mail from the infernal revenue service better known as the internal revenue service. For not filing taxes my wife has had a lovely surprise from these people a bill for $2,913.61 for tax year 2008./p p dir="ltr"She was a publisher of a coffee book, ldquo;Redbluff, The Way we were in the 1970s.rdquo; Her business partner, editor and photographer of the book died, and people not paying for a case of books that they bought, being both of them not savvy in the laws of publishing and dishonest business practices from the Hallmark Store in Red Bluff and the Red Bluff Daily News. For her being a new person in this field aka a neophyte and also a woman of color. She is not a stupid woman, she is very intelligent. I was brought up in the era where a personrsquo;s handshake was a big deal. Today#39;s practices are bend over and we will give you what you want! She forgot to file the taxes. People owed her $7500.00 for book purchases and they didnrsquo;t pay. Plus costs of storing these books in Red Bluff, shipping costs from San Leandro to Red Bluff and storage./p p dir="ltr"spanspanA few years later she filed the taxes. Her accountant now went South and her records disappeared like the IRS loves to do to people of color and poor people. The Donald Trumps of this world have lawyers up their butt. So they donrsquo;t worry about tax problems. Us poor people on the other hand, nbsp;just lucky to feed ourselves are vacuumed through the cracks. They keep an eagle eye on us like we are going to bankrupt the US Economy./span/span/p p dir="ltr"spanspanAs soon as she got that letter saying that she owed an xxxxx amount of $$$$$$$ she was the first one in the door the next day. The first of the three Stooges was a woman of middle European descent.nbsp; Kathy walked in the door with 2007 2008 filing in hand to prove that they were wrong. It was verified briefly that the taxes for 2008 were filed and paid. You are accumulating fees for not filing 2012 through 2014 you might as well file 2015 to get ahead of the game before too many fees for that tax year. Kathy explained that she didnrsquo;t have monies to go to a tax preparer. The Agent volunteered a list of nonprofits that would help me file my taxes for free. Kathy rushed home with the lists in her hands like a dog with a good soup bone. When she came home she was grinning from ear to ear. She immediately called two or three companies until she got the people she needed. The Chinese Newcomerrsquo;s Center called back and she went the next morning and met with George Chang. These people were very helpful to her.nbsp; My wife is a Pacific Islander and Cherokee Indian and no Asian that she knows of. She was treated the same as everybody else in the office. Returned home and went to the IRS the following week. Went to see another Agent that made the shit hit the fan. This Agent is the equivalent of Curly of the Three Stooges. Told her that 2008 was not in her file and this is what all the fees are for. The Agent added insult to injury by scaring her into thinking there will be big monthly payments that have to be paid. He did not do the proper paperwork when he accepted the check for $841.00. He did not accept the IRS Payment Vouchers that were given to me by The Chinese Newcomerrsquo;s Center. She came back home in tears. Talked over her problem. I cracked a joke about them, ldquo;The only difference between the IRS and a rapist is the rapist says thank you and the IRS does not.rdquo; A few days later after talking to her tax preparer, she set up a payment plan. She came home grinning from ear to ear and my wife told me I was correct in the amount./span/span/p p dir="ltr"spanspanOn Saturday, August 12, 2016 the final shoe dropped when she got 5 Certified letters from the IRS stating: They intend to terminate her Installment Agreement, and that she will have to pay $3,000.00 immediately in overdue taxes. They may seize (ldquo;levyrdquo;) any State Tax Refund and apply it to the aforementioned bill./span/span/p p dir="ltr"spanspanReporterrsquo;s Editorial:/span/span/p p dir="ltr"spanspanIt is about time to use a little known section of the United States Constitution. Any State that wants to resign from this Union shall just need a majority of the Legislature to vote to resign from The United States. California is in the best situation to resign. If we were a country California would be the seventh largest economy in the world. We only get back 3 cents to every dollar we give in our taxes. We have the most progressive constitution than all of the other states. It is about time that some Assemblymen or State Senators use this little known section of the United /span/spanspanStates Constitution./span/p

pThe PoLice culture of rape and abuse that continues behind the badge-nbsp;/p pldquo;The nails in the wall dug into my spine. Deep. The pain seared my back. It was a pain i forced myself to become used to. I lived with it. It was from my step-father. These horrific moments of child sexual abuse flooded back into my head as the media bombarded us with Oakland and San Francisco PoLice stories of rape of a minor child. Images of a young girlrsquo;s breasts and Facebook posts were splattered across multiple corporate media channels always hungry for ldquo;bleeds it leadsrdquo; media./p p The sexually exploited teenager at the center of a Bay Area police scandal said she told investigators that four officers had sex with her when she was 16 and 17 years old, including an Oakland police officer she considered her ldquo;boyfriendrdquo; and a Contra Costa County sheriffrsquo;s deputy who would pick her up and drive her to a rural road near the Caldecott Tunnel./p p My heart, soul and mind imploded. The babylonian media ate it all up with a subliminal narrative constantly implied, The only image of this girl-child that appeared almost every hour when the story broke was this baby wearing a shirt with breasts exposed. 535 years of rape and colonization of indigenous bodies floated in and out of my nightmares. Accusations of the fetishized native, objectified female who ldquo;wanted itrdquo; instead of a minor girl-child of color who was exploited by child rapist kkkops/p p From slave-catchers-rapists to missionary colonizer rapists to 21st century misogynist poLice rape culture these occupying armies, land-stealer protectors are and have been predating and perpetrating on poor bodies and bodies of color for centuries, . Any of us who have already had contact with poLice know that the culture of racism, violence and abuse is already rampant behind their state sanctioned badges, the frightening turn for me is the way that the ldquo;accusationsrdquo; seemed to only come from this child. Had it not been for the revolutionaries like Anti-Police Terror Project and so many more folks who fight poLice terror everyday, who followed up with a whistle blower hotline and mass protests, nothing would have happened./p p The rape and child abuse which spanned two counties and who knows how many paid poLice officers was so egregious, i wondered why it didnrsquo;t seep into the mainstream child abuse advocates world. Why was there no CPS charge or felony rape charges placed on the perpetrators? oh thats right, cause they are all working for the same team./p p PoLice shoot 13 year old child with Beannbsp; Bagsbr / This week we saw another child, a 13 year disabled child, be abused, seriously abused by San Francisco PoLice because he was supposedly wielding a ldquo;kniferdquo;. After the use of a killer robot this baby was hit with bags filled with hard small rocks ( beanbags). And then to add bizarre insult to our collective intelligence, this entire incident was framed by the kkkorporate media and poLice as though it was a success. If any parent, care-giver or teacher had shot a disabled child who was obviously in a mental health crisis with ldquo;bean bagsrdquo; or any bags for that matter or laid hands on them, we would be charged with felony child abuse./p p From Jessica Nelson-Williams to Luis Demetrio Gongora Pat, the addition of sexual abuse and child abuse are just another in a long line of murderous abuses of power from the land-stealer protectors, already with the blood on their hands of countless disabled, unhoused, Black, Brown and indigenous unarmed peoples.nbsp;/p p As a survivor of child sexual abuse this latest development was almost too much for me to handle, re-triggering me in ways i canrsquo;t even explain. I am only now able to write this./p p font size="4"bNational Call for a State Of Emergency/Moratorium on all PoLice Use of Force /b/font/p p As the most impacted, the poor, unhoused, Black, Brown, indigenous and disabled mothers, uncles and fathers who are becoming increasingly terrified for our children life in this climate of post-colonial power abuse, we are releasing a national state of emergency/moratorium on the use of all force, weaponry, robots by these tax-payer paid for pedophiles, murderers and child abusers.nbsp;/p p Due to the extreme danger, murder, and ongoing targeting of young peoples of color, Trans peoples, disabled and unhoused peoples by police forces in the US, We the targeted, criminalized, disabled, unhoused Black, Brown and Indigenous peoples hereby call for a State of Emergency - Moratorium on the use of any firearms or weaponry by all police forces in the US. Specifically weaponry, tasers, guns, AR15 rifles, UZI#39;s, etc while on duty as police officers in any line of duty for the 90 day period following the call for the Moratorium./p p We as community advocates and members of most impacted peoples understand that many police agencies across the US have implemented CIT training programs, with little or no change in the ongoing murder and severe abuse of poor, Black, Brown and disabled people./p p We need to change nbsp;the focus from what the police needs to what the community needs.nbsp; We need to look at other models where the community refocus on what the community need from Denver, CO where the community set up a neighborhood awareness program around autism so parents can call on neighbors not police..nbsp; Basically there needs a transition from putting funds to police to neighborhoods solutions.../p p In this 90 day period, it is our goal to explore the option of completely disarmament of police forces as well as the multitude of community based solutions that have been discussed, explored and conceived by movements of impacted peoples across the US and in other countries whose police forces do not use weaponry at all./p p This call is being made in honor of so many of our Black, Brown, Indigenous, Disabled, Trans Children who have been abused, murdered and/or shot as of July 2016/p p Co-signers, endorsers so far include Idriss Stelly Foundation, Krip Hop Nation, Justice for Josiah Campaign, Peoples Commission for Justicenbsp; and the Anti-Police Terror Project/p div bPress conference releasing official call- Monday, August 15th @ 1pm/b/div div bLocations TBA- (call a href="tel:510-435-7500" target="_blank" value="+15104357500"510-435-7500/a for details and if you would like to endorse or support and if you are in another state or city to hold your own call./b/div p/p pIin addition to this call POOR Magazine, a poor and indigenous people-led movement of media, education and art we have implemented and practiced a No Police Calls ever policy, for the last 20 years, facing and dealing with problems, violence, internal and external in a circle with our ancestors, elders and community members. On September 24th in collaboraton with the Idriss Stelly Foundation and the Peoples Commission For Justice we will be holding a community workshop on how to do this for other grassroots organizations, highlighting the examples of other organizations across the nation that practice the same model/i/p div class="yj6qo ajU" div class="ajR" data-tooltip="Show trimmed content" id=":x0" role="button" tabindex="0" img class="ajT" src="https://ssl.gstatic.com/ui/v1/icons/mail/images/cleardot.gif" //div /div

p lang="en-US" style="font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; margin-bottom: 0in;"When I was younger (and even now) I watched the Three Stooges and other old shows. I have always loved things from the 19supth/supnbsp;Century cartoons, songs, TV shows and elders. But, I always loved the Three Stooges. But then another night I was watching Three Stooges and I realized that the show was really racist. The show made black people look stupid and said all kind of racist slurs against different cultures./p p lang="en-US" style="font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; margin-bottom: 0in;"nbsp;/p p lang="en-US" style="font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; margin-bottom: 0in;"They made really racist slurs like referring to Japanese people as Japs and degrading Jewish people. But, in that time the Three Stooges was not the only racist kids television show in the 1930#39;s. Little Rascals, a television show airing from 1922-1944 was about poor children#39;s adventures in their neighborhood. In one of those episodes to get away form one of his friends he painted himself black to look like someone else./p p lang="en-US" style="font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; margin-bottom: 0in;"nbsp;/p p lang="en-US" style="font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; margin-bottom: 0in;"What I realized about all of these cartoons and television shows is that the people who are starring the shows and even the directors of these shows realize how racist they are they just think that they are doing the right thing by following along with the modern culture. And in a way they are. Because the whole American culture back then supported racism of any kind./p p lang="en-US" style="font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; margin-bottom: 0in;"nbsp;/p p lang="en-US" style="font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; margin-bottom: 0in;"Another cartoon was Looney #39;Toons, a popular kids show that was on today that some of the episodes were so racist they were banned from television. The Censored Eleven, the collection of Looney #39;Toons cartoons that were banned in 1968 from television were cartoons that were from 1930#39;s to 1940#39;s.nbsp;/p p lang="en-US" style="font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; margin-bottom: 0in;"nbsp;/p p lang="en-US" style="font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; margin-bottom: 0in;"The thing that really shocks me is that in all after all of these years people make the same stereotypes but less blatantly. A stereotype is what people call a sentence that assumes something about someone else#39;s race.The media supports it too just like they did back then in the 1930s and 40#39;s. They do subtle things like talk about all of the gang violence in the black and brown communities./p p lang="en-US" style="font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; margin-bottom: 0in;"nbsp;/p p lang="en-US" style="font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; margin-bottom: 0in;"Lately one of the prime examples of racism against black people is the police killing black and brown men all over America. Micheal Brown, Oscar Grant, Freddy Gray and Idriss Stelly are just prime examples of black men being shot down by the police for doing nothing but walking down a street./p p lang="en-US" style="font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; margin-bottom: 0in;"nbsp;/p p lang="en-US" style="font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; margin-bottom: 0in;"Another example of how racism back then effects the world today is all of the people back then who grew up in that racism and grew up watching those shows and saw how black people were humiliated along with Japanese people, Indian people and many other cultures. I have been doing some research and I realized that that Donald Trump grew up around that era here is I question I ask for you is that really surprising? nbsp;/p

pAbout a year and a half ago I lost the best healthcare provider I ever had in my life [The creator notwithstanding!]/p pShe not only provided me with everything necessary that she could for my well being , she actually listened to me and gave me feed back if I asked for it./p pShe always formed her advise like a suggestion and asked me ifnbsp; would be willing to try something without making demands./p pI always felt loved and cared for under her care./p pBoy have things changed!/p pHer first replacement was a hipster who claimed she was the only M.D. on the staff at what was then Glide health services and is now Tenderloin healthcare services./p pShe along with an in-house pharmacist tried to convince me to take prescriptions which I still refuse to take./p pThe Pharmacist recommended that I stop using marijuana as medicine because according to him it is a central nervous system depressant [hahaha!]/p pI finally got fed up and asked for a new Dr. She also claimed she was the only M.D. on staff./p pWe fought tooth and nail even filed a grievance. And when she finally saw how hard I was working by way of lab results we finally got on good speaking terms with one and other So of course, she got fired as well./p pThe new one is apparently another hipster doesnrsquo;t even have any letters next to her name so Irsquo;m doubtful if she is even a nurse [which is not necessarily a bad thing because Esker -D is in fact a nurse practitioner and more than qualified to hold the position she once held. Even Dr. # 2 confided in me that if Esker-D came back, patients would be lining up to have as a healthcare provider./p pBut getting back to Dr. (?) #3/p pShe is very demanding and seems to be more interested in getting me to do things to make herself look good rather than respectful of my desires and being supportive even if she doesnrsquo;t agree with my approach. Tenderloin Health services has all but white washed almost the entire staff. An office that was once flowing with people of African and Pacific Island descent have almost been completely replaced by young white hipster types./p pWho needs that ? Bring back Esker -D!/p

pspanStevie Wonderrsquo;s title of his September 28th, 1980 album, Hotter Than July can describe what teenagers young adults with autism are feeling this year. Although we celebrated the 26th birthday of the Americans with Disabilities Act; itrsquo;s been very hot for teens young adults with autism in cities all over the US not because of the Summer sun but because of police shootings/brutality from Miami, FL to Chicago, ILL to San Francisco Burbank, CA against them. From taser to robots to bomb squad to bean bag bullets to real bullets were all used against autistic young teens and adults by police this Summer especially July/2016./span/p pnbsp;/p pspanJuly 15th A local Latino family was outraged cause the officer pulled Tawnya Nevarez over because her son, whom the family does not want to name, wasn#39;t wearing a seat belt. Police said he became agitated during the stop, and his mother told the officer he was autistic. It ended with the teen being tasered and sent to the hospital./span/p pnbsp;/p pspanJuly 18th The police union of North Miami police department said that the officer was aiming for 26 year old Arnaldo Rio autistic Black/Native young man who was sitting on the ground next to his caregiver/therapist, Charles Kinsey, a Black man who was ldquo;accidentially was shot in the leg. It started by somone calling the police because they though Rio was carrying a gun. The gun was a toy truck and after Kinsey shouted to the cops that the yong man has autism and he had aa toy truck in his had the police still tried to shoot Rio but got Kinsey in the leg. The handcuffed both men and had Rio in the police car for four hours./span/p pnbsp;/p pspanJuly 26th San Francisco Police officers ended a 16 hours standoff with a 13 year old autistic boy who was in a familyrsquo;s garage with a knife. The police called in the bomb squad, sent in robots and shot beanbag rounds into the 13 year-old boy. The boy was taken to the hospital to treatment for the beanbag shots he endoured by police./span/p pnbsp;/p pspanThese are only the well populize incidents that you can easily googgle that happened all in July 2016. All of these horrible cases have started up the same machine controlled by mainstream institutions like police unions to corporate media that spits out to the media, legal field, families, victims, activists and the general public the story of police and the cycle that victims, lawyers activists should follow shape what justice would look like./span/p pnbsp;/p pspannbsp;First, message is to try to blame the autistic person and their families, secondly, in these cases above is to convince the general public that police reforms are working because all three autistic young teens and adults are still alive and thirdly to lay out the same path to ldquo;justicerdquo; through the courts with state attorneys who many times are stacked against the victims and families and was well reported in many cities that the close relationships between state attorneys and police is seen as a blockage to real justice to police brutality victims and their families. nbsp;lastly if families are awarrded a settlement then the focus is one hundred shifted to more police training even though the cities above already have training before the shootings/abuse.nbsp; To make it seems that US Federal Government cares the Department of Justice, D.O.J will have community hearings like they did this Summer in San Francisco anad Chicago to do what?nbsp; To do a report and give it to our president while locally police abuse/shootings continues./span/p pnbsp;/p pspanAs we end July of 2016, can we pour some cold water on police departments to cool off what Stevie Wonder callsi Hotter Than July/i and at the same time come up with community solutions so parents, neighbors and others don#39;t need to call police. nbsp;Here are some Bay area alternative of not calling the police./span/p pnbsp;/p pspan- Homefullness/Poor Magazine No Police Calls ever/National Call for a State Of Emergency/Moratorium on all PoLice Use of Force link nbsp;a href="http://poormagazine.org/node/5561"spanhttp://poormagazine.org/node/5561/span/a/span/p pnbsp;/p pspan- Critical Resis- tance of Oakland new project the Oakland Power Projects (OPP). From their website it says, ldquo;The Oakland Power Projects build the capacity for Oakland residents to reject police and policing as the default response to harm and to highlight or create alternatives that actually work by identifying current harms, amplifying existing resources, and developing new practices that do not rely on policing solutions. It goes on to say organized into short, medium and long-term steps, the Oakland Power Projects work to make our families and neighborhoods stable and healthy without relying on the cops. CR members spent the last year talking with allies, friends, neighbors, and community members.rdquo; More info at their website/span/p pnbsp;/p pspanhttp://criticalresistance.org/chapters/cr-oakland/the-oakland-power-projects//span/p pnbsp;/p pPhotonbsp;/p pArnaldo Rios‬ in a blue shirt with a toy truck in his hands./p

pem style="padding: 0px; margin: 0px; color: rgb(51, 51, 51); font-family: Lucida Grande, Lucida Sans Unicode, helvetica, verdana, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18px;"span style="padding: 0px; margin: 0px;"Editors Note: Asar Imhotep Amen is one of several power-FUL PNNPlantation prison correspondents. As currently and formerly incarcerated poor and indigenous peoples in struggle and resistance with all plantation systems in Amerikkka, POOR Magazine stands in solidarity with all folks on the other side of the razor wire plantation./span/em/p pnbsp;/p pldquo;One of the most tragic beliefs widely shared by Blacks throughout the world is that white people need or want us or will treat us equally and share societal resources with us. Faith continues to prevail in spite of overwhelming evidence which disputes this belief. Blacks continue to ignore the irrefutable truth that, in a racist social system, all institutions will reflect, protect and sustain values that are consistent with racism/white supremacy. This should not be considered surprising or profound since all institutions serve to perpetuate the social theory of the group which created them.rdquo;/p p style="margin-left:3.25in;"-nbsp;nbsp;nbsp;nbsp;nbsp;nbsp;nbsp;nbsp;nbsp; Dr. Bobby E Wright/p p style="margin-left:3.25in;"African-Centered Psychologist/p pSometimes, different people can independently arrive at the same conclusion I didnrsquo;t start and havenrsquo;t been affiliated with the Black Lives Matter Movement, but I respect their analysis of the problem and their desire to end it. Around the same time as #BLM was starting, I, like many other people, was thinking along the same lins about what the fundamental problem was behind seemingly rampant police murders of Black people. And for once, I didnrsquo;t feel alone in centering the problem of what Black life means. If Black life doesnrsquo;t mean anything, the USA would be a genocidal slave state in which the killing and punishment of Black people is meted out and widely considered acceptable, regardless of guilt or innocence, gender, socioeconomic status, or other factors. And thatrsquo;s exactly what it is./p p#BLM (Black Lives Matter) is a grassroots coalition-based social movement started in the United States by Alicia Garza, Patrisse Cullors, and Opal Tometi in the wake of several unpunished (or lightly punished) incidents of police killing unarmed Black people, including the killing of Oscar Grant and Kenneth Harding in Oakland, as well as Trayvon Martin, Eric Garner, Renisha McBride, and Michael Brown. While it consists of people with diverse viewpoints and tactics, the movementrsquo;s central aim is to oppose the systematic normalization of Black peoplersquo;s deaths, which makes violence against Black people more likely and more acceptable. #BLM began as a social media movement, but has quickly become an on-the-ground social movement with many different actors and organizations that arenrsquo;t necessarily connected as one organization but have the same general aims./p pActions and policies of the state result in the disproportionate killing, injuring, and incarceration of Black people, but the struggle for Black life to matter is not just about opposing policing practices against Black men, boys girls. It is also about how domestic abuse victim Marissa Alexander was not allowed to defend herself against her abusive husband under the same ldquo;stand your groundrdquo; defense in Florida law that George Zimmerman used to get exonerated in the killing of Trayvon Martin. It is also about how Black transwoman Cece McDonald was prosecuted and convicted for defending herself against a hostile and racist group of white youths in Minneapolis. It is also about how broader political practices, like the mass disenfranchisement of Florida sand Ohio Black voters, the shutting down of water services to Detroit residents , and the anemic federal response to Hurricane Katrina in 2005, show a remarkable disregard for black lives./p pBecause the nature of racism is not just prejudice but the power to enforce prejudice, these problems cannot be addressed individually, by punishing or educating those who commit violence against Black people without justification. Itrsquo;s too big a problem. The conservative Wall Street Journal reported that in 2011 NYPD had more stops of young Black men in Manhattan that there are young Black men in Manhattan. And at least one former NYPD police officer has stepped forward to ay that he was specifically ordered to stop young Black males at every opportunity. But he is just one officer, and NYPD just one department. Police officers everywhere had broad latitude to stop anyone they suspect may be involved in a crime and use that latitude to systematically target Black and Latino men and boys. The problem is deeper than any one department and itrsquo;s ldquo;stop- and-friskrdquo; policies./p pFor one thing, itrsquo;s everywhere, not just Ney York. One report described anti-black racism as ldquo;baked intordquo; police practices. The root of the problemrdquo;, says #BLM co-founder Alicia Garza, ldquo;is anti-black racismrdquo;. In other words, there is a unique, deeply ingrained, and pervasive kind of racism that American society at large feels toward Black people that goes a long way toward explaining these disparities as well as many others./p pWhat does blackness mean to America? There are not-so-subtle hints everywhere./p p*Black people make up approximately 12 percent of the US population, but constitute more than 40 percent of the prison population./p p*White Americans use illegal drugs at rates that are comparable to, or well in excess of, the rates at which Black Americans use illegal drugs, but Black Americans are incarcerated for drug offenses 10 times more./p p*In 2012, a Black American was killed by police and security forces at least once every 28 hours. According to another report, ldquo;black teens were 21 more times likely to be shot dead [by police] than their white counterpartsrdquo;./p pThe problem is not just that a de facto police state is ready to descend on Black people at any time, but also, more broadly, that the entire population of African Americans is perceived by the broader society (1) as a potential threat and (2) as unworthy of being listened to when we protest through legal, institutional, or other means. This problem must be viewed as a systemic one, not just an individual or institutional one, and it must be addressed on multiple levels, including not only institutionally or interpersonally but especially in our unconscious thought, the deeply ingrained thought processes that are reflected by our actions before we even have the opportunity to think. Before we can change our thinking to make Black lives matter, we must truly understand that the problem of Black lives not mattering is a problem of meaning that isnrsquo;t just individual or institutional but structural. It is rooted in what America is./p pAmerica needs Black lives to not matter. Due to centuries of negative images and stereotypes about Africans and racial blackness, in the collective psyches of the United States, throughout the Americas, and across the world blackness means, as the late psychiatrist Dr. Frantz Fanon said, ldquo;the lower emotions, the baser inclinations, the dark side of the soulrdquo;. A field of study within cognitive psychology known as implicit cognition (or implicit bias) finds quantifiable evidence of what Black people have been knowing for better than 1,000 years (had anyone with power bothered to listen): that deeply rooted negative attitudes toward people of African descent are held widely across the American population, even among those who claim to be non-racist, even when other possible causes for these attitudes (like socioeconomic class or education level) are taken into consideration ndash; and these attitudes tend to increase peoplersquo;s willingness to use violence (interpersonal, institutional, or state) and punishment against Black people./p pOne recent quantitative study from Stanford, title ldquo;Not Yet Humanrdquo;, shows that people of African descent are commonly associated with apes at an unconscious level of mental processing. According to the study, ldquo;this Black-ape association alters visual perception and attention, and it increases endorsement of violence against Black suspects. In an archival study of actual criminal cases, the authors show that news articles written about Blacks who are convicted of capital crimes are more likely to contain ape-relevant language than news articles written about white convicts. Moreover, those who are implicitly portrayed as more apelike in these articles are more likely to be executed by the state than those who are not.rdquo; This finding agrees with the earlier work of Stanford literature professor Sylvia Wynter, who found that police in Los Angeles in the 1980rsquo;s and early 1990rsquo;s commonly used the incident code ldquo;NHIrdquo; ndash; meaning ldquo;no humans involvedrdquo; ndash; for incidents involving African Americans. While many people acknowledge this police code to have been racist, the Stanford quantitative study shows that even people who donrsquo;t think themselves racist have the same thoughts./p pOther studies show that children of African descent are believed to be older, more mature, and less innocent than their white counterparts, something that might explain why teachers suspend African American preschoolers at triple the rate of white preschoolers and why police and prosecutors are more likely to charge African American youth with harsher crimes or in adult court than they are in cases involving non Black youth. It might also explain why 12-year-old youth Tamir Rice was shot dead by police at a playground in Cleveland Ohio, while holding a toy gun, whereas white youths are free to regularly play with toy guns in their neighborhoods./p pAnother set of studies (ldquo;shooter biasrdquo; studies) shows that Black males holding cell phones are, on quick glance, believed to be holding guns, while white males are believed to be holding cell phones. These studies also found that people would be quicker to shoot and to holster their weapons when faced with a Black male who might be holding a cell phone or a gun, compared with a white male in the same position. These studies might explain why plainclothes police shot unarmed immigrant Amadou Diallo after he reached for his wallet presumably thinking the officers wanted to see his identification or were trying to rob him./p pStill other studies have shown that a stereotypically- named, hypothetical Black defendant will receive a higher rate of conviction and harsher degree of punishment for the same crime than will a stereotypically-named hypothetical white defendant, even when identical evidence is presented./p pA hypothetical job applicant with an African- American-sounding name is less likely to receive further consideration when a hypothetical job applicant with a white-sounding name is granted further consideration, even when both have the exact same resume, except for the name at the top. An applicant for housing or mortgage will be similarly screened based on assumptions about whether they are Black or not, thereby shaping geographic segregation patterns./p pAfrican- American employees are more likely to be evaluated poorly by employers than are white employees./p pBlack NFL players are required to return from injury sooner than their white counterparts with the same injury. Other studies show that the medical profession is slower to give aggressive treatment to African Americans and less sensitive to the pain of African American patients./p pRegardless of whether one stands on the side of addressing the problem, like the founders of #BLM, describing the problem, like researchers at Stanford, or even denying the problem or defending police murders of Black people, the central problem is not a swirling morass of practices to be altered. It is a structure. These problems of anti-black racism are not simply problems of individual or institutional practice or prejudice because they are repeated across widely disparate individuals and institutions with the same independent results. The psyche of anti-black racism is not individual or institutional. Both the psyche and the institution are networked together as part of one dynamic, fluid and massive structure. The psyche, like the institution, is a structure. The problems of Black life mattering are hence fundamentally problems of structural power. In other words, structural racism encompasses the entire system of white supremacy, diffused and infused in all aspects of society, including our history, culture, politics, economics and our entire social fabric. Structural racism is the most profound and pervasive form of racism- all other forms of racism (e.g. institutional, interpersonal, internalized, etc.) emerge from structural racism./p pThe key indicators of structural racism are inequalities in power, access, opportunities, treatment, and policy impacts and outcomes, whether they are intentional or not. Structural racism is more difficult to locate in a particular institution because it involves the reinforcing effects of multiple institutions and cultural norms, past and present, continually producing new, and re-producing old forms of racism./p pThe problem of Black life mattering extends to unconscious levels of thinking and is not only deeply rooted, but also widely diffuse and reinforced through multiple networks of power. It is therefore quite challenging to uproot without a massive change in the social structure that abolished the ways that both personal and institutional practice, as well as individual and social frames of meaning are tethered to the genocidal slave empire of the ldquo;modernrdquo; world, the United States. If we only think about the practice of prejudice without centering the ways that all racism derives from structural racism ndash; what I call anti blackness- we will be at pains to explain why there is so deep a reserve of animosity that can result in normalized violence toward Black people (and people of color in general) and why the mass loss of Black life does not constitute a national emergency or a cause for widespread grief. True dedication to the principle that Black lives matter will require a revolution using all means necessary to end the structure of anti-blackness./p pRacism/white supremacy in America is deeply rooted in a global system of settler- colonial capitalism, land theft, mass murder (or if you prefer the sanitized euphemism of the term ldquo;genociderdquo;) racial chattel slavery and its consequences. White privilege is the manifestation, consequence, and flip-side of Black oppression and exploitation, violence of indigenous sovereignty, and the Eurocentric imposition of private property relations on both land and people to extract profit through domination. This is a global Empire, and it is an empire here within the US itself as well. White supremacy, white privilege and racism can only be uprooted by overturning that system of settler colonialism and imperialism, here in the US and throughout the world. Nothing short of decolonization, self-determination of oppressed and colonized people and revolutionary social, political, economic and ecological transformation of the entire society will do./p p style="margin-left:2.0in;"ldquo;Powerful people never educate the victims of their power away from themhellip; the ideology of our ldquo;formerrdquo; slave masters cannot save us. We will not be truly liberated until we are the main instruments of our liberationrdquo;./p p style="margin-left:2.0in;"Dr. John Henrick Clarke/p p style="margin-left:2.0in;"nbsp;/p pCORRESPONDENCE:/p pTroy T. Thomas, H 01001, A1-137 ndash; UP/p pCSP-LAC/p pP.O. BOX #4430/p pnbsp;/p pLancaster, CA 93539/p

pOn May 23, 2014, Nate Greer, dedicated husband and father,nbsp; died at the hands of the Hayward Police Department during a routine DUI traffic stop.nbsp; What began as a routine sobriety test would suddenly become a horrible tragedy for Nate when several officers from the Hayward Police Departmentnbsp;and the Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART)nbsp;Police Department took it upon themselves without probable cause to physically manhandle him./p pSeveral of the police officers aggressively wrestled Nate to the ground, roughly pulling his limbs behind his body, along with several law enforcement officers physically crushing Nate with their entire body weight pressure while he lay on his stomach helpless and unable to move.nbsp; They proceeded to place Nate into a straightjacket-like restraint device after he had been tasered multiple times./p pThe law enforcement officers continued to lay on top ofnbsp;Natersquo;s body, holding him down on the ground for a prolonged period.nbsp; After several minutes passed, they noticed that Nate was unconscious with breathing trouble, however they continued to put the restraints onto him.nbsp; As Nate lay there for nearly seven minutes struggling to breathe, the police officers did nothing as they chose not to perform any CPR on Nate nor did they untie him from the restraints so that the arriving EMT personnel at the scene could immediately provide him life saving emergency care.nbsp;/p pWhile our black and brown communities throughout the Bay Area, in California, across the nation and throughout the world continue to be plagued by police brutality, Natersquo;s murder by law enforcement in Hayward, California had gone virtually unnoticed two years ago in May 2014, having been intentionally silenced in the mainstream TV/radio news media up until the release of a video from a police cam worn on one of the BART police officers, depicting the incident of a defenseless Nate struggling to breathe./p pNearly two years to the day of Natersquo;s murder by the police, on May 21, 2016, a video of the incident surfaced, which documentednbsp;the sequence of actionsnbsp;filmed by BART Police body camerasnbsp;that led to Natersquo;s untimely death.nbsp; The video clearly exhibited that Nate was no threat to the police.nbsp; In the video, although Nate never displayed any aggression of any sort toward the police officers, he could be heard asking numerous times for the officers to get off of him, followed by agonizing screams for a few minutes before losing consciousness./p pHerersquo;s the script from the body cam video of the incident that had gone unnoticed for more than a year, which has now brought much-needed attention to Natersquo;s death while he was in police custody:/p pThe video shows Nate cooperating and not being combative, communicating with the officer about his medical conditions that may affect his ability to perform a roadside sobriety test./p pNate begins to perform the test, placing his feet together and holding his head back with his eyes closed when henbsp;notices a second cop standing to his right./p pSuddenly, Nate appears afraid, telling Police Officer #1 in front of him../p pNate:nbsp; ldquo;emWhat are you guys going to do to me? I donrsquo;t understand, I donrsquo;t understand.rdquo;/em/p pPolice Officer #1 (replies):emnbsp; ldquo;Irsquo;m testing your balance to see how much you had to drink tonight,rdquo;/em/p pnbsp;Nate (responds):nbsp; ldquo;I havenrsquo;t drank nothing,rdquo;/p pPolice Officer #1:nbsp; emldquo;Irsquo;m trying to give you a field sobriety test,rdquo;/em/p pNate takes a step to his left./p pPolice Officer #1: (suddenly grabbing Natersquo;s wrist):nbsp; emldquo;Donrsquo;t be walking away from me!rdquo; /em/p pNate (asking the Officer in a worried voice tone):nbsp; emldquo;Hey, what are you guys doing to me?rdquo;/em/p pImmediately, several other police officers begin physically grabbing onto Natersquo;s body./p pnbsp;Police Officer #2: (with his arm grasped around Natersquo;s neck):nbsp; emldquo;Relax.rdquo;/em/p pImmediately, the police officers quickly knock Nate to the ground, laying Nate onto his back./p pNate (repeating in a winded-sounding voice tone):nbsp; emldquo;What are you doing???rdquo;/em/p pMore Hayward police officers joined by Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) police officers proceed to roll Nate over onto his stomach, ordering him to place his hands behind his back, however it appeared that Nate was trying to use his hands to keep his face from being smashed into the ground./p pThe police officers then proceed to taser Nate several times before managing to get one of his hands into handcuffs while ordering him to place his other hand behind his back ndash; all while several police officers are physically piled on top of him with their total body weight./p pThe police officers kept telling Nate to emldquo;relaxrdquo; /emeven though it would be impossible to relax in that situation, feeling asphyxiated by the weight of the several police officers who were laying on top him as one of the police officers shoved Natersquo;s head into the asphalt as he continued to breathe heavy, asking why were they treating him that way while attempting to position his head to where he could breathe./p pAfter ten minutes into the traffic stop, Nate had relaxed to the point where he was no longer moving or speaking./p pBut the police officers still continued to keep their bodies piled on top of Nate with one police officer still holding Natersquo;s head down with his hand./p pPolice Officer #3: emldquo;Yoursquo;re doing all right bro?hellip;ldquo;Just take a deep breath.rdquo;/em/p pBut by this time, it appeared Nate had stopped breathinghellip;/p pPolice Officer #4 (after rolling a now unconscious Nate back over onto his back):nbsp; emldquo;Hersquo;s unconscious.rdquo; /em/p pAt this point, all of the police officers got off of Natersquo;s body, about ten police officers in all, each of them asking the other if they nbsp;were okay, laughing and joking about what an intense struggle they had just gone through, comparing scratches on each otherrsquo;s arms, hands and elbows./p pAnother Police Officer (who had been laying on top of Natersquo;s body) then tells Natersquo;s lifeless body to emldquo;wake up!rdquo;/em/p pBART Police Officer with the body cam on (asks his BART Police Supervisor):emnbsp; ldquo;Irsquo;m rolling by the way, want me to turn it off?rdquo;/em/p pBART Police Supervisor:nbsp; emldquo;Yeah, thatrsquo;s fine,rdquo;/em/p pAt this point, the BART Police Officerrsquo;s body cam is shut off./p pHowever in October 2015, anbsp;wrongful death lawsuitnbsp;wasnbsp;filed in the Federal Court for the Northern District of California by Greerrsquo;s son, Joseph James against both the Hayward Police Department and the BART Police Department. Natersquo;s family and community members continue to demand answersnbsp;as tonbsp;why no investigation had ever been conducted by the Hayward Police Department or at the District Attorney of Alameda Countyrsquo;s Office following thenbsp;brutal actions and subsequent neglect inflicted upon Nate by both the Hayward Police Department and the BART Police Department./p pa href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7427M-TrWj4"PNN-TV Justice4NateGreer-Oscar Salinas/a/p pa href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lSrcFGOBkUI"PNN-TV Say His Name! Nate Greer!/a/p pa href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D_NOdHW8-Lc"PNN-TV JusticeForNateGreer #2/a/p pa href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hx3VStnPnaQ"PNN-TV JusticeForNateGreer #3/a/p pnbsp;/p

pbNational Call for a State Of Emergency/Moratorium on all PoLice Use of Forcenbsp;/b/p pAs the most impacted, the poor, unhoused, Black, Brown, indigenous and disabled mothers, uncles and fathers who are becoming increasingly terrified for our children#39;s life in this climate of post-colonial power abuse, we are releasing a national state of emergency/moratorium on the use of all force, weaponry, robots by these tax-payer paid for pedophiles, murderers and child abusers.nbsp;/p pDue to the extreme danger, murder, and ongoing targeting of young peoples of color, Trans peoples, disabled and unhoused peoples by police forces in the US, We the targeted, criminalized, injured, unhoused Black, Brown and Indigenous peoples hereby call for a State of Emergency - Moratorium on the use of any firearms or weaponry by all police forces in the US. Specifically weaponry, tasers, guns, AR15 rifles, UZI#39;s, etc while on duty as police officers in any line of duty for the 90 day period following the call for the Moratorium./p pWe as community advocates and members of most impacted peoples understand that many police agencies across the US have implemented CIT training programs, with little or no change in the ongoing murder and severe abuse of poor, Black, Brown and disabled people./p pWe need to change nbsp;the focus from what the police needs to what the community needs.nbsp; We need to look at other models where the community refocus on what the community need from Denver, CO where the community set up a neighborhood awareness program around autism so parents can call on neighbors not police..nbsp; Basically there needs a transition from putting funds to police to neighborhoods solutions.../p pIn this 90 day period, it is our goal to explore the option of completely disarmament of police forces as well as the multitude of community based solutions that have been discussed, explored and conceived by movements of impacted peoples across the US and in other countries whose police forces do not use weaponry at all./p pThe money that will be saved from the continued purchase of high grade, murderous war weaponry which costs millions of dollars in tax -payer dollars can be redistributed to impacted, injured, unhoused,targeted, and po#39;Lice terrorized Black, Brown, injured, colonized, incarcerated and criminalized famlilies, elders, youth and community./p pThis call is being made in honor of so many of our Black, Brown, Indigenous, Disabled, Trans Children who have been abused, murdered and/or shot as of July 2016/p pemCo-signers, endorsers so far include Idriss Stelly Foundation, POOR Magazine/Prensa POBRE, Krip Hop Nation, Justice for Josiah Campaign, Peoples Commission for Justice, Justice4Josiah,nbsp; and the Anti-Police Terror Project, California Coalition For Women Prisoners, Answer Coalition, span class="_5yl5"spanThe Center for Convivial Research and Autonomy (CCRA)/span/span/em/p pstrongTwo articles related to the National Call:/strong/p div a href="http://www.poormagazine.org/node/5561"State sanctioned Child Rape and Child Abuse : Police Brutality/a/div div nbsp;/div div a href="http://www.poormagazine.org/node/5562"Autstic Teenagers and Young Adults in Hotter than July : Plice Brutality/a/div div nbsp;/div div bPress conference releasing official call- Monday, August 15th @ 1pm/b/div div bLocations: Mission Police Station 17th and Valencia- (callnbsp;a href="tel:510-435-7500" target="_blank" value="+15104357500"510-435-7500/anbsp;for details and if you would like to endorse or support and if you are in another state or city to hold your own call./b/div

div Hello Friends Supporters,/div div nbsp;/div div p style="margin: 0px; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: Helvetica; color: rgb(35, 35, 35); min-height: 13px;"nbsp;/p p style="margin: 0px; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: Helvetica; color: rgb(35, 35, 35);"span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px"How are you? Thanks for your ongoing support of my/Krip-Hop Nation#39;s work throughout the years! Now we come to one of our biggest dreams for Krip-Hop Nation, our South Africa Tour./span/p p style="margin: 0px; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: Helvetica; color: rgb(35, 35, 35); min-height: 13px;"nbsp;/p p style="margin: 0px; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: Helvetica; color: rgb(35, 35, 35);"span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px"Itnbsp; is September and things are rolling out for the Krip-Hop South Africa Tour Nov- December 2016/span/p p style="margin: 0px; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: Helvetica; color: rgb(35, 35, 35); min-height: 13px;"nbsp;/p p style="margin: 0px; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: Helvetica; color: rgb(35, 35, 35);"span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px"I have my ticket and the Krip-Hop South Africa crew is knee deep in getting us sponsors.nbsp; For this indiegog campign I relyaing on direct emails and close friends supporters and less on posting on Facebook but I encourage others to post./span/p p style="margin: 0px; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: Helvetica; color: rgb(35, 35, 35); min-height: 13px;"nbsp;/p p style="margin: 0px; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: Helvetica; color: rgb(35, 35, 35);"span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px"Our online Krip-Hop Nation South Africa Tour Indiegogo campaign IS LIVEnbsp;@/span/p p style="margin: 0px; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: Helvetica; color: rgb(35, 35, 35);"span style="text-decoration: underline ; letter-spacing: 0.0px; color: #1255cc"a href="https://igg.me/at/S4VPn49O978"https://igg.me/at/S4VPn49O978/a/spanspan style="letter-spacing: 0.0px".nbsp; We tried to get the video caption but we donbsp; have the video transcript on the page./span/p p style="margin: 0px; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: Helvetica; color: rgb(35, 35, 35); min-height: 13px;"nbsp;/p p style="margin: 0px; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: Helvetica; color: rgb(35, 35, 35);"span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px"The time is tight. We need to raise a lot before mid October./span/p p style="margin: 0px; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: Helvetica; color: rgb(35, 35, 35); min-height: 13px;"nbsp;/p p style="margin: 0px; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: Helvetica; color: rgb(35, 35, 35);"span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px"This is huge for not only Krip-Hop Nation but for the disability international community. After more than 30 years of dreaming and networking (on the internet) for the day that I can touch South African land and connect with South Africans who are Deaf/Disabled, I can say it is worth the wait and work! Krip-Hop South Africa Tour in Disability Month, December!/span/p p style="margin: 0px; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: Helvetica; color: rgb(35, 35, 35); min-height: 13px;"nbsp;/p p style="margin: 0px; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: Helvetica; color: rgb(35, 35, 35);"span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px"We are fundraising to cover the following:/span/p p style="margin: 0px; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: Helvetica; color: rgb(35, 35, 35); min-height: 13px;"nbsp;/p p style="margin: 0px; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: Helvetica; color: rgb(35, 35, 35);"span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px"* Publishing a book of stories, art, poetry, essays and song lyrics of artists,writers with disabilities who are Deaf in Africa US.Our publisher, Blacktastic.net/span/p p style="margin: 0px; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: Helvetica; color: rgb(35, 35, 35);"span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px"* Creating, editing, producing and marketing of a film documentary of the tour./span/p p style="margin: 0px; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: Helvetica; color: rgb(35, 35, 35);"span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px"* Accessible equipment that would make the tour more accessible like wheelchairs etc/span/p ul li style="margin: 0px; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: Helvetica; color: rgb(35, 35, 35);" span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px"Performersrsquo; fees./span/li /ul p style="margin: 0px; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: Helvetica; color: rgb(35, 35, 35); min-height: 13px;"nbsp;/p p style="margin: 0px; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: Helvetica; color: rgb(35, 35, 35);"span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px"Stay tune! Thanks to POOR Magazine who is creating the Indiegogo Campaigns and thanks CB Smith-Dahl for doing the video./span/p p style="margin: 0px; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: Helvetica; color: rgb(35, 35, 35); min-height: 13px;"nbsp;/p p style="margin: 0px; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: Helvetica; color: rgb(35, 35, 35); min-height: 13px;"nbsp;/p p style="margin: 0px; font-size: 11px; line-height: normal; font-family: Helvetica; color: rgb(35, 35, 35);"span style="letter-spacing: 0.0px"The online fundraiser IS NOW OPEN. Help out! Give to Krip-Hop South Africa Tour November-December 2016 a href="https://igg.me/at/S4VPn49O978"span style="letter-spacing: 0px; color: rgb(18, 85, 204);"https://igg.me/at/S4VPn49O978/span/a./span/p /div

pYes indeed....At last! The punitive Maximum Family Grant Rule, also known as the lsquo;MFG Rulersquo; a humiliating policy that had hurt so many vulnerable families like mine while on welfare in California has come to an end after adversely affecting poor families for the past twenty plus years./p pHaving been on welfare under the MFG Rule was never easy for me during the years I had to depend on it.nbsp; When I had my two youngest children, I was impacted of the MFG Rule which made supporting my family while participating in my Welfare-to-Work activity extremely difficult and nearly impossible at times, as this punitive State mandated law banned me from receiving welfare cash-aid assistance for my youngest child as she was born when I was still receiving welfare cash-aid assistance.nbsp;/p pDuring this time, I was in deep struggle, living homeless with my young children in a dilapidated storefront space in Downtown Oakland and was dealing with domestic violence as my then partner was dealing with his own mental health issues at the time, which made the situation even more difficult. However, having less cash-aid assistance to live on for my three children made it much harder for me to get my family out of poverty for good./p pAnd although I was playing by the rules, being in full compliance in fulfilling my welfare-to-work obligations, I was forced to live on $65.00 per month per child for my two youngest children, which forced me to make a lot of desperate choices like stealing diapers, shoes and food as the monthly food stamp benefits I received for my family never lasted throughout the month due to the high cost of food in the Bay Area. nbsp;Because of the MFG rule, my cash-aid assistance was reduced, taking me twice as long to get through my welfare-to-work activity./p pThe MFG Rule, which was part of ex-President Bill Clintonrsquo;s sellout of poor families for Welfare Reform with the Republican Party during the mid 90rsquo;s was optional for states to adopt, which California did in 1994 by then Governor Pete Wilson.nbsp; This policy demonized single mothers and was racist, sexist, classist, and ensured that children grew up poor./p pAs part of the MFG Rule, the cap on benefits was originally based on the apocryphal story of the ldquo;welfare queenrdquo;, a term popularized by ex-President Ronald Reagan during his Presidential campaign, describing women who gamed the welfare system by lsquo;popping out babiesrsquo; and amassing a fortune at the expense of gullible taxpayers./p pThe MFG Rule was designed to punish women for having children while on welfare.nbsp; The idea was that welfare recipients should not be given an incentive to give birth while on aid, so the amount of cash aid assistance they received would be tied to the size their family was when they started receiving benefits. If another baby came along, well, too bad. Unless mom was raped, a victim of incest or could prove that the birth control didnrsquo;t work, there would be no benefit increase.nbsp;/p pOver the last twenty years, this punitive policy (MFG Rule) has done nothing to stop poverty. And despite its general intent to provide less government funded safety net programs for poor families, instead the MFG Rule actually invited government to intrude into the most intimate of womenrsquo;s decisions, forcing them to face humiliation, being forced to disclose their methods of birth control and having to inform government agents how they became pregnant./p pAs quoted by Jessica Bartholow of the Western Law and Poverty Center in Sacramento, California: emCalifornia and many other states have a long way to go in deconstructing the harmful stereotypes of poor mothers and families they have perpetuated. But California has shown that the first step is possible, and that strong legislatures and citizens prioritize the livelihood, dignity, and opportunity of poor communities./em/p pHowever, after two decades, and the hard work of legislators such as Senator Holly Mitchellnbsp;(D-Los Angeles), Author of SB-899 (Repeal MFG bill) to finally end this offensive and degrading policy and Advocates like the Western Law and Poverty Center, ACLU and several other advocate groups and organizations, including myself as someone who was adversely affected by the MFG Rule, this offensive and degrading policy would come to an end as California Governor Jerry Brown would repeal the MFG Rule, as this policy has done nothing more than put families in deeper poverty as it did for me and my children as we were forced to exist on $623.00 a month for a family of four in the San Francisco Bay Area, one of the most expensive communities to live in the entire United States./p pMost importantly, this would be a huge win for families like mine and for anti-poverty advocates, as nbsp;in June of 2016, Governor Brown and several California lawmakers voted to repeal the MFG Rule, ending two decades of a shameful policy that forced women into having fewer children by depriving them of the resources they needed to raise them.nbsp;This repeal is expected to benefit aboutnbsp;a href="http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/wireStory/california-budget-eliminate-contentious-welfare-policy-39851180"1/a26,000 childrennbsp;in 93,000 families across the state of California./p pAs quoted in the Sacramento Bee by Senator Holly Mitchell (D-Los Angeles):nbsp; emldquo;I am thrilled that the state has acknowledged its error in creating a policy in 1994 that has done nothing but force families living in deep poverty into deeper poverty.rdquo;/em/p pAfter years of unsuccessful attempts to abolish the MFG Ruleand in sharing my own personal experience of the deep struggle I endured while being under the MFG Rule while on welfare, including working together in tandem with other Advocates on all levels to make eminent change so that all children in California will have better opportunities in life as they are our future leaders was truly rewarding in every way now that the MFG Rule has now been repealed in the State of California.nbsp;/p pI am very have proud to have been a part of creating this change and that my lifersquo;s experience of poverty scholarship helped put a real face to the thousands of families who live each day in struggle trying to keep their children warm and fed each day, knowing that my voice mattered./p pI also look forward to informing families about the repeal of the MFG Rule in California and am very thankful to all who never gave up.nbsp; nbsp;However, it is time that we open up a real dialogue on #39;silenced issues#39; such as this in the mainstream media, so that social change becomes eminent.nbsp; With the MFG Rule repealed, an increase in cash-aid assistance will truly help many families reach their goals to eventually having the ability to rise out of poverty, as no child should ever be left behind. I would like to thank the fierce warrior Senator Holly Mitchell (D-Los Angeles) for never giving up the fight so that all Californiarsquo;s children count./p

pspanbI watched the police shoot another black man, while aiming at an autistic man of color. Yoursquo;ve probably seen it on Google. I watched it as a Black disabled activist that has reported on police brutality cases since the late 80rsquo;s. I watched them shoot Charles Kinsey as he tried to calm down Arnaldo Eliud Rios Soto as he held a small toy truck in his hands. The neighbors assumed the toy truck was a gun and called the police. The police came. Shoot the black social worker on the scene, and said they meant to hit the autistic man with the toy./b/span/p pnbsp;/p pspanbFrom my experiences as an activist, I knew that the cycle would begin. The media, the police unions, and the legal representative would all operate as a well-oiled machine functioning to keep the police protected. They would first blame it on the victim. Soto was a potential threat to the community, they would say. He had a disability and the toy truck could have been a gun. nbsp;Next, the lawyers and often the community and loved ones would come out in the media asking for more police training to prevent future incidences like this. Next, the district attorney, who in this case as well as in many others has a questionable relationship with law enforcement, would likely dismiss the charges against the officers./b/span/p pnbsp;/p pspanbWe havenrsquo;t traveled all the way from A-Z yet, but it is likely that the district attorney will side with the officers that shot Kinsey. I looked more deeply into this particular case of Jeremy Hutton who has downs syndrome. He took his motherrsquo;s car, Deputies chased him where he ran a red light then deputies shot him three times thank god he survived. Deputies said Jeremy was coming towards them and they thought they were in danger. However street cameras showed that Jeremy was driving away from the deputies and state attorney at that time dropped the charges against the deputies until the traffic camera revealed a different story. Investigating journalism found out that since 2010 the State Attorney has not charge not one police officer in an officerrsquo;s shootings in Florida ./b/span/p pnbsp;/p ol li spanbAccording to the Florida Partners in Crisis, the North Miami police department (where the accused officers are employed) had recieved the Crisis Intervention Training already. And following the shooting the Miami Herald on July 21st 2016 in an article titled Shooting sparks call from autism advocates for more police training says the following:/b/span/li /ol pspanbiIn Miami-Dade, interactions between police officers and mentally ill and developmentally span class="Apple-tab-span" /spandisabled people are frequent. The issue has not gone ignored mdash; training for cops in dealing span class="Apple-tab-span" /spanwith both populations has been lauded thanks to the ldquo;Crisis Intervention Teamrdquo; program span class="Apple-tab-span" /spanpushed by Miami-Dade County Judge Steve Leifman./i/b/span/p pspanbiThe program became a greater priority for police departments in the mid-2000s after a string span class="Apple-tab-span" /spanof high-profile shooting deaths involving mentally ill people. nbsp;/i/b/spanbiIn the past decade, more than 4,700 officers have undergone the crisis intervention training, span class="Apple-tab-span" /spanwhich includes a class designed to help cops understand the challenges of dealing with autistic span class="Apple-tab-span" /spanpeople./i/b/p pspanbildquo;Wersquo;ve made great progress,rdquo; Leifman said./i/b/span/p pnbsp;/p pspanbnbsp; nbsp; nbsp; nbsp; nbsp; nbsp;b.nbsp; In 2010 there was a Deputy shooting in Palm Beach County FL. of a disabled man that lead to/b/spanbnbsp;questioning the relationship between State Attorney and police in police shootings./b/p pnbsp;/p pspanbWith all of this in mind I got intouch with Matthew Dietz, Attorney for the Arnaldo Rios Soto for an interview (Below).nbsp; Irsquo;m also looking to get in touch with a Black menrsquo;s activist group in North Miami called The Circle of Brotherhood.nbsp; Kinsey is an active member of this group./b/span/p pnbsp;/p pspan1) bLeroy Moore: /bnbsp;How is Mr. Roto now and how did this incident changed him and his services his family?/span/p pnbsp;/p pspanbMatthew Dietz, Attorney for the Arnaldo Rios Soto,:nbsp;/b Mr. Arnaldo Rios.nbsp; Mr. Rios is currently in a psychiatric unit at Aventura Hospital in Miami.nbsp; We are trying to find him a placement at a group home that will provide him the intensive behavioral treatment that he needs, especially after this incident.nbsp; His family may have to move to a location by the facility, since there are no facilities in Miami that have services that meet Mr. Rios#39; needs. nbsp;/span/p pnbsp;/p pnbsp;/p pspannbsp;2) nbsp;bLeroy Moore: /bFor more than 15 years I#39;ve been following cases of police brutality involving people with disabilities and it is the same one answer avenue and that is the call for more police training.nbsp; Is the issue of training central to this case and if so, how? What are other avenues cause it seems in this case it is bigger than just training./span/p pnbsp;/p pspanbMatthew Dietz, Attorney for the Arnaldo Rios Soto,: /bThis case is more than about training.nbsp; Even though it was obvious that Mr. Rios was a person with a disability and that they were told that he was a person with a disability, this fact was ignored because of a lack of training.nbsp; However, after it was known that Mr. Arnaldo was a person with a disability, the police representative had the audacity to say that they did not intend to shoot the health care worker, but instead intended to shoot the autistic man.nbsp; To me, this demonstrates deliberate animus against persons with disabilities. nbsp;/span/p pnbsp;/p pnbsp;/p pspan3) nbsp;bLeroy Moore: /bHow do you think this case relates to other cases of brutality in general and in terms of police misconduct policy?/span/p pnbsp;/p pspanbMatthew Dietz, Attorney for the Arnaldo Rios Soto,: /bThis case is different to most of my police misconduct cases.nbsp; In this matter, the psychological distress to Mr. Rios is profound.nbsp; Even though he was not shot personally, he is fearful whenever he sees anyone in a uniform, and is afraid that they will shoot whoever he is with.nbsp; Also, he was deemed by the police to be worthless, someone who could be shot or targeted.nbsp; There was no concern at all that what they were doing in targeting Mr. Rios was wrong.nbsp; There is no doubt that they knew that shooting Mr. Kinsey was wrong, but because of the irrelevance of Mr. Rios, they believed that it was acceptable to shoot him. nbsp;/span/p pnbsp;/p pnbsp;/p pspan4) bLeroy Moore:/b nbsp;Does Florida have an anti profiling law like CA justn passed and has include disability to the legislation?nbsp;/span/p pnbsp;/p pspanbMatthew Dietz, Attorney for the Arnaldo Rios Soto,: /bNo.nbsp; California is much more progressive than Florida.nbsp; In Florida, the only persons with disabilities are protected by the hate crimes law are those who are incompetent and have a developmental or intellectual disability.nbsp; Further Florida also has a new law where folks can pay a dollar to get a D on their drivers license or identification card, and that an Autistic victim or perpetrator of a crime can have the assistance of their own psychologist, counselor or special ed teacher at their own expense. nbsp;/span/p pnbsp;/p pspan5) nbsp;bLeroy Moore: /bAs a lawyer what can be done legally in FL?/span/p pnbsp;/p pspanbMatthew Dietz, Attorney for the Arnaldo Rios Soto,: /bThe same thing that can be done anywhere else in the country, a lawsuit based on violations of Mr. Rios#39; civil rights under the equal protection clause and under the ADA./span/p pnbsp;/p pspan6) bLeroy Moore:/bnbsp;If you know what are the community demands?/span/p pnbsp;/p pspanbMatthew Dietz, Attorney for the Arnaldo Rios Soto,: /bThe community demands adequate training for the police and safe and secure community based housing for Autistic persons and persons with intellectual or developmental disabilities.nbsp;/span/p pnbsp;/p pspan7) bLeroy Moore:/bnbsp;From the website of Florida CIT Coalition nbsp;it says it was Organized in 2004, the Florida CIT (Crisis Intervention Team) Coalition is comprised of representatives of communities across Florida that are currently providing CIT training based on the Memphis Model. The group supports statewide implementation of CIT training for law enforcement officers. nbsp; So that in mind I know Soto#39;s parents are pushing for more training what are the differences?/span/p pnbsp;/p pspanbMatthew Dietz, Attorney for the Arnaldo Rios Soto,: /bThe CIT program in Florida is great.nbsp; However, it is not a requirement of all officers to be CIT certified.nbsp; Upon the conception that this was a potential suicide (which it was not) a CIT certified officer should have been called on the scene, but I am not sure whether any officers in the City or North Miami are CIT certified.nbsp; However, at the least, there should have been regular training on the needs and issues of persons with disabilities, and the officers should be required to do community policing and visit group homes, schools and meet persons with disabilities who live in the commodity. nbsp;/span/p pnbsp;/p pspan8) nbsp;bLeroy Moore: /bAs you know FL. has a history of discriminating against youth adults with disabilities from having disabled youth in nursing homes to now this. How does this history connects with what happened to Soto?/span/p pnbsp;/p pspanbMatthew Dietz, Attorney for the Arnaldo Rios Soto,: /bIts all about the money!nbsp; Its always about the money.nbsp; Medically fragile children were forced into nursing homes because Florida would not provide adequate services for these children to remain in the community.nbsp; There are no facilities in Miami-Dade County for Mr. Rios to obtain intensive behavioral services.nbsp; Thank God that the institutions were closed, but now they need to travel elsewhere in the state to try to get adequate services.nbsp; The only other option is to use chemical restraints to ensure that some people will be able to remain in facilities without the required behavioral services. No matter how you try to cut it, it is still failure to ensure full community integrationnbsp;/span/p pnbsp;/p pspan9) nbsp;bLeroy Moore: /bWe understand that the Sheehan case is coming to trial in San Francisco in the upcoming months, and the question is still unresolved as to whether the officers were required under the federal Americans with Disabilities Act to accommodate Sheehan#39;s mental disability. Does that play into this case?/span/p pnbsp;/p pspanbMatthew Dietz, Attorney for the Arnaldo Rios Soto,: /bNo.nbsp; This is more of a denial of basic equal protection and basic fourth amendment rights to be secure in ones own person. nbsp;/span/p pnbsp;/p pspan10) bLeroy Moore:/bnbsp;nbsp;if there is any way that we can provide support from the community to the family and case from California./span/p pnbsp;/p pspanbMatthew Dietz, Attorney for the Arnaldo Rios Soto,: /bTeach North Miami the difference between a toy truck and a gun. nbsp;/span/p pnbsp;/p pspan11) bLeroy Moore:/bnbsp;As a lawyer what do you think needs to be done on a federal and local level in this heighten moment of police brutality knowing that over 50% plus are people with disabilities?/span/p pnbsp;/p pspanbMatthew Dietz, Attorney for the Arnaldo Rios Soto,: /b50 million plus!nbsp; At a local level, there needs to be more interaction between the police and the community.nbsp; At Disability Independence Group, we developed a Wallet Card program in conjunction with the UM/NSU CARD and the Coral Gables Police.nbsp; The program teaches persons with autism, a developmental disability or an intellectual disability how to disclose their disability to law enforcement.nbsp; In addition, we have an aspect of the program that teaches police how to identify and interact with a person with autism, intellectual or developmental disability.nbsp;nbsp;nbsp;/span/p pnbsp;/p pspan10) nbsp;bLeroy Moore: /bHow can the public support the family and this case?/span/p pnbsp;/p pspanbMatthew Dietz, Attorney for the Arnaldo Rios Soto,: /bDemand that your community#39;s police have adequate training.nbsp; Demand that Olmstead is fully implemented to ensure community based placement and treatment./span/p pnbsp;/p pspan11) bLeroy Moore:/bnbsp;Any last words?/span/p pnbsp;/p pspanbMatthew Dietz, Attorney for the Arnaldo Rios Soto,: /bNever any last words, and always available for more questions!/span/p pnbsp;/p pPhoto: Young Latino man,nbsp;Arnaldo Rios Soto in a gray t-shirt sitting on a beed holdidng in his two hands a brown-tan stuf Animal close to his chest . nbsp;He is smiling. nbsp;Photo permisssion by Matthew Dietznbsp;/p

pPoverty, Climate Change and the Dakota Access Pipeline Indigenous Resistancenbsp;br / by Tiny, Daughter of Dee, Mama of Tiburcio/p p nbsp;ldquo;I donrsquo;t care if we have half of a t-shirt to sell, we have no money and food left so you gotta go out therehellip;.rdquo; On my mamarsquo;s last words directing me to sell on the street in our micro-business even when we really had nothing to sell, words which were at a volume loud enough for the whole street to hear, the earth moved and moved and MOVED againhellip;rdquo; It was 1989 and the Loma Prieta earthquake shifted allnbsp; of our lives, especially those of us already in struggle, never to go back quite the same.nbsp;/p p This horrible moment of mama earthrsquo;s aggression and the deeper crisis it caused in me and my mamarsquo;s poverty herstory flooded back to me as I watched, listened, prayed and supported one of the largest gatherings in herstory of indigenous peoples from all four corners supporting the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe fighting the construction of a huge pipeline through their sacred burial grounds, rivers and homelands in North Dakota./p p Today and everyday throughout this struggle against the Dakota Access Pipeline I prayed in thanks to the spirit of my, orphaned Taino/Boriken mama, the Ohlone relatives of this (Oak)land and so many of our ancestors from all four cornersnbsp; who I pray to everyday, as word from Obama came through that he has finally listened to us all and suggested the halting of this corporate desecration called the Dakota Access Pipeline./p p ldquo;Water is life, said Dine Nation earth, water protector and mother Wahleah Johns who spoke along with many other water and earth warriors atnbsp; a San Francisco Solidarity rally with the indigenous resistance to the Dakota Access Pipeline on August 24thbr / nbsp;br / ldquo;Since 1990rsquo; we have been involved in fighting environmental racism and supporting climate justice efforts in the Bay Area and across the country,rdquo; said Pam Tau Lee from Chinese Progressive Association. Pam and Wahleah were one of many power-FULL speakers at the San Francisco solidarity rally organized by the NoDAPLsolidaritySF, a group of organizations that included the Chinese Progressive Association SF, Indian People Organizing for Change and Indigenous Women of the Americas Defending Mother Earth./p p Since April 1st the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe has been in a fierce battle to protect their cultural and sacred sites, their drinking water which comes from the Missouri River, native prairie lands, farmlands and other natural resources from this horrible destruction/p p The Dakota Access Pipeline is a 1,168-mile crude oil pipeline that will transport up to 570,000 barrels of oil daily from the Bakken Oil Fields in North Dakota to refineries in Patoka Illinois. Oil pipelines break, spill and leak oil; oil that has been treated with chemicals that are flammable, toxic and carcinogenic. It is not a question of if; itrsquo;s a question of when and where./p p ldquo;Water everywhere, even in Huchuin, Ohlone Land (Oakland) is connected to the Dakota Lands, we are all connected, that is one of the reasons it is important for all of us to fight this pipeline, and other acts of corporate destructionrdquo; said earth warrior and Ohlone sis-STAR Corrina Gould as she taught a class of 7-14 year olds at a data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?hl=enq=http://www.racepovertymediajustice.org/academysource=gmailust=1473625315755000usg=AFQjCNFw6j9FwsxmQUXJ8ajEvV3s0Yac3w" href="http://www.racepovertymediajustice.org/academy" target="_blank"Deecolonize Academy- /aa revolutionary school for children in poverty in Oakland started by myself and other poor mamas and uncles./p p From out of control fires, rising global temperatures, floods, hurricanes, fracking caused earthquakes, destroyed aquifers, lakes and rivers, climate change is here.But what does it even mean?/p p bClimate Change - or Mama Earth#39;s Destruction?/bbr / Climate Change are two oddly clinical words that really mean nothing, derivative science-speak for the destruction of our Mama Earth, Our Great Grandmama, the one for without whom we would have no water, air or lifenbsp; -nbsp; so i donrsquo;t use them, I try to say what exactly is happening and that our Mama Earth is under attack from the things, poisons, ldquo;conveniencesrdquo; and life-style choices we as humans have made, have tacitly bought into or have enabled just by not caring what happens as a result of our massive consumption./p p bThe most impacted by Mama Earthrsquo;s Destruction/bbr / The fight to save Mama Earth by poor and indigenous peoples is happening all the time, from water protectors like Wahleah Johns to Chinese elders in Chinatown trying to fight for safe, unpoisoned air and housing,/p p Similarly, the impact of climate change is felt everyday bynbsp; those of us with the least resources, from unhoused peoples in Arizona and Bangladesh who have nowhere to escape when the climate change impacted temperatures rise to beyond human ability to withstand and so they literally die on the street of dehydration, to the fisher peoples who live in the gulf coast and can no longer fish and there fore have no way to support themselves because of the BP ldquo;accidentrdquo;, to the fisher people and families who fished and lived and raised families and food in Fukushima, Japan until 2011 Fukushima nuclear plant cracked from an earthquake and tsunami and now live , barely with multple forms of cancer and can no longer make their living from fishing and farming to me and my mama who really never recovered from that earthquake cause our life was already held together by a string and ended up losing our tenuous grasp on our housing at the time cause we couldnrsquo;t sell on the cracked streets of Oakland and San Francisco./p p It is clear that climate change is not a good thing for anyone and a lot of people say its a class, culture and race leveler and yet the impact on 1st peoples like the Dine nation who struggle with the corporate poisoning of their water in their ancestral homelandsnbsp; and poor Black, Brown and White people of Detroit and Mountaintop removed Virginia and thousands of other poor peoples living in locations of environmental racism and corporate destruction of mama earth is deeper than it is for folks who can just move ldquo;out of the areardquo; or buy filters for their water or private bottled water for that matter. Things that peoples with access to resources take for granted everyday like clean showers and water to drink are already becoming scarce and therefore creating an even deeper class and race divide in this already frightening divided world./p p bA Victory of Indigenous Peoples/bbr / This is why the move of focused Indigenous collaboration of so many 1st Nations peoples in the fight to stop the DAPL was so significant. It is not over, we are sure of that, it might not even be halted, but the protectors were listened to and we cannot stop protecting and praying. We cannot water down, philantho-pimp, fetishize or foundationcize this moment in herstory and let it be re-written as anything but what it was- an indigenous resistance, a multi-nationed prayer led by the earth warriors and prayer bringing protectors who have been here since before the lie of colonizer discovery protecting , honoring loving and praying for our Great Mother, Mother Earth./p div class="yj6qo ajU" pnbsp;/p pstrongMore PNN-TV coverage from the SF solidarity protest:img class="ajT" src="https://ssl.gstatic.com/ui/v1/icons/mail/images/cleardot.gif" //strong/p /div pa href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2JGfN4oVtro"span class="watch-title watch-editable" dir="ltr" id="eow-title" title=" Chinese Elders Climate Change #NoDAPLSFSolidarity"PNN-TV: Chinese Elders Climate Change /span/a/p pa href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2JGfN4oVtro"span class="watch-title watch-editable" dir="ltr" title=" Chinese Elders Climate Change #NoDAPLSFSolidarity"#NoDAPLSFSolidaritynbsp;/span/abutton aria-label="Edit" aria-labelledby="yt-uix-tooltip1863-arialabel" class="yt-uix-button yt-uix-button-size-default yt-uix-button-default yt-uix-button-empty yt-uix-button-has-icon no-icon-markup watch-pencil-icon yt-uix-tooltip" data-content-id="yt-uix-tooltip1863-content" data-tooltip-text="Edit" title="" type="button"/button/p pnbsp;/p pa href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EwT5SgFcs7Y"span class="watch-title watch-editable" dir="ltr" id="eow-title" title="Water is Life #NoDAPL #SFSolidarity"PNN-TV:Water is Life #NoDAPL #SFSolidaritynbsp;/span/abutton aria-label="Edit" aria-labelledby="yt-uix-tooltip2381-arialabel" class="yt-uix-button yt-uix-button-size-default yt-uix-button-default yt-uix-button-empty yt-uix-button-has-icon no-icon-markup watch-pencil-icon yt-uix-tooltip" data-content-id="yt-uix-tooltip2381-content" data-tooltip-text="Edit" title="" type="button"/button/p

pspanbLeroy Moore:nbsp;/bnbsp;nbsp;Thank you Julius Shemang for agreeing to be interview.nbsp; Now I want to go back in time and can you give us brief historical roots of Nigeria from the time of independence from United Kingdom to now./span/p p nbsp;/p pspanbJulius Shemang:nbsp;/bThe history of Nigeria since independence in 1960, is tied to the fact that our Leaders just love to pay lips and eyes services. Every year they will read their budgets and earmarks billions for disability community and this money we will never feel impact because they are misappropriating and diverting it into their private pockets. Matters of fact, if they are truly committed to providing infrastructures and adequate facilities for our people, the issue of begging and destitutions will be contained and limit to a scope. But it is not so here./span/p pspanTaskforce are randomly sent out to harass and intimidate supposed beggars many of who are orphans, widows, without jobs to eke a living. And since government has no plan or adequate programmes to address their plights they are found all over the towns and cities begging. We work with political parties and votes during elections but no posts or status is accorded to us other than to ldquo;assistrdquo; our traducers and oppressors. This ugly trends has continue from Independence on October 1st 1960 till date. Really, one should be worried being marginalized and very much deprived in his father/motherland. We are trying of course, and with little support we can make huge inroad and impact but the help is always not forthcoming/span/p p nbsp;/p pspanbLeroy Moore: nbsp;Y/bou told me that you became Deaf later in life and also became active in the disability rights movement.nbsp; What is the difference then when you first got active to now in the disability rights movement in your city/country?/span/p pnbsp;/p pspanbJulius Shemang:nbsp;/bComing into Deaf and Disability world from the world of Hearing was like been in the flame of hell. I came to see that everybody was not giving equal recognition and opportunities, and the disabled suffer more of such discrimination in the society. At some points in time I got upset at the way and manner the able-bodied population viewed disability and treat issues relating to the disabled with charity rather than as a matter of onersquo;s right. With this, I began to think out ways of helping myself and other disabled in the state and nation at large. I went to New Nigerian Newspaper (NNN) headquarter here in Kaduna State with the sole aim of seeking space in the paper where I can be putting pen to paper on issues of the disabled so as to advocate for them and to draw the attention of government and society. A man I was introduced to who I later learned was an Editor of the paper, told me having listened to my mission that ldquo;SPECIAL EDUCATION NO BE JOURNALISMrdquo; and that since I studied special education I should go to any Deaf school in the state and look for teaching job there. His comment didnrsquo;t deterred me as I told him that I had what it takes to write a story and that I be given a chance at least to prove the ability in my disability. He then directed me to see one MEVER AYILA, news Editor at the newsroom whom I was told will be taking charge of my issue. I did my first write up in the paper titled ldquo;THE DEAF WANT TO BE HEARDrdquo; which discussed how the Deaf were being denied admissions into higher schools like College of education, Polytechnic and University to read courses of their choice, the lack of employment for them and other sundry issues. That was the beginning of my involvement in advocating for the rights of people living with disability then. NNN is one of the many legacies of late Sir Ahmadu Bello the then Premier of Northern Nigeria. Apart from NNN I also got involved in writing and reporting both news and features/opinion articles in other media organizations including television and radio. People begin to have a second thought rethinking about people living with disability unlike before when their opinions were all negative. From there, I took the initiative further by founding my own newspaper - Kafanchan Times. I got help from some Journalists who partnered with me. I was able to float the newspaper, and it comes out once every month. It more than addressed the issues of Disability Rights which I have been advocating for for long. Lack of serious funding and my teaching job later contributes toi collapsing of the paper, I still wish to revive it but economic recession bites harder here./span/p p nbsp;/p pspanbLeroy Moore: nbsp;/bYou are the fourth Nigerian with a disability in the last five years, I had a chance to interview from musicians to activists.nbsp; Tell us about organizations for people with disabilities in Nigeria and how were they got established and what have they been working on?/span/p pnbsp;/p pspanbJulius Shemang:nbsp;/bThere are different organizations OF and FOR people living with disabilities in Nigeria. Organizations OF people living with disabilities are those organizations nbsp;that are formed and own by Nigerians living with disabilities. The Joint National Association of Persons With Disabilities (JONAPWD) is the mother or umbrella body of all Nigerians living with disabilities with headquarter in Abuja the Federal Capital Territory and branches in each of the 36 States in Nigeria. JONAPWD is a collection of and coming together of the various clusters of people with disability, the Deaf, the Blind, the Albinos, the Mentally Retarded, the Physically Challenged, the Lepers and others categories as disabled into one big umbrella in order to fight a united and common front. Before the establishment of JONAPWD each cluster was formed as a Non-Government Organization (NGO) to advocate and fight for the welfare and rights of her members and with each group making different requests to government which was seen as improper for people working nbsp;for common and similar objectives, hence the birth of JONAPWD as a mouth-piece. Other orgganizations of people living with disabilities also exist and are playing supportive roles./span/p pnbsp;/p pspanOn the other hand, organizations FOR people with disabilities are those organizations that are established by normal people with general focus on issues of people with disabilities sharing similar goals and objectives with those of people with disabilities. We have been working assidously on inclusive policies such as education, employment, electoral system, economics empowerment, information, accessibility, participation, etc, as well as the ongoing advocacy and campaign to get the Nigeria Government sign and nbsp;pass the national disability rights bill into law with an independent implementation commission in line with the United Nations Convention on the Rights of persons with disabilities which Nigeria is a signatory. Nigeria currently has a huge population of 180 millions out of which 25.5 millions are people living with disabilities who deserve better life. Come to think of it, Nigeria Government recently came up with a law banning street begging especially in the marginaldized north where the number of beggers is high, and with no measures put in nbsp;place the law has been passed in Kaduna State. This is against the human dignity and rights of our members and violation of the United Nations Treaty on the Convention of Persons with Disabilities which Nigeria entered into. This is something we have been working on and it is ongoing./span/p p nbsp;/p pspanbLeroy Moore:/bnbsp;nbsp;You used to publish a newspaper for people with disabilities tell us about the newspaper and will you ever bring it back?/span/p pnbsp;/p pspanbJulius Shemang:nbsp;/bLike every registered organization be it media, association, foundation, etc, KAFANCHAN TIMES newspaper is intact. The paper was established in the year 2006 as a grassroot voice showcasing ability in disability and seeking to bridge the gap between the weak and the strong, the disabled and the able-bodied. The paper focus in all sphere of human endeavour not just disability issues. Production and circulation had to be put on halt a few years ago due to some constraints ranging from financial to marketing. The none return of sell proceeds by vendors to produce subsequent editions and the lack of funds to set up better structures for its operation were the major setback. The organization website also eased to continue as we did not have the means to maintain it. Although its Bank Account is intact. Re-organization is what we are doing to revamp the paper back to life and we are hoping this will come to pass soon./span/p p nbsp;/p pspanbLeroy Moore:/bnbsp;nbsp;I read that the Nigerianrsquo;s government hasnrsquo;t sign into law a Disability Rights Law although advocates have been pushing for it for a long time.nbsp; Can you give us a history of the advocacy for the Disability Rights Law and the reaction of the government?/span/p pnbsp;/p pspanbJulius Shemang:nbsp;/bThe struggle for a disability rights law began with the demand for the creation of nbsp;a federal and state ministries for Persons with Disability affairs in Nigeria. This started some years back then and in line with united nations convention on the rights of persons with disabilities. The demand could not be met as government said there was no funds for the creation of such ministries. Yet, government has created ministries to address militant, women, youths and others plight. We told them they can do it but they fear doing it will led them to loss lots of money which they usually divert to their own private pockets./span/p p nbsp;/p pspanbLeroy Moore:nbsp;/bI read that in 2014 Nigeria was elected into the United Nations Committee of Experts on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (PWDs)), in recognition of its commitment to addressing the plight of PWDs.nbsp; However like you said how can the government implement this treaty when they havenrsquo;t pass its own Disability Rights Law?/span/p pnbsp;/p pspanbJulius Shemang:nbsp;/bYes Nigeria was elected into that United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons With Disabilities (UNCRPD) committee as you have rightly observed, but it is just to continue the status quo. We were hardly consulted. Frankly speaking, we have soundly educated persons ready to work to uplift our community but their efforts are being sabotaged. For Government to implement anything, those rabble rouser who are fond of sponsoring candidates should back off and allow us elect credible candidates who will be accountable and answerable to the community. Not those who operates like a secret cult in a matter that concern us.Do you know that here, whenever our so-called leaders travelled out to attend conferences and other events, we hardly heard from them feedback on the programme and we know nothing that transpired in such events. They have been like that and continue to be worse. They only respect their sponsors./span/p pnbsp;/p pspanbLeroy Moore:nbsp;/bNow can you give us a window into everyday lives of Nigerians with disabilities from children to mothers?/span/p pnbsp;/p pspanbJulius Shemang: /bEveryday, PWDs in Nigeria from a little infant to an old adult face challenges. Many are indigent, have no work and doesn#39;t know what the day hold. Those who have work must still wake up to reality that they can be sacked or suspended from their work place! Sometimes some people who are anti-disabled will frame up an innocent PWD and that will lead to their dismissal, all on account of their disability and the absence of law to protect them. Need not tell you that there is huge competition for work as even University graduates roams the streets for job for many years. The PWDs are the least paid workers. They also enjoy little benefits. Unlike able-bodied counterparts who enjoy plenty. Need not tell you also that so many younger able people Lord it and bossed their disabled counterparts and some are wicked. They have this negative mindset and thinking that thank God that I am not a disabled and won#39;t allow this person get too much lest he or she infect me with disability! /span/p pnbsp;/p pspanMany disabled parents struggled to feed their young, pay school fees and accommodation, etc. It#39;s not easy as their take home pay is small. And they are expected to shoulder lots of responsibilities like their hearing counterparts. Many of them have aged dependent parents and relations also to cater for./span/p pnbsp;/p pspanThose who are in self-employment complained bitterly that able-bodied people do not patronize them like non-disabled because of fear of catching disability but we are able through our associations to organize many workshop and seminars nbsp;to educate and create awareness that disability is not contagious. We also fight for our People#39;s Rights but all these need funds. We are really struggling with funds especially with economic recession starring us in the face./span/p pspanTherefore, we shall be appreciative and grateful for any meaningful support we can receive from any individuals, groups, corporate organizations, etc, both at home and abroad to further empower us in our drive to create awareness and to empower our people./span/p pnbsp;/p pspanbLeroy Moore: nbsp;/bDo you know the advocacy and music of Grace Alache Jerry, a musician and advocate with a disability in Nigeria?nbsp; If so, how can her work help the present situation for Nigerians with disabilities?/span/p pnbsp;/p pspanbJulius Shemang: nbsp;/bYes. Grace Alache and several others sangs but it does little to change negative mindset and misconceptions. However, when other international world acclaimed disability heroes like Nick Vujicic, etc, visited Nigeria, we always see people cry while listening to them. But, still we have a long way to go because we have no law./span/p pspanWe desire more coming of these international disability achievers and heroes to our country to help us in our fight for emancipation and struggle from centuries of slavery and total lack of political will for true policy changes in Nigeria./span/p p nbsp;/p pspanbLeroy Moore: nbsp;/bNow letrsquo;s go into this government bill to ban people working on the streets (what mainstream press call begging).nbsp; I read that the government has painted this bill as safety and requiring children to be in school bill.nbsp; Give us how people with disabilities view this bill and the history of this bill./span/p p nbsp;/p pspanbJulius Shemang: /bActually, they are lying. If you are here, you will see these beggars, sitting quietly in some corners where people can see them and ldquo;donaterdquo; their widows mite. It doesnrsquo;t really need the alarming shouts the government is dissipating energy to combat. You must also know that our people are very religious, they love to give beggars so they can pray for them. These ldquo;elitistsrdquo; government officials want Nigerian cities to be clean like New York and London without providing necessary infrastructure first and they are banning beggars. You know what/ The same elites will be looking for beggars to donate to when they are facing storms of life like business collapse, health problems etc. In other words, they are just being hypocrites!/span/p p nbsp;/p pspanbLeroy Moore: nbsp;/bHow nongovernmental organizations and international development organizations are part of the current situation?/span/p pnbsp;/p pspanbJulius Shemang:nbsp;/bNGOs and the Civil Societies are behind us motivating and encouraging us. However, many of them are reluctant to send funds to us because there is no remote guarantee that all will be well soon in as much as they desire to assist, they also wish their efforts are not in vain./span/p pspanIt is frustrating for some of them to spend live savings to campaign and back us up only to watch the problem they are trying to help us solve remained the same. Mobility and lack of employment is the greatest problem we are facing. On our own, we are forming co-operative body, ready to farm and engage in business entrepreneurships soon as we get some funds. Many are willing to learn skills too. Some International Organizations and even local ones also sometimes contribute to our problem by dabbling into our elections affairs. They want their own candidates to win. But, some of these candidates arenrsquo;t popular with their people. This way our problems rather become complicated./span/p pnbsp;/p pspanbLeroy Moore: nbsp;/bMany people across the world have saw your pictures of the protests and read articles.nbsp; You also said that a lot more people couldnrsquo;t join the protest because of a lack of funds.nbsp; Give us your view on how the protest grew and where have you protest./span/p p nbsp;/p pspanbJulius Shemang:nbsp;/bLike i said earlier, many cannot come to join the protest because the state is divided into 23 local government areas and many are living in the remotest parts of the state. To really help them to attend will need huge budget. JONAPWD only have a rickety 10 seater Bus which is aging and could not cover long distances without needing repairs./span/p pnbsp;/p pspanGovernment is deliberately starving us of funds in order to incapacitate us from mobilizing disability community in Kaduna State. In order therefore to register our grievances against the government insensitivity in the passage of street begging bill without provisions, we sacrificed every little amount from our pockets to occupy the Government House Kaduna, the seat of power so that the world will know that all is not well in Kaduna State and the need to correct these abnormalities./span/p pnbsp;/p pspanIt is not that Government cannot pass our disability laws or the UNCRPD Protocol. The problem really is lack of political will. Also many of them who have Special Needs Children like us whom we are canvassing for sponsorship and identification are still reluctant to join us and partner with us because most of their children were sent to elite schools and institutions overseas and they feel stigma of our disability. However, some of them do support us secretly without making show it./span/p p nbsp;/p pspanbLeroy Moore: nbsp;/bWhat are disabled youth saying about this ban and how are the contributing to the protest?/span/p p nbsp;/p pspanbJulius Shemang:nbsp;/bThe youths are very much part of the struggle. They have been frustrated, marginalized and deprived. They long for social justice in the equitable distribution of jobs and everything. They want to be listened to and be allowed to have a voice./span/p pspanIn fact we have youth wings and they are very active and mobile in all our organizations./span/p p nbsp;/p pspanbLeroy Moore:nbsp;/bBeyond this ban and passing the Disability Rights Law, what do you want the government, the citizen of Nigeria and the international disability/non-disability community to do?/span/p p nbsp;/p pspanbJulius Shemang:nbsp;/bWe want proper setting up of Disability Empowerment and Vocational Training Centre where various skills and vocations can be impacted to people with disabilities so that they will be self sustaining nbsp;and economically independent and be gainfully employed as many are jobless and roaming the streets of major cities begging for food and sustenance. This means they will be trained and the government or donor agencies will help us to fund the training since most of them are from poor families who may not be able to pay for the trainings./span/p pspanThere is a piece of land given to the associations by previous administrations (Kaduna State Government). If we can get funds to develop it into Vocational Training Centre and modern shopping complex it will go a long way in bettering the lives of our people in the state. We also considered transportation and farming skills for our people. If we can have farms where we can produce food there will be money and job./span/p p nbsp;/p pspanbLeroy Moore: nbsp;/bWe, Poor Magazine, the San Francisco Bayview Newspaper and disabled activists in the US are with you so please give us some last words that I might of miss in this interview and share how can people stay in contact?/span/p p nbsp;/p pspanbJulius Shemang: /bI should be frank enough to say that POOR MAGAZINE is the second international organization that got identified with us. Before now, it was and still Chief Eric Ndubueze Ufom of Equal Rights for Persons With Disabilities, International, USA who has been supportive. Kaduna State has the third largest population of PWDs in Nigeria and is expected not to be less than six hundreds thousands if proper census is conducted and that is why we want this census badly./span/p p nbsp;/p pspanbLeroy Moore: nbsp;/bIn the US we have histories of racist , classist laws against poor people-homeless people sitting on the streets, asking for money- begging or panhandling as they call it in the US - they have made laws rooted in English colonial law- to criminalize our lives and our way of survival- what is the history in Nigeria of criminalization of begging?-/span/p pnbsp;/p pspanbJulius Shemang: /bThe Law here of criminalizing begging is not yet effective because the government are paying lip services to employment and rehabilitation of nbsp;people living with disabilitiesb./b/span/p pnbsp;/p pspanbLeroy Moore: /bHas there always been anti-poor people-laws- anti begging laws- are they rooted in British laws?/span/p pnbsp;/p pspanbJulius Shemang: /bTraditionally, the Almajiris-Street urchins in the North, most of them from broken homes further compounded the problem of serious business of rehabilitating the disabled. So many destitutes. And thoughh Government built Rehabilitation Centers, they were ill equipped and poorly staffed. Corruption also goes on at these so-called Rehabilitation Centers as foods and items including equipment meant for use of inmates are always diverted by corrupt personnel. When the inmates are suffering so much for lack of care, many will abandoned the centers to look for better alternative via begging around for livelihood./span/p p nbsp;/p pspanbLeroy Moore: nbsp;/bAlso, how does general society support or not support poor and homeless people in Nigeria? - Who supports the ban other than govt/span/p pnbsp;/p pspanbJulius Shemang: /bThe general society supports poor mostly through religious and faith based organizations since government has failed woefully in discharging their responsibilities. Hence we have mega Churches and Mosques making millions from welfare and charity works. Some of them also Institute zero percent rates Banks and lend to the poor. They use this mostly as a gimmick to attract members. Only the government support the ban on Street Begging. Some wealthy people may like it but most of them fear from religious points of view that they will lose blessings because these Beggars pray for them. As to housing, government has no concrete plan! Most poor areas and slums are taken over and turned to boulevards housing the rich and wealthy. Houses constructed by government are out of reach of the poor. The poor paid so much for accommodation. About five to six of them may manage a room. To save costs government only help a little in transportation by allowing us move freely but not on every routes./span/p p nbsp;/p pspanbLeroy Moore: nbsp;/bWhere are you allowed to be? - are there certain areas you are relegated to?/span/p pnbsp;/p pspanbJulius Shemang/b: Areas that our members are restricted from are mostly the busiest and commercial points like markets, motorparks, and other big public gathering points. And these are the areas where our members mostly eke a living for themselves and other dependants. These are the metropolitan areas /cities. We are only allowed in very less public areas like the rural areas and other isolated places where our member hardly get a penny to fend for themselves talk less of other dependents./span/p p nbsp;/p pspanbLeroy Moore: nbsp;/bWe also have a concept of gentrification in the US- also rooted in British colonial concept of Gentry- meaning that if richer people move into a neighborhood it suddenly means more police presence and more anti-poor people-laws and more harassment and arrests of homeless people, panhandlers-? is that the same there?/span/p pnbsp;/p pspanbJulius Shemang: /bTo really assist us we need help to conduct population survey to know the actual numbers of disabled. If we have an accurate headcount and file for each PWD member including those living in remote areas, our advocacy works will be easy./span/p pnbsp;/p pspanTo do this we need told and equipment and knowledgeable staff to carry out the head count and to issue certificate of disability to each member. We must identify special schools and disabled People#39;s organizations so that administration will be easy./span/p pnbsp;/p pspanWe lack equipment and many other important needs in our office which could have help us tremendously in discharging our duties. This is where your organization and others can come in. We are even looking at the possibility of travelling out to study some disability based organizations in order to learn best practices and obtain knowledge and information. Unfortunately, we rarely get sponsorship as government and people we look up to always disappoints. Anyway, we thank you so much for this interview. God bless you richly good./span/p

p style="font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;"span style="font-size: 12.8px;"ldquo;The fibroid shrunk one centimeter,rdquo; my gynecologist said. I stopped at Clinica de la Raza, because I had an appointment that day for a follow up on an ultrasound that was performed prior to my surgery. My gynecologist told me I had a cyst in my left ovary, we just donrsquo;t know where or what size. /span/p p style="font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;"span style="font-size: 12.8px;"ldquo;We might have to remove it.rdquo; The news felt like a bombshell. The gynecologist sounded like he was 15 million miles away. My mind set to pausehellip;My ovary??? My feminist side??? The last and only ovary I have./span/p p style="font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;"I felt an ocean of raging waters through my head. I went back to the Clinica to make sure the last thing I did was ask for some kind of medical records. I felt like I was pregnant and having twins the size and length of the above./p p style="font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;"The people who work at the Clinica think that because I donrsquo;t have a degree I wonrsquo;t do my research. After all I did not have time since my surgery was coming up. It felt urgent like cruising in an ambulance every random day./p p style="font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;"Yet I am totally satisfied with my surgery ndash; I am already feeling the difference. Thank you for reading this.nbsp;/p

p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-8ea40cf2-fb96-4b19-dc77-7673dc7e9851"spanWe begin to take or adapt to our surrounding neighbors schedules or routines without meaning or noticing that we do./span/span/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-8ea40cf2-fb96-4b19-dc77-7673dc7e9851"spanAntrsquo;s door opened about 7:30 am. I remember my subconscious saying we on our way to get breakfast as he normally did. We would occasionally encounter each other in the hall, I would jokingly say old speedy, he said with a big smile this is my 6/spanspanth/spanspan wheelchair and this one is the fastest. Thatrsquo;s the conversation that sticks out in my head. Then my thoughts went to recollection, like a time stamp on when was the last time I heard him./span/span/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-8ea40cf2-fb96-4b19-dc77-7673dc7e9851"spanBut today, Thursday I hear of his death found. Another pest control treasure hunt found in the usual sro round uprsquo;s some dissipate with us./span/span/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-8ea40cf2-fb96-4b19-dc77-7673dc7e9851"spanUnknown eerie shadows cast the building, halls, walls, and room. Pest control uncover the draining energy of death/span/span/p pnbsp;/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-8ea40cf2-fb96-4b19-dc77-7673dc7e9851"spanI sit and wait for you to discover me/span/span/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-8ea40cf2-fb96-4b19-dc77-7673dc7e9851"spanSitting /span/span/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-8ea40cf2-fb96-4b19-dc77-7673dc7e9851"spanWaiting/span/span/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-8ea40cf2-fb96-4b19-dc77-7673dc7e9851"spanTo be considered human being/span/span/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-8ea40cf2-fb96-4b19-dc77-7673dc7e9851"spanTo matter/span/span/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-8ea40cf2-fb96-4b19-dc77-7673dc7e9851"spanTo coincide/span/span/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-8ea40cf2-fb96-4b19-dc77-7673dc7e9851"spanNot written off as ldquo;overdoserdquo; ldquo;dope addictsrdquo; ldquo;drug phensrdquo;/span/span/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-8ea40cf2-fb96-4b19-dc77-7673dc7e9851"spanFrom the tender lion TLrsquo;s/span/span/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-8ea40cf2-fb96-4b19-dc77-7673dc7e9851"spanCasually written and stamped/span/span/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-8ea40cf2-fb96-4b19-dc77-7673dc7e9851"spanTime and time again/span/span/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-8ea40cf2-fb96-4b19-dc77-7673dc7e9851"spanIn many brains as the only gospel truth/span/span/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-8ea40cf2-fb96-4b19-dc77-7673dc7e9851"spanWe are still human being/span/span/p

pnbsp;/p pnbsp;/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-ba86569c-d675-74d9-d6a4-a502b3201f02"spanimg height="629" src="https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/5-TYDlOt4OXXkAEMzT9B_e4XGZ81aX6CvC48KzXt2jkqSLqMdEJd5OmLb262tXVYJzhKdvq8Rp-pn8vS9cqqcDSv10aiUne_iFhsFr0O8l158ZMTUPIvtsu6_HxYhHX6QAPeqs1e" width="602" //span/span/p pnbsp;/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-ba86569c-d675-74d9-d6a4-a502b3201f02"span[IMAGE DESCRIPTION: A black and white ink drawing of two young Black men, who are brothers, one seated in a wheelchair, the other with his arm on the seated manrsquo;s shoulder. nbsp;Big block letters at the top say ldquo;Justice for Andreacute; and Brysonrdquo; with three exclamation points. nbsp;On the left side of the image, the words ldquo;Drop the Chargesrdquo; run vertical down the page. nbsp;Andreacute;, who is standing, wears a t-shirt with the words ldquo;You Are Love,rdquo; and an image of hands making a heart-shape. nbsp;Bryson, seated, wears a hat that says ldquo;BOSS,rdquo; and stylish sporting gloves. nbsp;They are both wearing cross pendants. Drawing by nomy lamm.]/span/span/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-ba86569c-d675-74d9-d6a4-a502b3201f02"spanOn May 21, 2015, Bryson Chaplin (21) and Andreacute; Thompson (23) were shot by an Olympia police officer after a failed attempt to steal beer from a Safeway grocery store on the Westside of Olympia, WA. The young Black men are brothers, were unarmed, and while the officer shot at body mass striking several times (as police are trained to do, in the science of and Use of Force), Bryson and Andreacute; thankfully survived the shooting. One of the bullets fired that hit Bryson is still lodged in his spinal column, and has caused paralyzation from the waist down. The white police officer, 35 year old Ryan Donald, was not injured, but did report by radio that he had been ldquo;assaulted with a skateboard.rdquo; The shooter, officer Donald, like every single WA state law enforcement officer (ever) that has used excessive Force, was not indicted and was cleared of any wrong doing. Bryson and Andreacute;, however, are being accused of trumped up and very serious charges of assault. Rather than dropping the charges, which was the rallying plea of the Olympia activist community supporting this family, these charges are being brought to criminal trial./span/span/p pnbsp;/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-ba86569c-d675-74d9-d6a4-a502b3201f02"spanimg height="452" src="https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/0d8LtYnDqnkXP6ZVS647RaW3GDMRLI9dwGuEA_3vYv5UwC3A7Pynkztj7toHkKwoFZC1qEfluxZKpYcEIBC2_7lHVmFQSQS4xfiQNY4iXZt550grl3HZFKfIuq1lZfZ1cy6MzdEW" width="602" //span/span/p pnbsp;/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-ba86569c-d675-74d9-d6a4-a502b3201f02"span[IMAGE DESCRIPTION: A watercolor painting of a Black family facing a judge in the courtroom. nbsp;The familyrsquo;s backs are to the viewer, with a young man on the end in a wheelchair, and his sister, brother, and mother seated on a bench next to him. nbsp;Beneath the family is what looks like some kind of living organ, red and blue with veins and arteries, it spreads out on the floor underneath the young manrsquo;s wheelchair. nbsp;Over their heads is a tree branch, with a little bird sitting on it. nbsp;The judge facing them is a white woman in a black robe, and behind her is the Seal of the State of Washington, with George Washingtonrsquo;s face on it. nbsp;There are three flags flanking her with golden eagles on top, and along the wall next to her are portraits of four white male judges. nbsp;The words ldquo;Justice for Andreacute; Brysonrdquo; are written in an organic style in brown, with leaves sprouting from them. nbsp;There is a yellow burst of light, hearts and love surrounding the family. Painting by nomy lamm.]/span/span/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-ba86569c-d675-74d9-d6a4-a502b3201f02"spanOn January 21/spanspanst/spanspan, 2016 at 10:30am the Thurston County KKKourthouse is buzzing with activity. Inside a heavily monitored large crowded courtroom a steady stream of people, accused of crimes (and victims of The System) await the next name to be called, taking turns to meet their fate or find out the date of their next appearance. Some people are no shows. The back of the courtroom is lined with tables as makeshift desks over which check ins are happening. There is a hum of almost distracting voices as folks are last minute prepping to stand before the judge, with mostly white men in suits talking with clients. At the helm of the proceedings is Thurston County ldquo;Superiorrdquo; Court Judge Carol Murphy, a woman, and the most powerful white person in the room, and seated higher than everyone else, to display her power very clearly. Most of the rotating lawyers on both sides are white, while the ldquo;defendantsrdquo; are Black, Brown, Poor and people with Disabilities. On the left wall above the empty jury seats are huge photos of four (presumably very important) white judges who are men. Above the ldquo;superiorrdquo; court judge#39;s high perch is an embossed gold portrait of George Washington himself, the emblem of the state of Washington, a glaring symbol of colonization./span/span/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-ba86569c-d675-74d9-d6a4-a502b3201f02"spanFront and center of the courtroom, waiting to be called before the judge are the tight-knit Chaplin-Thompson family. In the aisle in his wheelchair is Bryson, holding a Chicago Bulls hat on his lap. To his right is his sister Jasmine, and next to Jasmine is Andreacute;, and to his right is their mom, Crystal Chaplin. You can feel the love between this family, they are a unit. There are members of community in support of Andre and Bryson sprinkled throughout the courtroom. Andreacute; and Bryson wait patiently for two hours, then find out from one of their lawyers, George Trejo, that they can actually leave without being seen by the judge. Hurry up and wait, and now go home. Papers have been signed and the next court appearance is in April 2016, and failures to appear will lead to warrants. /span/span/p p dir="ltr"spanspanimg height="451" src="https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/ViuqhxNdqlA94aqcJOpDXrRhMbEM-fXAadd-1Sk7OE5_regBxVa0TE21njhi8EwGQhPx3aQFJnwriPzDqQ15eLDWPJ5K5n-mKDaaIk4BCDordomqZVj82gH8o2TO15Ee--iJwQF6" width="602" //span/span/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-ba86569c-d675-74d9-d6a4-a502b3201f02"span[image description: Brightly colored chalk on the steps of a blue house reads ldquo;There were no charges for the Olympia cop that shot and tried to kill Bryson Andreacute;.rdquo; There are hearts around their names and the words ldquo;Young, unarmed, love, Black, brothersrdquo; are there. On the steps it reads ldquo;They SURVIVED and face assault charges. This family is in solidarity with the Chaplin-Thompson family. POLICE ACCOUNTABILITY NOW.nbsp;/span/spanJUSTICE FOR ANDRE AND BRYSON.]/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-ba86569c-d675-74d9-d6a4-a502b3201f02"spanIn the United States there is a nationwide crisis of profiling, police terror and violence against Black people. It is a low estimate that somewhere in the U.S. every 28 hours a Black Loved One is killed by law enforcement, and that does not consider those ldquo;disappearedrdquo; or who die in custody. In the state of Washington the Black population is 3.6% and in Olympia it is 2% (2010 Census report). The percentage of Black folks incarcerated statewide in Washington is 18.1% (Dec 2015 Department of Corrections). Not unlike other cities, such as San Francisco, where the Black population is 3% and more than half the jail#39;s population are Black, anti-Black racism is alive and well in Olympia, WA and plays out loudly in the actions of police (Ryan Donald) and the white people who call them (employees of Safeway)./span/span/p p dir="ltr"nbsp;/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-ba86569c-d675-74d9-d6a4-a502b3201f02"spanimg height="500" src="https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/83O-yxau-_9cFXLJ8BMBeDzNJSQheZri9Vq-viLZXDc_9MD0E4h4CuEyu4bjFVVOCyrrKE7gT5YNHvZ_wPAzG0HKBjd_HA8Mpv2G4Y229He6FD2drxmS5v6pUtqZ-guhtVa-Xt-F" width="429" //span/span/p pnbsp;/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-ba86569c-d675-74d9-d6a4-a502b3201f02"span[image description: A racist meme, similar to this one, was found on Ryan Donald#39;s facebook page by a reliable source, and was documented. The meme depicts civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. with a dreamsicle (an orange ice cream popsicle) disrespectfully photoshopped into his powerful clenched fist. Words read ldquo;I have a dreamsicle. A Dreamsicle. He has one.rdquo;]/span/span/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-ba86569c-d675-74d9-d6a4-a502b3201f02"spanREST IN POWER MARTIN LUTHER KING JR./span/span/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-ba86569c-d675-74d9-d6a4-a502b3201f02"spanIt#39;s 8am on July 7/spanspanth/spanspan, 2016 and Bryson bounces down three steps to the sidewalk in his wheelchair (which has a flat tire), he#39;s gotten extremely good at navigating using his chair. ldquo;I didn#39;t get much sleep,rdquo; he says. Andreacute; joins him, ldquo;me neither,rdquo; he says. They both look very tired, and for good reason, as they are about to make yet another early morning, mandatory pre-trial kkkourt appearance and they have been mourning the loss of many Black extended community members recently killed by police. ldquo;My mom should be right out,rdquo; Andreacute; tells his friend who has come to help with a ride. Crystal#39;s car broke down the night before. Bryson lifts himself into the car while Andreacute; breaks down his wheelchair and finds room for it in the back of the car./span/span/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-ba86569c-d675-74d9-d6a4-a502b3201f02"spanldquo;/spanspanDid you hear about the shooting, the one in the car?rdquo; Bryson asks his friend. ldquo;Philando Castile!rdquo; they exclaim. The conversation is solemn as the three talk about the violent lynchings of Alton Sterling and Philando Castile, the videos of their executions by police had just been all over social media./span/span/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-ba86569c-d675-74d9-d6a4-a502b3201f02"spanREST IN POWER PHILANDO CASTILE/span/span/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-ba86569c-d675-74d9-d6a4-a502b3201f02"spanREST IN POWER ALTON STERLING/span/span/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-ba86569c-d675-74d9-d6a4-a502b3201f02"spanCrystal emerges from the house ldquo;alright let#39;s go,rdquo; she says./span/span/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-ba86569c-d675-74d9-d6a4-a502b3201f02"spanToday the courtroom is very empty, on the left are four People of Color, attorney (and Woman) Sunni Ko, then Andreacute;. Next to him is George Trejo then Bryson. On the right side of the courtroom are the two white prosecutors, Scott Jackson and Wayne somebody. There#39;s a different judge presiding, white Judge Tabor, who is flanked by a white stenographer and white bailiff. Judge Tabor is very close to retiring, he announces this from his throne./span/span/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-ba86569c-d675-74d9-d6a4-a502b3201f02"spanldquo;/spanspanThis is a status conference,rdquo; Tabor announces. He talks about a ldquo;3.5 hearingrdquo; that happened recently where yet another Judge ndash; Judge Dixon ndash; made a ruling of some sort in this case. What he says doesn#39;t make a lot of sense to an outsider, and he#39;s very jokey about it. It does seem strange that this is the third judge involved presiding over the fate of two men, but this guy makes it clear he#39;s the judge presiding now, and will be seeing this trial through./span/span/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-ba86569c-d675-74d9-d6a4-a502b3201f02"spanldquo;/spanspanMr. Rogers, who is not a party to this case, and represents Donald, (the lawyer of Ryan Donald) is not present,rdquo; the Judge points out. It isn#39;t mentioned but Ryan Donald is also not present./span/span/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-ba86569c-d675-74d9-d6a4-a502b3201f02"spanldquo;/spanspanAugust 15/spanspanth/spanspan is not gonna work,rdquo; Judge Tabor says. The prosecutors are concurring (fancy lawyer talk) that maybe August 15/spanspanth/spanspan is ldquo;too soon.rdquo; This is the date Andreacute; and Bryson#39;s family and their community thought that the criminal trial was finally set to start. It becomes clear that this kkkourt appearance is about scheduling, (not dropping charges as what seems an obvious solution). Judge Tabor then addresses the defense, and infers that it is taking the defense a long time, he tells Trejo ldquo;this date was set LONG AGO.rdquo;/span/span/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-ba86569c-d675-74d9-d6a4-a502b3201f02"spanBryson#39;s lawyer Trejo tells the judge that this hold up has everything to do with a defiant and inaccessible officer Ryan Donald. Interviews so far with Donald were unsuccessful. Trejo finds it problematic that when interviewed, officer Ryan Donald had this ldquo;inability to recall disciplinary actionrdquo; that has happened to him as a police officer./span/span/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-ba86569c-d675-74d9-d6a4-a502b3201f02"spanDonald refused to respond to any questions about racism, having referred to Andreacute; and Bryson as ldquo;thugs.rdquo;/span/span/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-ba86569c-d675-74d9-d6a4-a502b3201f02"spanAlso, on March 1, 2016, a date set for officer Ryan Donald to be questioned by Ko and Trejo, Donald was a no show. At that time Donald refused to attend, as he was on paid ldquo;administrative leaverdquo; for his involvement with the in-custody death of Loved One Jeffrey McGaugh on February 29, 2016. Officer Ryan Donald was on paid vacation, like happens when kkkops kill someone, for his involvement in a ldquo;mysterious in custody deathrdquo; so he failed to appear./span/span/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-ba86569c-d675-74d9-d6a4-a502b3201f02"spanREST IN POWER JEFFREY McGAUGH./span/span/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-ba86569c-d675-74d9-d6a4-a502b3201f02"spanIf Andreacute; or Bryson hadn#39;t shown up for a court date, they would be in jail./span/span/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-ba86569c-d675-74d9-d6a4-a502b3201f02"spanTrejo also talked about a ldquo;motion to sever accountsrdquo; under the 8.3 motion, because ldquo;the state provided Donald with all the discovery on the case.rdquo; This sounds like Donald is being given all kinds of background information and history about Andreacute; and Bryson, yet Donald won#39;t even answer direct questions, questions being asked by two People of Color, the defense lawyers Ko and Trejo. It is likely that Donald the kkkop is still writing his narrative of what happened./span/span/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-ba86569c-d675-74d9-d6a4-a502b3201f02"spanTrejo agrees that August 15/spanspanth/spanspan is too soon. The reason for this is the lack of officer Donald#39;s version of what happened the night he shot to kill Andreacute; and Bryson. When he finally complies to that requirement, Ko (Andre#39;s lawyer) explains that expert witnesses will then need time to review his assessment. Ko pushes for Donald#39;s narrative, and some time to review it before trial. There#39;s a deadline for the defense team to interview Donald and it is July 29/spanspanth/spanspan./span/span/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-ba86569c-d675-74d9-d6a4-a502b3201f02"spanJudge Tabor then said something that sounded a lot like someone who thought fairness and justness and truth are irrelevant. From his seat above everyone else, to a mostly empty courtroom, Judge Tabor said ldquo;I know this case has high visibility, and people have strong feelings. They have a right to their feelings and opinions about what#39;s right and wrong. But that doesn#39;t matter here,rdquo; he said. ldquo;Legal issues need to be assessed here.rdquo;/span/span/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-ba86569c-d675-74d9-d6a4-a502b3201f02"spanThen the Judge told the court his scheduling conflicts the coming months, and he excused himself from the kkkourtroom so the prosecutors and the defenders could come to a decision about scheduling./span/span/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-ba86569c-d675-74d9-d6a4-a502b3201f02"spanThe scheduling conversation came off like a strange insiders theatric performance. It takes place in a bubble of laughter and talk of vacations and other pending cases, (SO MUCH GOING ON), and talk of more vacations... Even the stenographer gets in on the scheduling back and forth, describing this judge#39;s jury selection process to be predictable (and hilarious apparently), she described Tabor#39;s jury selection process as ldquo;half hour, half hour, half hour, 20 minutes, 20 minutes, half hour, hopefully done by noon.rdquo; And all the lawyers with the stenographer and the bailiff laugh together, because that#39;s so funny. ldquo;Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha,rdquo; they laugh, like no one else is in the room./span/span/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-ba86569c-d675-74d9-d6a4-a502b3201f02"spanAll the while Andreacute; and Bryson sit there. They are not laughing. They are not in on the joke. They face hard time in prison for failing to steal beer (no beer actually left the store) and for getting almost killed by a racist police officer. Crystal and a few friends, the only other people in the court room, also just sit there. They exchange looks, also not laughing. One of them is a child, even he knows this process is unjust, this Black family#39;s fate in the hands of these people in this system./span/span/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-ba86569c-d675-74d9-d6a4-a502b3201f02"spanThe defense and prosecution, never ever involving Andreacute; nor Bryson in the conversation, come to the conclusion that October 3/spanspanrd/spanspan is the date the trial will start. It will begin with jury selection. The Judge returns. It is agreed the trial will likely run 3-4 weeks. After all, these folks are the ones with the power, they know how it works, they are experienced and knowledged, they make the decisions. The judge says that someone must coordinate with Mr. Rogers (the lawyer of officer Donald, who is not ldquo;party to this kkkourtrdquo;) to confirm. The judge and Trejo also decide that July 20/spanspanth/spanspan at 8:30am is when Bryson must appear one more time, about those motions Trejo had filed./span/span/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-ba86569c-d675-74d9-d6a4-a502b3201f02"spanThe community is encouraged to attend July 20/spanspanth/spanspan at 8:30am in support of Bryson./span/span/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-ba86569c-d675-74d9-d6a4-a502b3201f02"spanThe community is requested to please attend t/span/spanhe estimated 3-4 week criminal trial for Andreacute; and Bryson that begins October 3rd, 2016./p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-ba86569c-d675-74d9-d6a4-a502b3201f02"spanplease read the article A Mother#39;s Cry for Justice in the BayView National Black Press by Crystal Chaplin/span/span/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-ba86569c-d675-74d9-d6a4-a502b3201f02"a href="http://sfbayview.com/2016/04/two-sons-shot-in-the-chest-by-police-a-mothers-cry-for-justice/"spanhttp://sfbayview.com/2016/04/two-sons-shot-in-the-chest-by-police-a-mothers-cry-for-justice//span/a/span/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-ba86569c-d675-74d9-d6a4-a502b3201f02"spanimg height="451" src="https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/_ztE5SGpR37iPiaQMp3oyzkuuaKeRmrjkuLaXxUQfPl4-n8s_W5xUQLRjQseguRlpB0fkPO6TfE_fY7wCyHSJnWQuJvDiFiDULeavdssEmWLbGqDIr0cL2apvJ3_bA0VJTro_tp1" width="602" //span/span/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-ba86569c-d675-74d9-d6a4-a502b3201f02"span[image description: It#39;s July 7, 2016 out front of the Thurston County Courthouse just after an appearance of Andreacute; and Bryson. There#39;s a big green leafy plant on the left and the Chaplin-Thompson fam hugging tightly on the right. Handsome and smiling Bryson, dressed in all Black is seated in a red wheelchair. Crystal, Bryson#39;s mom, has her hand wrapped warmly around Bryson#39;s arm, she is wearing a beautiful patterned dress with a black sweater over it. Crystal is also arm in arm with Andre, who is about a foot taller than his mom. Andreacute; is smiling, holding and leaning toward his mother, and wears white pants and cool high tops. This family loves each other.]/span/span/p pnbsp;/p pnbsp;/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-ba86569c-d675-74d9-d6a4-a502b3201f02"spanLisa Ganser is a white, Disabled, genderqueer artist living in Olympia, WA, on colonized Squaxin land. They are a copwatcher, a sidewalk chalker, and the daughter of a momma named Sam./span/span/p p dir="ltr"span id="docs-internal-guid-ba86569c-d675-74d9-d6a4-a502b3201f02"spanimg height="8" src="https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/i47SWYEoKQSq0gmhPf42CgyWBxZxL60iweKPPvN6tL8jEviaNS8FA2-P7ejOVQdfcml497AllXlWa_F8KnhTbWHZIkUNqYjWOPHPk_wmiIw-SFRGs-yTMmqBIET-j78qgaMuPfr7" width="20" //span/span/p

h1 class="with-tabs" strongnbsp;/strongspanThis is Leroy Moore and I#39;m interviewing today a couple of activists, disabled activists from Chicago. We#39;re gonna talk about the recent DOJ hearing in Chicago on police brutality. So you guys, introduce yourself and introduce your work./span/h1 div class="node" div class="content" pspanstrongCANDACE Coleman:/strongnbsp;My name is Candace Coleman. I am the Community Development Organizer for the youth at Access Living in Chicago. I have the pleasure of coordinating our youth advocacy group, youth and young adult advocacy group called Advance Youth Leadership Power. Lately this year, we#39;ve been focused on the impact of identities of being Black and being people with disabilities./span/p pspanstrongLEROY:/strongnbsp;Great. Who#39;s next?/span/p pspanstrongTimotheus Gordon aka TJ:/strongnbsp;Hello, everyone. My name is Timotheus Gordon, also known as TJ for short, and I am not only an Autistic self advocate, but I#39;m also one of the youth leaders of the AYLP or Advance Youth Leadership Power here in Chicago./span/p pspanstrongLEROY/strong: Thank you. And last?/span/p pspanstrongCHRISTOPHER HUFF:/strongnbsp;Yes, hello. My name is Christopher Huff. I#39;m a juvenile advocate, and my work focuses on empowering people with mental illnesses as well as formerly incarcerated youth./span/p pspanstrongLEROY:/strongnbsp;All right. So thank you all, you three for agreeing to talk about this. Let#39;s get back to what happened at the DOJ hearing, who talked, and what was the subjects, and what do you think that will come from that hearing?/span/p pspanstrongCANDACE:/strongnbsp;Well, just to start off, for the last couple of months, the Department of Justice has been in Chicago really investigating the Chicago police department in light of situations such as the Laquan McDonald event. One of the things that we#39;ve been noticing in our youth groups was that the voices of people with disabilities haven#39;t really been heard. Later on, during the investigation and the release of Laquan McDonald#39;s video, it came out that he was a person with a disability, and he went through Special Education. That really kinda drove AYLP into looking into organizing groups like Black Lives Matter and other organizing groups that really have been loud about police brutality in the country. But we just felt like there was just a disconnect of disability voice, and we wanted to use the Department of Justice hearing to honor victims of police brutality through a balloon release vigil, but also give people in the disability community--regardless of race--opportunities to kind of tell their stories at the DOJ hearing./span/p pspanstrongLEROY:/strongnbsp;I know that one of you talked at the hearing. Was that you, Chris?/span/p pspanstrongCHRISTOPHER:/strongnbsp;I#39;m sorry?/span/p pspanstrongLEROY:/strongnbsp;I heard that you spoke at the hearing./span/p pspanstrongCHRISTOPHER:/strongnbsp;Yes, I did. I spoke at the hearing. One of the main reasons behind me speaking at the DOJ event was based upon the idea of believing that the police corruption goes beyond just torture victims, but it also goes into the displacement of people with disabilities. Meaning, I wanted to shed light on my story coming in contact with the Chicago Police Department a couple of months after being diagnosed with a mental illness. And instead of being sent to treatment, I was incarcerated, and I see that tendency for the Chicago Police Department to incarcerate folks with mental illnesses rather than give them actual treatment and services is a by-product of a dysfunctional system./span/p pspanstrongLEROY:nbsp;/strongMm. And TJ, as a person with Autism, I know about the case in Chicago that the police just got off of killing a teenager with Autism. Tell me your experience with police and with the DOJ./span/p pspanstrongTJ:/strongnbsp;Beyondnbsp; hearing, even though personally I#39;ve been stopped by the police before because I was just walking around alone at night. But luckily, nothing else happened, but still I#39;ve been profiled before. But I was mainly speaking on you mentioned Stephen Watts where two police officers pretty much got away with murder along with another person where other police officers where the police also killed the person, but the community essentially actually found them and stopped the officers for killing him. And then later on, I found out that in a Chicago suburb, the police tasered an Autistic person. So it#39;s kinda like my message was that there#39;s a disconnect between the police and their understanding of Autism. It#39;s like they fear Autism so much that instead of getting to know what Autism really is, they quick to shoot, arrest, profile. And it#39;s scaring me also because not only am I Autistic, but I also fit the profile of a thug because of my race, size and my locks ./span/p pspanstrongLEROY:/strongnbsp;So beyond the DOJ hearing, what else are you guys working on in the police brutality kind of field?/span/p pspanstrongCANDACE:nbsp;/strongSo our group has been in discussions over the last couple of months in the spring, because we really were trying to figure out where can we I guess make change. One of the things is--and I know, well Leroy, we talked about this a lot, which is--the role that the police play in how we can more so give more power back to the community versus the police. But we live in a city that#39;s very police, we#39;re a police state./span/p pspanstrongCHRISTOPHER:/strongnbsp;Yes, anbsp; police state./span/p pspanCANDACE: And what is happening is that the police officers-- So in support of the Watts family, the Watts family wanted to put a law in place that required all police officers to get CIT training. Cuz currently right now, only 14% of the police force in this city has CIT training. But as we look at that training, that training is 40 hours, and it#39;s not very disability-inclusive. They#39;re not hearing from the people who have disabilities. It#39;s more based off of a medical model language that doesn#39;t really put a realness to how people actually are when they#39;re in a situation. So currently right now, we#39;re having conversations with what the training entails, who trains, and also, we#39;re trying to figure out how to educate communities of color about disability identity and how to be a part of a community that supports instead of calls the police. So in the fall, we#39;re looking for locations in various parts of the city to have our meetings in the community so we could start to do a community fair. So that#39;s just some things we#39;re working on. And then, we#39;re doing research to possibly do a report about disability identity and police encounters./span/p pspanstrongLEROY:/strongnbsp;So is this report statewide or mainly the city?/span/p pspanstrongCANDACE:/strongnbsp;We haven#39;t made that decision yet, but we#39;re doing research about that./span/p pspanstrongLEROY:/strongnbsp;Who is the partners for this report? Is it only your agency?/span/p pspanstrongCANDACE:nbsp;/strongAgain, we#39;re at the beginning stages. We#39;re doing a lot of research on that./span/p pspanstrongLEROY:/strongnbsp;Oh, OK. Wow. It#39;s interesting. So coming out of this interview, what kind of advice would you give to Black, disabled activists that#39;s trying to get into the activism around police brutality? Because I know for me in going to rallies, I rarely see Black, disabled people at rallies. So what#39;s your advice to Black, disabled people on how they can get involved?/span/p pspanstrongCANDACE:/strongnbsp;Chris, you wanna start off?/span/p pspanstrongCHRISTOPHER:/strongnbsp;Absolutely. I would say don#39;t settle for anything less than what#39;s needed to be done. I think at this stage, as it relates to the police brutality in Chicago, there needs to be a system wide restructuring, a complete restructuring of the entire police system in order to focus on empowering communities and providing communities with the skills and the knowledge and the resources necessary to secure and protect their communities. I think policing less and a full restructuring or the development of a fundamentally new system of policing here in Chicago, I believe that disabled community should not settle for anything less./span/p pspanstrongLEROY:/strongnbsp;OK./span/p pspanstrongCANDACE:/strongnbsp;I think that one of the things that I saw at the DOJ hearing, we have been in community with various people who have been victims of police brutality and didn#39;t even know it until they showed up at the hearing. I think I would say that I wouldn#39;t want a hearing to be the point of contact to find out information like that./span/p pspanstrongLEROY:/strongnbsp;Yeah./span/p pspanstrongCANDACE:/strongnbsp;And I think it speaks to us really having a space to have that conversation, open and not in a hidden space. So I think I would give the advice to just always stay true to your story, and if you can or are open to it, to tell it. Because even like outside of this building community, people who probably don#39;t even wanna reveal themselves as having a disability. There#39;s still this shame and this stigma and this idea that I don#39;t want people to know. And people are suffering for it./span/p pspanstrongLEROY:/strongnbsp;Yeah, yeah./span/p pspanstrongTJ:/strongnbsp;I would also like to add, not only and if you want to be encouraged to share your stories on how the police affects you as a person of color with a disability, not just share it with it with mainstream media either. We in the age where we can share our stories through almost any form of information blogs and other medias sources outside of NBC, ABC, stuff like that because you get to notice that while there are some forms of media that get our stories out there, mainstream still taking its time to get it. So the more that we tell our stories, the more that the mainstream media will eventually get the connections between what#39;s happening to us as disability community and the police brutality phenomenon, period. And just like I said, to tell our stories through all available media, even like media outside the mainstream. That was very helpful, like blogs, websites, things of that nature./span/p pspanstrongLEROY:nbsp;/strongYeah, you brought up a good point. What do y#39;all think about how cultural work plays in this movement of police brutality? What does cultural work plays into that, especially for Black, disabled artists?/span/p pspanstrongCANDACE:/strongnbsp;I think we have a lot of work to do within the disability movement and outside of the disability movement. For example, this weekend it#39;s the Disability Pride Parade in Chicago. People don#39;t know. People mix it up with other identities, thinking that it#39;s related to Gay Pride or something. It seems like we still have to reveal our identities to the world. That#39;s how I feel. So I think truly, within the disability rights community, we still need to do a lot of cultural competency work because there#39;s still a lot of white privilege that is keeping the issue of police brutality and disability quiet. But then also, in the non-disabled community, the idea that people don#39;t care about people with disabilities is also on their side. So we just got a lot of cross-cultural work to do./span/p pspanstrongLEROY:/strongnbsp;Mmhmm./span/p pspanstrongCHRISTOPHER:/strongnbsp;There. And I think in addition to that cross-cultural work, I think that there has to be a fundamental change in the way that we interact with people that are across disabilities, whether it be the way people with mental disabilities interact with or work with people with physical disabilities and begin to build that rapport within the current organizing activities and kinda really begin to build those relationships. Cuz right now, I think the biggest thing that#39;s hurting a big part of the movement is the kind of stigma and fear that Candace talks about within the disabled community. It#39;s almost like we#39;ve kinda learned that our voices don#39;t matter. We kinda learn to a large extent that our stories don#39;t matter cuz nobody cares. I think the only way that we can break that mold and break that culture of silence and not talking about the issues and the things that we care about, I think that in order to do that, we have to fundamentally come together, begin to share our stories across different lines./span/p pspanstrongLEROY:/strongnbsp;Totally agree, totally agree. One more question. How is the Black Lives Matter chapter in Chicago? Have they embraced people with disabilities, and have they collaborated with you guys?/span/p pspanstrongTJ:nbsp;/strongAs far as collaborating with AYLP, not yet. We would like to, though, it being the beginning phases of that. But as far as at least the citywide level, they recently put out a statement about the story that I mentioned earlier where a police officer almost killed a Autistic young man. But the whole community saved him, basically, from it. While I commend Chicago chapter of BLM for at least putting the idea out there that police brutality affects disabled people in the Black and Brown communities and just under-represented communities in general; however, they#39;re still some language that would still kinda get me. Like for instance, when they mentioned about 80% of police brutality happens to people with mental health, the issue with that is people come up thinking of Autism with mental health. When actually, Autism is a developmental disability, not mental health. So it still needs to be education on what disability really is between the disability community and groups that are acivists like BLM. And also, we need to figure out how can we participate with BLM, because it#39;s inaccessible as of right now. I#39;m sure the other two could chime in on that./span/p pspanstrongLEROY:/strongnbsp;Yeah, anybody wanna chime in on that?/span/p pspanstrongCANDACE:/strongnbsp;No, I think TJ summed it up./span/p pspanstrongCHRISTOPHER/strong: Yeah./span/p pspanstrongLEROY:nbsp;/strongOK. Any last words that you guys wanna talk about around this issue or any upcoming campaigns or events?/span/p pspanstrongCANDACE:/strongnbsp;I just wanna say that everything that we do is tied to the system, whether we in education or whether we#39;re not. The services we need, whether mental health is crucial schools/institutionsnbsp; are closing. Unfortunately, every arrow is leading to the prison system, and as a organizer, I know it#39;s important for me to figure out ways to block that path. Which is one of the reasons why we work on the school-to-prison pipeline. But in adulthood, when you#39;re just at home in your community, trying to skate or trying to hang out with your friends or being out and about and something happens, and the police is called, we need to switch from institutional, heavy base support for more community support. And I really wanna work on that./span/p pspanstrongTJ:nbsp;/strongYes, I second that!/span/p pspanstrongCHRISTOPHER:/strongnbsp;Yeah, and I guess the last thing I would like to say is just thank you for having this conversation, and thank you for utilizing your media/column as a platform to really look at these issues. I think the more opportunities that we have to engage in dialog like this, discussing movements, discussing our vision or the impact we would like to make on the system as people with disabilities, I think the more opportunities we have to do this, the more opportunities we have for the movement to grow and develop over time./span/p pspanstrongLEROY/strong: Well, with that, thank you so much./span/p pspanALL LEROY: Thank you./span/p /div /div

pHello Friends Supporters/p p It all started when I was in my early teens. I told my mom that I wanted to go to South Africa in the middle of the US anti-Aparthied movement in which my father and I was apart of. In my high school years I tried to do a paper on what was going on in South Africa for people with disabilities/Deaf and remember this was in the mid 80#39;s before computers. My paper turned out to be a half a page cause I couldn#39;t find enough information on people with disabilities/Deaf in South Africa at that time./p pFast-forward to 2007 when Krip-Hop Nation officially started in full-blown (It was in my brain in the 90#39;s) on myspace and with the internet Krip-Hop blew up internationally and I also continued my networking internationally connecting to disabled/Deaf activists, journalists, musicians including Hip-Hop artists. If you been following my column you would have noticed the coverage of disabled people/artists all of Africa from the Congo to Zimbabwe to Nigeria to South Africa and beyond./p pIf you know me you will also know I live on SSI i.e. a tight budget, however with this tight budget I manage to travel to the UK, Canada around the US spreading the work of Krip-Hop Nation setting up chapters etc../p pWell after years of networking and writing over the internet with African disabled artists/activists especially Hip-Hop artists with disabilities, Krip-Hop Nation aka myself will be flying to South Africa for a tour that will hit five or more cities meeting and performing with all types of artists with disabilities/Deaf in the Disability Awareness Month in South Africa from November 5-December 10th/2016./p pBefore I talk about the outcomes of this tour, let me tell you that I already have my ticket and that is a big thing as a person living on SSI the team in South Africa has been working overtime to get things ready. Big love to Simon Manda who is kicking butt on all the ground work in South Africa from accessible transportation to venues and so much more!/p pEXPECTED OUTCOMESbr / bull; Book of memoirsbr / bull; Talent Showcasebr / bull; Seminars/Roundtable Discussionsbr / bull; Documentarybr / bull; Skills Development/Transferbr / bull; Database of Artists/Creatives with disabilities/Deafbr / bull; Linkages to the DADA Festival/p pHere are our team members:br / bull; Leroy Moore (Founder: Krip Hop Nation- USA)br / bull; Simon Manda (Editor and Co-Founder: THISABILITY Newspaper)br / bull; Nicolene Mostert (Co-Founder: OCAL Global)br / bull; Alun Davies (Co-Founder: OCAL Global)br / bull; Mduduzi Nhlebela (Photography/Videography; Businessman)br / bull; 2 Assistants/p p Therersquo;s a lot of wisdom and ideas in the communities Krip-Hop Nation represents. But these ideas are not shared and applied. Thatrsquo;s what Leroyrsquo;s trip (and the book/film) aim to achieve. Simon and Leroy will be observing, listening, documenting and collaborating with others in Africa and in America to help connect and expand visibility, voices, common bonds and differences with others in a book format. This project is an opportunity to bring out the needed communication between the disability/Deaf community here in the US Africa and to build on our talents onto an international stage that Leroy hopes would lead to more collaborations in the artistic space-like networking artists face to face in an international conference or festival in South Africa with Stevie Wonder as ambassador./p pFriday September 9th, R.e. Spect​ of Zimbabwe, Africa agreed to let his song be the theme song for Krip-Hop Nation#39;s South Africa Tour 2016. He wrote performed this song for Krip-Hop Nation back in 2012./p pHelp out! Give to Krip-Hop South Africa Tour November-December 2016. We have a month and half left to raise funds for this tour so please donate and continue to pass it around. The donations will go to the following:/p p*Publishing a book of stories, art, poetry, essays and song lyrics of artists,writers with disabilities/Deaf in Africa USbr / *Creating, editing, producing and marketing of a film documentary of the tourbr / *Accessible equipment that would make the tour more accessible, including wheelchairs, etc.br / *Performersrsquo; fees/p pOnce again this is more than just a one time tour! nbsp;This tour will create more than a book and film documentary but will set a foundation to bring out the needed communication between the disability community here in the US Africa and to build on our talents onto an international stage that Leroy hopes would lead to more collaborations in the artistic space-like networking artists face to face in an international conference or festival in South Africa with endorsement from Stevie Wonder who is the United Nation ambassador of people with disabilities all over the world. If you know how to get in touch with Stevie Wonder, please get in touch with us at Krip-Hop Nation./p p Fundraising page:/p pa href="https://igg.me/at/S4VPn49O978"https://igg.me/at/S4VPn49O978/a/p pListen to the song read the lyrics:/p pa href="https://soundcloud.com/blackkrip/painting-voices-by-re-spect-ft-keali-new1-theme-song-for-krip-hop-nations-south-africa-tour" https://soundcloud.com/blackkrip/painting-voices-by-re-spect-ft-keali-new1-theme-song-for-krip-hop-nations-south-africa-tour/a/p pnbsp;/p pImage description: Picture of a world with a Black woman and a Black man kissing a Krip-Hop Nation video box. Above are words: USA to Africa South Africa Tour Nov-December 2016. Below is a set of crutches crossing each other with a white hand displaying a sign language sign Below words saying: Brought to You By This Ability Newspaper, Simon Manda Krip--Hop Nation/p pnbsp;/p pThank You,br / Leroy F. Moore Jr.br / Founder of Krip-Hop Nation/Columnist of Poor Magazine/p

pldquo;$5-10.00 per Disc- Hip Hop , Salsa, You name it, we got it,rdquo; At the corner of Vine and Melrose, Hollywood and Vine and Pico and Wilshire in LA, I would scream out my best CD deal of the day. I was 11 years old when i started selling CDrsquo;s. My best location was in front of the 7-11 downtown, until the poLice came and arrested me for soliciting without a license. For years me and my mama sold CDrsquo;s, art and all kinds of other things considered ldquo;illegalrdquo; on the street. We never had a permit or license to vend, sell or solicit. We were harassed, cited and several times i was arrested for it. And yet i lived to tell, write and teach about it. Alton was murdered./p p Broad daylight. Downtown Oakland. Flashes of shiny black and white metal shimmer in the sunlight. My heart stops, blood pools in my stomach. I have no ID, and my mama and me were driving one of many hoopties we had with a broken tail-light. This moment of terror followed by so many more DrivingWhilePoor moments of terror caused me to have PTSD to this day. My mixed race, light-skinned mama and my wite-looking self were constantly stopped because we were driving an old car and/or were parked in neighborhoods sleeping in an old car. We were often harassed, a couple of times thrown against our hood, and three times I was arrested, had our car towed and my disabled traumatized mama was left on the street. And yet we lived to tell, write and teach about it Philando was murdered. nbsp;/p p My houseless, disabled, mixed race mama and I were unhoused sleeping on the street on and off for years, we were arrested, cited, harassed multiple times, which was terrifying and traumatizing but we lived to tell, teach and write about it. Jessica Nelson Williams was murdered./p p This goes out to my fellow light-skinned People of Color and poor white people.br / In so many ways my life of poverty and houselessness, system abuse and hellfare was terrifying and left me scarred beyond words. But i am still here. My big loud mouth is still alive. My big loud, light-skinned mouth is still alive./p p The point of my story is not to rank oppression, to dismantle or disrespect your trauma, fellow light-skinned, working class and poor white people, Poverty, abuse, state- sponsored and personal violence is hella real and kills, If you have lived a life like me and my mama it is blessing you are still alive. And many of us donrsquo;t make it, killing ourselves with the mans poison, with each others fists, with our own minds. Our struggles are very real and devastating and completely legitimate. Our collective trauma-knowledge as poor and unhoused people is why we established the concept of Poverty Scholarship at a class="profileLink" data-hovercard="/ajax/hovercard/page.php?id=39770831995" href="https://www.facebook.com/PoorNewsNetwork/"POOR Magazine/a And has nothing to do with the necessity to understand the depth of danger faced by all Black peoples walking, living, working and driving in this stolen indigenous land/p p The point of this story is to help you understand that the fight for Black life, isnrsquo;t a fight for who is worse off,nbsp; who had more trauma, terror or abuse. the point is to understand thatnbsp; the impact and reality of white supremacy is not just trauma, its a deep and real situation of danger. for Black bodies. Due to a terrifyingly real, historically rooted and extremely dangerous system, Black bodies are in a specific state of danger, a clear and present danger of murder everyday in Amerikkka due to intentional, institutional and multi-generational white supremacy that all light-skinned people of colorrsquo;s(POC) and poor white people arenrsquo;t. And the moment for us to get extremely clear about this and name it constantly is now./p p This means some serious compartmentalization of our own ldquo;stuffrdquo; and the clear-headed recognition of this danger to our Black family members, friends, comrades, neighbors, lovers and community.br / nbsp;br / And once we have gotten over our own personal shit about this danger, to begin to act, educate and activate constantly. To bring up in spaces where our fellow unconscious family members, friends, comrades, neighbors, co-workers and communities dwell. To stand with, walk with, act with Black bodies in the ways that matter and are hard. To always kkkopwatch, to never walk by, drive by or stay uninvolved.nbsp; At POOR Magazine, a poor and indigenous people-led movement, this means supporting fellow unhoused, poor, disabled, elder and youth of color to get new cars, to get current registration, insurance, housing, healthcare, paid for by folks with race, class and formal education privilege, something we teach them in a poor people-led community school we call a href="http://www.racepovertymediajustice.org"PeopleSkool./a Something we are activating with the a href="http://www.poormagazine.org/homefulness"Homefulness Project./a/p p And in this narrative I am in no way saying that light-skinnednbsp; POCrsquo;s, poor and unhoused white people, Trans and disabled peoples are ldquo;saferdquo;. We are not. Period. Point blank. It is merely to clearly articulate the difference and terror we need to see and recognize and name./p p For unhoused, working class and light-skinned POCrsquo;s culture, race, age and gender matters in more subtle ways. For years as a child i had to navigate my ldquo;white skinrdquo; so that my mixed race single mama and i could rent an apartment when we were unhoused and later when myself and fellow Black welfareQUEENrsquo;s and POOR Magazine launched Mamahouse in the Mission I had to do it again, because racism and classism is alive and well everywhere. To acquire housing I was constantly lying about credit histories and wages and landlords were always believing it because white supremacy is alive and well in the land-stealing industry.nbsp; Indigenous, POC, immigrant, trans, youth, elders and unhoused people are constantly under attack by the subtle and not so subtle forces of racism, white supremacy and amerikkklan colonial domination./p p Ultimately the Porsquo;Lice are killing all of us. the fact that they used a robot to kill the alleged poLice murderer in Dallas is telling of a terrifying future to come, more proof that our collective liberation is linked. It is why we have practiced a No PoLice Calls Ever policy at POOR Magazine for the last 20 years and launched it and lived it at Homefulness. But before we can be truly linked it is urgent that we see the ways we are clearly different. It is why we have a motto at POOR Magazine, The Revolution will NOT be Melted in a Pot, which just means we need to respect each personrsquo;s journey through spirit and consciousness, we need to be clear about who we are and how we are different to truly value, support and overstand each of our individual struggles so we can work toward our collective liberation.br / nbsp;/p pemPOOR Magazine#39;s strongFree Revolutionary Journalism program for Po#39; Folks/strong is beginning tomorrow, Tuesday, July 12th at 6:30pm. email a href="mailto:poormag@gmail.com"poormag@gmail.com/a to register.nbsp; The next PeopleSkool for folks with strongRace, Class and/or Formal Education Privilege/strong is in Black august 27th 28th - go to a href="http://www.racepovertymediajustice.org" title="www.racepovertymediajustice.org"www.racepovertymediajustice.org/a to enroll. If you are interested in attending our strongNot Calling the kkkops EVER /strongworkshops which begin in September please email poormag@gmail.com/em/p