This is why I'm proud to work at Central Dallas Ministries:
Showing posts with label solidarity. Show all posts
Showing posts with label solidarity. Show all posts
Wednesday, July 28, 2010
Sunday, May 02, 2010
Mega March solidarity
We must stand in unity. When one person’s voice is silenced, it is up to the rest of us to cry out. Justice is not a flexible tool. It must be applied to all and it must be applied equally. This is a shared planet, and until we can learn to respect and tolerate one another’s differences, we risk the continued loss of our freedom, our dignity, and the chance to create a peaceful world for our children.
~Leonard Peltier, In the Spirit of Crazy Horse
As I walked from the bus stop to the front of the march, I could feel my chest tighten as it does when I get emotionally overwhelmed. The signs I saw and the chants I heard had such big messages for being so concise. "Obama, Escucha, estamos en la lucha!" (Obama, listen, we are in the fight!) was chanted throughout the march.
"Which one is the illegal one?" with three shoes drawn (photo below) struck me as Arizona considers arresting people who "look" illegal.
"My husband supports us. If he's deported, America will." (photo below) made realize how silly our arguments can be for splitting up families just to make our point.
I always learn about people when I attend events like this. Listening to their voices instead of my own arguments for or against seems to have so much more rationale and reasoning than I can come up with. It's important to listen to the people who are affected by these laws. Maybe by listening to them, we might understand how we can do a better job of helping out the country they left as well as helping them in the country they immigrated to.
~Leonard Peltier, In the Spirit of Crazy Horse
As I walked from the bus stop to the front of the march, I could feel my chest tighten as it does when I get emotionally overwhelmed. The signs I saw and the chants I heard had such big messages for being so concise. "Obama, Escucha, estamos en la lucha!" (Obama, listen, we are in the fight!) was chanted throughout the march.
"Which one is the illegal one?" with three shoes drawn (photo below) struck me as Arizona considers arresting people who "look" illegal.
"My husband supports us. If he's deported, America will." (photo below) made realize how silly our arguments can be for splitting up families just to make our point.
I always learn about people when I attend events like this. Listening to their voices instead of my own arguments for or against seems to have so much more rationale and reasoning than I can come up with. It's important to listen to the people who are affected by these laws. Maybe by listening to them, we might understand how we can do a better job of helping out the country they left as well as helping them in the country they immigrated to.
Wednesday, May 06, 2009
Dreaming of a healthy community
What does it take to make a community healthy?
Why are inner city neighborhoods run-down and crime-ridden?
Who are the people in those neighborhoods and how are they affected?
So often, businesses, non-profits, people of faith, and others come into our neighborhood to try to "help," but they often don't ask the questions that would help them understand the community before deciding what they want to do. A couple of months ago, a fortune 500 company came in and did just that. They decided they wanted to do something, so they asked.
As several of us from Central Dallas and the community they are hoping to impact came together, they asked questions and they listened. As we talked, I noticed that they had blank notepads and they wrote. There was no preconceived agenda on their sheet of paper. They simply asked a question or two and let us talk.
The people around the table voiced honest concerns. We talked about people who come to "do good" but never last. We talked about our friends and neighbors who have become victims of circumstance because of a failing school system, lack of businesses in the community to provide jobs, absentee parents because they ride the bus for hours to get to a job and can't be home for their children, absentee parents because they have turned to crime, hopelessness yet also a tight-knit community who knows each other and supports each other. We told them about the good that isn't often seen by the general public. We talked about the frustration and cynicism caused by people outside the community who don't understand and don't take the time to understand.
They listened.
Though the meeting was like no other I've ever experienced, I remained cautiously optimistic and hesitant, not wanting to be naive.
But they came back again. They talked about what we had said. They quoted people who were in that initial meeting. They remembered the names of individuals who spoke.
But more than that...they had taken our words, thoughts, and feelings to their company as wisdom from the community. They saw us as players on their team. They then combined that with all of the intellectual and innovative capacity in their company and came back with more ideas.
I was blown away.
What struck me was the amazing possibilities that can happen when the capacity and knowledge of an low-income, urban, informally educated community comes together with the power, resources, creativity, and formal education of a company that has the power to do something. The solutions to the very complex problems of education, jobs, health care, food insecurity, child care, and so many others, become much less daunting. And all it took was for a small group of people to come together and genuinely listen and be willing to act on what they heard.
I continue to tell them, "I'm still cautiously optimistic." But each time they come back, they continue to gain my trust and confidence.
Hopefully soon the entire project will go "online" so that everyone can know what is happening. But for now, here is a video they produced to help people understand what they are beginning to understand:
Why are inner city neighborhoods run-down and crime-ridden?
Who are the people in those neighborhoods and how are they affected?
So often, businesses, non-profits, people of faith, and others come into our neighborhood to try to "help," but they often don't ask the questions that would help them understand the community before deciding what they want to do. A couple of months ago, a fortune 500 company came in and did just that. They decided they wanted to do something, so they asked.
As several of us from Central Dallas and the community they are hoping to impact came together, they asked questions and they listened. As we talked, I noticed that they had blank notepads and they wrote. There was no preconceived agenda on their sheet of paper. They simply asked a question or two and let us talk.
The people around the table voiced honest concerns. We talked about people who come to "do good" but never last. We talked about our friends and neighbors who have become victims of circumstance because of a failing school system, lack of businesses in the community to provide jobs, absentee parents because they ride the bus for hours to get to a job and can't be home for their children, absentee parents because they have turned to crime, hopelessness yet also a tight-knit community who knows each other and supports each other. We told them about the good that isn't often seen by the general public. We talked about the frustration and cynicism caused by people outside the community who don't understand and don't take the time to understand.
They listened.
Though the meeting was like no other I've ever experienced, I remained cautiously optimistic and hesitant, not wanting to be naive.
But they came back again. They talked about what we had said. They quoted people who were in that initial meeting. They remembered the names of individuals who spoke.
But more than that...they had taken our words, thoughts, and feelings to their company as wisdom from the community. They saw us as players on their team. They then combined that with all of the intellectual and innovative capacity in their company and came back with more ideas.
I was blown away.
What struck me was the amazing possibilities that can happen when the capacity and knowledge of an low-income, urban, informally educated community comes together with the power, resources, creativity, and formal education of a company that has the power to do something. The solutions to the very complex problems of education, jobs, health care, food insecurity, child care, and so many others, become much less daunting. And all it took was for a small group of people to come together and genuinely listen and be willing to act on what they heard.
I continue to tell them, "I'm still cautiously optimistic." But each time they come back, they continue to gain my trust and confidence.
Hopefully soon the entire project will go "online" so that everyone can know what is happening. But for now, here is a video they produced to help people understand what they are beginning to understand:
Sunday, November 16, 2008
I can't quit
As I reflect on my friend Wyshina's death, I think about how much less stressful my life would have been had I stayed in Ozark county in rural Missouri. It probably wouldn't have been filled with as much death, tragedy, and worries that my life has now.
When things like this happen, a fleeting thought of quitting enters my mind. I have had people tell me I should move on...that I can do "more good" if I utilize my doctoral degree for something else...like working at a university full time or doing some other, larger job. Others have tried to convince me that I am not doing the good I think I am and could do it more effectively if I did more to fulfill myself. Thank goodness I have learned and continue to realize that the people who make those suggestions have their own issues and insecurities about who they are and what they are or aren't doing.
Wyshina's death makes my head throb as I think of the people I have lost over the last few years--some due to senseless murder, some being caught up in the drug culture, some because of a lack of healthcare...all of them societal issues that can and need to be fixed.
I think about how these deaths have affected me...I think about how many people's stories I carry in my head and how they burden my heart...yet I think about how anyone walking by me would never know about these things. It makes me think about other people around me...people who probably also have many things going on in their life that the average, outside person would never know about them. I know many of these are children...and the children grow into the adults of our society.
However, when I think that it would be easier to go somewhere else to make my own life less complicated, the word SOLIDARITY comes to mind. I think of Paulo Freire, who speaks a lot about solidarity in his book, Pedagogy of the Oppressed. Here is just one quote from this book:
I have found that there is true "family" in that solidarity. (Thank you Sylvia, Larry, Gerald, Marva, Mike, Mr. Wendell, Vicki, Dave, Lagean, Ms. Coleman, and so many others)
To truly be free, we cannot ignore what happens. We cannot remove ourselves.
When things go wrong as they sometimes will
When the road your trudging seems all-uphill,
When the funds are low and the debts are high
And you want to smile, but you have to sigh,
When care is pressing you down a bit
Rest if you must, but don't you quit.
Life is queer with its twists and turns,
As everyone of us sometimes learns,
And many a fellow turns about
When he might have won had he stuck it out.
Don't give up though the pace seems slow
You may succeed with another blow.
Often the goal is nearer than
It seems to a faint and faltering man
Often the struggler has given up
When he might have captured the victor's cup
And he learned too late when the night came down
How close he was to the golden crown.
Success is failure turned inside out
The silver tint of the clouds of doubt
And you never can tell how close you are,
It may be near when it seems afar
So stick to the fight when you are hardest hit
It's when things seem worse that you musn't quit. -Unknown
When things like this happen, a fleeting thought of quitting enters my mind. I have had people tell me I should move on...that I can do "more good" if I utilize my doctoral degree for something else...like working at a university full time or doing some other, larger job. Others have tried to convince me that I am not doing the good I think I am and could do it more effectively if I did more to fulfill myself. Thank goodness I have learned and continue to realize that the people who make those suggestions have their own issues and insecurities about who they are and what they are or aren't doing.
Wyshina's death makes my head throb as I think of the people I have lost over the last few years--some due to senseless murder, some being caught up in the drug culture, some because of a lack of healthcare...all of them societal issues that can and need to be fixed.
I think about how these deaths have affected me...I think about how many people's stories I carry in my head and how they burden my heart...yet I think about how anyone walking by me would never know about these things. It makes me think about other people around me...people who probably also have many things going on in their life that the average, outside person would never know about them. I know many of these are children...and the children grow into the adults of our society.
However, when I think that it would be easier to go somewhere else to make my own life less complicated, the word SOLIDARITY comes to mind. I think of Paulo Freire, who speaks a lot about solidarity in his book, Pedagogy of the Oppressed. Here is just one quote from this book:
...true solidarity with the oppressed means fighting at their side to transform the objective reality which has made them these “beings for another.” The oppressor is in solidarity with the oppressed only when he stops regarding the oppressed as an abstract category and sees them as persons who have been unjustly dealt with, deprived of their voice, cheated in the sale of their labor — when he stops making pious, sentimental, and individualistic gestures and risks an act of love. ... To affirm that men and women are persons and as persons should be free, and yet to do nothing tangible to make this affirmation a reality, is a farce.It is not fair or just for me to remain on the outside. I am not any more special than the people I know who directly face these tragedies. To think I am would be arrogant and unwise. It is because of my friendship and my solidarity with those around me that I can not leave. I must endure the hardships with them.
I have found that there is true "family" in that solidarity. (Thank you Sylvia, Larry, Gerald, Marva, Mike, Mr. Wendell, Vicki, Dave, Lagean, Ms. Coleman, and so many others)
To truly be free, we cannot ignore what happens. We cannot remove ourselves.
If you have come to help me, you are wasting your time. But if you have come because your liberation is tied up with mine, then let us work together.-- Lill Watson, aboriginal activist
I now understand that my welfare is only possible if I acknowledge my unity with all the people of the world without exception. ~Leo TolstoyI know these are just quotes, but remembering them in times like these gives me hope...provides me with a sense of direction and understanding that is much needed in times like these. I can't quit.
When things go wrong as they sometimes will
When the road your trudging seems all-uphill,
When the funds are low and the debts are high
And you want to smile, but you have to sigh,
When care is pressing you down a bit
Rest if you must, but don't you quit.
Life is queer with its twists and turns,
As everyone of us sometimes learns,
And many a fellow turns about
When he might have won had he stuck it out.
Don't give up though the pace seems slow
You may succeed with another blow.
Often the goal is nearer than
It seems to a faint and faltering man
Often the struggler has given up
When he might have captured the victor's cup
And he learned too late when the night came down
How close he was to the golden crown.
Success is failure turned inside out
The silver tint of the clouds of doubt
And you never can tell how close you are,
It may be near when it seems afar
So stick to the fight when you are hardest hit
It's when things seem worse that you musn't quit. -Unknown
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