Story Archives 2014

It is said
That it is
The strongest muscle
In the human body

It has been
Used to hurt, injure, maim
Humiliate and on
Occasion, build

It has caused wars
And disputes, ignited
Love affairs, fanned
The flames of hatred,
Feuds

Some have used it
To manipulate the
Masses while others have
Used it to enlighten

It is a powerful
Thing, this stained
Curved, twisted, forked
Thick, thin thing that lies in
Our mouth like a springboard
Ready to pounce or inspire or
Light the fire

No wonder there are
Those who want to
Suppress it or cut it out

Some of us go through
Life not knowing that
We have one

And there’s this guy
In San Francisco who
Didn’t know he had
One

And year after year
Eviction and removal
Have gone by

And the friends of his life
The landscape of his life
The elders of his life
Have disappeared before
His eyes, replaced by
Skyscrapers

He’s finally found
His tongue

It was in a jar
In the cupboard in
The house where
He grew up

And the guy
Took that jar
And looked at his
Tongue

A lot had settled
And built up
On it

Hot sauce
Ginger
Wasabi
Vinegar
Soy sauce
Fish sauce

Sitting
In a ferment
Of fire

Waiting to
Be found

My Hero

(For Muhammad Ali)

He has months
To live, the
Tabloids have
Reported

At one time
He could move
faster backwards
Than most could move
Forwards

A kid sat in front
Of a small
Black and white TV set
In 1975

The words crawled
At the bottom of
The screen
Muhammad Ali defeats Joe Frazier TKO round 14 in Manila

I liked them
Both

(somebody had to win)

I used to pretend i
Was him when i
Was a kid in the
schoolyard

Man, could he
Move

He fought
On too
Long

He won the title
When he too was
A kid

“I shook up the

World! I shook up

The world…he declared

He now travels
Around the
Globe

Reaching out
And shaking
Hands of old and
New fans alike

Shaking

He’s still
Shaking

The
World

© 2005 Tony Robles

The lion

The panda

The jaguar

Pacific walrus

Siberian tiger

Manatee

Wolverine

Albatross

Blue whale

And snow leopard

Are species

Marked for extinction.

But none

Have been threatened with that end complete

Longer than

They which are

Scattered,

Feared,

Captured,

Shunned,

Caged in record numbers,

Made to move from place to place,

Live in dirty, squalid areas,

Eat poorly,

Self-loathing,

Self-killing,

Called all the worst names

And built from the ground up

Great cities

While in leg-irons & chains.

They are unmistakably African, in look & origin.

This species

Doesn’t get listed with other

Threatened kinds. They get no such recognition.

Perpetual prey

In the hunt that’s always on

With or without guns.

[ The same can be said

  For a similar breed

  With lower numbers

  Whose native habitat

Thursday, January 30 2014. Before I begin this article I apologize to the Asian guy with the cigarette who cursed me and Mr. Lynn out when overhearing me say, “Yeah, they all look the same.” What he didn’t hear me say before that was, “just as we [black folks] all look the same.”

Damage done. Mr. Lynn asked him for a smoke after my overheard comment. Of course, he refused with an “F” bomb.

Let me explain. I’m not very observant (on purpose). This is why I‘m not an investigative reporter and instead write columns.

Saturday, January 25 2014. I didn’t expect to write this column. Oh, well.

Sunday, January 19 2014. James Memorial United Methodist Church. Late September last year I found out about a few churches in the Fillmore district, including this one at 1975 Post Street. Another church is across the street and around the corner two or three blocks.

I’ve got my backpack, bus pass, and two sturdy plastic bags in case extra food or empty glass bottles are around for recycling. Arriving late to the church for groceries around 10am, I see lots of Asians, whether they’re Korean, Chinese, Japanese, Phillipino, I don't know. A few Blacks and Browns, but mostly Asian and you can count the Black and Brown people on one hand.

Tuesday, January 28 2014. POOR Magazine Newsroom. Phillip Standing Bear comments on this point in my story. He says, “As poor folk always in struggle, I respect, not envy, the Hustlers known as Mama Sans.”

Back again to Sunday, January 19 2014. In line there is a color code of red, blue, green, pink, orange, and yellow badges. I guess they stand for those who’ve signed up for groceries, to prevent their getting skipped over in the line. What’s supposed to happen, is after the people in line get their bags of food, the unsigned-up (us) wait to get our chance.

As Mr. Lynn and I wait at the church gate, it's Mr. Lynn who sees what happens. Lynn says, “This line’s getting longer, I can’t tell who’s got food but it looks like they’re doubling back for seconds!” I’m not as observant but he may have a point. The line does seem to be longer, looks like some of ‘em were reloading.

Tuesday, January 28 2014.  Ms. Ingrid de Leon comments: "I’ve entered a community food disbursement space without being conscious of the community that resides in the area. I saw there were flowers in the bins…I took what I wanted without asking and was told, 'JUST ONE!! ONLY ONE!' That’s when I realized that I need to be considerate and think first before entering a space with services for people who may have a bigger need than I do."

Back finally to Sunday, January 19 2014. “They go in, get out, get back in for more food, then they resell the food all over again; I’ve seen 'em before,” Mr. Lynn said to me. After an hour or so the line begins shrinking. We get our bags of groceries. We go to a second church to eat an early 11:30 lunch.

That’s when the “They all look alike" comment is overheard. We go our separate ways.

Tuesday, January 28 2014. POOR Magazine Newsroom.
I bring up what happened last Sunday. POOR Magazine poverty scholars comment on our story, including Ms. Ingrid and Phillip Standing Bear.

Queenandi X adds, "I believe that all people of color living in poverty should unite and help one another out – Black, Brown, Red, Yellow– it’s fine with me. The only problem that I have is when other 'nations' come into our already impoverished neighborhoods and suck up our resources for their benefit. Due to racism, there is no give and take, meaning that you can come into our hoods and suck us dry, but we cannot come into your neighborhood and receive the same services because of the colors of our skin."

Thursday, January 30 2014. This renegade food pantry brigade is predominately Chinese Immigrants and they have language and immigration barriers to deal with. They work well, are very organized and work well together. Unfortunately they make it difficult for people who need the food as much as they do– messing up an opportunity for others to get it! How can we make this work for everyone when everyone has their own hustle?
 

Tuesday, February 7 2014

Papa Bear leaned forward in his seat, with elbows on knees. Folks at the Community Newsroom directed their attention, faces, and cameras toward him, POOR Magazine's "Panhandler Reporter." He then began reporting the news, his monthly state of San Francisco summary distilled from his daily studies and experiences of Geary Blvd.

"Well, they're almost done tearing down the Cathedral Hill Hotel," he began with a big sigh. He worried that the removal of debris and the demolition might cause traffic and additional pollution on Geary Street. "They are gonna put a tunnel underground. They have machines like a corkscrew that they're making a racket with." Papa Bear added, "The black and white come around the block every three minutes—six, seven latinos are gonna be deported."

After its closing in 2009 Cathedral Hill Hotel had been shelter to many houseless people, until California Pacific Medical Center bought the site and began removing/arresting occupants in 2012. Occupy (sic) San Francisco protested the removals in 2012, and police responded with more arrests of squatters, including undocumented folks at risk of deportation. The heightened police presence has continued since then.

With a crack in his voice, Papa Bear spoke on another piece of tragic news. "Someone choked Mary to death this week. She was an examiner in the Tenderloin. The wake was today. She was already in a wheelchair, an alcoholic who drank a lot. She was really a sweet lady, fun to listen to. I liked her a lot." The air felt leaden with sorrow. Someone asked how old she was. He thought for a moment with a questioning expression and replied, "I think she was… in her late 30s?" The Community Newsroom circle hummed with distress. It seemed that someone had killed her while trying to rob her of just some small change. He shook his head in dismay, asking aloud who would do such a thing. "They don't mess around with small change like that in New York," raising his voice. "This is something that only happens in San Francisco."

Papa Bear continued on: "They got my stuff again, took my stuff," he said of the Department of Public Works (DPW). He's planning to go to court next week and fight back for his possessions.

Someone raised their hand and suggested Papa Bear appeal to the Department of Veteran Affairs (DVA) for housing and other services. "The DVA isn't helping me at all," Papa Bear responded. "They're forgetting the Vietnam vets nowadays, focusing on younger vets from Iraq and Afghanistan." He added that he's not interested in the DVA controlling his life, his home. "I don't want to follow someone's rules in my own home," he said. "And they want to take 30% of your income? That's ridiculous!" Someone piped up, saying that the DVA comes to inspect peoples homes every day, and you can get booted out even if you're super careful to follow all the rules.

It was time to go. Papa Bear got up from his chair with an exhausted sigh. He left the room to many heartfelt farewells and thank-yous.

Guess where I met the author of Diary of a Disability Scholar Roosevelt Mitchell? Yes, on Facebook, but this was after I ran across Mitchell’s Kickstarter page for his book. I was excited about his book, being Black & disabled & putting out a book, got me stoke to get it. As I read & listened to the video on Mitchell’s Kickstarter page, I had questions from the start like the write up about Mitchell of him being the first person to write a sociological introspective viewpoint. When I post his book on my Facebook page many of my friends who are activists, educators, scholars & writers in the disability community had the same questions and wrote on the post, “He is not the first!” I tried to put everybody at ease by writing that I’ll interview him & write a review of his book. So here it is.

Before I received the book in the mail, I interviewed Mitchell that you can listen to at the below link on Poor Magazine at my column, Krip-Hop Nation. The second question in the interview was about the quote on his book, being the first sociological book on people with disability from a scholarly introspective viewpoint.

Reading that interview question at that time the late Paul Longmore & other disabled scholars who laid down the foundation in disability scholarly writings years even decades ago were going through my brain. Then Mitchell told me that it was his publisher who wrote his kickstater page & the book’s statement on the back. We both agreed that many publishers & people in power who have the authority on what gets out there have many times misrepresent people with disabilities like saying “He/She/it’s the first…” just to sell the product or brand. It sounded like Mitchell was stuck between a rock & a hard place. He could stay quiet thus don’t put his publishing contract at risk or say something if he knew that he wasn’t the first.

Anyway the book arrived in my mailbox & it was my Xmas reading of 2013. The book cover is a picture of Mitchell with a clean shaved head with a white dress, a light greenish tie & a dark vest on. He is sitting at a large desk with two stacks of books on each side of him and his nameplate in front. The book has nine chapters with the usual acknowledgement, preface, introduction and epilogue. Every chapter starts with one of Mitchell’s own poems that were a treat for me being a poet too.

For me the introduction laid out what the book was about and where the author is coming from. It was clear why Mitchell, a special education major in graduate school who became what the publisher wrote, “ an intellectual activist, writer & speaker in the battle against social injustice” he wrote his book.

He was tired of reading textbooks about people with disabilities by non-disabled authors. And yes I feel him on that big time however on the other side when I read his book I wonder did he know about disabled scholars and their books/writings that I brought into my undergrad classes in the late 80’s? I knew for me as a Black disabled student in high school that I needed to educate my teachers about my history and I also know now that it takes a strong family at home to build up that confidence what Mitchell pointed out in the book that was missing in his home growing up especially when it comes to disability.

Mitchell’s childhood was beyond rough & disability pride & education were not promoted but some how school was very important even when his disabled father took the kids but was abusive and spent every cent on beer. The father taught his boys to be tough but that was it. Poor Magazine could relate to Mitchell’s young adulthood from being put out by his own parents, poverty, living in a homeless shelter and being teased about not only disability (born with only one full hand) but being poor.

Not seeing or being encouraged to strive as a person with a disability I can see why through his book he did not once mentioned the importance of the activism of the disability rights movement that lead to laws because like many poor people especially poor people of color the disability rights movement didn’t touch him at an early age.

However as an adult with two masters, I don’t understand why he didn’t include it in his book. The reason could be that it, disability rights movement, was not taught in his school years all the way up to graduate school if that was the his only avenue of learning. On the other side it seems that Mitchell has a firm grasped on Black historical moments, people and music when e talks about WEB Dubois’s classic Soul of Black Folks & Amiri Baraka’s Blues People. To Mitchell’s credit he does recognize that he is apart of the legacy of disabled Black slaves and at the same time questions, why he doesn’t see himself when Black History Month comes around.

There were many common experiences that Mitchell has talked about in his book that many of us, people with disabilities goes through like not finding employment in your field even though he has two degrees, not knowing if the discrimination toward his disability or race. His experiences of rejections from publishers & agents is common among writers with disabilities to be face with the same sentence that a lot of us get, “There is no market for your writing.”

When Mitchell is talking about his field he is right on like chapters 7-9 but there are places that I must disagree. Although Mitchell’s reason of why he wrote his book & clearly states of feeling like non-disabled people need to learn from us, people with disabilities in the epilogue, he uses an organization’s philosophy as a scare tactic to prove a point. The organization was Autism Speaks (an organization that is not control by autistic people & promotes treatment not acceptance). Mitchell goes on to use Autism Speaks’ popular stands & that is looking for a cure aka treatment returning to the medical model of disability.

He goes on to say, “if we don’t do anything about the rise of autism we’ll become The United States of Autism!” For one thing as I’ve learned from autistic advocates that Autism Speaks don’t speak for people living, striving & advocating with autism plus Autism Speaks don’t have any autistic people on their board. By using Autism Speaks it goes against his book main goal of not having non-disabled people in control of people with disabilities thus learning about autism from an organization who don’t have autistic people in control.

Like I mentioned before Mitchell never talked about disability advocacy but when he uses events like when Hip-Hop artist used autism in a negative way in their songs he only points to people who are in powerful places that create change like changing ablest lyric but don’t see the advocacy of the community who also has pushed for change & most of the times before organizations get involved. To say the above I think the major flaw of the book beyond what I already mentioned is a lack of research or knowledge to present a fuller picture on subjects Mitchell writes about outside his own experiences.

Mitchell hits on topics like media, global discrimination, the church & charity all relating to people with disabilities but for me he doesn’t go further to display many sides that sometimes exclude the history, writings, advocacy and improvements that people with disabilities shared & experience.

I respect Mitchell’s Christian beliefs & using biblical verses throughout the book however if Mitchell is going to use faith base to explain disability in & outside the church with their charity philosophy then there has to be a disability historical activist voice that shows the full picture.

As a journalist & media critic, I’ve always questioned the notion that everything would change for a certain group of people if they were only included in mainstream media. Mitchell puts out this claim in chapter six where he gives praise to a television series “Scandal” and its diverse characters especially people of color and a gay character.

He writes “this is when issues like those make it to mainstream television where it is viewed by millions. This is what is needed to bring disability to mainstream to give kids & adults with disabilities hope & role models. I must say that mainstream media is powerful tool to change perceptions but like I mentioned over & over and that is the beauty and power of advocacy of the culture that have cultural movements like the Black Arts movement to today’s disability arts/cultural movement that have helped push mainstream media to put on sitcoms like Malcolm in The Middle to Brothers both with Black disabled main characters.

I’ll end this review by thanking Mitchell for mentioning the alarming rate of abuse against people with disabilities in-group homes, in schools & from society in general! His views & experiences in the mental health & special education fields as a Black disabled man are needed! As an upcoming publish writer and an intellectual activist, I treasure his first book, Diary Of A Disability Scholar I hope he and other intellectual writers/activist mix street activism, art, journalism and past & present scholarly writers will show up more and more in his future writings/books.

By Leroy Moore Jr.
For more information about his book, Contact Roosevelt Mitchell III, Email rooseveltmitchell@yahoo.com
Phone 314-708-9180

The People Charge Landlords With Elder Abuse for Ellis Act Evictions

(image: Remigio Fraga -Elder Activist with Idriss Stelley Foundation)- a co-sponsor of this action)

Reprinted from 48hills.org

On Wednesday, Feb 5th citing California Penal code 368...we, the evicted, gentrified, po'liced, elder and disabled, walked into the Hall of Justice in San Francisco to bring criminal charges of Elder Abuse against landlords for the perpetration of the crime of Ellis Act evictions against frail, elder, disabled and traumatized residents of San Francisco

"Becoming homeless as an already disabled senior almost killed me, said Kathy Galvez, African Descendent elder evicted in 2012 from her San Francisco home of 40 years so a realtor and bank gangster could make profit on her now stolen home.

Due to the predatory speculation of landlords like Urban Green and lawyers like Andrew Sacks trying to scramble to make profit from the huge influx of new tech employees flooding the Bay Area, thousands of families with young children and disabled elders have been served with Ellis act eviction notices, or have already been evicted, ending up in the streets, in shelters or most terrifying of all, dead from the trauma of eviction and homelessness.

The "Ellis Act" is a state law which says that landlords have the unconditional right to evict tenants to "go out of business". This landlord written law has been used to enable speculators to buy apartment buildings filled with long-term tenants and "legally evict" all the tenants living there so that after a short wait, can re-rent all the vacant units for any insane price they want.

“ I have nowhere to go…”

Pictures of Black Herstory filled every inch of Miss Nan’s walls. Mamas, daughters, suns, uncles, aunties, grand-mommas and great-greats, looked down at me as Miss Nan spoke, "This whole eviction process has made me extremely ill, i was already sick, but I'm not sure if I'm going to make it now, " the voice of 75 year old Miss Nan was shaking as she spoke about the Ellis Act eviction notice she and her neighbors had just received, which would mean she, an African-American disabled elder and life-long resident of San Francisco will be evicted from her home of 43 years, "I have nowhere to go, and i can hardly walk and now they are sending people out here to harass me," she concluded.

Me and POOR Magazine’s Co-editor and Manilatown sun Tony Robles were there, sitting in her humble living room with Judge Judy quietly adjudicating on the old school Panasonic in the background, trying desperately to “save” Miss Nan, from the vicious crime of eviction for profit.

As she spoke, telling her story and the stories of her two disabled neighbors, one of whom had just been rushed to the hospital because he was so traumatized by receiving an Ellis Act eviction notice, her voice remained deep and strong, holding back over 50 years of rent and bills paid, jobs tirelessly labored, unions joined, children born, families raised, elders cared for, mamas transitioned. “I have nowhere to go, she repeated.

After holding the disgusting crime of Miss Nan’s eviction on my heart, I was thrown back to the trauma of 9 years ago, when me and my mama were given an Ellis Act eviction notice, the last straw, she said, after an already too long-life of poverty and suffering, and the reason she became very sick and soon-after transitioned. I remembered the family of Gerry Ambrose, a four generation working-class family dismantled by Ellis Act eviction and eventual displacement to a trailer park in West Sacramento from the predatory impact of the first dot-com boom, my own eviction in 2010 under Ellis Act of Mamahouse- a home for poor single parents like myself that I started in 2007 and now Miss Nan, Benito Santiago, the entire block just Ellis Acted last month in North Beach, dozens more we at POOR Magazine have gotten calls from every week for the last 8 months and literally thousands more across the state of California, being evicted for profit of the few and the suffering of so many.

As a care-giver for elders, an advocate for all poor peoples who like myself and my family have struggled to survive in the inhuman system they call capitalism, and a good indigenous daughter that has always practiced eldership, I realized then that these evictions under the Ellis Act, used for the profit of a few and causing the suffering of so many, were an actual crime, a crime of elder abuse.

"We need to put an end to the Ellis Act and other laws like it which cause more poverty and homelessness," Luis Rodriguez, Candidate for Gov of California.who spoke at the press conference that proceeded the filing.

The Filing

“I’m sorry, we can’t take this complaint, you will need to go downstairs to the police window,” When we first presented the detailed complaints of 12 disabled elders ranging in age from 62 to 95 years old, whose lives have been dismantled by the abuse of an Eliis Act eviction, the DA tried to give us what us Po’ folks call the “welfareShuffle” i.e, sorry we can’t help you, you need to go somewhere else.

But this time, for one of the few times in our un-protected and system abused lives, someone stood up for our fight for the most unprotected in our society.

“Actually, no, this is the right place for us to be due to the enormity and seriousness of these charges, they have the right to go directly to the District Attorney, ‘ said Tony Prince, revolutionary lawyer who showed up for us and is also acting as Luis Rodriguez’ campaign manager in his run for Gov of California.
And then suddenly, almost as quickly as the “no” came out of her mouth, the DA’s representative agreed to go to the back and consult with other attornies. When she came back she agreed to take our first seven complaints and make an appointment to sit down with us to discuss investigating them further.

Her no was not unexpected for us. Us poor and profiled folks of color have been told “no” more than we would care to count. Our lives and the lives of our young black and brown people are constantly arrested, cited, incarcerated and harassed for less than what these landlords and speculators have gotten away with. We are constantly called criminals and thugs and perpetrators and dangerous, and yet, who among us is abusing the most vulnerable of us, who among us are creating sit-lie, stop and frisk and gang injunction laws daily to keep our poor bodies constantly under threat and attack.

"We will be investigating any clear acts of elder abuse," said George Gascon to reporters who questioned him on our complaints.

The ultimate irony of capitalist defined crimes is who is considered the good, honest, working people and who are considered the dangerous criminals It is not our houseless peoples, or black and brown young people that are throwing 95 year old elders on the street in the cold with nowhere to go. It is the people who have stolen this indigenous land and charged us rent for it and use papers and lawyers to destroy us, who are the real criminals, the dangerous ones. The ones we need to watch out for. The ones who need to be cleaned off our streets and out of our neighborhoods before they abuse anymore of us.

California Pen Code 368 (Elder Abuse Law)
Any person who knows or reasonably should know that a person is an elder or dependent adult and who, under circumstances or conditions likely to produce great bodily harm or death, willfully causes or permits any elder or dependent adult to suffer, or inflicts thereon unjustifiable physical pain or mental suffering, or having the care or custody of any elder or dependent adult, willfully causes or permits the person or health of the elder or dependent adult to be injured, or willfully causes or permits the elder or dependent adult to be placed in a situation in which his or her person or health is endangered, is punishable by imprisonment in a county jail not exceeding one year, or by a fine not to exceed six thousand dollars ($6,000), or by both that fine and imprisonment, or by imprisonment in the state prison for two, three, or four years.

This Friday, Feb 14th @ 12:00 noon- Elders, families and advocates come back to 850 Bryant st in SF to hold a press conference on the front steps of the Hall of Justice and then meet with the District Atty to pursue these criminal charges of Elder Abuse. Come Join us.

February 11, 2014

Governor Jerry Brown [D] California has recently asked for an extension on the federal deadline to release state inmates from California’s overcrowded prison system. Why not just release all of the people in state prisons on marijuana charges and kill two birds with one stone? The answer of course is that leaders like Jerry Brown hold more allegiance to law enforcement than they do to the constituents who elected them!

Nationwide, more people want marijuana to be legal rather than illegal. I can give two very good examples of how federal, state, and local authorities abuse their power to unjustly arrest, prosecute, and convict mostly poor black and Latino populations.

The first example, from my January 12, 2014 Facebook post:

This past Friday my friend Jose Guittierez was railroaded in Federal Court.
I wasn’t present for the event that led to his arrest so I cannot honestly say that the fact that he is Latino was a factor (I didn’t hear people call him bad names but did review part of the video footage). I am absolutely convinced that his exercising his right to free speech, bearing a sign with the words “Department of Injustice” while wearing a bull nose mask, is the reason for arrest. The arrest took place during the federal raid on Oaksterdam, Oakland’s version of Amsterdam, Netherlands.

He was arrested for allegedly assaulting a federal agent. He accidentally tapped a federal marshal with his protest sign.

The Judge seemed to be as angry with him for bringing a protest sign phrased
“Dept of Injustice” and wearing a bull nose mask, as for the actual “assault” that lasted less than a second. The Judge was brought in from another state, allegedly so Jose could get a fair trial. He accused Jose of “coming from another city to start trouble” (I can’t possibly be the only one who sees the irony in this).

The probation department recommended 6 months probation and 6 months in a halfway house. The Judge ignored their recommendation and instead sentenced him to a much harsher sentence of 5 years probation and abstinence from alcohol and illegal drugs. He grossly contradicted himself by saying halfway houses were for people with substance abuse issues. The Judge further contradicted himself by stating that the case was not about medical marijuana.

My questions are: If it’s not about medical marijuana, why so strong a message? Why were these raids conducted after President Obama promised federal raids would not occur on properties that followed state drug laws?

The second example, from my January 13, 2014 Facebook post:

Once again I was arrested for selling alleged marijuana brownies. This would be the fifth time I have been arrested for this alleged offense. Four police officers who I never even met before told me that it was SFPD policy not to arrest people for pot brownies.

If all charges aren’t dropped at my next court date, I want to be represented by Ann Irwin
(if she is still practicing criminal law in San Francisco). I feel that she’s the only attorney in the Public Defender’s Office who has been completely forthcoming with me and represented my interests.

I further feel that the retainer should be paid by wealthier people than me in the cannabis conscious community, or otherwise through fund-raising efforts.
Now is the chance to put your money where your mouth is!

My next court date is during the last week of Black History Month: February 24, 2014. And I am posting this on Martin Luther King, Jr. day. Yes indeed I have a dream!

It is important to note: later that evening I attended a Town Hall Meeting with gubernatorial candidate Luis Rodriguez, in my opinion a true revolutionary. He’s someone who would not just pay the people lip service and pretend to listen to them. It’s time for corporate sponsored leadership to com to an end!
 

I graduated from college at San Francisco State University in May 2012 with a Bachelor’s degree. After I graduated, I went to almost seventy job interviews for different counseling positions and I was never hired. I decided to apply to Macy’s corporate store in the United States. I got an interview and was hired on the spot as a sales associate. I was only in the system on the internet because I had applied a year before and was not hired, but they had kept my information. I was nervous before the interview, but I went above and beyond by studying the history of Macy’s. Macy’s claims to support the community by donating to various organizations. However, this doesn’t make sense because the people they supposedly help are discriminated against when they are hired. This seems like hypocrisy to me, because some employees are not treated with simple respect no matter how hard we try. Furthermore Macy’s is apparently known to be racist and judgmental with horrible customer service.

My first day of work I was thrown out on the floor with no training with the handbag department, and I had to guess and follow what other people were doing. I was picked on by my manager. She told me to sign up five customers for a Macy’s credit card each day even though I wouldn’t receive commission because I wasn’t considered a permanent worker. The manager made me do things that weren’t under my job title as a sales associate. A sales associate just stays at the register and makes sales. Apparently she wanted me to handle merchandise, recover the floors, work in different departments during the day, and stay for the seventy two hour period they had over the weekend at Macy’s during the holidays. She would say things like, “I am going to give you the dirtiest job in Nine West section,” but I never complained. I was stationed at accessories doing my overnight shift when she called the phone at four o’clock in the morning to see how many sales I had made. Not, “are you okay? it is really late and you are doing the seventy two hour clock for handbags.” Nonetheless I talked to my supervisor.

One day, I was purchasing a purse for myself, and manually discounted it because I could not make the coupons go through. After that, I was called into the security office, and interrogated. That same night there was six thousand dollars worth of counterfeit money in the registers, but to my knowledge that crime was not even investigated. They were more worried about me discounting the Betsy Johnson holiday purse! Reflecting on this experience with my POOR magazine family, I realize they did not want me because I was perceived as a threat to the manager and the other ladies at Macy's. I am a threat simply because I have a degree and other experience. I followed what the POOR family told me to do and wrote a grievance.

I asked the manager if he could lay me off as opposed to being discharged so I could file for unemployment. But because I had filed a grievance he felt it was a form of disrespect and he felt I was being pushy. I only wanted justice for something I deserved. When they called me in for questioning they said there are secret service agents in Macy’s. I believe they were assuming I was a criminal especially because I am young and black. I reported my mistake myself and offered to pay the half price to sum the total of my purse. Instead of giving me another chance they put me on suspension without pay and I had to talk to the manager who I filed the grievance against. Eventually, I was formally fired. The grievance is not really going to make a difference, but at least I tried to fight back. I feel unprivileged because I have not been hired for a job in a year, and I was only hired as a seasonal employee. POOR magazine recognizes these problems. I am fortunate to have the chance to express myself. Hopefully someone can learn from what I just went through dealing with the corporate world. It’s hard, because I’m conscious and aware of the problems with the corporate world, but I need money so therefore they keep us slaves.

The man in the
Uniform is what
I never wanted
To be

But here I am
Standing guard
At a super market

In the not-so
Rich part
Of town

The black and brown
And white and yellow
(And occasional red)
People walk by grabbing
Shopping carts

The badge over
My heart glints
In the artificial
Overhead lights

The economy is bad
Right now, people are
Losing homes, jobs

I guess I’m
Lucky to
Have this job

I thought myself
A revolutionary but
Find myself watching
Folks

Wondering if they’re
Concealing stolen
Merchandise

A black man walks
By with a
glorious head
Of hair

It flows like
Some sort
Of waterfall

I look at it
In amazement

He looks at me
And says, what
Are you looking
At?

Are you racially profiling me?

All I can do
Is stand and
Say nothing

How can I
Tell him that he
Has one of the most
Impressive toupees I’ve
Ever seen in my life?

I stay quiet
And write in
My log book:

All is secure

© 2009 Tony Robles