Incarcerated

Prison, probably after death, is the worst fate to befall an individual in the society we live in. The idea of imprisonment as punishment is by no means a new one, it is as old as the idea of the state itself, and dates back as far as the times of Hammurabi in ancient Babylon around 1750 B.C. This form of punishment was intended to help the accused ponder and perform penance of a sort to absolve themselves of their crimes and sins. Since those times, the prison system has evolved variantly and much around the world, but none as starkly as the Prison system in the United States. The United States holds the dubious honour of having the most incarcerated citizens on the planet,at a rate of 100 prisoners per 100,000 of the population. So for a system that serves such a large population of the country, must be done with respect for their rights and needs to, and thats where the buck stops.

While in Los Angeles, we visited an organization that works primarily with the incarcerated population and the protection of their rights within the country but especially within the city of Los Angeles itself. The general notion sold when one is sent to the prison system is that you have lost all your rights and whatever happens to you within the walls of the peninteniary is absolutely part of the sentence one pays back to society. The assumption that rape, and the devolving of your humanity is part and parcel of one’s sentence is one of the most glaring factors to why change must be made within the system. There have been attempts made to push change upon the Prison system at least in the protection of the incarcerated citizens, like the Prison Rape Prevention Act (2003) which is a universal rule system across the country and a federal law that both the Department of Justice and Corrections have to adhere too. The saddening part is that these laws do not translate as easily to practice especially within the Prisons, that is upto the wardens and the correctional officers to bring the law into being. 11160274_10153761456922506_1897941516_nThe statistics for rape and sexual abuse within the prison system is rather abhorrent, such as 4 % of sexual abuse in prisons are in the last 12 months and 3.2% in jails. 1 in 10 persons incarcerated in juvenile detention centers are sexually abused and 80% are by staff of these detention centers, and these are only the statistics of the sexual abuse reported. Most of the time within the jail system sexual abuse isnt reported because either there is the problem that it was committed by the staff of the facility which creates a fear of repercussion if one came forward and there is the fact that most men who are sexually abused within the prison system, are ashamed to come forward because of the connotation of homosexuality within our society. There are other issues also that come into play within the prison system , such as sexual slavery rings which are becoming rampant and puts at risk more of these incarcerated citizens who when are released after time spent , are shells of the people they used to be and not capable to handle normal society anymore.

The idea that imprisonment will solve the issue of crime is quickly becoming a farce, yes it does help the few who when released can be added back into society as a functional member, but the systeme the way it is now is not conducive to that. The Correctional System in the United States now, only further damages the psyche and will of these individuals further and then throwing them out to society where they arent given any aid or help to get back on their feet. The stigma of being a former convict even after one has served their sentence does not encourage the getting better and wanting to be part of civil society. The correctional system has to change within this country to respect that these incarcerated individuals are people too, and no matter the colour of their skin, their economical background or their educational qualification they deserve to have safety and security while they serve their sentences, so as to encourage the idea that there is a society out there waiting for them to return. To be a part of again.

Cops: The Reality

The men and women that serve as police officers in this country over the past year or so have been coming under heavy heat because of the methods and procedures that they follow to “maintain the peace”. Police state is a term denoting government that exercises power arbitrarily through the police, and this is what much of America has come to be if you are on the wrong side of the racial divide. With cases such as the Trayvon Martin incident and the happenings in Ferguson, Missouri only adds to the notion that the police force within this country is racially biased and are putting individuals in their graves for it.

While in Los Angeles, the ever reaching arm of the law was very prominent in certain areas rather than others, which brought up the question of why here, and why so many? Los Angeles as a city, has had her fair share of run ins with law enforcement , most infamously during the Rodney King Riots of 1992 where widespread anarchy and chaos ensued in parts of Los Angeles because of the acquital of police officers who were videotaped beating Rodney King. 11122491_10153761456902506_1842535471_nThe Rodney King riots were a part of the history of Los Angeles we heard a lot about while in the city, it was like a time where everyone remembers where they were and what they were doing. The most interesting retelling was when we were ferrying between the organizations we were visiting, and our van driver drove past the cross roads of Florence and Normandie where the riots had originally begun on that fateful April 29th night. He talked about how a truck was stopped at that very intersection and pulled out and beaten by a mob in retaliation for what had happened to Rodney King. The way he told us this story, one could sense the fear in his voice, how close his beloved city of Los Angeles had come to falling into absolute uncivilized chaos. The idea that this was all caused by the abhorrent behaviour of those we put our society’s safety and security in, is beyond what any state should allow, especially the United States. We visited the downtown Los Angeles are and made our way through the many neighbourhoods within, these included the Arts District and Skid Row and alos Boyle Heights and Little Tokyo. The presence of police in the hordes in areas like Boyle heights and Skid Row, where the homeless and immigrant populations reside puts one at a state of discomfort. For one, in Boyle Heights, the substation of the L.A police Department is one of the largest in the entire city and the size of the Boyle Heights area does not warrant it. In Skid Row, while walking around during daytime , I counted at least 4 different police vehicles “patrolling”the area constantly, as if to remind its residence that they better be careful cause they were being watched, constantly. On the flip side, the areas of the Arts District and Little Tokyo are almost devoid of law enforcement to the naked eye, these areas are much wealthier and heavily gentrified and seem to within the idea of what is “acceptable” to the law enforcement there.

 The battle for the soul of Los Angeles, is one that is less subtle when it comes to racial and other minorities against the police, in the eyes of law enforcement, it would seem that all people of colour could be a criminal and vagrant. The idea that the police are for the protection of some and not all is a detail of the system that must be fixed, if there is to be a clear and open dialogue for the improvement of race relations in this country. The irony to me was how the race relations within this country took a turn for the worse once the First African American President was elected into office, there is a troubled notion here that the government and officials working within policy must address, but more importantly those living within this oppressive and discriminatory system must speak out. For change to come, it has to be from self reflection and addmittance rather than a repeat of the Rodney King riots with violence.

We Dont Need No Gentrified Nation

The L.A experience opened up to me an issue I grew up around and in for the first 18 years of my life but never noticed, never paid attention and even more sadly never knew was a problem in the first place, this issue for me was gentrification. I grew up in Bangalore, India a sprawling metropolis located in Southern India of 7.8 million persons, where the concentration of population within the city is very high and the surge forward towards development and growth is always pushing. Gentrification to me growing up never occurred, I wasnt aware that certain rights were inalienable to individuals, one being the right to green and open spaces.

While we were in L.A the idea of green spaces, or spaces that were left intentionally without any development so the society that lived in that area could make what they could from, were seen as an inalienable right that was being encroached upon by the City of Los Angeles and especially so by the government and the Powers that would be. In L.A the push to make the city, like the one in the movies that the film industry propogates, has cost thousands of lives and even more clearly the lives of countless landmarks which were not seen for their true value. The gentrification of Los Angeles is more than a story of displacement and homelessness, but a story of injustice and the wielding of power irresponsibly by the sliver of those who control it. The search for development and making Los Angeles, at least look like the “city of dreams” , that it is sold as takes the process of gentrification from one of just pushing out the unwanted and bringing in the new and the more developed, to blaming the people and citizens of the city for not being able to cope with the system in place and get rid of them.

The removal of this “blemish” is truly more harsh Darwinian than required or should be asDSC_0117ked of these populations, the evolve or persish mindset to how the city of Los Angeles treats the most helpless and marginalized, is rather abhorrent. Boyle heights is at the very epicenter for this battle, where the city in its infinite wisdom has placed a large sub station of the police Department and a very swanky new hospital when the school in the same area is heavily underfunded. Boyle Heights is also the neighbourhood within the L.A downtown district that has been home to the immigrant population that makes its way across the border legally or otherwise for over 60 years, beginning with the Jewish and Korean immigrants to today with the Mexican, Honduran and Salvadorian immigrants. The idea that the government is targetting the immigrant population and using their lack of resources and knowledge about the system to hoodwink them into seeling their homes, and even livelihoods, puts a spin of insidious and even evil to the larger story of gentrification.

The push for development is one that the entire planet seems to running after with much gusto and even more spirit, to prove that we can and have evolved into this 21st century in much flourish. But the idea we are doing this to our spaces of living for the betterment of the society that lives there, is a farce and a bold faced lie. The idea that development is for the people on the ground is one that the city of Los Angeles has changed, the development a lot of the times, seems to be to remove the “blemishes” that the 1% sees and is put off by, which range from the homeless, immigrants, low income housing etc. The “overlords” of Los Angeles in search for perfection within their city, forgot that much like the art that adornes the walls of the city, the imperfections bring out the true beauty within.

Same Language, Different Cultures

            One symptom of culture is language. Language may be part of the culture, might be an instrument of communication in that language, and many cultures have a special language associated with them. As early forms of globalization took on, and in some cases, in the forms of invasions and colonizations, certain languages surpassed culture and country divides and now encompass many cultures. The language that quickly comes to mind is English of course, but other examples include Spanish, Portuguese, French, and Russian, to name a few. When this happens, as it so often does, the colonizers language becomes the necessary form of communication for any one in the society who wants to advance socially and to participate in the social sphere. This naturally puts the local population at a disadvantage, because most people speak much easier from their first language (also known as their “heart language”), than from their subsequent languages.
            Which language you choose to use and the way you use it denotes status, dictates hierarchy, reveals your origin, level of education, and so on. While it’s true that this is most easily seen when talking about cultures where multiple languages exist, I want to bring attention to those places where everyone is seemingly talking in the same language, but are truly using it in different ways. This is visible in the lexicon they use, the connotation associated with words used and the history behind them. Such was the case when we were in LA – even though the cultures we visited were within our own language, English, the journey was certainly an immersive experience. Since we were conducting group field research, we were paying attention to what our interviewers were saying, but also how they were saying, and the non verbal communication that went with it. Many of the people we woe with have a lot of pride in the way they speak, as it is a mark of where they come from, and part of their identity. I was faced with understanding that even though I speak English, I do not speak their language, which is to say that even though I understood the words, I was often blind to the connotation and hidden meanings of those words. And that is just in reference to English.
           According to According to Professor Vyacheslav Ivanov of UCLA, there are at least 224 identified languages in Los Angeles County. Less than 45% of the people that live there speak English alone, and nearly 40% speak Spanish or Spanish Creole. More startlingly, a estimated 35% of the over 10 million people living in Los Angeles were born outside of the US. With each new language comes the culture and customs associated with it, which helps frame the way each person views and understand the world around them.
          This of course includes nicknames for the areas of the city, as you can see in this map, which is greater by S.H.F.:
Judgmental LA by S.F
*While on the subject of language spoken, check out this interactive map that shows language density of fifteen different languages across the US: http://www.census.gov/hhes/socdemo/language/data/language_map.html?eml=gdhttp://

All the World’s A Stage…

In the whirlwind of returning from LA, writing our magazine articles, and preparing for our presentation with the Mindanao group (not to mention catching up on other coursework), I felt like there wasn’t enough time to truly decompress and reflect on the experience.  In fact, over a month after the fact, it is something I am still processing…

Like most things, I would have preferred to have more time to work with the two groups – LA and Mindanao – to create a more cohesive and rehearsed presentation.   Time constraints necessitate urgency sometimes and all things considered, I think we pulled it off smashingly.  If there is anything I have learned from my years as a performer it is that somehow – despite an incomplete dress rehearsal or maybe because of it – when the audience arrives and the lights come up, people rally and the show comes together.  Somehow.  I would say that our combined trip presentation: Violence Explained and Peace Explored was a MIIS event success.  I received only positive feedback from the attendees and not only the obligatory congratulations kind.  I had audience members, including faculty, tell me they were glad they came because it reminded them to re-visit these conflict laden issues that are often swept under the rug at MIIS.  Moreso than any performance aspects, the ability to make the audience reflect and continuing reflecting to the point of enacting change is a marker of accomplishment.  After all, wasn’t gathering stories to share with others and initiate an ongoing dialogue one of the main goals of the trip?  In this sense, I feel quite proud of our work.

On the other hand (there is always an other hand isn’t there?), due to the hastiness and contrived nature of the presentation, it also felt a bit disingenuous.  Partly, I felt like our story was more the voices of a dominant few and not a platform for everyone involved to speak.   More problematic for me was the feeling that our narrations, as well as our answers to the audience questions, were scripted, filtered and/or embellished for appearance sake.  I regret that we didn’t talk about the more raw, uncomfortable and conflicting issues that arose on our trip.    For me, it reduced the experience to feeling sterilized and censored instead of alive and authentic.

In a way, this conflict I have about feeling both hopeful and fake about the experience captures one of the core conflicts from our trip.  I think many of us felt hopeful and inspired to see so many NGOs hard at work providing critical services to their communities.  At the same it was disappointing to see so many Band-Aid approaches without real systemic change.  The non-profit organizations all put on a positive, high quality show when we, the audience, came to visit.  But what really goes on behind the scenes with the funders, the inner office conflicts and the ethical dilemmas was outside our privy.  We can all talk the good talk and put on an engaging, well intentioned show, but beyond the gaze or judgment of others, both individually and institutionally, we are all in flux, conflicted and ultimately driven by selfishness and fear.  Until we can openly and honestly admit and discuss these not-so-nice motivations that we all experience, we will not progress beyond the surface cordiality of discourse.

La Gringa

Throughout our course in Los Angeles we visited a wide variety of organizations working tirelessly on the ground to make a change in their communities.  In Skid Row we toured long-term single room occupancy affordable housing and we visited the short term homeless shelter where cots line the wall as if on an assembly line.  We discussed the violence perpetrated against women and men both domestically and in state sponsored institutions such as prison.  We heard first hand stories from former gang members and prisoners, both young and old.  We spoke in depth with neighborhood advocates exploring alterative ways to invest in their neighborhoods without displacing the residents.

According to the 2000 Census Los Angeles is the most diverse city in the United States.  It’s demographic is predominantly Latino (47%) followed by white (30%), African American (11%) and Asian (10%).   The population of LA is about 10 million residents, one-third of which are foreign born immigrants.  L.A. is a home of transplants trying to find their slice of the American pie.  Some have made it big but most are simply trying to survive.  LA exists in the extremes of the rich and famous and the severely poor, creating a huge disparity in income, opportunity, political voice, access and race.

Even though we were unable to visit all 3,000 non-profits of L.A. county during our brief visit,  among the handful of groups that we had the fortune to visit, there was a distinct and reoccurring theme that emerged.  Race.  Racism is still an ongoing struggle in L.A. county, and the country for that matter.  It isn’t necessarily the blatant, aggressive racism; it is the more subtle, systemic discrimination that is harder to extinguish.   Many of the activists we spoke with referred to the history of marginalization, ill conceived policies, and the growing disparities between whites and people of color.  There was a palpable distaste and frustration with the majority white man designed social status quo.

Full disclosure here, I am white.  Several of us in the group were.  Whenever I heard these negative statements made toward the generalized white population I made the conscious choice not to be offended or embittered.  As a privileged white person in America these grievances deserve to be heard without a defensive stance or a rational white perspective explanation.  Besides, for the most part, although not always, I agreed with their criticism.  What impressed me the most is that they were open and willing to invite me into their communities, into their safe spaces, and share their stories with me.  Me, a gringa, a person who in all appearances looks exactly like the enemy.

With the wealth of new knowledge and empathy acquired from our experience in LA, I am left with the lingering question, what can I do as a gringa, as a living contribution to the problem, to support the oppressed minorities of L.A., and elsewhere, in America?  As an educator I am committed to working with youth and fighting for equal access and opportunity.  Yet I also recognize that a student of color will always relate better to a mentor from the same neighborhood who has experienced the same struggles and discrimination.  And that is how is should be.  I don’t ever want to be that white woman coming into a community telling them how to run things.

What I do want to be is an an ally.  An advocate.  A friend.  And a sounding board.  I want to continuing sharing the stories they entrusted to me within my own community.  I can do this in a respectful manner that facilitates ongoing dialogue and progress.  But perhaps one of the most important things I learned on this trip is that, as a white person, I need to sit back, shut up, and truly listen.

The curse of Knowledge

Having presented my experiences in LA to the MIIS community in conjunction with the group that went to the Philippine island of Mindanao, I was struck by how similar and yet how different our experiences were.

On one hand, they had a multi-cultural experience where they were exposed to new gestures, a different language, different food and a completely different environment.   I, on the other hand was in what I consider my native state, speaking uniquely English with other native English speakers. People didn’t seem odd to me, I blended in to my surroundings and I felt at home, like it could have been a town that I could have lived in. So the cultural experience wasn’t so pronounced for me as it was for the group that left the country. But that’s not what is odd.

What is odd is that the way I digested knowledge, the way that i interpreted my surroundings was through the lens of a native. I felt that i understood the historical, spatial and economic realities of LA and i took my lens for granted. Seeing LA, for the first time, but somehow, not. Being in skid row for the first time but the fact that i could place the policies and the history that created skid row, made it seem familiar, almost something that was obvious. I found myself reinforcing the historical and political narrative that I have cultivated instead of trying to create a new one.

So the group that went to Mindanao, did not have that lens of the “obvious”. They were perhaps able to be less judgmental because they were there, in actuality and mentally, for the first time.

I cannot write to the experiences of others, but i can recount my own. I feel that there was something yet still lost in the experience of LA, something intangible that i can’t quite get at. I was blocked in my understanding by my preconceptions, by in fact, the over information that i have about Los Angeles. How do we tear down that wall of knowledge that blocks us from having “new eyes” to see with “new ears” to hear with and a new sense of discovery. How do we eliminate the curse of knowledge in order to have a learning experience like you would have leaving the country?

Working in graduate school, it seems like there is a never ending competition to know everything, to be more informed, to do more and more research. In the classroom setting this is useful. Once in the field, the “real world” this seems to almost hinder people. In LA we hear “just shut up and listen” because people weren’t able to have a voice to express themselves because all the “educated” people ( I use the quotation marks sarcastically, school diplomas don’t seem to make people smarter) had researched the problems of others, they had the economic model on a piece of paper. Poor people are reduced to numbers and statistics, and their voices are lost because people, like me, already “know” what’s happening.

My lesson in this is to listen. to have the humility to not “know the answer”. To break the paradigm of proving how smart i am by speaking for others. Intelligence lies in humility and knowing when you don’t know something. And being able to ask and listen to others.

 

Gentrifying Knowledge?

It has been more than two days since the LA research team shared stories to and informed the MIIS community of our research on poverty, homelessness, and violence in Los Angeles. Our presentation focused on storytelling and drama (skits), recounting stories told to us and situations we encountered. Sticking with what impacted me most, I spoke about the Metro gentrification of Boyle Heights. Sharing what I have learned and how it affected me with 40+ people consisting of faculty, students, and community members was a way for me to honor the citizens of Boyle Heights. Through me, their voices: their information, their feelings, and their perspectives were being shared hundreds of miles away in Monterey, CA. It was as if those who we spoke with were here in Monterey sharing with MIIS what they originally shared with us.
Then, an audience member suggested that we were gentrifying knowledge from Boyle Heights.
I did not fully comprehend this phrase until the next day. As an educated white male, I understand that I am part of the system that oppresses and gentrifies minority populations. Through my shopping habits, where I live, and my career choices, I am either reinforcing the discriminatory system or changing it to be more inclusionary, fair, and equal to all social, ethnic, cultural, and religious groups. The purpose of our presentation was to share our research, to honor those we met and pass on what they shared with us. However, were we truly passing on their information or stealing it to benefit ourselves? Was this public presentation that was meant to give the attention to LA activists upended by our involvement in speaking upon LA’s behalf? Have I gentrified knowledge from LA?
I have reflected upon these questions throughout the weekend and believe I am at a place to begin answering them. Reflecting on my own motives and intentions, I can honestly say that I intended to represent and pass along Boyle Heights’ plight and their perspectives to raise awareness for their cause. However, even good intentioned out-of-town people who move into a lower income area out of necessity can still be contributing to the gentrification of a neighborhood regardless of their intent. Does my telling the stories of Boyle Heights displace this knowledge from this neighborhood and transfer its ownership to myself? Every time I speak about Boyle Heights, my name will always be attached to this information, these stories, these people. Like an essay’s author becomes associated with and overshadows the sources he/she cites, critics argue that my involvement is doing the same to residents in Boyle Heights.
This of course does not sit well with me. I wish to represent and be an advocate for those we heard. I aim to elevate their voices above my own. I give them credit at every opportunity provided to me. It is about them and not me. These distinctions, I believe, does not absolve me completely of gentrifying knowledge, but clarifies my position. Our goals in telling these stories are the same: Save Boyle Heights. Unless, Boyle Heights’ residents change their positions or stop fighting to preserve their way of life, I am not displacing knowledge from this community. I have not stolen their voice, but am rather a reverberating echo of what they initially proclaimed. Power is strongest always at the source and in this I am confident that their voices will continue to be heard directly from Boyle Heights to speak and work against the structures that remain in place to discriminate and exclude them.

Fighting the Tide

As I reflect back on Los Angelese i wonder what keeps people going to fight the good fight everyday. While in LA we met with amazing people who are the unsung heroes, the champions of the poor and unwanted. The people who work on behalf the rest of us have forgotten, who fight everyday to give a voice, not to themselves, but to their brother, their sister  in need. Yes there’s a personal agenda, yes, there are people who do it stroke their own egos as selfless martyrs but then again, there are energy company executives who spend their entire lives accumulating wealth,to spend their vacations on boats that kill manatees.

What i wonder about as i go to school everyday, while i spend my time studying and writing and thinking lofty thoughts, what will this all come to? What will become of me, will i choose the easy path, will i choose the life of the people i saw who spend their time “singing for their supper”? I know when it is the right time to make a decision other things will affect me, like my family, my friends, the pay grade, but how many of the people who i saw have always envisioned themselves in that role?

there is this double pull, the idea that nothing that we do is neutral, there is no middle ground. Everything we do, or choose not to do has an effect on something somewhere. How do we fight against the tide that pulls us unconsciously in one direction or another? How do we become the best versions of ourselves?

I ask myself this question a lot. LA has shown me two sides, the side that is fighting for what’s right, and the faceless “other” the side that supports the business interests and not the people’s. The side that shoots a mentally ill man in the street because earlier that system tore down the structures that would have housed him. I don’t want to be on that side. But that side too needs good people who want to speak up for the downtrodden. The question becomes how do you fight the tide. How do you exist in that system that wants to swallow up and make you just like them.

I hope that i find my “sacred purpose” the reason why I am here, the best version of myself, for i am fearful of being swallowed up by the tide, forgetting the bigger picture, forgetting myself.

The Stories We tell..

One night in LA we took a Lift car home from our last event. You guys know the one, the car service with the pink mustache? Our driver’s name was Duke, a cordial middle aged man, nice car and prompt pick up. In the car he mentioned that he was from New York. As we continue down the road I ask him what brought him to the West Coast, what made him leave New York?

Well, his story starts out with him saying that he used to keep a baseball bat in his car, and he used to use it, regularly. He talked about what could only be called repeated incidents of road rage when other drivers cut him off, or took his parking spot. Apparently he also kept an ice pick in his driver side door. He said “and I know how many spare tires you got.” to the guy who allegedly “took” “his” place, “he could just stay there a while, you know what i mean?”

So we are driving along the road with this man who is very open about himself and his past, but the more he spoke, the more he became a sympathetic character. He talked about his kids, and his wife, how he got shot during a home robbery trying to protect his wife. He narrowly escaped paralysis, while his wife was 6 months pregnant with their last child.

This story makes me think about the narratives we have about ourselves. What is our lived experience? How do the stories we tell about these experiences make us who we are? Do we tell only the good side, hoping that strangers will see us in a good light? Or do we paint a negative picture to test other people’s tolerance? How does the narrative change the way we remember events, do we forget the things that don’t fit the story? Once I read about how easy it is to change the memories of children who were suspected of being molested. If asked enough questions in a certain vein, children would tell a story of molestation and abuse, actually re-wiring mental pathways so the story in their head fit the outside narrative.

I don’t think Duke was particularly aware of how he came off to me, a Californian, quick to say something nice and friendly lest I be taken poorly without an overt show of friendliness. But how does that come off? more than one time I’ve heard non-Californians complain about the lack of sincerity of the California “gushing” “how ARE you?, you are SO pretty!” to us the overt display of compliments and insincerity is an informal dance, a way to seem nice rather than show our actual feelings. I hate the fact that our “customer service” attitude in California is seen as insincere, but I have to admit that it performs more a ceremonial role in relationship forming than is an actual heartfelt thing.

I only hope for 2 things. 1, that people are semi-tolerant of first impressions, and don’t get turned off immediately by the ceremony and 2, that maybe we can learn someday to be as open and frank as Duke, be able to present the world with the things that we’ve changed in ourselves that we didn’t like, and stop hiding behind the plastic surgery of ceremony.