I have returned now to the “real world” and am coming down off of the natural high of the ADAPT action. The adrenaline of that 5 days was pretty extraordinary. I heard several stories explaining why and how the arrests went down at Dodd’s office — and several other offices of members of congress, apparently. Rather than relate them here, with the inaccuracies of sleep deprived memory, let me point you to ADAPT’s press releases: http://duhcity.org/duhpress.html. They are all informative, but the first on the list — http://duhcity.org/press/duh004.html — is the most relevant to the action that happened on Tuesday on Capitol Hill.
One thing of note that you won’t find on the press release pages is a description of how I spent my Tuesday night.
DUH City was erected as a political statement of solidarity with folks with disabilities who are, in essence, homeless because of the lack of availability of affordable, accessible, integrated housing. Many folks with disabilities are either homeless in the traditional sense of lacking shelter or homeless in the sense that they do not have a home, but are warehoused in institutions and nursing homes. While such arrangements meet the minimal requirements of permanent shelter from the elements, it is argued that they are not homes because the people living their do not have the security and freedom that is essential to calling something a home. That is, a home is not a place where every moment of your day is controlled by someone else’s regimental routine. So it is that ADAPT tried to call attention to these unacknowledged homeless by living as close to homeless as we could for a few days on the front patio of the US Department of Housing and Urban Development.
ADAPT button with our standard slogan!
In a personal statement of solidarity with people with disabilities who are homeless, I chose to tweak this idea slightly and sleep in a cardboard box on Tuesday night, at the fringes of DUH City. This was intended to be both a political statement, contributing to the overall message of DUH City and an attempt at an exercise in empathy. Since doing this, I have decided these are separable ideas and that I may have succeeded in the one and failed in the other.
As a statement of political solidarity, it probably went mostly unnoticed, but was genuine. However, I don’t think it really worked as a way of building any kind of real personal empathy for those who face this kind of situation as a crisis. As my friend Dominic pointed out in a comment on my post “That could have been me…,” it may be impossible for genuine empathy to be developed between folks who are embedded in systems of drastically disparate power relations. His basic idea was that true empathy — rather than pity — could not exist between able bodied people and folks with a disability because the power differential is too permanent and too absolute for anyone to be capable of truly thinking outside of it.
I am starting to understand Dom’s point here. Like disability, class is a system of power relations. While I can sleep in a cardboard box for a few hours, this will not be a genuine understanding of an impoverished person with a disability’s experience of the world. Firstly, I had a CHOICE of where to sleep. This in itself means that I can not understand the most important aspect of the oppression of poverty and homelessness, power relations. I cannot get outside the fact that I could have gone back to my 200 a night hotel room at any time. How can I understand homeless on anything but the most superficial of levels while retaining this position in society’s power structure? In addition, I had the luxury of a sleeping bag and plenty to eat and plenty of hope for my future. This cannot be a genuine exercise in empathy.
September 24th, 2008 at 10:04 am
Joe- Thanks for the update on the ADAPT action. I did not mean to be so pessimistic about the empathy/pity distinction. I was talking as a philosopher, and trying to parse the distinction. But as a lay person, a degree of empathy- of feeling outrage or genuine concern on behalf of another- I think is a real possibility. I’m just not sure how to put into words.
Dom
September 24th, 2008 at 10:50 am
AGH, i had this long comment written and with a million tabs open, lost it. if i pressed submit, delete it : )
this is actually a topic i’ve been thinking a lot about since i got your text about sleeping in the cardboard box. progressives/liberals/activists have a long history of showing up to a neighborhood, rally, movement and take over, make the struggle about them, and leave, you know? (there is a blue scholars song i’m gonna post below). social justice movements cannot exist successfully without talking about privilege. there is also the question of getting arrested on purpose when the prison industrial complex is so real and detrimental to communities.
at the same time, when i got your text, it felt different— i think because we as disabled people live on a line where nothing is permanent. obviously rich folks have privilege that can negate their disabilities but for the rest of us, everything (i.e. services, healthcare, homes) can disappear any second
i live with a real real fear of being institutionalized, losing services i need to live my life, getting sick and being hospitalized and then moved to an institution, etc. which is why i don’t trust doctors at all. not to go into a personal history, but 3 years ago when i was really ill and hospitalized, they moved me to a long-term care facility. it was only for a month while my home health care services were being put in place but it was so scary because i didn’t have any options and doctors had full control over where i’d go, what i need, etc. what happens if i am in that position again? of course there is privilege in the fact that i went in knowing it was not permanent and for many people it is (or they don’t have access to healthcare and have to live on the streets)
i suppose my point i am unraveling here is that unlike white folks going to a rally against colonization, globalization, police brutality, etc and then going home, is that without a lot of privilege, power around disability is something that can change at any time? i’m actually not sure what i’m saying here… (mostly streaming thoughts)
definitely appreciate you looking inward and processing this with us
Blue Scholars- 50 Thousand Deep
I had to duck out ’cause I knew I stuck out in the crowd
After many years growin’ up brown in this town
Now this is what democracy looks like
Not what you all had in mind for tonight
Mr. Mayor, shell-shocked for 5 days straight
Press conference, lookin’ constipated and pale
Tossed a homie in jail, wasn’t even protesting
Wrong place, wrong time, learned a quick lesson
But this is not a question what we did to deserve this
Rich kids went and got arrested on purpose
But was it worth it? My first inclination
Globalization is the root of the pain
September 24th, 2008 at 10:51 am
it looks like i took over your blog!
ahhh
love you.
September 24th, 2008 at 11:07 pm
Thanks for the feedback guys! SPM, why didn’t you link to your blog with your user name!?
September 25th, 2008 at 2:23 am
wanted to post a more private comment. feel like a feminist james bond with secret identities : )
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