It Could Happen Here Weekly 64

All of this week's episodes of It Could Happen Here put together in one large file.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hey, everybody, Robert Evans here, and I wanted to let
you know this is a compilation episode. So every episode
of the week that just happened is here in one
convenient and with somewhat less ads package for you to
listen to in a long stretch if you want. If
you've been listening to the episodes every day this week,
there's gonna be nothing new here for you, but you
can make your own decisions. Hello, podcast fans, it's me today,

(00:28):
it's James. It's Ernie James. We're giving you some updates
on the UC strike, but we record these before some
changes happened. Progress, you could call it, maybe it's not progress,
depends on where you're at a position wise with that.
But there are two interviews today. One's going to explain
a little bit about the bargaining and the differences between
rank and file on the bargaining team. The other one
is going to explain the very important and radical and

(00:51):
progressive access needs demands that were made. And it seems
like ultimately not at least, I'm not on the table
in this tentative agreement. So that's a tentative agreet out
for voting right now. If you have been on the
internet today Saturday, and if you've been on today you
will have seen it presented as if the strike was over.
That's not necessarily the case, right the contractors up for

(01:13):
ratification and it's ratified by union members who have to
vote on it. A number of people who are organizing
for a no vote, especially people who are in departments
or parts of the university, which would qualify follower tears
of pay. The contract has tiered pay, has tiered pay,
birtht geographically and depict based on what kind of work
you're doing. Um So a lot of people who are
left at the bottom of those tears are obviously feeling

(01:33):
like they've they've been out of strike for five weeks
and haven't got what they wanted. A lot of people
who are in those higher tears are also feeling like
they should be expressing solidarity with their fellow workers at
the bottom. But you will have seen like a lot
of reporting. Some of it came up very very quickly
after the after the attemptive agreement was made, which it's
odd and perhaps is because the union appears to be

(01:56):
the union staff. I should say to people who are
who are making these in the terms some of the
people who are who are in favor of this contractor
using a PR company which appears to have maybe seeded
some stories and some publications, but we can't be sure.
Certainly they were very quick to press. So I would
urge you to listen to this as sort of a
coda to some of what you might be reading. There

(02:17):
are two things. You can listen to them separately. You
can listen one after the other. We won't have any
podcasts for a while over the over the break, so
I will speak to you again in the new year,
and I hope you enjoyed both these interviews. Mohammed, can
you just explain, first of all, tell folks at which
campus you're at and maybe what you're studying and where
you are in the in the giant structure that is

(02:38):
like the U A, W U C S D. Yeah, absolutely,
so I'm at you see San Diego. I'm a fifth
year in the PhD program in the Department of Ethnic Studies.
And yeah, I specifically study like Muslim racialization and sectarianism
in the US UM and how that yah, how that
looks up to like imperialism, settler cornialism, UM gender formations,

(03:02):
things like that, UM and I suppose my place within this,
as you say, like the labyrinth of U C S D,
ANU AW politics. UM. Right now, I'm just a ranking
final member UM. However, a couple of years ago I
was UM the unit chair for San Diego, So I
was actually on the bargaining team previously UM, and that

(03:24):
was at the beginning of the pandemic UM, and so
a lot of like COVID bargaining for example, UM, I
sort of like oversaw that. And prior to that, I
UM was organizer with the COLA movement and so I
helped organize the wildcat strike UM GREA at San Diego. Yeah. Nice, Yeah, Yeah,

(03:44):
there's a long history off union ORGANA. It's good. And
so can you explain to folks a little bit about
because you mentioned the bargaining team there, right, and maybe
people wouldn't be familiar with the distinctions in union organization.
Obviously this is in Italy and in the nineties, so
you don't bargain with the entire union on mass e sadly,

(04:05):
but they do. The university meets with a certain group
of union representatives. So can you explain like who they
are and how they're selected to start with? Maybe yeah, absolutely, UM.
So there are essentially two levels of three levels of
leadership UM within the union. So at the top, in

(04:25):
terms of statewide leadership, you have the Executive Board UM,
and that's you know, like president, vice presidents for North
and South campuses, UM, trustees, treasurers, things like that UM.
And then you have campus based leadership and that's split
between head stewards that are apportioned to campuses based on

(04:46):
their population in size UM. And then you have to
kind of sort of like head leadership positions, one being
the unit chair and the other being the recording secretary.
And so the bargaining team for the whole union is
composed of the unit chair and the sec from each
campus UM. And at this time around we've added someone

(05:06):
from you see, San Francisco. They're usually not represented, like
in the past bargaining cycles they haven't been, So there
are now nineteen people on UM the u W two
eight six five bargaining team, whereas previously there had been
a team UM. Yeah, and I guess that's sort of
like final level of of leadership that combines both campus
level and statewide leadership is what's called the Joint Council UM.

(05:29):
But that's kind of the hierarchy of the structure of
the union. Okay, yeah, it's fascinating. They just went to
an odd number because I want to get onto some
think next, which is this division like this that I
think people are calling them b T ten and b
T nine, right, Yeah, which which could a bit b
T nine at b T nine if you if you
didn't have the the UCSF person, which would have been

(05:52):
a whole larger sort of mess. N Yeah, yeah, that
would have been great. So what is this division like
there there are two distinct I guess positions as as
regards bargaining, So prectually could explain a little bit of that. Yeah, absolutely, Um,
I mean I think just you know, this might be obvious,

(06:12):
but just to preface with the fact that, um, even
within these so called camps of like b T T
N b T nine, there's a lot of heterrogen aggy, right.
And so we saw this voting block emerge in the
first week of the strike mainly around UM the wages
demand and how um you know, one of the central
pieces of that original demand, the way that it was

(06:34):
crafted was that it was aimed at bringing members out
of rent burdon and so rent Burton. I'm sure folks
have talked about this before, but it's defined as paying
more than of your monthly income in rent. And so
that translated in terms of our demand to a minimum
base wage of dollars a year, along with wage increases
that are attacked on to UM, the increase in like

(06:57):
the median rental price UM for housing and so uh,
in that vote, we saw you know, the split emerge
ten nine, and then we saw UM again this kind
of split paralleled in the vote to have open or
closed Bardening sessions and the fact that ten people voted
to have closed sessions. And again, you know, since then

(07:18):
another big concession. I'm going to use the term concession,
even though there's a lot of consternation coming from like
u AW leadership, because concession is technically when you lose
something you've already had, you already have. And so when
it comes to like the Disability and Access article, UM,
you know, something that we proposed and which you demand,
that was crafted through and by uh, you know disability

(07:41):
just as activists and disabled workers was mandatory supervisor training
and that was dropped UM. And again we saw that
along the same lines of ten and nine UM and
so you know, I think ideologically speaking, if I were
to kind of you know, analyze this and give my
I take, it's that the nine people I think are

(08:03):
more committed to UM, I suppose being like representative of
UH their campus concerns UM. And so, for example, some
of those b T nine members I was on the
bargaining team with a few years ago, and you know,
they and I didn't necessarily agree on a lot of
issues UM. But now because their campuses have been vocally

(08:27):
in support of demands like a cost of living adjustment
of COLA or in support of UM, you know, not
dropping the amount of child care that we can get
folks reimbursed for UM. You know, actually listening to their
membership has caused them to kind of quinde quote side
with UM other bargaining team members which may have other
ideological commitments beyond just the contract right and so commitment

(08:51):
to progressively defunding you see p d R at the
police department and sort of putting those funds elsewhere within
the university system UM. And so yeah, I mean I think,
you know, we see that kind of split and emerge UM,
you know now with this bargaining cycle. But this is
also a split that's existed within the union for a while.

(09:12):
And so you look historically at the contracts cycle, right,
UM two thousand eleven, and there's always been this kind
of division, and it's red. It's represented in American labor
more broadly between kind of like socio political unionism on
one end and we're like liberal or business unionism on
the other. And so it's not really at least it

(09:34):
shouldn't be surprising to us that a lot of those
BT ten members or a majority of folks on the
statewide executive board are aligned with what's called like the
administrative Caucus at the u a W international level, or
they're vocally supportive of current UW President Ray Curry. And
in the latest general elections UM, even though officially the

(09:58):
local didn't take a stance UM. On social media, there's
photos of our union president posing with Ray Curry UM
for the crease ador any team UM. And so there
are those kind of like larger structural alignments as well. Yeah,
and of course if people are unaware and even yeah,
but like you said, within the union as a whole,
like and within the whole American unionization, right, we have

(10:20):
the a f l C I oh, which includes unions
which are of police officers. And then we have I
know that the UCSD locals of you at least so
you see locals I should say, of u AW have
made statements about that being an issue, but it's it's
still a thing that's happening. And yeah, it doesn't necessarily

(10:43):
and follow especially in this country, that labor organization is
always progressive in its in its other politics, right, absolutely, Yeah,
I thought it was really cool that a lot of
the demands that were made were progressive when when the
star began, right, like there was a cops of campus demand,

(11:03):
there was access needs demand and things like that, like
access to childcare for people. And some of them some
of them were economics, some of them were not economics
some of them which has always been a thing with
student organizing. Right, we can go back and I'm not
really good at masks. We can get back to night
and we can we can look at like students making
political demands and that changing the demands that unions made

(11:26):
in the nineteen sixties. And I think it's cool that
that you will have those going in. Where are we
at with the bargaining now? Like it it doesn't look
like cops are leaving campus from what I can see
right now, yeah, I think, um, so it's kind of
complicated right now because we've just recently entered voluntary pre

(11:50):
impast mediation UM. And so a lot of the big
outstanding articles wages, childcare, the remission of UH nonresident supplemental tuition,
which disproportionately affects international students right makes them quota postre
more costly to the university. UM. So a lot of
those open things now are being discussed through this mediator UM.

(12:12):
And I think even within that process, UM, we see
a lot of the same issues emerging that have been
present for the entirety of the bargaining processes, which mainly
is that UM. Again, my position on this is that
our bargaining team hasn't been pushing enough UM. And you
see that kind of on two levels. One at the

(12:34):
actual table UM, there's a lot of passivity. And so
when you know the barbaining team is kind of explaining
their decision to membership, it's mainly UM. You know, they're
saying things like, well, we reduced the wages demand by
eleven thousand dollars, like right away, because that's what would
be more amenable to the university. And of course that

(12:55):
is not true, right because the u C came back
to us with like a dollar offer something like that,
like pitifule low um. And so again there's a lot
of you know, concessionary I think moves UM. And there's
the desire to to kind of close the gap with
the university essentially, and again that kind of betrays UM.

(13:15):
I think a fundamental misunderstanding from our bargaining team that somehow,
if we are respectable enough, if we present enough rational
arguments that you see will respect that right, they'll they'll
sort of like give in to our demands. UM. That
will somehow goad them to come in our direction. Whereas
you know, we should see that you see as like

(13:35):
one of the largest bosses, one of the largest landlords
in the country. UM. And so of course they're gonna
try to scures us out of as much as they
can because that's their function. UM. And so on one end,
I think we've seen a lot of core demands get dropped.
We've seen um uh intense like weakening of our position

(13:57):
as well as the really incredible black transparency UM. And
so I mentioned before the fact that most bargaining meetings
or most bargaining sessions have been closed doors. UM. The
fact that a number of like private like sidebars have
taken place, and oftentimes membership gets like very vague emails

(14:19):
or or we're you know, told like progress was made.
You know, we won certain things, but then the technicality
of those wins is completely left out of the picture. UM.
Even more recently, bargaining team members voted to uh, make
the votes at the table private. And so after dropping
the coal to demand, you know, folks were upset and

(14:40):
obviously reaching out to the bargaining team, showing up to
caucuses and being upset, and so from there, the bargaining
team framed this as quote court harassment and essentially voted
to make all the votes private. UM. And so you know,
we've seen a lot of moves like that that, you know,
make it clear that the union leadership is trying to
preserve the union rather than preserve its membership right in

(15:03):
prisoner of the well being of those folks. And so
I think at the table again we see this kind
of passive or concessionaire UM strategy. And on the ground,
when it comes to the strikes at all these campuses,
we see something similar where you know, the majority of
the actions that we took in the first two to

(15:23):
three weeks of the strike was just picketing, right, And obviously,
you know, the picket is a powerful tool to picket,
is a very symbolic tool. But in a you know,
industry like the academy, picketing doesn't serve the same purpose
as it might like at a factory. Right, we're not
actually shutting down the workplace. It's a great show of
force in a way because you have thousands of people out,

(15:43):
but obviously, when we're being required to sign up for
twenty hours of picketing to get our strike pay, folks
get exhausted. We will have you know, like huge marches
through campus, go to a rally and it will be
two hours of people talking um and that exhaust people.
And even when it comes to you know, like you
see Davis, they had the undergrads actually had like an

(16:05):
amazing direct action where they blockaded the campus every single
day um and that of course led to a legal
response from the university and the union leadership. You know,
rather than challenge that or you know, take take measures
to make sure that those folks could organize autonomously of
them um started uh, like harassing and discipline folks basically

(16:29):
UM for taking taking part in solidarity actions that may
push up against the law. UM. And so what we
see as like a concessionary attitude at the table, I
think is translated as a very or is translated into
like respectability politics UM on the ground UM Yeah, yeah, No,

(16:49):
I think that's an makeing way of phrasing it. And
that's that's sort of what what you're definitely suggesting and
what it seems that we've seen. So when is that
leave people? And I think some of the things that
have been suggested to be like in in the sort
of current proposals both from the union of the university,
would leave people with a contract that they would find

(17:12):
I'm guessing unsatisfactory, right, especially after for four and a
half five weeks of being out of and and possible
withholding of pay right which we can get onto. But
where does that leave people? Like what what sort of
feeling amongst your So obviously you can't speak for the
rank of file across the whole university, but what's was

(17:33):
the sort of feeling amongst the rank and file with
regards to what do we do if we get this
offer which doesn't give us the things that we went
out for in the first place. Yeah. UM, I think
that there is a lot of just polarization around that question. UM.
I've heard from a number of folks. Unsurprisingly. I think

(17:53):
people who UM are material at least treated a little
bit better. Right, we get higher pay already UM from
the university being all right with it, you know. But
that's that's the most that I hear. I haven't heard anyone,
even the most staunch supporter of the union establishment, say
that this contractor at least what is bound to come
to the table at this point, is going to be satisfactory,

(18:16):
is going to actually be desirable. It's just seen as like, oh,
this is the best we can get, and we might
as well settle in like every sense of the word UM.
But that being said, there is a large contingent again,
folks that are totally fine with that, or they're tired
of striking, or they're seeing a lot of retaliation from
their supervisors, and the union I think has failed to

(18:39):
um not only respond to that retaliation and to like
reensure and empower members, but it's also failed to you know,
the technical term and organizing would be innoculated. Right. UM,
there is a huge, in my opinion, organizational failure to
make clear exactly what could happen to folks when we
go on strike, or to prepare us to hear the
talking points from the university UM, and how to you know,

(19:01):
collectively organize against it, to build up a kind of
consciousness to resist internalizing that and to say like, oh,
I don't want to strike because my jobs at risk
or something. And it's like, yeah, of course, right, that's
the point, you know, it's like where we're taking that action, UM,
And so on one end, right, I mean, there's a
number of reasons as to why, and the kind of
hinted at that, but there is a large contingent of

(19:21):
of people who UM would just be okay and they're
going to vote us. UM. But I also think, right,
and as I'm sure you know you've you've seen around
social media or you've talked to other folks who are
on this side of voting no UM. You know, I
think a lot of the consternation there comes again from
the fact that we've dropped so much UM and kind

(19:43):
of have left our most vulnerable members out to drive UM.
So whether that comes from you know, reducing the amount
of childcare or dependent health care or UM you know
again dropping those like really core elements of the disability
and access needs UM articles. When it comes to dropping
COLA and dropping our wages down to a point where

(20:05):
we would still be in not just rent burden, but
severe rent burden. UM. It's been leading a lot of
folks to, uh, you know, promote the idea that we're
going to vote no UM regardless because even if the
remaining articles you know, are better than we expected UM
and they get tentatively agreed to, there's already too much
that's been lost to make this uh an adequate contract, right,

(20:26):
not even great, not even satisfactory, but just adequate. UM.
And so you know, of course that kind of UH division,
as you might say, UM, has brought up a lot
of tensions, especially in the last few days. UM. But
you know, I think now we're seeing a broader gap
between these two like sides UM, where there are folks

(20:49):
that are pretty much again set on voting yes because
it's good enough UM, and there are other folks who
are pretty staunching in voting now and trying to build
up that movement UM. And I think the point we're
at now at least speaking from that like vote no
side is that, Um, we really need to outline and

(21:09):
be transparent with membership where we can go from there,
Like how do we demystify the process or the process
the possibility of impasse? Um. You know, that's been a
concept that's thrown around a lot by UNI leadership and
is never fully unpacked. Um. And so it's like a
fearmongering tool that's that's been, in my opinion at least

(21:30):
like used to subdue member militancy. UM. So that's one issue.
Another issue is like how do we reopen certain articles?
How do we build this quote unquote long haul strike
to gain more than we've already you know, um given
up at this point, And so I think a lot
of those technicalities that are up in the air are renewed,

(21:52):
sort of like areas of organizing focus. UM. Yeah, so
you don't have to abandon some of those demands which
we're not economic. Yeah, those can still be Yeah. I mean,
I guess there's my point in really speculating how many
people will vote yes or no. We'll see once once
we see the agreement. And yeah, but like can you
give us an update then on where striking gets some progressively,

(22:15):
how did it gets longer? Right, people don't want to
stand on a picket for five weeks, six weeks. They
don't they want to go home for the holidays. They
have this pressure that's been leveraged, perhaps unfairly and sometimes
like erroneously that their students will face immigration or graduation consequences,

(22:35):
which is largely untrue. So, like, can you talk about
there's there's a chance that people won't be getting paid
right in December? Has that happened to any one? What's
the latest with that? Um SO? A lot of what's
been going around UM in terms of issues with pay,
A lot of the news I've seen concerns post docs,

(22:56):
so folks from the local fifty eight who actually just
signed an approse that tenantive agreement um SO. The university
has put out some language implying that they'll retroactively dock
pay UM and so UM Yeah, I can't like speak
to the technicalities of that UM but that's definitely a
concern I've seen floating around UM, and I know that

(23:17):
they're actively organizing around it. UM for a s c
S and UH student researchers. UM we none of us
have been docked pay yet um we all got paid
for December. Um, in part because I just think the
university has a really hard time keeping track of who's
on strike. On top of the fact that, I mean,

(23:38):
I don't know if anyone's already complained to you about
you see path, but the parallel system that got rolled
out yeah a few years ago. Um, it's terrible. It's
an absolutely fucking nightmare. Yeah. Um. And so I think
it would be a massive achievement for them to even
be able to withhold folks pay through that system. Yeah.
They struggled to pay people in the first including myself.
Yeah yeah, um yeah, absolutely, and so um, you know,

(24:03):
I think it is it is a real concern. But
at this point, um, at least to my knowledge, no
one in five or s r U has been affected
by by pay withholding. And then let's let's talk about
the grade withholding, which is now like today, is today
right that the grades should be doing. Obviously many people
are not filing those grades, and which again it's another

(24:26):
example of sue the UC just being a bureaucratic disaster.
But we can skip past that. So the grades are
not being being filed, can we talk about some of
the suggestions that have been made by the university. I
know one of them was that students on like F
one visas might face consequences. That's not true, as best
having been one visa has better understand it, and that

(24:49):
students on think on grant and scholarships might face consequences.
So can you explain sort of what they've said and
then perhaps prehaps offer some insight into into why you
think that that might be misleading? Yeah? Absolutely, UM, so
exactly what you're saying. Um, you know, folks and vulnerable
categories such as people on academic probation or whose financial
aid is dependent on being in like you know, good

(25:10):
standing um or yeah, like international students. Um. Yeah, there's
been a lot of uh fairmongering and misleading information out
there that these students might be you know, kicked out
of school, they might be reported, they might um face
uh you know again like financial consequences. UM. But it's
important also to recognize that uh having a grade remain blank,

(25:34):
it doesn't affect folks g p A, it doesn't have
folks affect folks academic standing um. And for international students, um.
You know, the best that we understand, and we've actually
communicated with Universities International students offices and what they say
is that, UM, it's enrollment that matters, not necessarily having
the grade, and so UM even if you know, let's

(25:58):
say like all of someone's grades are withheld, they've still
enrolled in the requisite number of credits UM, and so
that that standing in terms of a visa wouldn't be
affected UM. And the same goes for even something as
simple as moving onto the next course in a sequence UM,
because uh, you know, again, the withholding of a grade
doesn't affect UM that kind of like progress or academic

(26:20):
standard UM. And as a show like technical note, a
lot of folks are again concerned that like, well, wouldn't
this blank grade lead to an incomplete or wouldn't it
lead to an F UM? And in terms of the incomplete,
there's a reason why we're not filing everyone with an eye.
We're leaving the grades blink because an incomplete is costly,

(26:41):
it's more work for everyone, and so we're avoiding that.
And UM, blank grades don't default to an F until
the following semester or following term ends. And so for
us at U C S D UM since many of
us are withholding grades. They those blank grades wouldn't turn
to and F until the end of winter around March.

(27:02):
And I don't think anyone expects to strike to go
that one. Yeah, it will be truly historical. And yes,
So how has he had the graduate response been then? Yeah,
that's um, it's difficult because I know at certain campuses,
like I mentioned you see Davis earlier, there's been huge
undergrad involvement there. UM. At San Diego, I think the

(27:27):
response has been a bit mixed. UM. I know many
of my students, for example, we're supportive of the strike UM.
And within you know, my department Ethnic Studies, we did
try to get students more involved, Like we held teachings
UM to get students to come out. And you know
the class I'm teeing for right now is called Land
and Labor and so we talked about you know, U, C. S. D,

(27:49):
right and and the relationship to like colonialism, capitalism, landed
labor um. And so we've tried to integrate you know,
not just um, you know, student and engagement and support,
but also to use this as another form of study, right,
as a form of study that's not that's outside the
kind of like bureaucratic mess that is the university with

(28:09):
its nonsense UM. I think what's difficult at San Diego
is that, UM, you know, political engagement has historically come
in waves. Obviously at all universities. Folks come and go,
but it's particularly acute, I think at San Diego where
there's massive moments of like upheaval and like folks coming

(28:31):
out in the thousands, like we saw back in UM
around the pandemic, around the uprisings UM during the summer,
around even the Cola movement, right, which was a little
bit before that, we saw huge numbers of undergrads come out,
in part because we were able back then at least
to connect our demands to their concerns. Right. The fact

(28:52):
that psychological services on campus are horribly underfunded, Right, people
have to wait a whole quarter to get even the
intake of planet UM. The fact that again like they're
getting screwed over with housing just as much as we
are UM paying you know, over ten or fifteen thousand
dollars a year in it for a dorm um. And
so you know, that connection back then, I think, really

(29:14):
drew out the undergrads. And that's what's really lacking Now again,
I think because of the way that the union has
framed the struggle quite narrowly as not just what affects workers,
but what what affects the majority of workers. UM, that's
left out a lot of the broader concerns. That has
foreclosed a lot of broader critiques of the university. And

(29:35):
so when it comes to something like the cops off
campus demand, the fact that we have bargain team members
at u c l A, for example, literally lie and
say that it's never been on the table UM, it's
really indicative of how the union is trying to frame this.
And so the fact that you know, again those broader
conversations around the UC being a landlord around them, the

(29:58):
way that you know, profit it and resources are inequitably
distributed through the university infrastructure, right, those things drop out
of the conversation about our strike, UM, and if we
do bring it up, we're seen as dissidents or something
like that, or radical UM. And so the fact that
those things have dropped out, I think has led to
us seeing the situation like we see at UCSD where

(30:22):
the undergrads are almost ambivalent, if not hostile, because we
haven't done a good enough job engaging them. We haven't
also organized alongside and with them. Um. Rather it's been
like come support your t A s and not like
we're fighting together, right, And so it's yeah, it betrayed.
It gives the impression that this is like a very

(30:44):
one way um or you know, like an interdirectional form
of support, where in reality, you know, we should be
building up those ties of solidarity and that you know,
we should be focusing not just on winning a contract,
but then building and sustaining this movement against the university
in a much larger or broader sense. Yeah, because I'm

(31:05):
speaking from experience, I know a lot of those undergrads
feel very disempowered in their relations with the university and
and some of the demands, like the access needs demand,
you know, the demand for improved student counseling, psychological services,
things like that. But that would benefit directly everyone on campus.
And then it's a shame not to see that. It's
a shame to see that sort of left to the

(31:27):
side when I think it could build a more effective movement. So, yeah,
it does seem to go like you said, campus by
campus department, your your department like has historically been a
lot more engaged than others. I think it's fair to
say so. And so we've reached the Christmas break now

(31:47):
great have been withheld. I think a lot of people
thought was like sort of a nuclear option or like
a step up, which he doesn't seem to have been, like,
it really hasn't done anything. And and the you see
it entered into the university and the union have entered
into a voluntary pre impassed mediation. When do you, like,

(32:08):
if you were just speculating, and when do you think
we'll see like a resolution, because it's already slipped out
of coverage, right like if I look at our local
newspaper that they've stopped reporting on it, which doesn't help absolutely. Yeah, um,
I think you know, it's it's difficult to speculate in
part because as we've seen with past bargaining updates, they

(32:32):
tend to drop bombshells on us. Um, like with the
whole coal of demands being you know, severely cut down.
We found about we found out about that like two
hours before the bargaining which is out like ten pm.
And so it's totally possible by like that by the
end of this week we'll have a tentative agreement, like

(32:52):
you know, folks have been speculating on that. It wouldn't
surprise me. I would be disappointed, but I wouldn't be surprised. UM.
At the same time, though, I I do think that
we've been able to build up sufficient pressure on the
union establishment or the leadership UM that I think there
it might be a bit more hesitant right to take

(33:12):
that sudden of a move or to kind of come
out of left field or something like that. UM. And
so you know, there is a distinct possibility, especially with
the holidays coming up, that this might go into the
new year. UM. And obviously that would be like my
hope to go as long as possible, yea. UM. But yeah,

(33:33):
I think it's it's incredibly tough, and I think that's
causing a lot of anxiety UM. And that's kind of
a disorganizing energy, right to not know when something like
this might happen, because there is such an utter lack
of communication or um, you know, democratic input UM. And
I think in terms of you know, the the coverage

(33:54):
or the great strike, UM, what's really unfortunate, I think
is the way that I I've heard, you know, from
the horse's mouth, right certain barning team members saying that
withholding grades isn't an important form or isn't an impactful
form of labor withholding because the university doesn't care. And
historically we've seen that they really do care and within

(34:14):
activity strikes, withholding finals is a massive thing, right, And
I think that in order to really um realized the
impact that that will have on the institution, we have
to go for a few more weeks into the winter quarter. Um.
And you know, right now even to try to um
build up some more UM. I guess, like you know,

(34:36):
pr around great withholding UM. There are folks doing research
and trying to calculate like quantify um what like you know,
each credit would mean in like real dollars. And then
the fact that you know, hundreds of students grades are
being withheld for a three or four hour like three
or four credit UM class and what that translates to
into money? Um? And so yeah, yeah, I mean, if

(34:59):
we live what the university does, right, it turns its
capital into into into income essentially through like leveraging its
credibility for credential and and charging people masses of rent
for living there increasingly, and you can't take away the
housing right, which is it's made just so survivingue, but
you can't take away this this this product. Yeah and

(35:20):
and and there have been um you know, there are
a number of petitions out there, for example, UM UH
for undergrads to request like a reimbursement of their tuition
for any classes that haven't been held or grades that
have been withheld UM and I think that's a really
fantastic way to engage them and to put pressure on
the university. There's also been UM attempts or at least

(35:42):
you know, UM some strategizing on on our end on
how to uh have the grade strike impact the university's
accreditation UM and so we are trying to look for
avenues to increase the pressure from this kind of like
strategic move Yeah, that's smart. Yeah, Yeah. It must be difficult,
I'm sure, Like is you develop relationships with undergraduate and

(36:06):
especially when you're teaing in your department of class you
care about. It's a shame to to lose that opportunity
to talk to people about important things like landed labor.
And so I'm sure it's difficult to not have that
chance to even check in at the end of the
end of the term and just say like that, you know,
it's been fun. What have we learned? Yeah? Absolutely, um,

(36:26):
And I think you know, for a lot of us
who are a s c S. You know, we're doing
this not just for ourselves but for our students, right,
because we care about education. We recognize that the university
as an institution is actually corrosive right to a quality education.
And so absolutely, I think like there is a sense
of loss. I think the fact that I can't, like

(36:46):
you're saying, close out my class, the fact that I can't, um,
you know, really invest in my students the way I
want and not trying to blame that on the strike,
but trying to blame that on the conditions that have
brought us to strike in the first police. Right. Yeah, um,
I don't want to get like full marxistm on me,
but like, yeah, the further alien atd you are from
your labor, then the the less that the experiences for

(37:09):
your undergraduates. And that is definitely a thing that happens
at the university. You become more and more inlalienated. And yeah,
the joy dies I say with a PhD in doing
the work in academia and mohmmed is there anything else
people should know about the strike like that we haven't

(37:31):
talked about mm hmm see UM. I I would say,
you know, one one important thing is that both for
folks within the university system and from you know, the outside,
is to kind of place this strike in historic context. UM.

(37:52):
I think when the union leadership has spoken about this
at all, it's mainly around the size of the strength,
the fact that it's it's historic because we have you know,
forty eight thousand possible strikers UM from throughout the u
c S. And that's kind of misleading because I think
the real kind of like historic potential within the struggle
is UM for example, establishing a precedent of what a

(38:16):
researcher strike looks like. Part of the reason it's so
difficult for us to not only you know, mobilize researchers,
but also you know UM push back against retaliation is
because there is no set structure for what that kind
of strike looks like, right, UM. There is no effective
way that we have to UM counter the possible impacts
on these people's futures UM. And so I think that

(38:39):
you know, really emphasizing that to folks is UM is key.
Another thing is um the cola demand. Right, the fact
that we are trying to or at least we've tried
to tack um our wage increases not just to um
inflation or the consumer price index, but to the median
increase in rental prices. UM. That would be huge. And

(39:03):
that's not just big for us as as workers within
this local but that does set the precedent for all
workers in the US. And I think that you know
we really by we, I mean like the union as
a whole apparatus has not stressed the importance of that
or the kind of like monumental shift that I could,
um kind of provoke in the landscape of American labor broadly,

(39:27):
just so if people aren't aware, Like, like rent in
California has gone up a way more than double, almost
almost triple the rate of inflation, and working people people
who are members of unions by a large tend to
be people who don't own property, but they tend to
be people who rent property, right, And I can see
by your your unfinished concrete ceiling that you're you're renting

(39:47):
from the UC, which is the biggest landlord in California.
So like you're right that this is a very historic
thing is that rent increase for Cola. Is that tried
to median rent in the state or is it median
rent across you see rented uh, like like apartments. So
I think the actual language So this is part of

(40:10):
the problem is that because it was dropped so quickly
at the table, we weren't even even able to get
into the vicissitudes of the demand itself. UM. And so
from my understanding, the increase would be based on UM
the like least affordable or essentially the largest increase that
will see at any of the campuses, and everyone's wage

(40:33):
would be increased to that when we look at the
base wage k UM that was tacked onto again a
kind of like median income or a median rental price
throughout the state as well. And so actually fifty four
k would be exactly enough to get me out of
rent burden. So anything less than that would actually still
keep me in rent burdon UM And so yeah, that's

(40:55):
kind of how they Yeah, which rent bedon is it's
far too normal, I have to think, especially in California. Yeah, yeah,
that and like collective bargaining is tenants as well as
workers is fascinating, right, Like it's something we've seen, but
not in a large scale like and and like you
on on rent strike yet but yes, and as as

(41:16):
as a side note, yeah, UM, we did have a
couple of rent strikes in UH within the UC system
in the past few years at Berkeley at u C
l A and here UM and so I was actually
part of organizing UM in the aftermath of COLA at
the beginning of the pandemic. UM, I helped organize the
first rent strike UM within h D h U C
S D grat House UM. And so we have we

(41:37):
have also seen that. But that's another way that the
union has kind of limited the scope of this movement.
Because there's been so much focus on us as only
workers and the bread and butter issues, we kind of
lose sight of the way that withholding rent, as you're saying,
is another way of like really getting at the heart
of the U c S profit engine. Yeah, yeah, and yes,

(41:57):
it is a shame that these like yeah, if you
want to, I think a historical perspective of course, like
a Paris, it's like the monolith of student political organizing,
I guess, and student political organizing changing the established structures
of the left, which which is it's some of what
you had demanded was very similar to that in a sense,

(42:19):
and that it was societal and political as much as
it was an economic right. And American unions tend to
phrase themselves in terms of respectable liberal politics, not that.
So it's a shame to see that. Go, I guess absolutely,
and I think you know. This actually came up in
a in a meeting UM, which kind of astounded me,
but again didn't on one hand astounded me. Another hand

(42:41):
was completely sort of like to be expected, which is
someone saying, we need to make this movement um as
accessible as possible to workers without an activist bone in
their body. Um. And so again there's always that appeal
to the right, always the appeal to the most conservative
reactionary force, and always at the expense right of the

(43:01):
folks who are the most vulnerable, always at the expense
of expanding this movement. And so as you're saying something
that is more socio and socially and politically engaged, yeah, yeah,
I think most people come activist when they have to
live in their car because they can't reford to live
in the EUC housing when they work at the EC.
But that is not everyone, of course. And all right, Mohammed,

(43:22):
where can people find you? Do you have social media?
Do you, as I said, you want to share with
you first, to share like your unions or um something
else I guess on on Twitter? Um, I am at
a Islamo Marxist um and so yeah, yeah, so folks
can find me there. Um. Otherwise, I mean, if there

(43:43):
are folks within the u se Um that are organizing, um,
within any of the like vote no channels, I'm sure
folks could find their way to me. Um. But yeah,
I think just in general, like following the rank and
file and COLA associated accounts on on social media, trying
to you attend as many means as possible, is is
really how I think folks can get more in tune

(44:05):
with the struggle. Yes, that's great, Thank you so much
of your time. I appreciate it. And yeah, best of
luck with everything. Thanks so much. So. I'm joined today
by Megan Lynch, who's the founder of and a volunteer
for u SEE Access Now, which has been one of
the important bodies lobbying for increased access needs for people

(44:26):
with disabilities at the u SEE as part of this strike. Hi, Megan,
how are you doing Hi, I'm doing well. How about
Thanks for having me great? Thanks, thanks for coming on. Megan.
Can you explain and maybe explain a little bit about
you see, access now first and then we can get
into sort of what the issues were and what the
demands were. Well, let me start with clarifying what access

(44:49):
needs are. Generally, I wouldn't want to I want to
I wouldn't want to have more access needs because it
would mean that I need more things that I need
to negotiate getting them met. So an access need is, uh,
I have something that I need somebody to to. You know,
the inaccessible environment that we have often it's it's sort

(45:12):
of default inaccessibility, and so having an access needs means that,
you know, I need to work out how to be
in that environment. And sometimes you can even be in
a really well accessible environment, and uh, it would be
hard for people to meet your access need without again
trying to come to some kind of agreement. So there's
a difference between accessibility and access needs and I just

(45:33):
wanted to clarify that. Thank you. I think that's very important.
And so could you explain then what what sort of
issues people were running into before the strike, like what
what sort of things where they're that limited people's access
to university spaces or education or work. Well, still very
much going on, and in fact it's actually increased during

(45:55):
the pandemic. Um the only time where things got a
little better for some of us is, uh, you know
in March when everybody you know, and this is what
often happens, is that something when suddenly people who don't
identify as disabled needs something, and there's enough of that,
then there's there's no problem. Nobody has to submit medical documentation,

(46:16):
nobody has to get special permission. It's really not a
big rigmarole, right, But uh, when you identify as disabled
and you say I have this as an access need,
then suddenly, you know, you get you get the Spanish
inquisition in terms of whether you you you deserve this
thing that your tax dollars have been paying for at
your institution anyway, So, um, it really runs the gamut

(46:41):
for you know. I guess what I could best talk
about is my own situation and uh what led to
the formation of UC access now. So, um, I arrived
here before the start of fall as a fifty year
old disabled grad student, So I'm already in a kind
of unusual position ship by being fifty or four years

(47:02):
old here and then disabled on top of it. And uh,
I was set to t a my first quarter here,
and I could spot even before the quarters started that
the kinds of cycle recks they have here at UC Davis,
which is, you know, usually lauded for being quote unquote
bike friendly. Uh, we're not accessible to me, and that

(47:23):
they would eventually, you know, I could do it once
or twice without hurting myself, but over time I was
gonna be hurt and that would get in the way
of me being able to do my duties as a
t A. Not to mention anything I need to do
for myself, because I was writing, like a lot of
disabled cyclists, I don't ride the standard upright bicycle. I

(47:45):
ride a recumbent bicycle with underseat steering, and the recks
are not usually a big deal. Places I've lived in
a number of different cities in California, Berkeley, Los Angeles,
see a lot of places have what are you know
you acts you know, which is similar kind of to
a Sheffield rack for foes folks who know those, except

(48:05):
you know, not quite as big. So it's not like
it's this special you know, you don't go to a
special adaptive store for this rack. It is a more
accessible rack, and most cities are sensibly using them, but
for here, because despite their bike friendly reputation, they actually
want to prioritize space for cars. They have made these
racks that are so close together and not supportive, etcetera,

(48:28):
that the only part I could ever lock my bike
too would be the ends, and that's what everybody else
wants to take first. Um, And it wouldn't even be
easy to the ends because again, these are really very
specifically they have wheel wells, and the relationship between the
locker thing and the wheel well is exactly the space

(48:49):
of part you would do if you had sort of
a standard adult size upright bike. And honestly they're not
even good for people who ride those. So, for instance,
if you go and you see Davis subreddit, you will
see sometimes threads where people are bullying people who want
to get a cruiser bike because they're like, those things
take up too much room. No, it's not that they

(49:09):
didn't take up too much room, it's that the racks
are very poorly designed. There are things, but they are SUVs. Yeah,
they rather they would rather bully somebody about their choice
of bike than to say, hey, these are really what
a waste of taxpayer money to get these these bike
racks that not only don't work for a lot of
disabled people, but don't even work for people who are

(49:32):
riding cargo bikes or using a trailer or you know
other things you would want to do. So so anyway,
I went first to the Disabled Students Center here, which is,
you know, the rationing and policing agency for disabled people.
And you know, it's amazing to me like this, these
are the people and they would literally call themselves experts

(49:54):
on disability and accessibility. And they said to me, gosh,
it never occurred us that that would need to be accessible.
This is on a campus where they're trying to encourage
you to leave your car at home at least some
of us, right, and uh, and it's also how you
get to school and to work, right, So why wouldn't

(50:15):
I need that to be accessible? And so they I
asked for something as simple as can you sign a letter?
They wouldn't do it, you know, can you said they wouldn't.
They wouldn't back me up at all. So then I
go directly to the Transportation of parking services. They were like,
it's not covered under a d A, which is not true,
and you know, and then they were like the solution

(50:36):
they wanted to pose with it. You know. Eventually when
I finally after months, got a meeting, they were like, well,
give us your schedule of classes and will install one
of these racks at each building you're at. As if
my schedule isn't going to change each quarter, is that
a better use of Yeah, is that a better use
of tax money to send a crew around to like
to to to Jackhamber Concrete at a different location for

(50:59):
each quarter of acording to each disabled cyclist class that changes,
just get the right rack. So that that's when I
went to the union, and even in the union at
that time, you know, it was really clear it wasn't
just with that issue. I had other issues, but this
was definitely getting in the way of my work as
a t A because it was hurting my hands very badly,

(51:23):
and in fact I had fallen a couple of times
and my bike had fallen on top of me and
like nobody helps you that, you just sit there watching
you like a turtle trying to get So there's things
like that. There's things like um even just the housing
here in terms of for instance, if I had had
the luck of having a romantic partner, if I'd had

(51:43):
the wealth and the ability to choose to have children,
I would have been able to get grad housing. But
as a disabled person who has an access need to
be close to campus, I was I had zero priority whatsoever,
and so I very nearly ended up starting that quarter
how thing to live out of my car because you know,
and I would think it would be pretty clear that

(52:04):
a fifty four year old disabled grad student might actually have,
uh maybe have more have fewer options in housing than
somebody who's in their twenties and isn't disabled. But but
you know, and I'm not saying that parents don't need
family housing or anything like that, but what I'm saying
is very clearly I think some disabled people do have

(52:27):
strong access needs to have accessible housing near campus. And
that's very much not something that they bothered themselves with
here at UC Davis. So you know, there's other things
in terms of online accessibility and other things, but that
those are the things that that affected me that I
think are worth mentioning simply because they they're both unusual

(52:48):
things people don't tend to think of right, Yeah, yeah,
I know, and it is a very uh, it's a
very difficult system to navigate. Like, like you said, I
think one of the things that's already stood out is
this this demand for like documenta shoan, frenny, any sort
of accommodation that you might need that they can make
it very hard to remember in um, I was teaching
at UCSD and I shattered my pelvis, uh, and like

(53:10):
that made moving at all extremely difficult for me, and
they wouldn't give me a parking pass and like then
then proceeded to offer me once their diabetes, which is
a whole like like interesting, like it's sort of calculation
of which one of those things will definitely stop you walking.
So yeah, and it was extremely sort of humiliating, I

(53:33):
guess from a personal perspective, and degrading and time consuming
and unnecessary. And so what were the demands then at
the start of this strike, right, there was an access
needs element to the demands being made by the union.
So perhaps we can go through Maybe first we can
go through how you went from uh like this bike correct,

(53:56):
which didn't accommodate but pretty pretty basic need right to
trans for yourself to campus, how do we get from
there to the union? Having access needs to minds as
part of the strike. So as far as you see
Access Now, it's involvement with it. UM. We went on
Twitter and Facebook and Instagram and published the demandifesto in

(54:19):
July of so, uh, the months between you know, the
fall when I made you know, went through these processes
and when I finally decided, Okay, nobody's doing anything about this,
and I don't see any other organizations, so let's you know,
jump into this um. By July, Uh, you see, Access
Now was contacted by somebody who was an officer within

(54:43):
u A W fifty ten and that's the post Doc
and and Academic Researcher Union, and they had seen our work,
you know, via social media and whatnot and said, you know,
we're about to go into contract bargaining and we'd really
like to talk about disability issues. So we had a
meeting with them, and we actually had we did a

(55:06):
presentation also to them, uh for their social justice and
in our series. But we also had a meeting with
a number of people from fifty in terms of let's,
you know, let's think creatively here, let's let's be ambitious
about what it is, you know, because the thing is
is that a lot of what people tend to do,
particularly particularly when they're not disabled, but even some disabled

(55:30):
people can do this because internalized able ism is a
really hard to throw off. We're sort of you know,
and this is true of other oppressions too. You know,
we're all sort of used to this system that has
this policing, austerity, etcetera. You know, we all get schooled
into not hoping for much anymore because we're just so used.
You know, in my life time, I've lived through decades

(55:52):
of this kind of regularite bologne. So so it takes
a while to think big about these things. But that's
what we were trying to do. And so we sort
of brainstormed with them as several UC Access Now members
and several fifty eight ten members in terms of the
sorts of things that could be uh asking for. And
so if if there's time and you don't mind, I

(56:13):
can give you a view of that because the other
stuff is online. But this isn't so again, this is
sort of just a spitballing document. But we were like,
you know, all ads for post doc positions on all platforms,
they have to be accessible. Now some some of this
and some of what we're talking about is stuff that

(56:34):
you see is actually legally obligated to do and just
has not been doing. Um. That would be one of them.
UM training. You know, most emergency access plans are not
made with the input of disabled people, and they don't
even mention us. So you know, there are considerations for
accessibility for different types of disabilities, different people. Uh. We

(56:54):
have several buildings on UC Davis campus here that have
little placards right in the lobby that's say a they
say something like, if you depend on uh, visual alarm
systems in an emergency, please let somebody else know you're
in this building. Blah blah blah. And it's like even
the way that's phrased, because you know, quote unquote abled people,

(57:17):
are you dependent on a sound alarm system to get
out in a fire. But they but they don't phrase it,
you know, as dependence when it's for them, right, They
only phrase it as dependence when it's for somebody who's
death or hard of hearing. So we've got several buildings
on campus where they know that it's not up, it's
not up to even not even just a d A.

(57:38):
But just like basic human decency, people will die in
that building. Deaf and hard of hearing, people will not
know that there's a fire or another emergency alarm system
going off because we couldn't be bothered to pony up
for some lights. Um. So that that kind of thing.
In terms of an emergency action plan, these things have
to be done. There has to be training not only

(57:58):
for the supervisors but really for you see itself, because
the whole system is just you know, a cram full
of able is um. You know, online working is key
to accessibility. So it has to be a regular option,
not just something for the pandemic. It should have been
the whole time, and it also shouldn't you know, be
a big burst up to it. There are some and

(58:20):
you know they're like kind of things you would think
of as smaller that we put in here simply because
again we're trying to think creatively, which is you know,
reimbursements for instance. I mean that's a general problem with
grad students and whatnot. Is that the university, which has
far more resources than we do, it's sort of you know,
taking its time reimbursing us for things that we've had

(58:42):
to get right, and so the debt is actually being
heaped onto the people least able to support it. And
when it comes to disabled people, that is going to
be even more of a burden because most disabled people
have a higher cost of living and often have a
lower income to boot. So we put you know that
in there. Put in reimbursements for costs incurred working at

(59:04):
home or or or you know, in other ways remotely
for an employer. That's section to eight oh two of
the California Labor Code. Um uh, you know, sick policy
in terms of like commuter checks, which you know, or
some other kind of thing for public transit. The child
care spaces and lactation rooms are accessible because you know

(59:25):
the union will like lobby for that right, but you
need to be you need to be express about the
idea that these things need to be accessible. Like people
don't think of everything needed to be accessible, but really
it does. Yeah, and that sends a very sort of
condescending message about like what you know, different people with
different diffabilities might or might not be doing at which

(59:49):
obviously isn't great that the US doing that. And so
like I really I thought these demands were fascinating because
it's not what we often talk about when we talk
about rights that we talk about strikes often purely in
terms of economics, right like UH, in in the US,
I can include things like non way to benefits like healthcare,

(01:00:10):
but it in sort of most instances we talk about
striking bread and butter terms like they have gone out
and they want this much money to come back. And
I think that strikes have the potential to build much
greater solidarity by doing things like this, by incorporating these
I guess social justice demands is one way of phrasing it.

(01:00:32):
This basic human decency to minds will be another way
of saying it. And it really Yeah, it really impressed
me that this was part of the package of demands
from the union. How have things gone? Are you comfortable
talking about how things have gone since the strike began? Well,
I certainly don't know everything backwards and forwards, because honestly,

(01:00:56):
it would be hard for any one person to do
it all. It's all extremely complex in terms of not
in terms of like you know, things on the ground,
but in terms of the language in contracts and the
process and bargaining. UH. There's a difference between like things
that are tradition traditional to do as opposed to things
that are actually the law, and then of course the

(01:01:16):
actual enforcement and law. So anyway, this has been going
on for a whole year, and as you can imagine,
like penetrating it as your average person, it can be
very difficult. So I will certainly give you, you know,
my view of it as so far as I've seen it,
but um, we do have. Uh So, so we helped
with like sort of spitballing and they took it from there.

(01:01:36):
And what they started out with was not as you know,
ambitious as the spitball document. Um, I think it tends.
I think that got replicated a lot throughout the unions,
which is, you know, my advice as somebody from the
outside just thinking about negotiations in general. Okay, you know

(01:01:58):
they're gonna cut you down, right, so why would you
be the one to cut you down. You know they're
gonna do it right, you think big, let them cut
you down. And and unfortunately there were the majority voices
in the bargaining teams tended often to be at least
where the access needs articles were concerned, um, tended to

(01:02:20):
be kind of let us cut ourselves down. Uh So
the starting doc for ten, although you know, it's still
had things in it that were very like if we
have the original version of ten instead of what actually
the folks you know voted on voted yes on recently, Uh,

(01:02:42):
it would still be a revolutionary document in in US
labor history. I think, you know, I don't. I've never
heard in the news of anything any uh more ambitious
than that. But but definitely it was down from what
we were starting with, which you know, um so, But
I think what happened was that you know, fifty eight

(01:03:04):
ten came out and they were trying to coordinate and
learn from each other to different units. Right. So then
folks on s R you and U A W also
uh worked on the access needs articles and and the
access needs articles even in themselves was a change because

(01:03:25):
the previous versions of these things were phrases reasonable accommodations,
which is language that stems from the Americans with Disabilities Act.
And even that phrase is something that is really outdated
because it is the idea, the ideas who is deciding
what's reasonable, right the person who has no lived experience

(01:03:47):
of disability or this gigantic public institution that is funded
including by disabled people's tuitions and fed fees and whatnot
in taxes. But you know where's my money go. It
goes into building an inaccessible university, right, So why am
I supposed to let you judge what is reasonable? I
think it's incredibly unreasonable that you use my money to

(01:04:11):
build a university that not is not only hard for
me to be at, but it is actively hostile to
my health. Um and so you know, and just the
word accommodations centers and codifies that inaccessibility as being the norm,
and anything you do different from it is like you
being accommodating. We'll get that, get the hell out over

(01:04:34):
here with that stuff. Yeah, yeah, yeah, it makes much
more sense to phrase it in those ways. And like, yeah,
it seems like it was, as you said, a very
ambitious goal and one that not only those things got transferred,
which is I mean that that can happen in strikes.
But it's also like it's it's a non economic thing

(01:04:58):
that the university could have given to you all of
they wouldn't have had to have, you know, I mean,
the university has a lot of money, and it would
it would be very possible for it to pay grad
to its students aways they asked for at the start
and post grad post docs and could be paid the
way to say, asked for to your and it wouldn't
really have the university. They could they could, you know,
there are a million ways they could fund that. But well,

(01:05:18):
I think that gets to the crux of why they
don't do this, because the thing is is that if
if you really think about it this way, and it
takes a little doing, because again we're sort of school
dot to, but it is a form of misappropriation of
public funds. If all of the public is funding this institution,
and we do that through our state and our federal taxes,

(01:05:39):
we do and then of course if we get in
we're doing it through tuition of feeds, and then of
course the grants the university gets are also federal grants
and this sort of thing. Um, then what you're doing
is you're taking money that comes from all of the
public and pre pandemic figures in terms of like this

(01:05:59):
is before the mass disabling event that the pandemic is
the of America, adult Americans had at least one disability.
So you're taking money from those folks, and you're saying,
but we're not going to build this public university in
a way that is not only like tolerable by you,
but like a place where you could thrive. It doesn't

(01:06:21):
even reach tolerable. It actually drives a lot of us
out of here. It worse in health, and I have
no doubt that it has killed people. So we So
what happens? The reason I mentioned this is because that
misappropriation to funds. You know, that's the incentive, right, what
can if if if you're going off this austerity mindset

(01:06:42):
that you shut off like people from things they need, right,
what happens to that money? Well, we have an admin
that is completely bloated in size. We have every single
chancellor getting a raise during a pandemic that they completely
blew in terms of public health protections, in terms of
accessibility even to people when they needed it during the pandemic.

(01:07:04):
Like if they hadn't been fighting accessibility that long, we
would have handled the pandemic better because we would have
had better online pedagogy already available and developed. So it
is that's a kind of jump that people don't make.
But that's exactly what's going on. That's why they have
the interest in putting this rationing and policing bureaucracy together too, Like,

(01:07:28):
not many disabled people even get here because this is
of course not the only ablest institution. It's hard to
even get here. But then when you get here, they
want to reduce who can get their access needs met,
and then the access needs being met is such a gauntlet,
and only the most privileged of disabled people can get that.

(01:07:51):
And so you know, as far as disabled people at
at you see who are in the system so to speak,
you know, our registered or whatever that's going to not
at all be representative of the public. That's going to
be mostly white folks with some access to privilege. You know, yeah,
of course. And I think you've given a good sort

(01:08:13):
of elucidation of why this is a struggle that obviously
everyone should be part of, everyone should be getting behind,
because it's like it's it's all of us who are
invested in this in order of us are paying for
this university which isn't accessible right now. So I wonder, like,
what's your advice, because there are unprecedented numbers of people

(01:08:34):
forming unions right like Starbucks being one example that we
see a lot of coverage of, but all across the
country there are more people forming unions there and more
people going on to strike. How should they organize around
similar things like, how should they organize around getting these
access needs met? Well, I think I think you have

(01:08:55):
to start by sweeping your old side of the street,
which is that you have to make sure that you
or union communications, your meetings, uh, everything about your union
is accessible. And if you don't know how to do that,
then that's where you start. You start with learning what
accessibility is and how to make things accessible. Because what
we found when we started, uh, when we came out

(01:09:18):
kind of UC access Now did was you know, as
you can imagine, in a society where there are quite
strong financial punishments for even to say, you know, even
identifying as disabled. And what I mean by that is like, say,
again here on UC Davis, you were talking about how

(01:09:40):
hard it was for you to get parking right, you know,
when you had s chatter Paul Pelvis, how it was
to go every single day here on campus. There are
able to employees driving trucks and vans that they drive
straight up to the door of the building on the sidewalk,
blocking egress for actual disabled people and actually blocking fire
regress out of the building. Because that's what's you know,

(01:10:00):
because they can't be bothered to walk twenty ft from
the legal space that they have already have the privilege
of being on campus compared to everybody else, right, but
they but they had to have it even more convenient
to that, and then they drive straight up to the door.
Right Nobody gives them. Nobody says boo about that. Nobody
says you need to get a medical documentation, Nobody says

(01:10:22):
you're getting fined and you'r and you you don't get
to drive this campus truck again or whatever. None of
that goes on. What would happen, I guarantee you if
that employee identified as disabled all of a sudden, then
they would come down on that person for what they're doing.
It's it's a real so because of these things, there's
a lot of incentive for people to hide their disability

(01:10:47):
because you get there's a lot of stigma, but there's
also a real, quite real financial hit to it. And
uh and so what happens once you sort of create
a safer space to talk about it, people will start
damning you, you know, and they will let you know
that they're starting to have problems on the job or whatever.
They may not be ready to come out. For those

(01:11:09):
like some people, it's obvious they're disabled, right, it's not
even like they have a choice about quote unquote coming
out right. But for other people it's not obvious unless
they tell you, and they they have a lot of
incentive to not you know, identify that way. Um. But
when you make your union a safe and inclusive and
accessible place, you will find that you have already been

(01:11:31):
making assumptions about what your union membership is. So you
already have members who are disabled, it's just that they're
not telling you about it. But furthermore, if your union
starts really um becoming an accessible inclusive place, you know,
not performative, really being there, like your your communications are accessible,

(01:11:53):
you you're clearly um educating yourselves around able is um
educating yourselves around accessibility. So like when you have your meeting,
it's not in a room that isn't wheelchair accessible, that
doesn't have a working elevator on that floor. You know,
all these things that people kind of don't think about
until uh, they're the one with the broken leg. Um.

(01:12:15):
Then that really goes some way to helping you organize things,
and you will find you already have members that you
can tap, you know, because they'll start to feel more
for more involved once they see you're willing to go
to bad from them. And what I would say that
peaks folks should learn from the U see U a
w experience right now. And this doesn't just refer to

(01:12:39):
disabled workers, it's really other marginalized workers, which is, you know,
if you're in a contract bargaining situation and it's clear
that like you're the bargaining chip, Like why would that
why would that group want to hang with you? You're
you're saying, support us and what we want, but we're

(01:13:00):
gonna desert you when it's your time. You weren't gonna
depend on the fact that everybody likes more pay and
we're just gonna say, Okay, you're gonna stick with us
and and work, you know, with the union no matter
what it's like. Now a lot of people are gonna go, well,
I'm sticking you know, you clearly don't support me, So
I don't see why I need to go with you

(01:13:21):
and put myself at risk because if you win, I'm
gonna get the raise anyway. And uh, and if you
don't win, well then that's good for you because now
you know how it feels like to be tossed aside,
you know, so, so you have to really be there
for your marginalized workers. You know, it has to be
this non performative thing. But the but the thing is

(01:13:42):
is that if you are non performative about it, you
are you're making the workplace not only better from disabled
workers you already have, but you are making it better
for yourself. Because every single one of us pretty much
is going to be disabled either temport earlier permanently at
some point in our lives. It is the easiest club

(01:14:04):
to join. And you know, I think as we found
during the pandemic. You know, people, a lot of people
they make this They say, oh, online sucks, Online school sucks.
Why does it suck because you never invested in it.
It's like several several decades and old, you never invested
in it. You never put any effort or money into it.

(01:14:28):
Like that's you know, So if you want your workplace
to be a good quality workplace for you, that is
not only just like a place you barely you know,
feel okay going to, but like someplace you really we
spend most of our lives in the workplace. You know,
Students right, So it should be someplace that really makes

(01:14:50):
us feel better and fulfilled, because nobody works well when
they're stressed out. Nobody, you know, you're not productive when
you're constantly stressed. So this really to be a win
win all around. And and you're think about it this
way also, which is that you know, and this is
particularly applicable when it comes to you see, and you know,
the pandemic is another great example of this is this

(01:15:12):
has gotten a little bit of focus on the press,
but I don't think as much as it deserves, which
is that you have this not only an event where
millions of people died globally, right, which you have. You
have quite a few people, they have long COVID, they
have other things. People who arrive at you see, and
particularly who go you know, get to the point they've
got their degree or whatever. You know, these are people
who are trained, highly educated, trained in a certain thing.

(01:15:39):
They're making contributions to their field. Do you really want
it to be that we lose all the knowledge that
these people have, all the the institutional memory and experience
that these people have, just at a time when we're
facing an incredible crises as a planet. You know, in
terms of climate change and in terms of you know,

(01:16:00):
the attacks on democracies and things, or just even what
the people mean to their community, right, you know, you're
talking about the fabric of your community if you make it.
If you have an inaccessible workplace, if you have an
inaccessible school, if you have places you know in the
public square that are not accessible, you're making it so

(01:16:23):
that when somebody becomes disabled, and that person could be you,
you may never be able to practice the thing that
you love and you've trained for your whole life, and
the community loses what you could bring to this at
a time when we need more than ever every all
hands on deck to be like solving climate change and

(01:16:44):
other problems that face us. Yeah, yeah, that is it's
very well said. Actually that yeah, certainly made a very
good case. So I want to I mean obviously that
the negotiations are still ongoing at least four uh the
s I U and for a I think for as well, Um,

(01:17:06):
so what can people do to support the demands that
have been made? How can people maybe who are not
part of the union, who are not part of the
u C even or preps undergrad to are part of
the U S but not part of the union. How
how can they show solidarity and support here? Well, I
think part of this is, you know, not giving up

(01:17:26):
on the idea that we can press for the original
access needs article. I know there's all sorts of like
you know, technical rules about regressive bargaining, but honestly, I
think you see has broken a lot of the rules
of bargaining. So I don't see why that doesn't you
know what It's like, what's good for the goose is
good for the gander as far as I'm concerned. But
there's also even outside of bargaining. You know, as I said,

(01:17:50):
a lot of these things are things that you see
routinely breaks. A d A you see routinely breaks There's
other parts of disability law in terms of sex five
oh for the Rehabilitation Act, and there's some California law
as well as my understanding of it. So you know,
you see, just as they have this rationing and policing
agency bureaucracy, and it's two separate silos, one for students

(01:18:13):
and one for workers, and they do that. Like even
the fact that they do that communicates that it's not
about offering accessibility as a default, because why would you
have two silos for that. Well, you have two silos
for that because the law that affects students and affects
workers are slightly different. So what you're coming from is
this aspect of we are dedicated to only doing the

(01:18:37):
barest minimum of the minimum required by law, so we
don't even want to meet that minimum required by law.
It's like it's like, you know, you want to offer
minimum wage, but if you can get away with it,
you're not even going to meet minimum wage. And you
have a lot of lawyers in a bureaucracy to make
it possible for you to do that. That's what you
see does um So that kind of stuff is stuff

(01:18:58):
that outside even a labor contract, you should be able
to write the governor, right, the lieutenant governor who's actually
got a seat on the board of regents rights your
California legislators. You know, when there was a there was
a nimby who sued cow. This was in the news
this year. There was a nimby who sued cow to
make it so the caw con make housing and and

(01:19:22):
or to cow to make it so the cow was
going to have to limit how many it was admitting.
Because in the opinion of that group, like they weren't
building enough housing to take care of their students, and
they were crowding at Berkeley and blah blah blah. The
outrage about that from parents who wanted to send their
kids to cow was so great that like within a
couple of weeks, the governor and the legislators had passed

(01:19:44):
something to address that. If you put that kind of
pressure on the governor of the lieutenant governor and the
you know, your state legisslators, they will make sure that
the UC Office of the President feels that pressure because
these are things, these are laws. You know, at the
we had more ambitious things beyond law. But some of

(01:20:06):
the things that we were that are trying to do
in this contract are really just things that they're already
required by law to do but aren't doing. We were
trying to give it and make it so there was
more teeth there, because clearly the federal and state teeth
weren't good enough. So we um, we have a resist

(01:20:26):
spot petition out there, but you know, to make it
a little easier to contact your if you're a California resident,
the resist pot petition would work that way. But if
but if not. You know, like I said, if you
if you if you're a parent of a student here,
you can write. If you're an alumni, you know, you
can write, just really hammer them about it. Okay, Yeah, yeah, definitely.

(01:20:50):
I think I think writing does make a difference. And
I think especially for an institution that I don't quite
know how financially dependent they are in donations, but they
certainly do like to solicit them, actually if you're an alumnus,
because think they solicit them for me a lot. I
do not have that much money. So yeah, thank you
very much for sharing all of that with us. And

(01:21:11):
I thought that's really really interactive. How can people find
you and how can people find you? See access now
if they want to find you online? Uh, we are
on Twitter as access you see at access you see um.
We are on Facebook and Instagram as well. Actually is
also linked in for the more business people. Uh you

(01:21:31):
see access now um. And you can also reach us
at you see access now at gmail dot com if
you wanted to email us. Wonderful. Yeah, thank you very much.
And just to finish that briefly, we are going to
try and make a transcript. It's available at the same
time the episode goes out and so folks would like
to read it that way if that's easier for them,
than We're going to make sure that we have that

(01:21:53):
for this one. So yeah, if you're if you're listening,
or if you think someone else that you know would
like this and this it doesn't work for them, and
we're going to do that. Thank you so much, Megan
for giving us some of your afternoon. And yeah, I
hope you see some support and I wish you the
best of luck with everything. Well, thank you so much.

(01:22:26):
Woo and welcome to it could happen here. My name
is Sharene and today you are stuck with me. Yes,
what a treat for all of you beautiful people out there.
I've been wanting to do an episode about the World
Cup for a while, but I felt like there was
just so much to cover, and it was also happening

(01:22:47):
in real time, so I want to wait a bit
so I could have enough stuff to pull from. I
will say I am recording this on Monday, December nineteenth.
It is the day after the weekend where France lost
to Argentina, and Argentina are now our World Cup champions.
I'm happy about that. And then Morocco did lose last

(01:23:10):
week to France, which was devastating to me and my
family and the rest of the Arab world because we
would have loved to see them beat their colonizers, but
they got really far, and I want to talk about
the impact that that's had. They did coming forth when
they lost to Croatia this weekend as well, so just

(01:23:31):
in case y'all needed to know that, But I will
say I am really happy for Argentina, and maybe it
was because Morocco lost to France, but I wasn't mad
seeing France losing, and all the celebrations I've seen from
people celebrating Argentina have been so heartwarming and yeah, but anyway,

(01:23:53):
I wanted to focus on something that I think has
been so unprecedented and beautiful and singular and I think
deserves more coverage, and that is this show of Palestinian
solidarity that has been happening during the World Cup. It
is so cool, and I want to talk about why
it's happening, the circumstances that could lead to this happening,

(01:24:16):
and what it means, because I think it's very significant
moving forward when it comes to Palestinian rights since Palestinian support,
So let's get into it. There's a great article by
British Palestinian writer Hams Aisha titled Palestine is the biggest
winner at this year's World Cup. And this article did

(01:24:36):
such a good job compiling some key moments, so I'm
going to be referencing from it a lot as we
continue this episode. Okay, here we go. Despite the Western
media doing its best to ignore it, the World Cup
has seen a huge tidal wave of Palestinian solidarity and
it's united the Arab world in a really special way

(01:24:58):
and also highlighted just how many people Arab and non
Arab alike support the Palestinian cause. And so, not to
be too cheesy, the biggest winners of this World Cup,
in my opinion, haven't even had a team at all competing,
and that's the Palestinians. The World Cup has been characterized
by unforeseeable developments and dramatic quote unquote upsets, which it's

(01:25:22):
a word I don't even really like, even if it's
grammatically correct when it's used in fucking sports jargon. But
I don't like it because it kind of sounds like
a bad thing, because it's like upset bo who. But really,
I think surprises like this are a really good thing
because what these upsets usually mean is simply that the
underdog one, which is a narrative I will always support.

(01:25:43):
So these surprises really started with Argentina's lost to Saudi Arabia,
which shocked everyone. The faces in the stadium, draws on
the floor, everyone was shocked. I watched it with my mom.
It was it was incredible and it was truly a
beautiful game. I highly recommend you at least watch some
clips from it. It was fucking cool and I don't know,

(01:26:06):
it came out of nowhere. Was really beautiful. And after
this victory, Kingston, man of Saudi Arabia, ordered that day
that they won a public holiday to say the least.
Everyone was losing their minds and these surprises seemed to
be endless in this World Cup, mostly because, as I said,
the obvious teams were losing to the underdogs. And coming

(01:26:27):
out of this one of the most consistent themes has
been this overarching Palestinian solidarity that has unfolded, particularly among
fans of Arab Nations. World Cup was already significant on
its own It's held in Gotha, making it the first
World Cup to be held in the Arab world and
the Muslim world, and only the second held entirely in

(01:26:50):
Asia after the two thousand two tournaments in South Korea
and Japan. The Arab world is obsessed with soccer. An
understatement to say obsessed, I should you not. It's a
huge part of Arab culture, Middle Eastern culture, and so
this was already a huge deal to start with. And
I think these two things together, the fact that it's

(01:27:13):
very cultural and the fact that this is the first
time it's been on an Arab stage. I think these
two things together created the seed for Arabs and Middle
East owners to really come together in a way we've
never really seen. And this first World Cup in the
Arab world has captured in this symbolic way, this reality

(01:27:33):
where Western powers have receded in the face of their challengers. Morocco.
They reached the semifinals and they played France, their colonizers,
which was so symbolic. Saudi Arabia humiliated one of the
tournament favorites, Argentina, and then Tunisia did the same to
its former colonizer France Japan. They beat Germany and Spain.

(01:27:58):
This traditional power and battle in global soccer and what
it means for geopolitics. I feel like it can no
longer be taken for granted or ignored. As many as
five million Moroccans live abroad, mostly in Europe, and they've
celebrated the team's victories in huge street celebrations in France

(01:28:18):
and Belgium and Spain and the Netherlands, and just internationally.
For Moroccans living outside of Morocco and for so many
other migrants from the Arab world or Africa, they've been
driven by decades of desperation in their home countries to
risk everything to reach Europe, only to suffer abuse and contempt.

(01:28:38):
So this achievement after achievement was a huge pivotal milestone.
And I think this drive has been coupled with the
show of Palestinian pride and thought out as well. There
was no Palestinian team at the World Cup, and yet
the Palestinian flag was everywhere, not only in the hands
of celebrating Moroccan players and fans, but also at every

(01:29:01):
game and on the streets of Dha and it was
just overwhelming and so amazing to see. And these displays
they shocked some Israeli journalists who had been assured by
their own government that the US brokered Abraham Accords that
had happened between Israel and Morocco and other Arab states.

(01:29:23):
They thought that this signaled that the Arab world had
relinquished any pretense of advocacy for Palestinian rights. But as
we see with a lot of sports, soccer creates its
own form of civil society. And especially because it's a
huge international game in a way that no other sport
really is, and also being played in a region where

(01:29:46):
civil society has largely been suppressed by authoritarians, it's made
it clear in this World Cup that the Arab public
is not willing to follow their unelected leaders and accepting
the brutal against Palestinians and what human rights organizations have
called Israel's apartheid system a k a. Israel's ethnic cleansing

(01:30:08):
of Palestinians, violence, brutality, murder. The list can go on.
I'm sure you've heard me on my soapbox before, but
it always bears repeating. My point is that the Arab
public and the people in these Arab nations do not
represent and do not necessarily believe in these leaders that
again they did not elect it's all authoritarian dictatorships and

(01:30:33):
just corrupt government that I mean, we can get into
history another time, but the disablement of so many of
these governments have been because of the Western world, say
the least, I don't know, a different episode. I'm getting distracted, sorry.
Even countries that did not qualify for the World Cup
are surging with this united pride and pro Palestinian sentiment.

(01:30:56):
The Palestinian cause is obviously near and dear to the
hearts of many Arabs across the world. And again, not
only is this the first time the World Cup has
been hosted in an Arab country, it's also probably the
first time there has been such a large gathering and
concentration of Arabs across nationalities gathered all in one place.

(01:31:18):
And again, at almost every single game, there have been
fans holding the Palestinian flag or banners that say Free
Palestine in the stadium. In their matches against Australia and Belgium, respectively,
Tunisia and Moroccan fans each unfurled a huge Free Palestine
flag in the forty minute, which is very significant because

(01:31:40):
this is in reference to the ninet Necba, which translates
to the catastrophe. The Necaba deserves millions of episodes on
its own, but essentially it was the mass expulsion and
ethnic cleansing of at least seven hundred and fifty thousand
Palestinian refugees in ninety eight when the state of Israel

(01:32:02):
was formed. A side note that I do want to
mention here is that there's an incredible film on Netflix
right now that you should all go watch. It's called
Farha f A r h A. It's about the Neckba
and there's never been a film like this before. And
the Israeli government has been doing this like smear campaign
against it and has been calling it all sorts of

(01:32:24):
terrible things. But the other side, Palestinian supporters and Palestinians,
they've made it so successful. They've outdone the haters, I
guess to say the least, and it's doing really well.
And it's because of these supporters that it is doing
so well. So I mean, sorry to get a little
bit tangential here, but I really encourage you to watch
Farha on Netflix right now. There's never been a film

(01:32:47):
about this catastrophe, the Neckba, so I highly encourage everyone
to watch or even just like put it on in
the background while you're doing something else, so it counts
as views. Just keep supporting it. I think this is
a really important time and it feels really significant that
this is all happening at the same time. So anyway,
go out to that film. But Tunisia and Moroccan fans

(01:33:10):
each at the forty minute in reference to this catastrophe,
they unfurled this huge free Palestine flag, and by waving
that Palestinian flag, Moroccan fans and players expressed a very
public descent from the choices of their government and of
the Western powers and as well as other Arab autocrats
to abandon the Palestinians to their fate. And as they advanced,

(01:33:34):
Morocco was able to sustain the attention on these issues,
and their players proved time and time again that they
are more than deserving to be playing on this world stage.
Morocco was also the first African team to make the
semifinals of the World Cup, which is also a significant
achievement and a lovely slap in the face to anyone
who doubted them. The Moroccan defense was incredible, maybe some

(01:33:58):
of the best defense I've ever seen, but due to
soccer's globalization. The top players in soccer have for decades
all played in Europe's elite leagues, and this was the
first World Cup in which all five African teams were
coached by African coaches rather than by European ones, and
Morocco's coach in particular appears to have made an exceptionable difference.

(01:34:23):
During Tunisia's game against France, a Gunesian fan ran onto
the pitch and he waved a Palestinian flag, cartwheeling in
the process. The crowd erupted into chance of Palestine as
he was dragged away by security, and in a different
match at the stadium, fans chanted with spirit and blood,
we will redeem you Old Palestine. They chanted this in Arabic.

(01:34:46):
And this occurred on the International Day of Solidarity with
the Palestinian people November twenty nine, and it felt very poetic.
And then when Morocco knocked the former champions Spain out
of the tournament, the Moroccan team posed for the standard
celebratory team photo and instead of holding the Moroccan flag,

(01:35:06):
they all held a Palestinian one. A winning team holding
up the flag of another country has literally never happened before,
and the fact that it's a Palestinian flag. I don't know,
man chills, I'm obsessed, obsessed, but okay, I feel like
I'm going to get more rambily and distracted. So before
I do that, let's take a break. I could not

(01:35:28):
think of a witty segue to get there, but here
are some ads. Okay, we're back. I also wanted to
mention what, in my opinion, is the most iconic image
of the World Cup, and that is when Morocco's Sophia
and Buffal was dancing with his mom after his team's

(01:35:50):
brilliant upset victory over Portugal in the quarterfinals. They were
dancing and happy, and she's wearing a hijab, and it
was just this you're display of joy and um it
just it felt really familiar to me, and it felt
that way to a lot of Middle Easterners and Arabs

(01:36:10):
and Moroccans. This moment, this dancing between him and his mom,
it was a statement of pride and of priorities and
a reminder that as the mother of another great football player,
Zenna Dean's Adan, she once said that quote some things
are bigger than football. Buffall and his mother, like the

(01:36:31):
majority of Morocco's players and coaches. They live in European
cities and they're part of that continent's vast, marginalized and
embattled migrant underclass. Again, she wore a hijab, something that
she would be barred from doing if she was a
teacher or a public servant in France. Against all of that,

(01:36:52):
this moment on the field was captured in a moment
of unbridled joy. It was so pure and so human
and just reminded everyone, I hope reminded me and my
family of who we are. And again, I think this
is really significant when you think about the geopolitical implications
that we've seen during these games, with countries like Morocco

(01:37:15):
playing against the teams of the countries that colonized them
a k a. When they played with France, it really
feels like this beautiful blossoming of culture against all odds
of trying to suppress it. So outside the stadiums, this
theme remained the same when it came to Palestinian solidarity.

(01:37:36):
A Saudi Arabian vendor selling flags of different countries. He
went viral after he was spotted giving customers an extra
Palestinian flag as a free gift with any purchase, and
so this uplifting message that has been repeated time and
time again during this World Cup is that Palestine can
never be removed from the hearts of the people. And
there are so many heartwarming videos like the one I mentioned,

(01:37:59):
and I urge everyone to follow Palestinian accounts to keep
up if you're curious. I know the World Cup is
technically over now, but these videos are so fun and
joyful to watch. I really felt so much joy watching them.
This outpouring of support for Palestine is reminiscent of an
earlier time in history when the Arab world was also

(01:38:21):
united in its support for Palestine. The Palestinian cause was
once a driving force in the policy direction of the
Arab world, and it reached its zenith in the nineteen
sixties when nations like Syria, Jordan and Egypt they went
to war against Israel with the anti imperial objective of
regional Arab unity in Palestinian liberation. However, those aspirations were

(01:38:45):
stomped out in nineteen sixty seven when Israel quote unquote
one the Six Day War or the June War, which
is also known as the nineteen sixty seven Arab Israeli
War or the Third Arab Israeli War. Just a very
quick history lesson here. This war was fought between Israel
and a coalition of Arab states, and it ended after

(01:39:07):
Israeli tanks and infantry advanced on a heavily fortified region
of Syria called the Golden Heights. They successfully captured the
Goal and Heights. After this, the next day, on June
tenth and nineteen sixty seven, a U N brokered ceasefire
took effect and the Sixth Day War came to an
abrupt end. The casualties between the two opposing sides are

(01:39:29):
basically incomparable. I'm gonna say some stats here, but despair
with me. Between seven hundred and seventy six and nine
hundred and eighty three Israelis were killed and four thousand
and five hundred and seventeen were wounded. Fifteen Israeli soldiers
were captured. Arab casualties were far greater. Between nine thousand

(01:39:52):
and eight hundred and fifteen thousand Egyptian soldiers were listed
as killed or missing in action. An additional four thousand,
three hundred and thirty eight Egyptian soldiers were captured. Jordanian
losses are estimated to be seven hundred killed in action
with another two thousand and five hundred wounded. The Syrians
were estimated to have sustained between a thousand and two thousand,

(01:40:14):
five hundred killed in action, between three hundred and sixty
seven and five Syrians were captured. It's an incomparable, an
insurmountable loss, and I might go as far to say
it was a massacre because it was so unbalanced. Casualties
were also suffered by the u n e F, the
United Nations Emergency force that was stationed on the Egyptian

(01:40:37):
side of the border. In three different episodes, Israeli forces
attacked a U n e F convoy as well as
camps in which UN e F personnel were concentrated, as
well as the un e F headquarters in Gaza, and
this resulted in one Brazilian peacekeeper and fourteen Indian officials
killed by Israeli forces, with an additional seventeen peacekeepers wound.

(01:41:00):
Did in both groups, that's your history lesson for today,
at least for now. But as you can't imagine that
this was a huge loss for the Arab world. In
addition to stealing the gold and heights. This war led
Israel to seizing and occupying all remaining Palestinian territories, and

(01:41:20):
as you know or should know by now, Israel has
maintained its control of the land at the expense of
the Palestinians, with Arab leaders not able to do much
in protest over these years, especially after this nineteen sixty
seven loss, a lot of Arab leaders almost seemed indifferent.
When we fast forward to something happened that seemed like

(01:41:43):
a decisive death blow to the hopes of Palestinian solidarity
in the Abraham Accords were signed, and these were a
series of joint normalization statements between Israel and Arab countries
that would theoretically pave the way for increased business and
diplomatic relations. The implication was that Israel could afford to

(01:42:04):
maintain it's apartheid rule and still enjoy warm relations with
the Arab world because their politicians too, We're happy to
willfully neglect the Palestinians. Officials from Bahayan, the UAE, and
Morocco all signed the supposed quote unquote peace treaty with Israel. However,
as we've seen from this year's World Cup, the Arab

(01:42:27):
people do not agree with their politicians or their decisions. Again,
most of these decision makers are not elected by their people.
There's a lot of corruption at play, and I think
it's very important to always separate a government from its people,
as we're seeing, especially in Iran right now, which is
something that makes me very emotional and deserves to be

(01:42:50):
talked about more. I can't do a justice in this
one sentence, but I urge you all to keep spreading
awareness about Iran. Please. What they're doing to protesters is
inhumane and truly medieval. Recent polls indicate that the Arab
public widely disapproves of the Abraham Accords, strongly disagreeing with
the prospect of normalizing ties with Israel as long as

(01:43:12):
the Palestinians remain oppressed. But if there were still any
lingering doubts that these accords our bullshit had not wanted.
The experience of Israeli journalists and Clethod can be seen
as this decisive confirmation that the treatment of Palestinians will
actually be what dictate the trajectory of normalization. Israeli journalists

(01:43:36):
broadcasting live have been interrupted by rallies of people chanting
pro Palestinian slogans and waving Palestinian flags. An Egyptian man
went viral after he leaned into the camera and said,
live on Israeli television, Viva Palestine. Fans refusing to speak
to Israeli channels has also been a hilarious common occurrence.

(01:44:00):
One particular exchange included Moroccan fans posing for the camera
before swiftly walking off upon realizing it was for an
Israeli media outlet. The reporter's response was one of shock,
repeatedly citing that a piece agreement had been signed by Morocco,
thereby assuming that the Moroccan people themselves endorsed the notion

(01:44:20):
that Israel's crimes could be whitewashed and forgotten. And again,
highly recommend you watch these videos. They have brought me
a joy that I haven't felt in literal years, and
it's just beautiful and most importantly hilarious to see. Highly recommend.
There are silver lining sometimes to life, and I feel

(01:44:43):
like there are enough terrible things happening where a little
joy is fine. And seeing Israeli journalists being accumulated, thank you,
Thank you world. There's a thread on Twitter of World
Cup football fans refusing to speak to Israeli channels. I'll
try to put that in the notes and where, but regardless,
highly recommend looking up these videos. Just again beautiful, beautiful stuff.

(01:45:08):
And as I mentioned, Israeli journalists often seem bewildered as
to why they are being boycotted. An Israeli reporter told
The New York Times, I really changed my mind here.
We are not human beings for them. They want to
wipe us out from the map, which is obviously not true,
and language like this is one of many Zionist talking

(01:45:29):
points that are all stupid. And while Israeli journalists speculated
about being wiped out, that is in fact the lived
reality for Palestinians under Israeli rule. Also, there is a
video that was captured, and I'm sure there are many
more instances like this where it was not captured on video,
but the Israeli police were violently cracking down on Palestinians,

(01:45:52):
including children, who were celebrating Morocco's previous winds and occupied
East Jerusalem. They were celebrating Rocco becoming the first African
or air country to reach the Semifinals, and they were
literally beaten up. There's no defense in this video That's
the thing that I can't get over is the idea
facts in a way that is so indefensible and so obvious.

(01:46:15):
And you can say maybe the similar things about the
police here. It's mind blowing that they've been able to
terrorize Palestinians for basically a century now. I also want
to play this video. Well, you're gonna hear the audio.
There's a Palestinian activist online that I really admire. He's
always posting really great things, and he sometimes posts funny

(01:46:39):
things which are very funny. But his name is Slaa
and his handle is s b e I h dot jpg.
And there is a video that he posted about basically
what Israel has been doing just throughout even the past
week when this World Cup is happening, and I feel
like he'll say it better than me paraphrasing it, so

(01:47:01):
here he is. Let's go through everything Israel has been
doing to Palestinians in the past week or so, during
all this hype of Morocco making it to the semi finals.
And these are the reasons why so many people are
carrying and waving the Palestinian flag at the World Cup
right now, including the Moroccan team. After their matches. First,
we have Palestinians who are celebrating Morocco's winds being attacked

(01:47:22):
by Israeli occupation forces. They're out here waving the Morocco flag,
trying to celebrate with them, and of course it has
to be cut short with Israeli soldiers coming and hitting everyone.
Then we have a sixteen year old child named Jennezekadine
who was on the roof of her house when she
was shot in the face by Israeli forces during another
illegal raid of the city of Genine. We have another
sixteen year old Palestinian child, a boy named Yeti Maui,

(01:47:45):
who was also killed by Israeli forces in west of Romola.
On top of those two, we have four Palestinian men
also killed by Israeli forces Jehad Hamid Ladock damage and
Israeli forces demolished another Palestinian home in a town near Jericho.
Then another Palestine home in the town of Laban. Israeli
occupation forces fired tear gas at journalists who were covering

(01:48:08):
the Palestinian protests against the illegal Israeli settlement expansions in
the town of bid Desion. You'd think that we're done,
but there's more. We have an Israeli soldier brutally beating
a young Palestinian man in Nabilis. The soldier sits on
top of him and punches him in the head. And
the east of Hebron, Israeli forces cut down fifty olive
trees belonging to Palestinian farmers. And of course Israeli settlers

(01:48:32):
continue to break into a Uxam moss under the protection
of Israeli occupation forces. This is why everyone's living in
a Palestinian flag at the World Cup. This is why
that tun Asian man randomly ran through the match with
the Palestinian flag, or why Israeli reporters are being ignored
and shunned. These are the reasons. Why not because anti
Semitism is because Israel is literally killing Palestinians. You'd rather

(01:48:56):
just blame it all on anti Semitism instead of simply
holding Israel a acountable for their actions. Everything I just
listed happened in the past like ten days, putting aside
everything that Israel has been doing to Palestinians for the
past well almost a hundred years now. So don't be
surprised when people stand with the people of Palestine. Last

(01:49:16):
week marked six months since El Jazira journalist Sharine was
assassinated by Israeli forces, and while her death did attract
more coverage than as usual, in part to her being
an American citizen, it was unfortunately not an exception. Since
the year two thousand fifty, Palestinian journalists have been murdered,

(01:49:37):
many many more civilians, including children, have been murdered. So
if media representatives or journalists from an apartheid state can't
seem to understand why the reception to their presence has
been so cold, they just are better off examining why
that is and why their government is actually the one
attempting to wipe a people off the map. Even in

(01:50:00):
the weeks during this World Cup, Israel has killed multiple Palestinians,
has murdered multiple Palestinians. They killed a sixteen year old
girl when she was on her roof searching for her cat.
She was shot four times, twice in the head. How
can you justify that they're claiming it was an accident.

(01:50:22):
But it's similar to what police say here when they
shoot someone multiple times in the back and then blame
it on the person that they murdered. In the family
that they destroyed X y Z, etcetera, etcetera. And just
to put it in perspective, Israeli forces have killed over
two hundred and fifteen Palestinians this year, making it the

(01:50:44):
deadliest year and over a decade. Israel is the one
who does not see Palestinians, as has proven time and
time again by their actions as human beings. Something so
significant is that the public support of Palestinians solidarity has
not been confined to only fans of Arab nations. Brazilian

(01:51:05):
fans also proudly raised the Palestinian flag, and Uruguay supporters
have been spotted donning the Kofeia, which is the symbolic
black and white scarf that has become a symbol of
Palestinian resistance, and they're also wearing pro Palestinian shirts, with
fans insisting the Palestinian people deserve freedom. One clip that

(01:51:25):
also went viral on social media featured an English fan who,
during an interview with an Arabic channel, confessed that as
Arabic wasn't really that strong, and then he shouted free
Palestine and great Arabic and then he broke into this free, free,
free chant with everyone around him again joyful, beautiful stuff.

(01:51:45):
That just proves that this kind of support works, and
it grows and it spreads, and so all of this
really goes to show is that while Arab governments have
been normalizing relations with Israel, that sentiment is not reflected
in the streets, and Arabs and non Arabs alike are
more passionate than ever about the Palestinian cause. Some Palestinians

(01:52:08):
living in Cutold have referred to the World Cup as
a quote golden opportunity to introduce our cause, and this
intent has been received enthusiastically, to say the least. And
yet in the face of such an unavoidable talking point,
there's been a striking, if not unsurprising, radio silence from
Western media. It's a huge reason why I wanted to

(01:52:30):
talk about this in an episode. I found it so
strange that my family and friends who were tuned into
the World Cup, we're constantly talking about something that hasn't
been covered at all by Western media, at least not
in a real honest way. If anything, the World Cup
has ignited a Islamophobic and orientalists tropes in some Western

(01:52:52):
news coverage, which I think is so shameful. For example,
I'm going to go through a little list that Al
Jazeera shared. A Dutch newspaper published a cartoon of Moroccan
men stealing the World Cup trophy. And this image, they're
on a bike and they're grabbing this trophy from a
white man. They're depicted as not white, obviously, and it

(01:53:18):
just reinforces these stereotypes of young Arab men in the
Netherlands being seen as criminals. Another example is Okay, so
when Muslims put up an index finger, it's what we
call dak weed, which is to signify the oneness of God,

(01:53:39):
because Islam there's only one God, just like all the
Big Three as far as religions go. But when these
Muslim teams are winning, the gestures from the players, like
sometimes you'll see a player raising an index finger, are
raising two index fingers. And so this fucking German TV
news anchor responded to Moroccos excess by suggesting that these

(01:54:02):
players that are raising their index fingers are showing support
for Isis. And some fans have responded to this with humor,
but at the same time it's like you're laughing only
because it's sad and maddening. Another example is a cartoon
in a French newspaper. It depicted Cathos national team as
bearded caricatures that were playing soccer holding rifles and machete's.

(01:54:27):
Is such an ugly cartoon and I have no idea
why they insist on making these artistic depictions. I think
they know because it's gone people riled up in the past.
It's almost like they're like poking the bear. So it's
kind of annoying. That's so childish in my opinion, but again,
terrible depiction of Arabs, what's new. And then another example

(01:54:50):
is a photo caption in a British newspaper stated that
Cathodies are not used to seeing women in Western clothing,
when in reality about population is from other countries, including
western ones, and this caption was later removed. Another example,
yes there's still more, is that a French journalist joked

(01:55:14):
about there being a lot of Mosques in Clethod as
if that was something like notable to be aware of. Yeah, no, ship,
people are sucking Muslim And then a Danish TV channel
literally compared Morocco's players who were celebrating by hugging their
mothers on the field. They compared them with monkeys on

(01:55:34):
live television TV two News. They showed a segment in
which the anchor Sore and Lippert he held up an
image of monkeys embracing while talking about Morocco's national team
players hugging their mothers. And while comparing black and brown
people with monkeys is a common, unsurprising racist trope, it

(01:55:56):
was still pretty upsetting to see what happened in this
year of two whatever. I just think the obvious orientalist
nature of Western news really um came out in full
force for some of this coverage. But yeah, I just
think these kind of depictions and coverage, it reinforces stereotypes
that are harmful and shameful, and it further makes immigrants

(01:56:21):
and people of color in countries that they immigrant to
just get terrorized. And I just wanted to bring up
some examples to remind you that news sucks most of
the time. Okay, the World Cup and all the joy
and pride that's come from it is all my family,
and I'm sure most air families have talked about for

(01:56:41):
the last month, and I feel like it barely registers here.
You have no idea how happy I've seen my parents,
and my mom in particular just text me updates, are
watching a game with me. We're all so united in
a way that I haven't felt before, and it's just
really beautiful, and it reminds you that borders are all

(01:57:03):
made up and in the end, we're all the same
people fighting for the same things. Notoriously, large sections of
US and British media have engaged in the practice a
deceptive framing and untrue coverage when it comes to covering
Israel's treatment of Palestinians. We've seen this in inaccurate headlines,

(01:57:23):
the twisting of words, and the general constant anti Palestinian
and pro Israel bias that is almost always present when
Western media talks about Palestine, and if Palestine rises in
the political agenda, western media is quick to disparage it.
In the UK, when a Labor Party candidate made reference

(01:57:45):
to Palestine during a campaign in one the liberal leaning
New Statesman magazine referred to it as quote unhinged and
an obsession. British Palestinian writer again Hamazali sha rights in
his article do people suffering from decades of cruelty deserve support?

(01:58:06):
Apparently not if they're Palestinian. It's characteristic of this bias
that while human rights have been a hot topic throughout
the World Cup, and fans across the world are being
commanded to speak out against injustice. The outpouring of Palestinian
solidarity has largely been ignored, and this, unfortunately isn't surprising,

(01:58:28):
but it doesn't make it any less disappointing, he continues,
as it maintains its rule. Israel has spent years, with
unconditional assistance from the Western world, cracking down and suppressing
Palestinian solidarity. We are under no illusions that the outpouring
of support at the World Cup will cause the occupation

(01:58:48):
to grind to a halt or prevent Palestinians from being killed.
As a British Palestinian, he says, I often see the
misery of my family who are living under occupation gets
swept under the carpet by the international community. As a result,
it's hard not to exist in a perpetual state of despondency.
But seeing the Palestinian flag hoisted so proudly during the

(01:59:12):
World Cup has been heartening because it provides new grounds
for hope and it shows that this is by no
means a solo struggle and that the commitment to palestinean
liberation remains as unshakable as ever. That was the end
of his article, and uh, that's a great place to

(01:59:32):
end because that was fucking great and poetic. And I
hope that you also go watch the movie on Netflix.
It's really important and it all goes hand in hand
with supporting the Palestinian people and continuing to raise awareness
because that's a huge reason why we've gotten this far,

(01:59:53):
and the culmination of all of that being broadcast from
the World Cup internationally. It's just been really really incredible
and beautiful to watch. And uh, yeah, that's the episode
until next time. I don't know, go watch. That's the

(02:00:14):
only thing I can really say. And I hope you
all have nice holidays whatever you do. Um yeah, have fun, goodbye,

(02:00:40):
Welcome Today could happen here. It's it's the last episode
that that that we're that I'm recording this year. Um yeah,
I'm your host. Be along, and today we are going
to tell you a story of the Republican Party using
extensive political violence and attempt to manipulate an election to
install their unelected presidential Canada as dictator of the United States.

(02:01:01):
And of by this, of course, I am referring not
to the election, but to the election of two thousand's okay,
So for for for those of you who do not
remember this story, and this is okay. I was like
three when this was happening. But weirdly, I have a
very very this is legitimately one of my first memories.

(02:01:23):
Is just I have the words engraved into my mind
hanging chads, and so we we we will get to
what exactly that is. But the two thousand election was
one of the most chaotic elections in the history of
the United States. Now, the US has a long history
of really really weird elections. I mean, you know, from

(02:01:46):
from from the serbspective of sort of like is the
U s representative democracy? I think there's a pretty good
argument that no election until like after the Civil Rights
Act is even sort of a legitimate election. But you know,
I mean, and and so far as you like consider
elections to be legitimate, which you know, okay, but you

(02:02:09):
know that the US is no is no stranger to
someone winning an election than not taking office. There are,
in fact, there are if you if you go back
into American history, there are two different elections that are
called the corrupt bargain Um. There's uh, John Quincy Adams,
and I think it's makes this really really weird alliance

(02:02:30):
with the original American political Slee's ball Henry Clay to
get himself and solved as president. Although that that that's
an election that's like truly an election where there are
no heroes, where it's it's John Quincy Adams Henry Clay
allying to bring down Andrew fucking Jackson. So you know,

(02:02:53):
no no heroes there. There. There's there's another election after Reconstruction,
which is the end of Reconstruction, where the Republican Party
literally trades and like trades ending Reconstruction for putting their
president in office. After a truly genuinely wild set of
voting results happens, we're like all of the votes are

(02:03:14):
in a box and the two parties are fighting over
like who's going to count the votes because the guy
who counts the votes from like the box is the
person who's going to determine who wins the election. And
so there's this whole negotiated thing where the eight d
like racist Southern Democrats, are like, okay, we'll we'll give you,
we'll we'll give you this election if you promised the

(02:03:35):
pull troops out of the South. So okay, you know,
American elections have always been sort of more fraudulent than
people give them credit for. But the two thousand election,
even by the standards of like an American election, is
some bullshit. So let's let's let's go back. Let's go
back to the origin of the story. The year is
two thousand. For the last time in human history, humanity

(02:03:58):
has taken collective action to stopping in penny catastrophe, having
by the heartrending labor of a bunch of siss admins,
including a guy that I knew growing up who spent
fucking New Year, who literally spent New Year's Eve until
the bell ring, like basically in a closet with a
bunch of computers at his job trying to make sure
what UK wouldn't happen. But you know, we did it,

(02:04:19):
Actually we we actually did it. There was there was
there was like, you know, there was human collective action
to stop a major catastrophe from happening. And Al Gore,
a Democrat who claims to have invented the Internet, is
running against Harvard educated Harvard and actually Yale educated oil
man caused playing as a cowboy whose name is George Bush,

(02:04:40):
and I, oh god, I don't know, I don't I
feel like people have kind of forgotten how really genuinely
sleazy George Bush was. Like he he has this sort
of public like, you know, one of the reasons he
wins elections, and he has his public images like the
guy who you know, like everyone like he he's the
presidential candidate you'd want to have a beer with. But again,

(02:05:02):
like literally everything from he's like public mannerisms down to
like the minutia of his accent to like the stupid
cowboy hat that he wears. All of this this is
a bullshit, right, This is a fucking Harvard guy, And
all of this is you know, completely intricately manufactured by
a set a set of like very very very like

(02:05:25):
sleazy but incredibly ruthless and efficient Republican political operatives. Now,
George Bush's father is George H. W. Bush, who was
the first and only director of the CIA to become president.
So yeah, but Bush bushes running on this sort of
neo conservative alliance of Texas oil men, evangelical hardliners, and

(02:05:46):
weapons contractors. Um. The weapons contractors part uh winds up
being incredibly relevant when nine eleven happens, and both Bush
and Dick his code what's it called vice presidential I
guess candidate at the time, but it is vice presidential selection.
Dick Cheney, who is like Dick Cheney like saying that

(02:06:09):
he's like the physical human embodiments of the military industrial
complex is under selling how closely tied um Dick Cheney
is to the military dustrial complex. And you know, like
this is this is part of the reason why the
warn Rock happens because again, like this entire coalition is
just like it is, it is the it is is
the sort of height of the military petro dollar coalition,

(02:06:33):
just a a coalition of pere evil like fueled by
war profits and homophobia. And but you know, part part
of part of what's been happening in in this entire
period is this is this is the year after the
Battle of Seattle on the anti globalization movement hasn't been
smashed again. This is there's other things. This is pre
nine eleven, right, This is this is a very very

(02:06:55):
short period of time where like in between the Battle
of Seattle and UH eleven, where American politics are very
very very weird, and you get another thing that we
don't really have now, but from the nineties until about
nine eleven kind of existed where that which was that

(02:07:18):
there was a period where third party is kind of
mattered ish like Ross Pirot like in the nineties. Arguably
maybe could have won the election if vietn't just like
given up. But yeah, you know. And one of the
sort of products of this is that the Green Party
is actually a real thing in in two thousands in

(02:07:39):
a way that they're kind of not right. And then
this has been this this sort of unfolding of a
bunch of left wing social movements into which is absolutely
disastrous attempt to enter party politics. Um, but they pull,
you know, and this is the thing that no one
has ever heard the end of, but they pull a
bunch of votes into Ralph Nader in Florida, which winds
up being a big deal. But the product of this

(02:08:03):
is that this election is on a just on a
knife's edge. Both sides of this election are unbelievably close.
The entire election comes down to Florida. Now, the problem
with the entire election coming down to Florida is that
the American electoral system is a fucking joke. It is
a disaster. It is a a genuine embarrassment. The United

(02:08:24):
States is a country that has more resources than like,
it has enough resources that, like Genghis Khan would weep like,
it has a genuinely unfathomable amounts of resources, and its
election system is basically run by a bunch of weird

(02:08:49):
dipshit like party if like local like a weird patchwork
of like completely underfunded and overworked local government officials who
never have real budgets and who just spends like two
months not sleeping with their like three co workers trying
to make the elections work. And this is really weird

(02:09:10):
because like most places on Earth that have elections, um,
there's like, you know, a national thing that sort of
does the elections in the US, Like no, no, it
relies heavily on volunteers. It's just like this weird patchwork
quilt of stuff, and Florida being Florida, a bunch of
stuff goes very wrong very quickly. Um. There There's two

(02:09:34):
very famous ballot problems, the most famous of which is
hanging chads. So okay, okay, what what what? What is
the hanging chat For people who have forgotten? Are people
who you know, weren't alive then, which I realize is
I man, the fact that the fact that I have
coworkers who are not alive for hanging chads is really
really disturbing thought. But okay, so what is a hanging

(02:09:56):
chat um? The answer is that in Florida, the way
this ballot works is that you have to physically punch
holes in your ballot. And you know, you punch a
hole in the place, like, okay, so today, right when
you fill in a ballot, you have to like fill
in a square right with a pencil in in in Florida,
you have to like hole punch that square. This is

(02:10:17):
maybe the worst ballot design I can possibly imagine, and
it goes terribly wrong. A bunch of these whole punches
basically don't actually remove all the paper. And there's there
are so many ways, so many ways that this gets
sucked up. The hanging chat is the most famous one.
That hanging so a chad Basically, it's the piece of

(02:10:39):
paper that when you punch the thing with like the
whole punch it's supposed to like, it's the paper that
comes out of the hole. Right. Hanging chad is when
you do the whole punch thing. But the chat is
still connected to the piece of paper by like one corner.
But but but again less less. Do you think there's

(02:11:00):
only one way that these ballots get sucked up? No, no, no, no, no,
there's there are like, there are an unfathomable number of
ways that these ballots don't punch correctly. They're they're swinging
door chairs, there's tried chairs, there's did bull chairs, there's
pregnant chats. It's unbelievable. And a bunch of people's votes
just don't get counted because these ballots. The reason they're

(02:11:23):
doing these whole bunch ballots that these are these are
you know, this is what it's supposed to be, like
the fancy new like voting technology. Right then, then the
new vote technology is the voting machines. And the way
the voting machine works is basically, the voting machine can
check if if if there's a hole there, and if
there's a hole in the paper, then it counts you
as the accounts that as the vote. But if the
entire chad hasn't been punched out, it won't count your vote.

(02:11:44):
This is a problem. And there's another problem, uh, and
and that problem is the butterfly ballot. So the butterfly
ballot was original. Is this ballot they're using in Florida
that was originally designed to help elderly voters? Um, it's
supposed to be. The goal all of the ballot is
to have larger thought sizes to make it more accessible
for people. Which this is good, right, like, okay, I

(02:12:05):
I support I support accessible design. Is put accessible design
for voting. The problem is this ballot is designed like ship.
The way it works is there's a two page ballot
with like a crease in the middle. Right. It's it's
kind of like a book, right, like you unfold the
book in the middle of the ballot, you know, And
on both of these pages there are like the different

(02:12:27):
different candidate names and parties. The problem is, in order
to pick a candidate, you have to punch just like
a whole. You have to punch one of the one
of these served circles. But these circles are in a
line down the middle of the crease of the ballot, right,
so you have you have candidates on both You should
you should google what these look like because it's kind
of hard to explain. But basically what's happening is that

(02:12:48):
there are there are different party names on each side
of the ballot. But then in order to pick which
party you're voting for, you have to pick for a
specific hole that's supposed to be next you the like
the candidate you supported in the in the middle of
the page. Of the problem is these are all on
a line, right. They're on a straight line, which means
that two candidates can be like across from each other

(02:13:11):
on the same page or on on opposite pages. And
then there's two holes that are like right next because
because the holes are both in the middle of the ballot, right,
so that you have these situations where for example, for
and this is the one that's important. Inside of the
there's like two lines and then there's like it says
al Gore and Lieberman in it, right, and inside of

(02:13:31):
those two lines in the in the in the middle
of the page, there are two holes, and one of
these holes votes for Core. But the other one of
those holes, I is for the candidate on the other
side of the page, which is Reformed Party candidate Crimtinal
Fascist Goal path Bu Canon. And the result of this,
it says, people start looking through these things. Pap Bu

(02:13:51):
Canon has a bunch of voters from Democratic Party strongholds
and like also particularly like like a bunch of like
Democratic Catholic voters vote for Buchanan, and Buchanan himself is like,
there's no way this is real. Like Buchanan's like, you know,
he's he's a figure will probably like one day do

(02:14:12):
a like we'll probably talk about more on this podcast. Yeah,
that those behind the Baschard's episode about him, he is
a he is a fucking Nazi. Uh, he sucks ass.
But he's also so he's from a kind of evangelical
who like really really really fucking hates Catholics. And you know,
so there's a bunch of these Catholic like Democratic voters

(02:14:33):
he voted for this guy, and everyone's like, what the
funk happened here? The thing that happened here is all
these people got confused. And yes, so this is a
disaster on a hundred million levels. And when we come
back from ads, we will talk about the product of
all of this, which is not good. Alright, we're back.

(02:14:55):
So on election night, the media starts to call Florida
for Gore based an exit pulling, but they start getting
calls for Republican political operatives saying hold no, hold on,
hold on, it's actually too close to call. And the
initial count from Florida has the Republican Party ahead. But

(02:15:15):
when I say the Hublican Party is ahead, they were
ahead by like six votes. And so this triggers a
mandatory recount. But and this, and this is another problem
with this, right we we we we've gone through at
length all of the problems with these ballots. Right the
recall that they do is a recall using the voting machines.
And those voting machines our guess what the ones that are.

(02:15:40):
If if you if you rerun a funked up Chad
ballot through the same voting machine, it's going to get
a fucked up result. So okay, So they run this
again and the difference in votes comes down to fle
five hundred votes. At this point, Gore's campaign requests a

(02:16:02):
manual recount. They want people to look at the balance
by hand and figure out who people actually voted for,
because these machines are a fucking shit show. But in
any kind of sort of like you know, and even
remotely competent or saying like democratic political system, there would
be a bunch of people doing this like they're there.
You know, like when when an election happens, they would

(02:16:24):
be just a very very large number of people mobilized
to make sure that it runs smoothly. There's not. There's
like a bunch of like unbelievably overworked and underpaid. Some
people are people who also people who are just sucking volunteers,
like a bunch of just random like unbelievably exhausted, like
local election officials who have to do this recount. And

(02:16:47):
this is where the Bush campaign sees their chance to
steal the election. So the election happens on November seven,
and on November eleven, the Bush campaign sues to stop
the recount. Now, we talked on a previous episod known
a while back about the Democrats how they have this
line in the two thousand's about how they're part of
the quote reality based community, and how this is a

(02:17:09):
reflection of you know, if you look at the whole quote,
which is from a Republican political strategist, I what's actually
what they're saying here is that what's happening is that
the Democrats observe reality. Well, the Republicans set out to
define reality. And this is the moment, this election is

(02:17:29):
where we get to see how the dynat we we
we we we get to like really first see these
these principles in action. I'm gonna read from the Washington
Post here. Unlike the Gore campaign, which focused on filing
motions in Florida courts to keep the recount going in
key counties like Miami Dodd, the Bush campaign waged a broader,
costlier effort on multiple fronts. Blakeman said it was a

(02:17:53):
three pronged effort. He said, it was a court battle,
it was a recount organization, and it was also a
pr effort because although the voting effort ended, the campaign
never did until there was a definitive winner. So what
happens here is Republicans start this massive media blitz to
convince people that Bush actually won the election. And this

(02:18:13):
this is a really really important moment in sort of
American history because it's one of the things that solidifies,
um It's one of the things that solidifies sort of
like like owning the lib for example. It's like a
major point, and it's like like one of like the
key focal points of America of Republican politics. And this
is eventually gonna consume like all of their politics right
until when we get this sort of you know, like

(02:18:35):
now right where that's like owning the Libs is the
only thing this is about. You know, this this had
owning the Libs is kind of like it's it's been
a part of Republican politics for a long time. But
this is where we really start to see it sort
of consuming everything. And Okay, if you look at their
like like what they're saying, by modern standards, it is
incredibly weak ship. Right, this is like this is a
culture that is just a bourge from the es. Nobody

(02:18:58):
has invented real posted yet, but it is really on
the lip stuff. Like they have this whole campaign where
they call the Goyal Libramain campaign sore loser Man, and
everyone has like sore loser man hats and like they
have all these like printed signs and like T shirts
and they're selling merch and you know, and so you know,
they're running basically an OP and they're running an OPT

(02:19:20):
to convince everyone that like, no, actually we legitimately won
this election and it's over and the recounts just people
being but heard they lost. And this is where things
get really really weird. So in Miami, DoD where there's
a manual recount going on. A bunch of protesters in
fancy suits show up and starts screaming at election workers. Now,

(02:19:44):
if this was the old Democratic Party machine like LBJ
would have personally pushed six of these guys out a window,
and the recount would have been run by like sixty
of the earliest dudes, the entire Chicago mob. But this
is the the incredibly decrepit two thousand Democratic Party, who
have replaced all their mob guys with consultants. And these
people legitimately, like you know, they believe in the rules

(02:20:07):
and the norms and the process. And the result of
this is that Bush literally destroys the entire United States,
and I think, like irrevocably damaged, like the entirety of
the of you know, like what what whatever is left
to the American democratic system. So how how this has achieved?

(02:20:28):
But back in Miami DoD this Democratic Party operative is
seen walking around the recount area with a ballot. Now
this is a blank ballot, right, this guy is going
to see He's going with an election official to go
see if he can replicate like the like how the
hay h has stuff happens to prove that like this
is what's going on. But they Problicans see this guy

(02:20:48):
and they immediately start screaming about how the Democrats are
staling in the election, and they like beat this ship
out of this guy, and just a full on riot
starts in this government building and it works. The recount stops.
The election workers are terrified. The recount. Yeah, like the

(02:21:09):
all like everything stopped for the day. They can't do anything.
And the next day the recount is fully stopped. It
never resumes, and the Republicans are sunned by this. They
assumed that, like, you know, the political operatives doing the rioting,
we're gonna like face some oppositions to the Democrats on
the ground for you know, like literally assaulting and intimidating

(02:21:30):
a bunch of election workers in order to like stop
votes from being counted. But there's they they don't, there's
there's nothing, there's no resistance at all. Um. Here's a
quote from Douglas Hay, who is there a Republican political
operatives who is one of the organizers of the Brooks
Brothers riot, who he tried to do a redemption arc
in the media to sort of like be like, oh

(02:21:53):
I was part of the Brooks Brothers riot. But even
I think the stop the steel stuff is bad, which,
like I think man doth protest too much. Um, here's
just the quote. I still don't understand how it was
that we completely outmatched the Democrats, Hey says, and this
is how Bush wins the election the Supreme Court, which

(02:22:13):
again it should also be know the Streme Court is
staffed by a bunch of George H. W. Bush appointees. Um.
Eventually here's the Clayic case and decides that the constitution
says that the winner the winner has to be declared
by a certain times, so there's no time for a recount,
and they have the election to Bush. And this is achieved.
And this is possible because of the Brooks Brothers riot
and the Brooks Brothers, right, is what this whole sort

(02:22:35):
of republican opertor things comes to be known because they're
all wearing Brooks Brothers suits. Um. Now, okay, there are
a lot of people involved in this riot who are
like at the core of modern republican politics. Um. Yeah,
Neil Gorrich and Amy COLEMYN. Barritt, and I think there's
actually one other like Paris and Republicans of elevated senior office.

(02:22:56):
There are multiple people on the Supreme Court today who
were on the Wish legal team when they were doing this.
And you know, there's also the question of the extent
to which roger Stone is involved. If you asked roger Stone,
he claims to have organized literally this entire thing. Um. Now,
other people who were involved with they claimed that roger
Stone was like fucked off at a hotel somewhere else

(02:23:19):
and didn't was just sort of around and didn't actually
organize it. But either way, this set up precedent for
how you can rig an election, which is if you
if you can seize the majority on the Supreme Court.
Was sort of like when you know, you can put
your sort of loyal minions there and then you can
have an initial count of an election that looked that

(02:23:42):
that that looks like it's favoring you, even if that's
not actually true. If you then have an initial count
of an election that says that you win, and then
you can stop and then you were able to stop
votes from being counted, uh from November until January, you
will win the election. That that that that is the
precedents that was installed by by the two thous election

(02:24:05):
and if you look at the Stop the Still campaign,
this is exactly what Trump is trying to do. And
literally Roger Stone is also trying to do this, right, Um,
this is this is this is this is what stop
is Still is. I you can you can find Trump
talking about this months before the election, right this, this,
this is why he was trying to do his whole
thing about about the mail in ballots because he and

(02:24:28):
Roger Stone and sort of all the political operators whore
involved in the circles were like, okay, so we know
that like a bunch of Democrats are gonna do mail
in ballots because of COVID because they don't want to
be there at the ballots. They know that the initial
count is going to favor them. And I think people
have forgotten this, but if you remember the the night
of the election in I remember like like even a
bunch of my friends who were like people who were

(02:24:49):
you know, like like fairly serious, like I don't know
politics nowhere, people were really deeply invested in politics, like
thought that Trump had won the election because what would
have been counted on that night was just was just
the sort of initially wasn't counting the mail in ballots,
and so yeah, the plan was just to de legitimate

(02:25:09):
mail in ballots in the eyes of of sort of
the well mostly the Republican based, but like sort of
the American populacets the whole, and then have a bunch
of people physically assault these centers to get them to
stop the places with these votes are being counted, to
get them to stop the count and it doesn't work.
And it doesn't work I think partially because but yeah,

(02:25:33):
those feelings, Like one of the things is that you
know you can't if you're gonna do a play like this,
you have to run it like you you are relying
on the sort of physical intimidation of the court workers.
But mostly what you need to do is make sure

(02:25:53):
that it's stuck in a court fight. And the problem
is that like the sort of modern like trump Ace
people like they don't have any competent lawyers. The root
of Giuliani is like trying to do this ship or whatever.
But like that guy, I don't know that that guy
may have known what a law was in like ninety three,

(02:26:16):
but his brain has been just melted by like inhaling
cigars smoke and truly copious about of drugs, so you know,
they're not they're not really able to sort of pull
this off. But Bush is and the result of this
is the American reaction about eleven is the war in

(02:26:38):
the Rock is basically the the the sort of complete
annihilation of like the content like this is slightly an exaggeration,
but like the concept of freedom in the US, like
the ability for you not to be constantly surveiled, the
ability for you to like you know, live live in

(02:27:01):
a society in which there's like every single thing you
do isn't being monitored by a thousand different kinds of
police stations who are all sharing your tweets so they
can fucking grab people out off of the road, sucking
unmarked fans, right, Like, that's all stuff that is a
specific product of the sort of kind of fascism at
the Bush administration deploys and they're a we'll do this

(02:27:23):
because they just try to stole an election, and now
we all we all sort of just live in in
the permanent afterlife of the Brooks Brothers riot. This is
what January sixth was. This is what stop the Steel is,
and it's what the that's what the modern Republican Party
is so yeah. It's happy holidays everyone. I hope you
have a good new Year. And uh inslaw. We will

(02:27:44):
destroy these fashion Republican bastards and make sure that none
of them ever get to do this again. Hello, Ulu,

(02:28:07):
welcome to another episode of It could happen here with
a twist. Um, this is the holiday special answer for that. UM,
So you know, buckle up, you know Santa might make
an appearance. UM. I don't want to take a moment
to discuss, you know, this whole idea of Christmas. This

(02:28:30):
practice is globally celebrated cultural festivity, and I guess on
the not to be stereotypically leftist, but the issues I
have with it alongside UM, I think some of the
ah best UM and most I think UM hopeful elements

(02:28:54):
within it. I don't know about the rest of you. UM.
And by the way, I'm joined by Garrison andterest for
I'm very excited we get we get to finally talk
about the issue that I've been wanting to talk about
ever ever since we started the show. How telling your

(02:29:15):
kids that Santa exists is actually child abuse? This is
very exciting. I'm glad we can have this civil discussion
to to to cover these these hard hitting topics that
are impacting us most in Are you trying to say
this like a Santin's abolitionist or something. Yes, I think

(02:29:35):
the fact that we condone lying to children in this
way every Christmas is I'm sorry, but that's that's so
politically unrealistic. I don't know how you have a platform.
Can't take that seriously. Um, it teaches our kids not
to trust us. Um. It starts. It is really an
extension of the great Man theory that Santa as this

(02:29:55):
man is the only one capable of delivering all these presents.
I think it's I think it's quite. Are you trying
to say so it's a manifestation of patriarchy. That's right,
it is. It is quite. It's it's quite problematic. Um.
You know those elves are not getting paid. You know
that Santa has tried to bust unions at his workshop
every year. Um. I don't think this reindeer are treated

(02:30:16):
very well. Um. There is a whole, a whole lot
of issues here. Yeah, it's a normalization of the surveillance state.
It right on the shelf classic, Yeah, elf on the
shelf came to rise after the Patriot Act was introduced
to condition American children into thinking it's okay to always
be watched. This is it's it's this, this, this is sick.

(02:30:37):
Parents are culpable in promoting this myth. Um, I think
this needs to be addressed. You know what I think,
you know what I think. I think you all need
to be Christmas bill. I don't know about show, but
I love I love Christmas, I think, Um, I think
it's I think we need to take a Christmas bill. Um.
You know, of course the actual gift getting hasn't been

(02:30:59):
the best. Especially want to get past une, just like, okay,
this is what it is then. But you know, the
the unity and the joy and the excitement, I mean
what about that? You know, the color, the food and
the drink, getting people together, um, catching up. You know,
celebrated in many different ways, religiously and non religiously. And

(02:31:20):
of course it's not even celebrated at all, um in
some places and with some people. Um. And you know,
there are other religious observances and holidays around this time.
They don't like Kannaka and concer and whatever else. But
you know, I think a lot of us are most
familiar with Christmas, and I think we're, you know, mostly

(02:31:41):
familiar with the origins of Christmas. That's not the kind
of episode we're getting into here. Um. I think you know,
we all known about Jesus and you and sat Anlia
and all that fun stuff. Knows it about Charles Dickens
and Scrooge and of course the the diagram of Scrooge

(02:32:04):
and cringe. And you know whether or not those two
concepts will a lap. But I want to look more
to these sort of you know, ideas of what Christmas is,
what it means, you know, um, and really how a
lot of our society's issues come to the forefront around
this time of year. Um, the scourge of Scrooge is

(02:32:26):
particularly apparent. I mean, for many, Christmas is basically capitalism
on steroids. For one, UM and Santa have to sort
of promote that from an early age as a propaganda
tool of the capitalists, as I'm sure would m would.
Thank you, thank you, thank you. Great. Well that's the

(02:32:48):
episode everybody. Again. I hope you I hope you have
a good holiday season. Oh wait, I think Andrew is
more to say. Yeah, I think we're wrapping up a
little bit EARLYI there, you know, but you know, we
can't talk about the fact that you know, Santa really
is um a big fan of this like ultimate now
you know, there's GDP growth sull of inducing this this

(02:33:11):
pro growth ist capitalist production for production, seek consumption for
consumption sake, like the idea that Santa expects children to
write and request something from him every single year. Um,
that he he, he stakes an entire holiday upon his
own business and upon his own you know production, whole

(02:33:35):
industrial apparatus a center around this one event, um. And
I mean the sort of consumption we see around Christmas season,
it's like it ramps up, you know, online stores, department stores,
malls just burst in with with people um looking to
bye bye bye all around the world. In America, at
least twenty nineteen so Americans spent over one trillion dollars

(02:33:58):
just in the Christmas see done. I mean, it's just
glorious excess, honestly. And of course there's also the excessive
you know, decorating and shopping and drinking and the us
and sort of arrities with those things. And that sort
of over indulgence is part of what's seriously harm on
the planet. Not to you know, blame individuals and exclusively

(02:34:23):
because you know, obviously the sort of thing is encouraged
by you know, advertising and by the entire industries that
builds around around this, this idea of consumerism. But the
holiday is basically, you know, you know, it's become this
thing where the focal point is to indulge, to splooge,
to consume um. And you see a lot of Christmas

(02:34:45):
movies too, I mean Christmas of the Crowns is when
particularly iconic example. And with all this you know consumerism,
it feels like we lose sight of the purpose, you know,
of the gift giving. I don't think we've lost our
selves less nature. I think we've lost some of the
within it. I think it's by design a natural tendency
to care for the people in our lives are sort

(02:35:05):
of exploited. Um, you know, we're expected by the systems,
are super hyper competitively in spirital coupitlism. But now we
have to be super generous and caring around this time
of year. But just in a way that just so
happens to profit campus anyway. It's like, yeah, yeah, be generous,
be caring and stuff by this gift for you know,

(02:35:26):
you know, you loved one and I will pocket the change.
And I don't think it has to be that way.
But the commercialization of what we're wants wholly days is
you know, it tends to do that. And of course
with all these soup kitchens and can food drives and
Red Cross Santa's outside groceries, building and for some donations.

(02:35:48):
Um and by the way, it don't donate the Red
Cross that kind of problematic. Salvation Army do not do
not donative salvation Salvation my bad, I'm back. I think
that's confusing them. Red Cross just takes credit for anarchist
projects in the relief of disasters and salation Harmy hates

(02:36:11):
gay people, so it also has also has shot anarchists.
I think they don't talk about very much. Well damn,
that should probably be an episode. Yeah, there's another way
of that, but yeah, yeah, you know, it's like all
this stuff is happening, and it's like this sort of

(02:36:32):
performance of all of a sudden, we care about, um,
what's the name of that little kid from Christmas Carol,
Tiny Tim? All of a sudden, we care about Tiny Tim.
In a system that literally requires an impoverished base of people,
you know, poverty is certainly this virtue that we we

(02:36:55):
look to help Tom meliorate to be careful. You know,
we we want to uplift the tiny him as we're
gonna warm the hearts of the Scrooge McDuck's of the
world the rest of the year. It's just like, oh, well,
in this underclass is a patrol and the class needs
to exist. I think the extension of our tendency towards
mutually throughout the year and across bonds of kid and

(02:37:17):
on kind of like, um, it's something that we should
pursue um to prefigure a gift economy um, not just
around a particular season, but year round. I think that
is both while exercise to look into and of course

(02:37:37):
I think an ideal you would want to see. I
guess we could call us my Christmas wish UM readjustment
to this sort of consumption around this time of year,
the one that is done with a sort of ad
growth mindset. One of his cognizance of local condition is
the one that seeks to reduce food miles, socalize the

(02:37:59):
production can some shown. So that's I guess wish number
one Christmas wish number one. Let's um, let's make a
gift economy rather than a capitalist gift consumption day. And
of course I think our next Christmas wish on this
topic would be a wish for work abolition. You know,

(02:38:20):
with all that consumption happening around this time, yet it
really does a number on the service and manufacturing and
delivery and SOT and so forth workers around the world.
You know, work sucks in general, but it's extra sucks
around this time of year. Um, you know, with sweatshop labor,
with retail hell around this season, it's really opposite of

(02:38:43):
peace on you for a good chunk of the working class.
You could call it the season for overworking. And it's
not just for um, you know, gears, token oppressed group,
you know, the elves, like the other workers that the
exploits it that we should probably be championing. Yeah, we

(02:39:05):
we talked about this in a couple of China episodes
that I did. But one of the big reasons for
the sort of huge like workers up risings in China
in the last like a few weeks was that like
basically a bunch of people got locked into a factory
because Fox Gone and Apple were trying to hit their
Christmas like production targets. And people started fighting the cops

(02:39:28):
because they were like, this actually sucks. I don't want
to be stuck in here being lied to by how
much I'm going to get paid so that these companies
can have their Christmas sales. I mean, yeah, definitely. I
think it's completely fair to say that the worker elves
are very mistreated. Um. But with the exception I think

(02:39:49):
of specifically the elf on the shelf elves. I don't
think those count as workers. Elves are cops. They only
function as niches for the surreal state. So yes, the
elf workers are are mistreated um and should unionize and
and should should deserve way more support and possibly even
the abolition of of work. But the elf on the

(02:40:10):
shelf elves are not workers. I think that's a that's
an important distinction. Yeah. Yeah, it's like the class strators
more than anything, exactly. Yeah, very blatantly. So yeah, it
really is, you know, the season for overworken. You know,
with all this, it's very interesting that that's really what

(02:40:32):
triggered the protests in China. I mean, I would love
to see celebrations and festivals have given in any sort
of an archic society, but it doesn't fail. No, it's
at the right these festivities UM built on the exploitation
of others. I mean, what kind of celebration it's we

(02:40:52):
had when people are suffering in such a capacity to
produce that sort of celebration. And speaking of suffering, I think, um,
there are a lot of people who suffer through family
around this time of year. And I think some people
actually appreciate having to work through the holidays because it

(02:41:13):
means they don't have to deal with said family. And
I mean family is a big focus and the sort
of culture of Christmas. But you know, unlike the greeting
cards and the billboards and stuff, not everyone's family is
picture perfect and holiday is often open a lot of
wounds and heightened re read for a lot of people. UM.

(02:41:34):
People consume to hear people um, and a lot of
toxicity and intoxication is brought under one roof during TRUSTMA celebrations,
bigotree abuse, that sort of thing. It's not a fun
time for some people. And I think it's important in
the season and in general to let go of this

(02:41:55):
sort of patriarchal and restricting designation of family in favor
of something that is more subject to choice, to agency,
to consent to you know, more expanded forms of kinship,
bringing people together who care for and enjoy and want
to share each other's company, you know, create a new traditions,

(02:42:16):
to build new bonds of solarity and care. UM. I think,
you know, opportunities like these, Seasons like these enable us
to demonstrate the veracity of the liberation that can be
had in our projects. I think it's something that a
lot of people need around this season because mental health

(02:42:39):
boways seem to worsen around this time of year. They
often toxic culture of Christmas could be clearly bad people's
mental health. You know, it's loneliness and depression and suicide
and the struggle to care for your basic needs that
alone and joy the season, and it takes some big
tool on people's well being. You know, it's easy to

(02:43:00):
they all just go to therapy and whatever. But with
the inaccessibility of therapy and the fact that you know,
therapy is not necessarily a salve for material conditions, UM.
There needs to be a social safety net in place.
They must be healing in community and not just an
exolution UM. And so I think the season is an

(02:43:22):
opportunity for us to reflect on that and to you know,
try to avail ourselves to those whom we fay might
be suffering at this time. And if you yourself a
suffering and it's trying to reach out and sort of
engage in that sort of mutual mutual aid and mutual support,
I think there's a lot that we can reframe and

(02:43:43):
reconsider surrounding Christmas. I mean, for a season of kindness
and given it unfortunately hoots a lot of people, um,
but that can change, you know, through solidarity, through generosity,
through kinship, solidarity organized in the bottom of the extension
of the principle of mutually into everyday life. Redirecting our

(02:44:06):
generosity around this time from giving to the pockets of
billionaires to given to the people, um. To display our
capacity for well doing, to think locally, to think d
I y, to think meaningful rather than to just add
another thing to the Amazon card. And of course not
just physically giving gifts, but as being generous with our

(02:44:29):
time and our love and our care because we do
need each other, um, not just in this time, but
in general. I think bred Santa had some entertaining suggestions
of the season. To bred Santa, of course, being Peter Kropotkin,
he figured that we should all pose as Santa Clause

(02:44:50):
perhaps there as a subversion of what he represents as
a capitalist. We all pools as Santa Claus or as St. Nicholas,
and to infiltrate the stores and give way the toys.
Um and one postcard Krobakin route that of the night
before Christmas, we'll all be about while the people are sleeping.

(02:45:12):
We will realize or cloud will expropriate goods from the
stores because that's fair, and distribute them widely to those
we need care. So yeah, Merry Christmas and half of
your holidays to all and to all are good. Fight
for freedom. You can of course find me on YouTube

(02:45:40):
at androids um dot com slash and underscore seeing True,
and if you want, you can support me on picture
on dot com slash saying true. That's it for me
for this year, for it could happen here, So you're
next year great destroist icons Center Clause. Hey, we'll be

(02:46:06):
back Monday with more episodes every week from now until
the heat death of the Universe. It could happen here
is a production of cool Zone Media. For more podcasts
from cool Zone Media, visit our website cool zone media
dot com, or check us out on the I Heart
Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts,
you can find sources for It could happen here, Updated
monthly at cool zone media dot com slash sources. Thanks

(02:46:29):
for listening.