Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
By six by six seven eight alrise you rise, We Risebey Risebey Rise
Rise We rise, We rise,Rise Rise Rise, We rise, We
(00:25):
rise, Rise Rise, we rise, We rise, We rise, Riseley
Ride We Rise. Our community mediasponsors a Radically Fit and Gemini moon Botanicals
event Queer and Well ACUTEI Bipocableness Fair, with technical support from Poppers are Red
(00:50):
local DJs. We are sharing outthe speakers panels from this gorgeous Earth Day
gatherne. We are so excited toshare these recordings with you all. Queer
and Well is a queer, trans, Black, Indigenous, and people of
color centered wellness fare, including panelsdiscussing what environmental and social justice looks like
in tandem with community care as wecontinue to navigate capitalism and white supremacy.
(01:15):
More information and links to these speakerscan be found in show notes. We
hope you enjoy this brilliant dialogue.We'll jump into this recording hearing from Luca
Page, the founder of Radically FitOakland and one of the key organizers of
the event. The audio begins midsentence. Luca is introducing the panel round
(01:41):
queer and trans people being able tosteer away from institutions that are trying to
kill us is really important, andbeing able to show up for each other
and really move in practice with transformativejustice and abolition is an important message for
all of us and something that wereally center in the work that we do.
(02:05):
And we're really happy to have thefolks that are coming, so not
that they need any introduction, butI'll introduce them. We have Cat Brooks
with us from the Anti Police TerrorProjects, we have Christina Chase with us
from NAFA, and we have Lyellfrom Shelterwood Collective who will be leading the
conversation. So let's give it upfor our panelists and thank y'all so much
for being here. Yeah, Ijust ate a really big burrito, so
(02:35):
I'm really gonna need that energy hypefrom y'all for reals, Not that these
folks wouldn't already summon the biggest hypein the room, but if I could
get another round of applausis did getme in transition from this burrito digest,
I would really appreciate that. Thankyou, thank you, thank you so
much. How fortunate am I tobe up here with Christina with Kat like
(02:58):
I just feel so lucky and soblessed to transition from that initial conversation about
queer land stewardship projects and now reallytalking about the day to day work towards
abolition, towards really adjusting the medicalindustrial complex, thinking about the inclusivity of
disability, justice and what we needto build for us to survive, for
(03:19):
us to thrive as queer folks,as black folks, as indigenous folks,
as people of color. So thankyou, thank you for being here with
me, and I hope that Ido this conversation justice. I just want
to start off by giving folks somespace to talk about their work. What
are you advancing these days that iscoming up that you would love to share?
Christina, can we start with youand then we'll go with Kat.
(03:40):
All right, Hi, everybody,My name is Christina Chase. I'm on
the board of NAFA, which isthe National Association to Advance Fat Acceptance.
So our work mostly revolves around doingeducation, advocacy and support trying to end
size discrimination and create a better worldin lives for fat people across the country.
(04:01):
And we actually have a really coolwebinar happening tomorrow which is free from
the Fat Poets Society, So checkout our website if you'd like to participate
in that, and I will alsoshare that coming up in August is when
we celebrate Fat Liberation Month, sothat's when we have like the most of
our virtual events and programming, Sostay tuned for more from us in August
(04:26):
for Fat Liberation Month. Hello beloved, I am so so glad to be
in space with you all today.My team and I have spent the last
ten days trying to support the WoodStreet residents who are being violently evicted by
the City of Oakland through the utilizationof law enforcement. I'll get into some
(04:49):
specific asks if I can take liketwo minutes at the end for that,
because the fight continues. But I'mthe co founder and executive director of the
Anti Police Terror Project APTP is ablack letter right on. Thank you m
y'all. Give it up for thevolunteers because like I get to sit up
here and run my mouth a lot, but it's the volunteers that have been
(05:11):
busting their asses for almost fifteen yearsdoing the work. So we have a
little bit emission and that's just toeradicate state terror and communities of color,
and we actually believe that we cando that. And APTP was really born
to interrupt state terror in addition toresponding to it. Right, we spend
a lot of time from two thousandand nine to twenty eleven really in the
streets. For those of you thatwere here, you know that we just
(05:32):
all the time right, we wereshutting sit down, left, right,
and center. And then we hada conversation about what of that energy were
we funneling into things that actually wouldstop the genocide that is happening against black,
brown, Indigenous, queer disabled bodiesin this country. And so to
that, and we work really closelywith families. We do family support,
and that's everything from mental and emotionalsupport for our family group every week,
(05:57):
which also develops their skills and leadershipso they can take the rightful place in
their movement, to running to thestore for them right to mutual aid financial
support. We do policy work mostlyat the local and the state level.
We don't do policy work that reinforcesthe status quo. You're never going to
see APTP advocating for body cameras orto waste another three million dollars on cultural
competency training. Things like that's allbullshit. You will see us advocate for
(06:20):
things like SP two, which isthe police decertification bill that we got passed.
So now through legal channels. Imean, it's still a fucking fight,
but right like, they can't justrape and kill and just move to
the next county and do it allover again. We actually have a process.
You'll know that defund was born righthere via APTP and two. Thus
in fifteen. So we do budgetwork. We do a lot of human
(06:43):
justice, but I'll talk about thatwith the next question. And we develop
alternative models to respond a community crisiswithout the violence of the carstoral state,
which I think is actually the mostimportant work we've ever done and will continue
to do. But I think wetalk about that later too, So and
then just really quickly, I'll sayalso, I'm a mom, and I'm
a poet and a playwright and adirector and an actress, and I am
(07:04):
the host. You have not listened, and please do to KPFA's Lawn Disorder
weekday mornings at eight a m.Wow. Wow, Wow, Kat.
We'll just stay with you for asecond. And you know, in the
spirit of queer and wellness, becauseof the pandemic, we've really tapped into
mutualate and what it has felt likea reparations around the ways in which black
(07:29):
and brown bodies have been dehumanized,have been exploited. And so what's been
possible is now we've been able toincorporate wellness into how we organize, care,
into how we work with each other. And I would just love to
hear from you, and then wouldlove to hear from you as well,
Christina, is how are you advancingwellness and care and how does that play
a role in the work that youjust described. And please fel free to
(07:51):
tell me to stop talking. Ilove when you because we got a limit
of time, right, and soI'll also go sort of as quickly as
I can. So I'm not anelder, but I am an older head
in terms of organizing. I've beenan organize with my entire adult life.
And the way that I was broughtup to organize was work, drink,
smoke, die. White supremacy doesn'tstop, which means you don't either.
(08:13):
And so I watched, right,I watched the people that that policized me,
radicalized me, trained me in thecraft of organizing on work themselves to
death, and then not you know, and expect me to do exactly the
same thing. So the example Igive is like the day that well,
the morning because I went into mywater broke at two am. I had
(08:35):
worked seventeen hours the day before Iwent home, I watched an episode of
Law and Order with my mom.I'm like a police show junkie. I
don't know why, it's so weird. It's so weird, but I am,
um, and and then I andmy water broke, right, And
then I think I was off fortwo weeks before I was. You know,
(08:58):
I literally learned to hold my peoplewill see me with my cell phone
like this, And I learned thatbecause I was holding my infit and working.
We are absolutely committed at an antipolice terror project to interrupt that cycle
of violence that we impose upon ourselves. We do not need dead organizers.
They don't actually do the movement anygood. But that all said, right,
(09:18):
So with the advent of Black LivesMatters, say, twenty fourteen,
twenty fifteen, people started talking aboutthis thing called self care, and I'm
not gonna lie, It's like,what the fuck is that? Right?
Take a breath, go get amassage. I don't have time. Our
people are dying, and I stillfeel a way about the term self care
because and I'll tell you why,and I actually steal this from doctor Malina
Abdullah. Right, So we doall of this work as a community,
(09:39):
and then what when you break?Then you're supposed to go by yourself and
take care of yourself. Absolutely not. So for us, the community became
about what is community care? Iso much I want to say, I'm
trying to set it real fast.It's okay, I'll be your timekeeper.
So I started to really think aboutthat, right, what does community care
look like? In addition to thewar work? What did it mean to
(10:01):
be sustainable as an organization? Andbecause so much of the work that we
do was rooted in trauma, whatdid it mean to not just care for
the families and the community members thatwe were responding to, but for those
of us that are literally having conversationsabout dead black, brown Indigenous people every
single day. And a lot offolks that come into this work are impassed.
(10:24):
So we're not just carrying the workouthere, right, We're sucking it
into our bodies. I'll also digressquickly and say, my mother was a
frontline warrior in the fight to endgender based violence. And it killed her.
It literally killed her. I watchedit kill her. So then I
got introduced to this concept healing justice. Well, what is that, right,
(10:48):
That's a conversation that I wanted tohave and as and thank you care
Page and the pioneers of this work. That conversation and healing justice came into
my consciousness around the time that thisconversation about the next phase of the work
came into my content like what actuallyreally comes next? Really, how does
(11:09):
our trauma show up? And howdo we address that? And when I
say what I'm saying us talk specificallyabout black people because that is my lived
experience, know that I am alsotalking about brown folks and indigenous folks as
well, right, And that isthat we not just walk with the trauma
and the wounding that was inflicted uponour bodies every single day, every second
(11:33):
of every day that we are aliveand awake and moving inside of this country,
but we bring with us, right, the generational trauma inside of our
DNA's facts science, it's proven,right, we don't have to argue with
people about that anymore. And forblack people, right, I think about
what is it like if we wouldever really sit in the terrors of colonial
(11:56):
and chattel slavery. If we wouldreally sit in the horror worse of what
it was like to traverse across thelargest underwater graveyard in the world, what
it was actually like to be putup on an auction block, what it
was actually like to have your childripped off of your back while you were
picking cotton, to your back,screamed in your fingers, bled right,
And I can go through all ofthe whores. All of that is in
(12:16):
our bodies, along with the factthat we wake up every day knowing that
we're hunted, and so we spenda lot of time going like this to
all of that trauma and all ofthat rage, and all of that anger
and all of that pain. Becauseif we didn't do that, we couldn't
function. We couldn't take our kidsto school, or go to work,
(12:37):
or fuck make a cup of coffee. It would literally be impossible. So
I have this theory that in thesame way that the Black Panther Party,
which is where APTP, we pulla lot of our politics from Minister HUEP.
Newton, Doctor Minister HUEP. Newton, you know, survival pending revolution,
in the same way that The BlackPanther Party for Self Defense understood that
(12:58):
if you were worried about being hungryor paying your rents, it made it
that much more difficult to struggle foryour liberation unless they gave birth to the
survival programs. Trauma acts in theexact same way, and so if we
are not addressing our trauma, theneverything else we're doing is putting band aids
(13:18):
on gunshot wounds. Period. Andthat's why I think we're stuck. I
think it's the trauma that we keeptripping over. So we have quadrupled down
on healing justice. We hired amanager of Healing Justice. We're hiring a
coordinator of healing Justice. We startand end our meetings through a healing justice
lens. I force people to taketime, so like after this Wood Street
(13:41):
thing, right, I will shutdown the organization so people rest. We
kick people out of signal chats whodon't know how to rest for reals like
bye, you're leaving. And thenyou know, when we became a C
three for me, the conversation became, how do we do this through a
healing justice lens? What does itlook like to blow up everything I've been
(14:05):
taught about nonprofit management and leadership becausemost of it's bullshit anyway, right,
and do this through a healing justicetransformative justice lens. So that's it,
right, Like it's in every Soit's healing justice, not as go get
a massage, mean, definitely,massages are part of it. For sure.
I've come to accept that we're lingling, but it's everything. It's healing
(14:28):
justice as an organizing strategy, rightthat that is what we are leading with
through all of our work. Andshout out to Guadalupe Chavez who runs this
work for us, who we stolefrom dignity and power now shamelessly from Los
Angeles. We now have a Healersnetwork which has eighty plus healers across the
state. The People's House, whichwe just open now has healing portals which
(14:52):
are open for community and family members. So we're learning and we're pushing this
this politic. My One Woman showedTasha because I think the same thing is
true for artists, bipac artists,right, because we're usually writing, performing,
directing, watching our trauma. Andso my Showtasha, which is about
the execution of Natasha McKenna, shewas tasted to death in twenty fifteen.
(15:15):
I did that show so long,over so many years. I got to
a point where like I never wantedto get on the stage again. Just
the trauma, right, So itjust ran at ze below with this amazing
artist named Jenney Simon. If youdon't know who Jenney is, find her
because she's everything. And we hadhealers in the lobby. We had HJA
practitioners in the lobby who prioritize black, brown, Indigenous, disabled queer bodies
(15:39):
to process that trauma with then theidea that then you would be able to
take that experience and engage in action. So it really has transformed my life.
It's been hard to figure out howI'm a healing just as badass because
I got a brand I gotta maintain. But I'm working it on out as
this sapt piece. So thank youso much for that question. And I
really think it is through healing thatwe will give free Oh I mean you're
(16:03):
you started off the question being like, cut me off when I start talking,
And I just want to set therecord straight that part of wellness and
care is if this is the onlyquestion we talk about, then this is
what we needed to talk about.So this is your Timecat, and with
that, I want to invite youall to just take a deep breath in
Kat just said so much like whatKat said was not just of right now,
(16:30):
it's the years and years of organizingof evolution from self care to healing
justice that we are benefiting from.So in taking a moment right now to
really take it in in a collectivebreath, that's the honoring that we get
to do for our organizers. SoI want to invite you are into that
practice of wellness right now if youcan just take a deep breath in with
me and release that's wellness, y'all? All right, this is I'm just
(17:00):
kidding. It only gets better,Yeah, it always only gets better.
So thank you Christina. We wantto hear what wellness and care looks like
for your work, and you're outhere wrapping the fat community, and I
just want to encourage you to justtell us really how you all practice this,
how we can be better allies,how the community is showing up,
(17:21):
how it plays out in your dayto day. Thank you. So I'm
in fat my whole life and throughoutthat life, willness has always been something
that felt like it wasn't for meand always felt like something that was just
another name for like healthism, whichis not something that I'm interested in and
not something that benefits me. Sowhether it's like going to yoga class or
(17:45):
getting a massage or trying to takelike a fitness class, oftentimes those places
and activities aren't accessible to fat people, particularly folks who are like on the
larger side of fatness, so folkswho identify as for fat or in finn
a fat. So I think forfat folks and for NAPA specifically, community
(18:07):
care is one of the biggest avenuesfor wellness and for healing in our community.
So something that NAFA does once amonth is we have the Fat Friday's
Virtual Social Club, which is afat only a Finity space. It's super
dope. So for any fatties inthe audience or who are like listening to
this after the fact, we'd loveto have you join our Fat Friday's Virtual
(18:30):
Social Club. We like play gamestogether and like do just like get to
know you stuff. And I'm sureeverybody knows the power of being in a
community space with folks who share someof the same struggles as you, and
like when you don't have to explainwhat some of the bullshit is how freeing
that can be to me in thosespaces. So that's like our biggest thing
(18:51):
that NAFA is doing to yeah,to actualize them our wellness for our community.
So I hope you'll join, AndSkinnies, I'm sorry that you're not
invited. I mean, what wasthat even necessary? I mean, I'm
sorry because I'm sure this space ishell a dope, Christina. Is there
any practice that you do on theday to day that you would like to
(19:12):
share how you take care of yourself? That does that feel complete? I
would, but like, honestly,I don't really have h like a dailier
regular want of self practice something thatI'm working on, and that's like another
I think, I don't know,maybe side effect of like the like culture
of fat phobia that we live in, and like my own internalized fat phobia
(19:33):
is like I've learned that you know, if I'm hurt or if I need
help, that like I don't deservecare, I don't deserve to like seek
out help, and like when Ido seek out help, it's scary as
fuck. I'm like, people treatyou like shit. So I can't really
answer that because that is so anarea of learning. For me, I
just really want to honor that levelof vulnerability, because whileness is not consistent,
(20:00):
It's not a linear journey. Andjust the fact that you can own
where you are is in advancement towhere you were speaking to around the trauma,
needing to suppress, just to function. There's room for it all up
here. So thank you, Christina. I love that audacious and it needed
to be heard and said. Here, kat I'm gonna ask you this.
You already spoke that you're going totalk about this, but I'm still going
(20:22):
to ask the question, what doesit look like to turn away from institutions
like law enforcement? Especially when wetalk about community care freedom, It looks
like freedom. So the state islike super insidious, right? Is it
like one of those things too?If you really spend time thinking about it,
you're like these motherfuckers. I'm sorry. If there's children here, it
(20:48):
would be like my child, shecan cuss with the best of them now.
So the state creates these horrific conditions, and then we respond to those
conditions in a merit of ways,and then the state criminalizes our response to
those conditions that the state created,and then the state says, the only
(21:08):
way out of both the conditions andyou respond to those conditions is the most
violent institutions and organizations in the world. That's gaslighting at its finest right,
And I said, you know,APTP was formed to interrupt state terror,
not just to respond to it.And so when we started fringing out what
(21:30):
that looks like. Really, itlooked like about ten years ago, folks
started calling APTP instead of OPD.Not everybody, but enough folks that we
were going out in enough calls andit was everything, Like the first call
we got was to respond to IPv, and then a lot of mental health
calls, right, some substance usecalls. Asantawa Bookan, who's one of
(21:52):
the other co founders along with terHac of APTP as a registered nurse.
And so I started reading, right, like, what were the theories on
interrupting state tarret Like, what doesit mean to lean into our mission to
stop it from happening in the firstplace. The only thing that we were
able to find is that the onlyway to reduce or eliminate state violence is
to reduce and or eliminate our community'scontact with the state. That's it.
(22:18):
So how do we do that,right, And the reality is that the
state is engaged in our lives inways now that it was not like this.
Cops being the answer to every singlesocial ill actually was not a thing
until the Kerner Report, which,right, the Kernel Report can google what
that is. We don't know whatit is. But basically, they came
back and we're like, Yo,all of these urban areas are powder kegs,
(22:41):
and you better flood it with resources. The federal government said, well,
that's silly. Let's actually continue topull all of any existing resources and
then let's wage war on the blackfamily and let's flood it with law enforcement.
And that's basically it's a really simplifiedway of how we got to where
we are today. Right. Andso we've got fifty plus years of the
(23:03):
state being the answer to every singlesocial ill, and we know that we're
not any safer, and in fact, we're much much less safe when you
consider the fact that law enforcement inthis country murders on average twelve hundred people
every single year. That's an averageof three people a day. So we
said, fuck that. And becauseAssignsa was a registered nurse and she'd spent
(23:23):
most of her time as an elvIn and through nursing school in mental health
institutions and actually examining and responding tothe intersection of state violence and mental health
crisis. That's where we started.And also because upwards of fifty percent of
everybody that the law enforcement kills inthis country has a disability fifty percent.
(23:45):
And then when you intersect that withmental health crisis, black bodies mental health
crisis, Indigenous bodies mental healthcare.I mean, y'all, y'all know those
numbers skyrocket. So the first thingthat we developed was mental health first.
And mental health first are now Ihave to say because because nine eight eight
like my talking point, So nowI have to say, we're the only
abolitionists. We are the only abolitionistresponse to mental health crisis in both Oakland
(24:07):
and Sacramento. Right now, we'reonly open on the weekends, and I
shouldn't say only we're open when nothingelse is available, and that's from a
pm to eight am on Friday andSaturday. They were getting ready to expand.
And that doesn't mean we don't dowork during the week right, So
we take phone calls, We starteddispatching, We do cop watching. If
people end up at John Georgia ina hospital, we send advocates to go
(24:29):
help them navigate the violence of themedical industrial complex, which is just as
deadly to our bodies as is theprison industrial complex. Let's be super duper
clear about that. We just releasedour guide on intimate partner violence. So
I'm both a survivor of intimate partnerviolence, but I'm also a survivor of
the state's intervention. And so thatintimate partner violence where I went to jail,
which is the truth for so manyAnd I'm going to talk about in
the binary of male female because they'rejust sort of the numbers. That's not
(24:52):
that it doesn't happen to everybody,but you've got thousands upon thousands, one
thousands of black and brown Indigenous folksthat are not calling for law enforcements help
because they know that either you're goingto go to prison, your partner's going
to go to prison, somebody's gonnaend up beating even worse than the order
beaten, or in the worst casescenarios, folks are gonna end up dead.
Right. And so my mother wasone of those cars wo feminists that
(25:14):
pushed for law law enforcement intervention.And I'm working really hard to build on
her work and undo it at theexact same time. I love you.
And then the next place that we'reheaded is into substance use. Right,
we know that substance use is aresponse to trauma often, Right, if
we're doing it in larger quantities thanmaybe it's not healthy for our bodies.
Why are we responding with somebody havingan overdose with a badge and a gun.
(25:40):
I don't know what the gun,you know, can do for that
situation. So that's next. Andthen of course the final frontier and community
Ready chord. That's smooth security withCRC. Y'all know CRC who keeps us
safe? They do like the intercommunalviolence, right, how do we address
root causes? How do we stopthe voluntie from happening? So for us,
that's the next frontier. And ourtheory of changes is that we build
(26:00):
small, replicable models. So wetrain folks all over the country, not
saying that you have to have matesfirst or you have to be a mini
APTP. We just bring our values, our principles, our structure, and
our lived experience, and then wetrain folks and help them adapt it to
their communities. Because you cannot.I don't give a fuck what Kahoot says.
You cannot take a model that wasborn in your city and dump it
(26:22):
onto somebody else. That's not selfdetermination and it's not gonna work. So
that's the work, and it's becomingmore and more of our work. And
I think that between that and thehealing Justice, that's where you're going to
see APTP. And then you knowthat like when there's crisis, so like
when there's a school closure right forus, that's state violence. When there's
things at Wood Street, that's stateviolence. For us, All violence is
(26:45):
state violence. The state creates allthose conditions. And so you're probably going
to see us in the mix somewheresomehow. But yeah, that was very
well rounded, just very holistic,taking a lot of notes your cat.
Thank you. Something that you saidreally brought up the quote from the Sabbatistas,
which is we need to live ina world where many worlds exist.
And I think when you spoke aboutteaching folks but not letting that be the
(27:08):
definitive, I'm thinking about the multipleworlds that we need to help instigate,
support, catalyze fight for that isabout queer wellness, our survival and in
the spirit of Earth Day, it'spart of our survival around climate change.
And what you're really speaking to issomething that environmental is called bio diversity,
(27:30):
and many organizers say biocultural diversity.For us all to survive, we need
to have many cultures, many peoplestanding in their power around cultures, and
that means different languages, that meandifferent practices around certain ecological tending and how
we organize as people. I lovethat you all don't go somewhere and then
(27:51):
just homogenize it, just like thisis the thing, and if you don't
do it like this, then it'sthe wrong thing, because that's what white
supremacy did and that's why we're inthis ship show. And so in the
spirit of that, the disability justicemovement has done amazing things. And some
of the things that I've learned fromthe disability justice movement it's really a movement
of competing needs and identifying under thecontext which needs need to be prioritized or
(28:17):
centered over others in a temporal period, which is anti colonial because colonizations like
this is forever, like there's nothingaround it. But it's like, yeah,
that's not how the world works.There's seasons there's times when you're most
productive in times where you just needto rest. So in that spirit,
how can the disability justice movement,how can accessibility be more inclusive to fat
(28:38):
folks? Well, so, thereare plenty of fat folks who are disabled,
and there's plenty of disabled folks whoare fat, and also folks who
are like only one of those things. I'm a person who is fat and
disabled, and I don't know it'sbeen like personally, it was really difficult
(29:00):
coming to terms with being disabled andlike claiming that and like seeking out support
for it, even like amongst myclosest friends, because well, there's this
fear that like, even though likemy disability is that like my knees were
fucked up, I have like ameniscus tare and to have our threatis which
like can happen to anybody and likealmost anybody, right, But there's this
(29:22):
fear that like if I need likehelp like walking around, or if I'm
like struggling with stairs, that likepeople will assume that that's just because I'm
like too fat to like live inthe world, right, And well,
that like fear didn't really serve meat all, right, Like it just
helped to further isolate me, whichwas kind of the way that oppression works.
So I think, yeah, I'dlike to see like more folks talking
(29:45):
about what it means to be likefat and disabled at the same time.
I want to see folks talking moreabout like how does our fatness or our
like disability, like how do thoseinform each other? How do those like
make the other things like worse?And we're challenging as somebody who's like new
to being disabled, I'm not superactiveand like the disability justice movement yet,
(30:07):
so it's not a space that Ihave like felt included for a long time.
But there's like some fucking radical likefat folks out here who are disabled
and those who aren't, and wehave a lot to offer. So yeah,
I'd like to see more fat folksinvolved in the movement for sure.
I just love the spirit of thedistinction between the two experiences and the lack
(30:32):
of nuance that we have. SoI appreciate you bringing that perspective because that
alone is a radical expression, andI love the invitation around the potential discrimination
that can happen when that distinction isn'theld. So I'm really I'm walking away
with that We're getting close to theend, folks, and we're going to
open it up to Q and A. But how is this feeling so far?
(30:53):
Does the conversation feel good? Iy'all in the Earth day spirit,
Mother Earth, one planet, y'all. That's what it all comes down to.
And transformative justice, prison abolition,disability justice, advocating for communities that
are left in the margins. That'sliterally what it's all about. If we
(31:14):
can get all on the same page, we will advance. I just wanted
to ask Kat, what is somethingthat folks either in this room or folks
who are residents, maybe Native folksto Oakland, what can they do to
help advance your work? And Iknow you spoke about this potential work that
you want to highlight well being uphere. Might be a good time to
bring that up. So we're alwayslooking for volunteers, for sure, for
(31:38):
white folks that have access to resources, We're always looking for those two.
We actually we just hired a volunteercoordinator, and we do. We need
folks to populate these committees. Thefolks that have been grinding have been grinding
for a long time, and folksare really tired. We need folks to
do the not sexy work, tosit inside those gone awful police mission meetings.
(32:00):
We need folks to be sitting incity council, not just when we
mobilize you to tell landlords to gofuck themselves. We need um, we
need right like we need We needbodies in that work too. And then
I'm gonna try to get to thisnext part without crying. We got you,
we got you. What is happeningat Wood Street is horrific. It's
(32:27):
going to happen. I mean,it's happening. It just it just is.
Um. We need folks to comehelp support with a mental health work.
The city is offering two sites.One is an RV site, the
other is a tough shed side.I refuse to call them cappins. They
are chemically treated tough sheds. Thoseare the two sites of city is offering.
(32:49):
And that's what the city will saywhen you say you can't evict people
and not give them someplace to live. So we're giving them two places to
live. They can live at theRV side on sixty six, or they
can go into these tough sheds.Well that's not working. That doesn't work
for everybody. So we've been movingfolks who want to not, we've been
moving them. We fight with thecity and the pigs to get in there,
and then we're providing mental health servicesthrough a self determined lens, right,
(33:13):
which is what we do. Andso for some folks, self determination
look like being in a hotel room, of which we were able to offer
seventy two hours, right, Sowe're actually looking for support with housing and
hotel funds. I know that there'ssome HJ practitioners that are going to go
be somewhere outside of which Street tomorrowfor a few hours on the afternoon.
(33:35):
Yeah, I'm really thinking about Okay, well, what does it look like
for us to get it. There'sgoing to be rolling evictions throughout the city.
What does it look like to getin front of it and try to
craft self determined solutions for folks thatare going to be at the other end
of those bulldozers before the bulldozers arethere. So, if this is the
work that you have expertise in,or if your resources that can help,
or if your mental health or traumaworkers, we would love to welcome you
(33:59):
into the space. And can folksreach out to you immediately after this or
should they like go on the websiteshould probably go on the website instead,
an email another dopest crew of volunteersthat checks that regularly, and it'll get
it'll get to me, or it'llget to the crew that actually runs the
work. I'm often a log jam, but I don't want we can't afford
for me to be a lot timehere. Thanks Kat, and thank you
(34:22):
for being vulnerable. The reality isorganizing is hard to work, and we
just it's important to give space forthat. And I think with that,
I was wondering, Christina, ifyou could shed light on the work that
you're doing, how do we asa community support for it to be felt,
(34:44):
for it to be seen and forit to be heard. Great question,
I'll say this. So NAVA hasbeen around for a long time.
It's been around for fifty four years, and throughout like most of that history,
it's been like an all volunteer organization. So like currently, we definitely
pay folks who like contribute to likeour webinar, our blog post or like
(35:06):
speakers stuff like that, but wedon't pay ourselves yet. So like the
ten of us who are on theboard, which is like a working board,
we all volunteer our time so I'mreally excited that this year we're working
on like moving from a volunteer modelto like a paid staffing model so that
our work can be more equitable andmore sustainable. But you know that's going
(35:30):
to take us a long time.We don't actually have a very big budget,
even though we've been around for overfifty years. So certainly you can
donate to NAFA, that would bereally helpful. You can follow us on
our social medias that helps us alot. Our website is naffa dot org
and AAFA. Our instagram is naffaOfficial. I'll also share this in my
experience, living in a fat bodyin this society is kind of like being
(35:54):
stranded on alien world, where likethe atmosphere is like not actually suited to
your own biomechanics. So it's liketechnically you can like just barely survive,
but like you can't really thrive inthe like inhospitable atmosphere. That's that's what
it's like for us. And likefat phobia and anti fat bias shows up
like in almost every space, Likeit shows up at work, it shows
(36:15):
up when I try to go thedoctor, It shows up in like conversations
with my mom. It shows uplike basically everywhere I go, and it's
inescapable. So whether you are afat person or you like know somebody who's
a fat person, fat people occupylike every aspect of our society, right,
Like there's queer fats, there's transpats, there's folks who are disabled and
(36:37):
fat. There's folks who are likewhite and fat, Like anybody can also
be fat, right, So we'rea group who are like multiply marginalized.
So I hope that you will likejoin our fight. What else? Oh,
Like I said, we historically havebeen all volunteer and most of our
funding comes from like individual donors,and most of that is like really small
(36:59):
donations, like less than five dollars, So like really, if you can
even only give us like a dollar, that would be really helpful for us,
And spreading the word would be veryhelpful as well. We're doing really
good work for free and it's reallyhard. Thank you for that. Again,
the theme has been about visibilizing andreally starting to hold the complexity,
(37:22):
So I appreciate that invite seems tobe a theme. I'm gonna take it,
and I hope everybody else you know, notices it. We're gonna open
it up to Q and A seeif anybody has any specific questions, and
if you do, raise your hand. So that's funny, you should ask
(37:47):
MH. First, Oakland was bornlike right after the shutdown had happened,
so we'd been on the phone.And now it's a hybrid. So there
are a group of volunteer that aremeeting in the people's house and then there's
folks that are still at home becausethe shift is two shifts. It's like
eight am to two am and thentwo am to eight am, so the
(38:09):
two am to eight am shift isstill in people's homes and someone brings a
backpack and the supplies and all thatstuff to write where you are whatever sham
ever many you can do. Butalso through the lens of healing justice,
right, we track how many shiftsyou're doing and if you don't sit yourself
(38:30):
down, we will happily help youdo. So, yeah, there is
training. There's there's quarterly trainings formental health first and first responders. If
you go to a BTP and yousign up for the newsletter, promise we
only spam you wind there's a crisisand we need you absolutely to be sure
you're going to show up to citycouncil. Otherwise it's things like trainings and
(38:51):
stuff like that. Yeah, anyother questions from the audience. Summoning those
questions from the ancestors, feed theminto your child kin that you are protecting.
All right, I'm gonna actually moveus towards wrap up, but I
(39:14):
wanted to see if there's any anythingelse that you two would like to either
highlight about your work, about beinghere in queer and well campaigns, just
opening it up again, ancestors,send the divination of it's needed more about
my work. I just want tothink radically fit. I was introduced radically
fit when I ran for mayor,and y'all like help me and loved on
(39:37):
me. And just thank you andthank you for being here and thank you
for the space and for having mefor this conversation. So thank you,
Thank you so much, Kat,thank you so much, Christina. This
is a rap on the conversation ofhow we take care of us. This
is an example and there's a lotof grassroots on the ground interpersonal ways in
which we do that. So continuebeing your badass fine selves for the rest
(40:00):
of the day. Thank you toomuch. Hey, y'all, let's give
it up one more time for ourpanelists. Thank you lyall for hosting that
conversation. Thank you everyone for comingthrough. This was our last panel the
day, but please stay. Wehave a dance party hosted by Poppers starting
(40:24):
at five pm. Queer and Wellwas presented by Gemini Moon Botanicals and radically
Fit Oakland. Radically Fit is theBay Area's radical community Jim rooted in fat
liberation and joyful movement for all queer, trans, black and brown folks and
(40:49):
their allies, regardless of experience,size, or ability. You can learn
more at radically fit Oakland dot com. Thank you for listening to the we
Rise podcast. You can learn moreabout our cultural production at we rise production
dot com. We love to hearfrom you, and you can email us
(41:13):
through the link on our website andconnect with us on Instagram and Facebook at
we Rise Production and on Twitter atwe Rise Producers. We Rise is a
labor of love and we deeply appreciateyour support. If you're able, you
can contribute to our Patreon or PayPal, which you can find on our website.
(41:34):
Shout out to our brilliant music producer, Diasporatical to the inspirational youth of
Pink Panther Sorority for our theme song, our compassionate transcriptionist, Yolanda Mendoza,
and to our collaborators, creatives andvisionaries, lifting hearts and minds in classrooms,
on stages, in zoom rooms,and on frontlines across Turtle Island and
(41:55):
overseas. By six by six seveneight al ride you rise, We rise,
me rise, me rise rise,We rise, We rise. He
(42:17):
rise, we rise, rise,we rise, We rise. He rise,
we rise, we rise, Werise, We rise, Me rise Me Ride