Episode

🎵 🎵 🎵 Hey, good afternoon everyone. This is Suzette Shaw with Ladies Take the Mic. We are here at Skid Row Studios. We are here at Skid Row Studios in downtown LA today. We have a real live fresh show for you all today. It's called Rude Awakening. Rude Awakening in light of our match that will happen tomorrow in downtown LA. It is the Black and Brown Lives United MLK Legacy March. It commemorates the 47th anniversary of the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King. And we call it Rude Awakening because that was one of them. That was part of the message in Dr. King's speech. I believe it was I Have a Dream speech. Rude Awakening and here we are years and decades later. We're still dealing with a lot of the same issues and trying to move forward. So Rude Awakening because there's a lot. There's a real call to action in the community. There is a raise of consciousness that we as a people are feeling and coming together and uniting as folks. And we're trying to deal with the issues in the community. So with that said before me, I have some folks who are community members and leaders that I'd like to go around the panel and have them introduce themselves. Why don't we start with you? Hi, my name is Guillermo Torres. I am a faith rooted organizer for CRU LA, CRUGY LA, the United for Economic Justice. Okay. I'm Tom Grody. I've been a Skid Row resident about a year and a half. And then a downtown resident. And a year and a half before that. Great. And I'm Cynthia Ruffin. I am a theater activist, an organizer and a revolutionary angel. Awesome. What does that mean a revolutionary angel? It means that well, one, you get an angel, right? And all the qualities that one thinks that an angel has, right? An angel that comes down from heaven and walks the earth to help everyday people. You know? And that's how I view an angel. And a revolutionary angel means an angel that's not afraid to step into the fray. To step right into it. You know, I feel as sometimes that there are angels that exist in heaven. And then there are angels that walk the earth and to be here in human form and to move positive action forward. Amen. So you're not talking about it. You're about being about it. Well, you're about talking about it and being about it. Every way. Yes. That right there. Okay. So when you say you're a theater activist, what does that mean? Well, I mean, I think it's a very different thing. I mean, I think it's a very different thing. I mean, I think it's a very different thing. I mean, I think it's a very different thing. In我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我 more that needed to happen. And I first got involved with theater activism, working with a company called Fringe Benefits Alliance, a company that works here in Los Angeles. It's all about creating constructive dialogue around issues. And my first work was working with street youth on Santa Monica Boulevard and looking at telling their stories and turning those stories into plays, but plays that could lead to action, plays that could lead to actually speaking to people about their issues. And from there, I moved into Theater of the Oppressed and was trained by Augusta Ball. Okay. So how did you come to be involved with the Skid Row community? Well, when I went back to school to get my bachelor's degree, I went to Antioch University here in Los Angeles. And Antioch is known as a social justice university. And, you know, a lot of, they do social justice organizing, they do management, non-profit management for social justice organizations and so on. And there I became familiar with a program there that is a brilliant, brilliant, brilliant, brilliant, brilliant, brilliant, brilliant, brilliant, brilliant program called the Bridge Program. The Bridge is about offering free education in the humanities to people who live on the margins of society, people who are low income, people who have been out of school for a long time, feel that school is not for them. Maybe they didn't graduate school, maybe they got a GED, but for whatever reason, they don't see school or any kind of higher education as something that is for them. So there's several people within the Skid Row community utilizing this program? Exactly. So a lot of people from Skid Row came to that program and I met them and just had a rude awakening as to who is on Skid Row. And I really became inspired to and motivated and activated to want to make some difference on Skid Row. Okay, hold that thought. We're going to come back to that. Now I'm going to ask, you know, that we move back a little further and then tell if a gentleman, if each of you can tell me then how you, your position in the community and what exactly, you're doing currently that brings, that resonates, kind of piggybacking off of what Cynthia said here. Well, my, most of my time and energy goes into small nonprofits and community groups in Skid Row. Okay. So I like to be aware of what's going on the street through what they're doing and their backgrounds, and then like to try to cross pollinate and build some, you know, deeper relationship and communication between the various groups. Right. You know, for the most part, they're focused on their mission statement or their priorities. So I'm trying to, you know, do some cross pollination. Right. If I were to affiliate myself with one group, I would say it would be Operation Faceless Skid Row simply because when I moved downtown three years ago and then someone said, oh, you should go, you know, into Skid Row and help sweep the streets and here's the group. Okay. And so I did that and, you know, immediately got plugged in through their work and then through their relationships. And so I started to build relationships and connections, started meeting other people. All right. So, but, but what I love to do is, cause I think, you know, there's multiple pieces to the puzzle and the pieces have to come together. And I think that's one of the really powerful things that's happening right now. I love to get to know them better than they know them each other, even though they've been here a lot longer than I have. And then, oh, you really need to talk to so-and-so. Yeah, I've known him for eight years. Well, you need to talk to him right now. Right, right. Well, you know, I'm going to say, Tom, that I actually, you know, I've been in the I've been in Skid Row a little less than two years, but I remember I see you around after moving to where I live now. And I see you and I'd see you from afar and I don't, and then, you know, I see you sometimes, you know, come into a church or what have you. And I'm like, oh, is that man, is that man? And then, you know, and you and I kind of, you know, built up a relationship over the course of the last several months. So, you know, I'm going to actually, you know, agree with you that, you know, in regards to what you're saying, because our, our relationship has kind of organically come about with, you know, exactly resonating off of some of the things that you're saying here. So excellent. Thank you. And last but not least, please, Guillermo. Well, you know, I like the theme that you chose today, Root Awakening and then Revolutionary Angels. And I think our organizations go the, that we organize the interfaith community mostly around the issues of economic justice. And I'm also one of the conveners of this march tomorrow. Pastor Q, one of the organizations, one of the co-organizers for this event. And a lot of these issues from the police issues to the immigrant issues and to the scary issues has a lot to do with income inequality. And I think, you know, I feel in my heart that for many years we kind of been dormant on a lot of these issues. And now we're getting that Root Awakening that Martin Luther King spoke about in 1963 on his speech, right? That we cannot be silenced no more and that there's a lot of wrong things in our countries. Right. And our job is to educate, organize and move the faith community to walk in the struggles for economic justice, but also in the, in other struggles too that, you know, when people are being oppressed a certain way, our job is to help create a sacred societies where everybody's value equal. Exactly. Where we love our neighbor as ourselves. Exactly. Now, I'm glad that you said that. Tom and I were making signs and banners for the march yesterday evening. And actually, I went back again this morning. So you'll have to excuse the pain on my hands. Because I wasn't able to get that out prior to coming here. But some signs that I made today were, se se puede. What does that mean to you? Yes, we can. Okay. All right. Well, that's a famous quote of that goes back, I think, to Cesar Chavez, right? During the farm movement. Goes back also to economic justice and the way they treated workers, right? Because in many industries in the past, when they started maybe seeing more of the profit instead of the profit, they were able to get more of the profit. So, I think that's a great quote. I think that's a great quote. I think that's a great quote. I think that's a great quote. I think that's a great quote. I think that's a great quote. I think that's a great quote. I think that's a great quote. Because in many industries in the past, when they started maybe seeing more of the profit instead of the dignity of every human and the dignity of sacred labor from workers, right? From the farm workers to today we have issues, for example, airport workers. We have women working preparing food for the kitchens at the kitchens at the airport that go into the airplanes. That they've been working there for 17 years and they're only making $10.49. Right. Right. Right. Right. That's just crazy nonsense. We have the fast food campaign for $15 an hour, right? And you saw the recent announcement from McDonald's, right? Yeah. Which is very not enough to lift people out of poverty that's affecting many communities of color. So, that's, you know, every time you see a movement or an action for workers' justice that are fighting for living wages and better working conditions, you're going to hear that phrase, si se puede. Right. Now, one of our sisters in the movement, she has a car wash campaign. You want to, on her behalf, you want to talk a little bit about that? Yeah. Yeah. Rosemary, who I work, actually I was part of that campaign, the clean car wash campaign. You know, and we were probably about two years ago, we saw, they saw that there was a lot of horrible conditions going on at the car washes. We had workers, mostly immigrant workers, in many cases that were not letting the companies or the owners were not letting them take breaks and lunches, working in extreme heat when they're drying the cars. So, and we've heard. We've heard. We've heard that in some car washes, they were only getting paid tips, not even the minimum wage. Wow. So, we, together with the team, the campaign from Clean LA, helped organize and help join the workers. And we helped form the first union car wash in the country, which was in Santa Monica. With the help of the community, of the faith community workers, our union partners. And now, today, there's about 25 car washes. There's about 25 car washes that are unionized. How is it that this happens in 2015 in the United States of America? And after Dr. King fought all these years and decades prior, and then we want to say in this country that, oh, no, we're all equal. And why are you still fussing? And why are you still fussing? Why are you still fighting? Why are you still marching? And how is it in 2015, all of this flies under the radar, yet you have all of these conservative groups that say, hey, why are you mad? Right. I mean, how does this happen? Please, someone. Well, I just want to say that it's very sad when you hear political leaders attacking, for example, you know, unions who are trying to keep these jobs, you know, good paying jobs and stuff like that. And they still want to come after them when there's so much poverty and so many low wage jobs, right? A lot of jobs used to be before union jobs in our country. And they still keep coming after us. It's like if they hadn't had it. We had enough poverty in our country, right? Yeah. So those policies have to be, these policies have to change in people's mentality. They have to value people like they used to before. Right. In our country. But it's sad that so many companies right now are oppressing the workers by not paying them, you know, the living wages that they need, right, to support their families. And it so happens that tomorrow's march is on the start of Passover, also on Holy Week, right? Good point, yeah. Which was an expression of freedom from slavery. Right. For the Jewish community, right? And today we're not free still. Today that words of Martin Luther King resonates. And that's why we need this rude awakening. We need to wake up and really not stay dormant anymore. It's a travesty. It's a travesty. Now, you know, given, you know, here in America we talk so much about, you know, if you just work hard and if you just, you know, you're going to move ahead and you're going to, you know, what does that say about us as a country when these people are working hard for these little, little bitty dollars? Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. They're working so hard and yet it's not moving them any further ahead in the sense of, you know, it's not moving them up on the, up on that pedestal or, you know, on that level of the middle class and a lower middle class and so on and so forth. I mean, it just really kind of reiterates that whole notion of, you know, people being one step away from, you know, one paycheck away from. From the street. From Skid Row. Yeah, exactly. Well, also it speaks to the whole idea that we've become. We've become such an individualist society, especially with the way that capitalism is going right now, you know, and people actually still spouting that same rhetoric of pulling yourselves up by your bootstraps and, you know, a lot of people don't have boots. Right. Amen. You know, or no straps on those boots to pull themselves up, you know, by. And I think one of the things that needs to happen that you were talking about here is that, you know, we've got to look at the fact that what makes us common with each other is that we all have this common. Humanity. Right. And we really have to look at the fact that we are interdependent. Right. And the only way that we are going to survive as a human race, the only thing that's sustainable. We like to talk so much about sustainability is, you know, the rhetoric of now. What is sustainable is for us to realize that we are interdependent and we need each other. You know, nobody gets there on their own. Amen. Those are all good points. And, you know, it's making me think in terms of how, you know, in the workforce here in the United States of America. You know. We have. We have. We have the equal employment opportunity that's supposed to be equal and fair. And and yet it seems like the workforces and employment opportunities has become more like who's liked. It's almost like a personality contest, you know, running for, you know, homecoming queen and queen. I mean, king and queen. You know, everything is about being liked rather than equal and fair. Yet we still you know, you got to be linked in and networking with everyone yet. You know, you got to know people in order to get jobs. But then they want to say, well, there's equal still equal and fair as far as employment opportunities. I mean, isn't that kind of redundant? I mean, not redundant, but isn't that counterproductive? It's contradictory. It's contradictory. That's what I'm looking for. It's contradictory, right? Yeah. I mean, is it not? Yes. And yet we act like I mean, we just again, I'm one of those things that just flies under the radar. I mean, you know, we act like this doesn't everything's about being liked and linked in. Yeah. And the thing is, the interesting thing is the way that technology is moving. Technology, while it connects us to the other side of the world, it's so incredible. At the same time, it kind of serves to isolate us a little bit. You know, you're talking about being liked. It's all about Facebook. You know, you get enough likes on your page. Right. And you can step up into another level. You can go up the ladder, you know, based on your likes. So it's interesting the whole idea of how we figure out how to use technology now to further the movement. Yeah. And to find a way of getting back in the situation. And to find a way to get back in the same room with each other, of being able to look each other in the eye and have conversations and realize that are dependent on each other. Yeah. And, you know, it kind of feeds into like, you know, the popular shows and, you know, in the pop culture, you know, as far as, you know, we've got these, you know, housewives of such and such and this and this and such and such. And, you know, and who's a popular, you know, pop person out there. Everything, again, feeds into liked. I mean, it's, you know, and I tell people. And, you know, I mean, I'm a grown woman. So I tell people just very matter of factly that, you know, I won the congeniality contest all growing up. You know, I'm a grown woman now. I'm not trying to be a homecoming queen any longer. I won all those congeniality contests when I needed to. So I'm not trying to be your friend. I'm about trying to tell the truth here. You know, I'm about doing what I need to do to move forward in the movement and what needs to happen. And, I mean, it's just like I just I get so irritated about this whole like thing. Everything is about pop. You know, being somebody's. And then it also for me as a woman. And I know this is going to be part of the conversations that we're going to have tomorrow. It's about women and women's issues and equality for women. It really kind of underscores that whole. I call it the Stepford Wives syndrome. You know that it underscores that whole notion of the Stepford Wives syndrome that, you know, you got to fit into this kind of kind of repressive role in order to be as a woman here in 2015. You know, I mean, it's like everything is kind of it goes backwards. It's like it's a counterproductive as far as we say that we're about, you know, when moving women forward. Yet there's still that undertone of keeping women submissive and repressed. Gentlemen, I'd like to know your feelings about this. Thank you. Well, I mean, we're talking about a march that that is based on Martin Luther King's legacy. And his legacy was very inclusive. And it was about raising everybody up. And virtually everybody on one level or another needed needs to be raised up, needed to be raised up. And so I think there are a variety of issues that it's like this is their moment in the spotlight. Yeah. And and certainly women's issues. You know, you go back with the National Organization of Women and a variety of things going on. And maybe now is the time for the spotlight to go back on some women's issues. If they haven't really been. Seriously looked at in a while. But I mean, with our nation of immigrants and each, you know, each immigrant has a story. You know, each age group has a story. Each gender has a story. Right. And it's and unfortunately we live in. I mean, you're talking about everybody wanting to be liked. We live in a very pop culture society. That's not that's not really based on listening to anybody's story, let alone go deep. Right. So then what does that say, Guillermo, to you as a man? Yeah. You know, an ethnic man and so forth. And a man, you know, you're you're a biblical man. What does that say about, you know, as far as I mean, without getting too deep, but as far as on a biblical level and for you as an ethnic man and, you know, yet a man who's also part of the movement as far as moving a progressive movement. Yet, you know, we still carry these roles in society where women are supposed to have a place. And how does that? What is that? How does that translate to you in the role as a man who's part of the movement, yet also how that overall fits into the world as far as how a woman is supposed to be and act in the world? Are you feeling me? Well, let me see how I answer that. Well, you know, I, I, I grew up in my family when I grew up with my father, my mom. You know, it's I had a kind of dysfunctional family. I don't know if any of you have. Haven't we all? I had that experience. I can write the book. But and sometimes it's the way we're taught, the way we grew up. Sometimes we didn't have roles. And, you know, like my father was, you know, he drank a lot and my mother got mentally ill when we were only like 10 years old. So. Okay. So the way I grew up, you know, sometimes in the streets and when I early in my childhood to about 12, then I had my first experience with God about 12 and a half years old. Okay. But I've developed. It took the experience because my sister was a very accomplished person, woman. She's she in the in 1980, she was going to many arts high school and she was a student body president there. I remember we were poor. My father had thrown all the money from from the business that he had. My mother was mentally disabled and my sister was still her escape was the education. Right. And she ended up from many arts. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. I. she moved to Europe and she worked with prime ministers of countries and things like that in 2000 in 2007 Sally we lost my sister to cancer and it was my another it was the second turning point in my life where I you know I was telling I was it was like a reworking for me because you're bringing thinking about why God that allowed that to happen and she was such a kind person and she worked a lot in human rights originally she was studying to be a diplomat so it opened my eyes a lot to how I look at women how I value them I how I well I've always valued my mom but she was mentally disabled right so I'm the I'm the caretaker of my mom even though being the youngest of the family so you still see today many men that the way they speak about women you know just by terms that they use that might not value the role of a woman they also by the way they they're treated they treat them they don't see them equal sometimes and they still have that mentality and they're not treated the same way they were treated they don't see them with that mentality going back to the old the dark ages right uh I see other cultures do that also that I hear um sometimes from other coaches when they they're talking to me about their their upbringing um so and then you have the the way uh women today are treated as far as in the workplace as far as their their pay they they are ones that are affected very much when it comes to what kind of pay they get that they don't get the same equal pay exactly and for example when we had the campaign in measurement in um in Long Beach for the hotel workers many of them were women of color working at these hotels screening 20 to 16 rooms uh they got paid mostly the minimum eight dollars per hour after working there for many years and uh so they were at the lower skill so a lot of the uh you know I I my friend Kathy Depp who works has an organization called nine to five mostly works with a lot of uh women who are Victims of Economic Justice and things like that and she says and then you know sometimes she shared the stories including immigrant uh woman that worked maybe on the farms and women that work maybe on the farms and things like that, how they could be victims of abuse, victims of not only wage theft, but also victims of sexual abuse and things like that. Right, there is that. So, you know, it's very important. Working in my organization, which is an interfaith organization, my program director is Pastor Betty Roberts. She emphasized that every time we have an event or something like that, the importance of the role of women, and she's our supervisor. So you learn, I learn, but other people, you know, and to value and appreciate the role of a woman in God's eyes, nobody should have Lord over anybody. And that was Jesus' words, that you will not be like the Gentiles, telling the Jewish group that he was speaking to at that time, you will not be like the Gentiles, that they Lord over each person. No one will be Lord over you. So that is telling me how he valued every person, especially when he approached the Samaritan woman also. And he made her the kind of the first evangelist. And sometimes we even have faith communities that don't, we believe in the woman as a pastor and stuff like that. And here's Jesus determining the value of a woman that came to get some water and made her the first evangelist, pretty much had the longest conversation with her. And that's recorded, I think, in the Bible. And so it tells you how we might... That's not Deborah. No, this was the good Samaritan woman at the Jacobs when he went to ask her for some water. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. So he broke this tradition. He broke this tradition of speaking to a woman that supposedly had five husbands. Oh, that's right, yes. And speaking to a rabbi who was not supposed to speak to a woman in public. Here he is going against all traditions to see how he values somebody, you see. And today we have those kind of Samaritan women today here with us, you know, whether it's a single mother, the undocumented mother, the mother living on a scale rule, is how Jesus looks at them. That's how we have to look at them, how he values them. Those are the eyes that we have to value people with, you see, equal. I appreciate that. That was beautiful. That was beautiful. Now, and I appreciate you all letting me, gentlemen, have this platform since this is about ladies take the mic and, you know, helping us to move the conversations forward as far as women's issues. And we're going to, you know, move back to MLK, an event, in just a minute here. But, Cynthia, before we go into break and go on to the next segment, I'd like you to talk in regards to the events and the things that you're doing in the community currently that stem around women's issues and women's needs and so forth. Can you speak further about that? Yeah, well, I want to piggyback on something that Guillermo just said about mothers and motherhood. There are so many mothers that are on Skid Row. And we know from the Downtown Women's Center's last women's needs assessment that was done in 2013, about 30%, almost 30% of women who live on Skid Row report having children under the age of 18. And we've got a variety show. We're coming up. DWAC, the Downtown Women's Action Coalition, has actually got a variety show coming up. We do a variety show every year, raising money for DWAC. And this year, we're celebrating mothers, mothers on Skid Row, women who are without their children, estranged from their children for whatever reasons. And women who become surrogate mothers on Skid Row end up being mothers to other people who are on Skid Row. So I thank you for bringing up that, how important mothers are. The other thing that I'm doing here on Skid Row now is I just want to say thank you to all the women who just got a grant from the California Humanities, from Cal Humanities, to create a theater project, which is the Downtown Women's Theater Project. We'll be looking at bringing together Skid Row women and non-Skid Row women who live and work in downtown to come together in dialogue about how we can re-envision what's happening in Skid Row, all the change that's happening down here. I think that women have a lot of power. And, you know, together, re-envision what downtown can actually look like and build a play around it and bring it to the table. And I think that's what I'm doing right now. I'm trying to build a three-year theater project. Awesome. So doing that. And then, you know, volunteering with DWAC, which is wonderful. I've got this great... Downtown Women's Action Coalition. Yeah, I've got this great tea party that's coming up. We're going to have our first high tea at DWC that Yvette will be... Yvette. Suzette. Suzette will be... is chairing and will be hosting kind of thing. And that is all about just bringing the idea of women's issues downtown to the fore. And just, I'll just end with, I know you need to go to break, but just to end with, one of the things going on right now is the story of Trishan Carey, which mostly nobody knows her name. It's very hard to find her online. Now, why should that name even be familiar to us? Because she was the woman who was arrested the day that our brother Africa, Charlie Kunang, was murdered on Skid Row by the police on March 1st. That was March 1st, yeah. March 1st. She was there as well. She was with him that day. In the foreground. And the police beat her and she was jailed and later charged with assault on a federal officer and resisting arrest. Her bail is set at $1,085,000, which the judge refuses to reduce, stating that she is a danger to the community. Now, in actuality, she would have received better treatment had she been a white man who'd gone into a theater and opened fire on everybody in there. Oh, that's deep. And that bail set at that, that amount is against her human rights. And so right now, one of the things that we're doing on Skid Row is really trying to raise awareness about what is happening with her and just to rally some support around finding and getting justice for her. And then as we extend out from there, really looking at what is happening with women on Skid Row. Okay. All right, we're going to take a quick break. And then when we come back, I want to talk about the overall message of tomorrow's margin. And kind of, and how that feeds into Brother Africa and the message, raise of consciousness is about can't kill Africa. You know, the meaning behind all of that for each of you. And we'll go to break, quick break, take a quick break and we'll come back and deal with that. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. the mic here in Skid Row Studios. We've had another member of the community join us since we were last before break. And I would like to introduce him now. I've got Steve Pham sitting next to me. Steve, why don't you tell us a little bit about who you are, what your role is here in the community of Skid Row, and as far as the movement that the march is going to happen tomorrow. Oh, yeah. My name is Steve Pham. And about seven years ago, I started a Christian community website. At that point, I wanted to mobilize the Christian people in Los Angeles to come together and basically just love on the people of Los Angeles. And three years ago, I came down here to actually involve in this thing called Operation Facelift Skid Row. And at the time, it was an offshoot of an activity that Skid Row Brigade had been doing for years. And at that point, they wanted to bring outside people to... What is it all about? The Operation Facelift Skid Row is to go around Skid Row and just clean up the trash and basically have a good relationship with people, talk to people, that kind of stuff. And so when I started, I brought up the idea, like, why don't we do it every Saturday and make it like a very, very regular thing? Because I have tried this at my old apartment building and it did work. If you show up and then you clean on a regular basis, you actually restore something in people, and they actually take ownership of the place. And so we did that with Operation Facelift for, for six months. And then after that, we went out on our own. So we started with Operation Facelift February of 2012. And August of 2012, I had my own group. And at this point, the emphasis is mostly on cleaning up the streets because at that point, Operation Facelift, they wanted to have other activities like playing basketball in the summer. And so I felt that we needed a more dedicated, dedicated group, dedicated strictly to cleaning up Skid Row. And it doesn't have to be Christian either. We want to basically welcome the spirit of helping people and cleaning up the streets. So anybody from Los Angeles or anybody who can just show up and join us on Saturday for two hours. And so, so we started building up a storage area. We have equipment and we did a lot of research into safety equipment. And so it gradually built up. And so we started building up a storage area. We have equipment and we did a lot of research into safety equipment. And so it gradually built up up to a point where we make it so easy as anybody can come up, come and join us and they don't have to bring anything. You know, we have everything set up. This is amazing. Now, how many years have you been doing this? We started on our own August of 2012. This is amazing because this really, really, really just feeds into how Cynthia got started on. You weren't here at the top of the show. We were talking about Cynthia identified herself as a revolutionary. You were talking about Cynthia identified herself as a revolutionary angel. And I'm sitting here listening to you and I'm thinking about all of you sitting here in this room and involved in this movement. And I'm like, God, I just got like just more compassion and love and respect for all of you because you really are. You are people. I mean, it's just this whole the fact of how people, you know, so many people talk about it. They talk about it and they talk about it. But you guys, in spite of any and every other thing, conflict or anything going on in your personal lives, you are so knee deep in it. You're on the streets of Skid Row cleaning every Saturday, brother. Every Saturday you're cleaning these streets. Cynthia and I were actually out filming last Saturday morning and happened to bond you or you happened to bond us. And I mean, there was a huge rat right in front of us. And we were like, ew. And what did you do? You came along and you swept it up. There was a big long thingy and you just picked it up. And we were like, ew. And what did you do? You came along and you swept it up. There was a big long thingy and you just picked it up. And we picked it up. And we got into the trash and we were like, ah, I'm telling you, it's amazing. I want to add that that rat didn't die of disease because Operation Healthy Streets, they had been robbing palliative to kill them. So it was a diseased rat. So they had been dying. But because we want people to get involved with us. So sometimes we have a lot of organizations with women and children cleaning with us. And we did a lot of research. And our policy is if we see humans, we clean them. If we see human feces or rat, the regular volunteer, they don't clean it. But if we have staff present and if it's favorable, then we do clean it. And so we have procedure for everything. And the regular volunteer, they don't touch any of that stuff. And I'm glad you mentioned that about the women and the children and so forth. Because I have to interject here that, you know, I was raised by a single mother. I'm the sixth child of a single mother. I'm a twin. I have a twin sister who's five minutes older than me. I was raised by a community actress. I was raised by a community activist woman. That in spite of everything, you know, she still every single day was devoted to the community, to the state and so forth. And the greater cause of the needs of not just black folks but, you know, people of all different ethnicities. And, you know, and it's funny because I was actually having a conversation with some ladies on the bus or on the train the other week. And we were talking about how, you know, like as a mother or as a woman, you know, you're not supposed to be a mother. You're supposed to be a father. You're supposed to be a mother. You're supposed to be a mother. And, you know, it's really not about the amount of time you spend with children, but it's the quality of time. You know, you really, you know, and just how kids learn so much about what it means to be a community leader and be a leader. You learn so much just about what it means to be a leader just by observing others, just by observing your parents. And getting out and getting involved in the community, doing the things that, you know, you're talking about, you know, we have mothers and their children. And their children who come out sometimes and support. I'm involved in other things in the community. You know, mothers and their children come out and support. You know, and sometimes even fathers and their children come out and support. But the bigger picture is the fact is that people, it's a beautiful thing when we talk about, you know, this Adopt a Mother campaign and tea that we're planning currently. And, or what it means to be a mother who is adopted by others, you know. I mean, I, you know, I think about it. You know, I think about this right now. I had a young lady who's coming here from Arizona who's in her master's program in a social justice program. And, you know, sent me a message the other day saying, oh, Suzette, I'm coming to intern over the summer, you know. And I'm looking for housing and so forth. And, you know, in the middle of, you know, different things, you know, I'm trying to assist her with finding housing. And, you know, and I, you know, I call them all like kind of like my, you know, my baby kids out here. I mean, you know, they're in their early 20s or what have you. But, you know, I've brought no kids into the world, you know. I've never been a pregnant woman. So I just think that it's really important just talk about how, what leadership and community organizing and involvement looks like and what it feels like. And, you know, I'm going to move a little forward and talk about the march for 4-4 tomorrow. And, you know, someone actually asked me the other day, they said, another march? Why do we need to do another march? What are we really marching for? Now, I'm going to just say this. I'm going to say personally for me, I had to say to this person in a very long-winded way that this march is the movement, the empathy, you know, about loyalty, about, you know, faithfulness, about family, about love, and about something that's a bigger and a greater cause than you. It's something about, something that's not even tangible. You just know that it exists and you know that people fought and sacrificed for us to do the things and be where we are here today, especially as black folks. So I'm going to ask. If anybody would like to answer that question, what does this movement tomorrow, this march tomorrow mean for you? Who would like to answer that question? Okay. Okay. I'll. Go ahead. Tom. If you look at history, the history of the civil rights movement or just history in general, marching is very powerful. I mean, any major social movement or transformation, revolution, anything, I mean, marching is foundational. Yeah. I mean, that's just an overall answer. But this march, there was a very long, I thought very well researched, written article on March 30th, just a few days ago in the LA Times that pulled the pieces together of who this guy Africa really was. You would occasionally pick up things that just seemed really strange. He robbed a bank because he had to pay for acting classes. And this is his name. But no, it was actually, he stole an identity there. I mean, it was just, it was very strange. Yeah. It was very strange. But this article really, you knew who he was. You knew the background. You knew the sadness. You knew how the system failed him. You knew how he ended up sleeping in a tent on San Pedro Street in front of Union Rescue Mission. Who was this written by? Gail Holland, who's their- Oh, was it LA Times? Okay. Poverty and homelessness reporter. I have to look at that. Okay. Yeah. It was a wonderful article. But then the thing that really grabbed my attention was that this came out on Cesar Chavez Day. So the whole thing is Black and Brown Lives United. And here it's right here. Here's an in-depth personal story about Africa so that you can finally put the pieces together and make some sense of how he even ended up where he ended up. And telling that story of this man nicknamed Africa on Cesar Chavez Day. So, I mean, I literally saw that as a sign from God of how profound and how significant this is tomorrow. That's beautiful. That's beautiful. Thanks for sharing that because I will look for that article. Cynthia, what it is that you wanted to add to that? Well, I wanted to add that what is that which is important about marches is that marches make us visible. You know, a lot of the time we feel, you know, we can slink into the background and we can talk about how we think this and thus is unfair. But unless we step into the fray, then it's almost like we're not even there. We're not visible. The Zapatistas have this great way of covering their faces. Covering their faces so that they stand. And out from the crowd. You know, if you look across at everyone you look and you see everybody looks the same. So, we can see them as one big blob and not pay attention. But if they cover their faces, then they're the ones that stand out. And in that way, I think that taking to the streets make us visible and make us heard en masse. And that's why it's important to keep on stepping out into the streets, especially when the injustice keeps on happening. So, we need to keep on being seen and we need to keep on being heard. Right. Anything you want to add into that? Well, you know, this march is very important because it continues and you said it when we were working together on writing the press advisory. Race consciousness, you know, changes the narrative, puts, humanizes the issues out there that still exist in our country. You know, there's issues with what happened to Michael Brown, Eric Garner, Omar Obrigo. All these issues point to something more than just police use of force. Right. It also points to the disparities that have existed in our communities of color for so long because of past policies. Right. Past policies that go back a long way where we were excluded from economic opportunities. Right. Education opportunities. And not only those, there's other communities too, Asians, Jewish communities, Filipinos. So, it speaks also that we cannot remain silent anymore, right, including the faith community. You know, many of our young people today are disconnected from the communities of color. Right. And they're not being elected from the communities of faith because when something like this happens, we go have a vigil, we go have a prayer, but nothing changes, right? Right. So, I see like, you know, the theme of this march, Rood Awakening, revolutionary angels, all this stuff is happening for a purpose. Like, there's something going on. Right. And it's not only Martin Luther King not happy with what's happening today. God is not happy with what's happening today. Right. And he's moving people to act. Yeah. And this is the voice. God is the cry, God hears the cry of the poor. Mm-hmm. God hears the cry of the poor. Mm-hmm. And so, I think that's what's happening. Right. And so, I think that's what's happening. Right. God hears the cry of the poor. Mm-hmm. God hears the cry of the oppressed. How does he reveal himself? Through us, through people like us. Mm-hmm. Through other people who are the light, shining the light to these injustices. The prophetic voice is going back all the way to Moses. Mm-hmm. Right? Well said. To free the Jews from the Egyptians, from hard labor, from bondage, right? So, today there's a lot of bondage and this march will be on Holy Saturday. Mm-hmm. Both, this week is very holy to both Christians and Jews. Right? But we're inviting everyone. It's not just, we're an interface. Mm-hmm. It's a safe community. Everybody who is for justice, for compassion, for correcting the wrongs in our society and lifting the voices and joining the voices of other people who are oppressed. Absolutely. We're not speaking for them, but we're just joining their voices because people have not heard them. So, come, people should come to this march to keep raising that consciousness. How many do you estimate that we'll have at the march tomorrow? Well, we have a good, we got a lot of good. We got a lot of good response to the march. It was a little bit challenging for the faith community because it's Holy Weekend. Mm-hmm. And some of our faith community are very busy because they could do a service tonight for a good Friday. They do a service tomorrow. They do a service on Sunday. So, it's very challenging. So, we're very thankful for those who encourage you who are going to come out to stand with the community. Mm-hmm. But we have about 40 to 50 endorsers for this march. Wow, that's quite a few. So, we're getting a lot of, we're getting calls from the media today. Great. About this march. So, we hope it's a good turnout. But, you know, but nevertheless, if it's one voice out there, that'll make the difference too. Right, right. You know, I just thought about something. Cynthia, you designed a puppet that depicts Brother Africa. What compelled you to design this human-sized puppet that you'll be wearing tomorrow from what I understand? Yeah, I will be. It came from the idea, I used to work with a, you know, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, circus and anarchist theater company in New Mexico called Wiseful In Mexico. And they basically work on bred and puppet theater company out of Vermont. And it's the whole idea that when, you know, we were working with a我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我我 It came from the idea, I used to work with a circus and anarchist theater company in New Mexico called Wise Fool New Mexico, and they basically work on bread and puppet theater company out of Vermont. And it's the whole idea that when, you know, we were talking earlier, Tom, about artists coming out and putting a face on this movement and putting a creative face on the movement, there's one thing to go out with signs and yell loud with your signs and proclaim what's on your heart and what needs to be said. So that's one way of doing it. Another way of doing it is to create spectacle. And spectacle, on the other hand, makes... People stop and look and say, what is that? And it's, you know, and it's the beauty of it, you know, the beauty of having a huge piece of artwork that really takes people's attention. And the other thing is to put a little bit more of a face on him, to humanize him. You know, Tom, you were talking about, you know, finally getting to see, get little bits of who he actually was, who he was as a human being before he was the dead man on Skid Row. Before he was... Before he was the man who everyone knows now he robbed a bank at one point. But to look back to who he was, he's in African dress. Yeah. So he's in his traditional Cameroonian dress. So we get to see who he was before all this happened. And that was my hope with him, is that it would inspire people to see him as a human being. Right. Steve, did you want to say something? Oh, yes. I want to interject a few points. But the whole point of me coming out to Skid Row is basically... I'm doing activity in the Christian community when I asked Christians to come down to Skid Row. And it's the same spirit that I'm fighting against. It's almost like they sweep these people under the rug and they don't want to look at them, you know. And they were like, why do you want to come down to Skid Row? It's a bunch of addicts. So I had the hardest time inviting my church people to come down. And it is against everything Christ stood for, you know. Exactly. I was just thinking this. When he started preaching, the first thing that he said when he quoted Isaiah 61, the Spirit of the Lord God is upon me to preach good tidings to the poor, to heal the brokenhearted. That was the first thing he said. So it doesn't matter what political affiliation you have. If you're a Christian, you cannot get away from it. You have to help the poor, you know. I mean, people can have different affiliations and people can be fighting against each other. But if you're a Christian, you have to help the poor. And basically, I think marching is a way to let the world know that... Because, you know, like the people, the powerful people, they have the media. So they have a way to communicate to the poor or to the world. What do the poor people have? The only thing to communicate, hey, you helped me. It's more to show something, you know. It doesn't matter. You got to show it. And it's like, hey, a wound has been made and then something needs to be rectified. Well, you know, I think that's really important that you say that right now. Because one thing as far as the Can't Kill Africa hashtag that's been created and the whole message in regards to that resonates off. You know, you can't kill Africa. I feel that it sings to exactly what you're speaking of right now and what each and every one of you have laid your hands upon today in regards to how, you know, Africa represents each and every one of us. And especially for those of us who live in Skid Row that are, you know, or have felt oppressed at some time in our lives that, you know, Africa represents who we are as a people and who we are as an individual. Africa could have been me. Africa could have been my brother. You know, Africa could have been my future husband. You know what I'm saying? Africa, that's how close we are. Just like that. Living on the edge and, you know, being one paycheck away from poverty and homelessness and so forth. And then the overall rude awakening as far as Dr. King and that overall message of, you know, and the march and how Dr. King, the marches, you know, each little bit that Dr. King moved, the movement forward, right, brought more rays of consciousness, if you will. And so I think that kind of also then leads to the bigger picture. Bobby, did you want to say something before we? Oh, please. Yes. Yes. This is actually the flyer of the march that we have going around. And again, it's the Black and Brown Lives Legacy March and MLK Legacy March. It'll be Saturday, April 4th, 2015. That is tomorrow. It starts at 3 p.m. at Olympic and Broadway. And we hope you all will come out to support. We have various speakers who will be engaging the community, some spoken word. We have some singers and so forth. And we have a march. It's a march. So don't be twisted by it. It is a march. And I would have liked to have everybody come back at some point so we can continue these conversations. This is only the beginning. Because again, we're talking about a movement and we're talking about a rays of consciousness. And this is just a beginning, opening dialogue that we'll have to continue to move forward because we're still in it, right? Yeah. So we're all going to put our boots on tomorrow. And we're going to be ready to move forward and stand up for what we believe in. And I appreciate each and every one of you. Thank you so much for being here with me today. I look forward to having you back on the show. And so we can continue this conversation. And power to people. And rude awakening. Can't kill Africa. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Bye.