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. @JoeBuscaino went full mask off at council last week. "The best way to help people is to threaten to take away their freedom.” "If you don't take down your tent, you’re gonna go to jail.” "Our streets are disgusting because of a lack of consequences." (thread) https://twitter.com/NicolasEmmons/status/1322377748174659584
Joe's a cop, so no surprise. But what's disgusting is we have to deal with a cop peddling fascist talking points/motions, and many other councilmembers happily concurring.
. @PaulKrekorian was one of those concurring, and referred to criminalization as "harm reduction.”
. @PaulKrekorian was one of those concurring, and referred to criminalization as "harm reduction.”
This is the most deceiving and harmful definition of "harm reduction" one could possibly imagine. The city council has a tendency to appropriate progressive language and concepts, and use them to describe or justify the very things the concepts were created to combat.
. @CD6Nury is a CM who does this. She uses her background as a working class woman of color to defend her actions which harm other working class people of color who are currently houseless. It's incredibly manipulative and cynical. Solidarity is what we need, not criminalization.
. @CD6Nury will elaborate on how "Black and brown families have to witness things that they shouldn't.” Notice how she has simply added race and class as qualifiers to what are normally conservative or fascist talking points. This is a tendency by many of the worst liberals.
Liberals like @CD6Nury don't understand why we focus on race and class. Racial identities aren't used to raise oneself above others, like the caricature that conservatives paint. They're identities that reveal the systems of oppression that must be undone for liberation.
We recognize that this housing system, ruled by landlords and private developers must go. We dont blame those caught in the throes of the system. We support them in their struggle. We aim to build solidarity across racial lines and unite working class housed and unhoused tenants,
in their fight against this system of private property. We recognize that white people have historically weaponized their identity and power against poor and working class people, especially black people who are over-represented 5x on the streets.
. @CD6Nury should stop hypocritically spouting the same xenophobic, racist talking points used against people of color. She insisted that people are flocking to her district for shelter, playing to a bigoted myth that unhoused people are "invading".
. @CD6Nury recruits @MRodCD7 as an ally in this line of cynical oppression, who is another woman of color. Monica adopts the same fascist talking points, saying that "people" (excluding unhoused people) are tired of "enduring living next to poor&unhoused people.”
Many CMs complain about "trash on the streets.” They ignore the fact that trash pickup, which is coordinated for millions of housed residents, has been systematically denied to unhoused residents. It's not uncommon to see this city actually _removing_ trash cans from camps.
. @PaulKrekorian is more than happy to push for "compelling compliance" from unhoused people, but has never mentioned compelling compliance from powerful people, like setting rent prices for landlords that currently charge $3k/mo for a 1BR apartment.
The city is never “compelling compliance” when it comes to hundreds of illegal planters blocking the sidewalk, intended to displace unhoused people. Or many restaurants that are now blocking public sidewalks in order to accomodate outside dining, which is acceptable to the CMs.
The most dangerous line of thinking that pervades this conservative wing of council, is that we must hurt people in order to help them.
That jails and violence is motivating. That a criminal record is good for you. That ticketing people with no money makes sense.
That jails and violence is motivating. That a criminal record is good for you. That ticketing people with no money makes sense.
That houselessness and poverty is a personal choice. It's a disgusting misrecognition that is completely uncritical of and in service of the power centers in this city, landlords and developers, and instead blames the tenant, crushed under the weight of the commodification,
privatization, and profiteering in housing. It is the same thing that the billionaire capitalist would tell you if you were to steal a loaf of bread to avoid starving. It is the same thing that the cop would tell you as he kicks you out of an abandoned house.
Nevermind that we have landlords that let units sit vacant, and developers that demolish rent controlled apartments. These CMs choose to blame the pennyless, powerless unhoused tenant.
The line of thinking, that hurting is helping, is exactly the same logic as the Trump administration used in their paper on homelessness. That people must be punished via police and made to be as uncomfortable as possible on the streets so that they choose to exit houslessness.
And as we struggle to build a better society, we recognize that this kind of punitive oppression is a weapon and a disease and must be excised.
All LA council has to do to educate themselves on these falsehoods, is to listen to their own agency, LAHSA, who will tell them that the majority of people are unhoused because of issues of housing affordability and housing availability.
Or listen to the dozens of people calling in every week. They have no excuse. Unhoused people deserve no harm or criminalization. The 17k unhoused children in LAUSD deserve no harm or criminalization.
We need to support people experiencing the disease of drug addiction or mental illness, with counselors and needle exchanges, and reduce their contact with the criminal punishment system. THAT is harm reduction.
We know empirically and by lived experience, that criminalization harms health and housing outcomes. It's widely accepted fact. Housing is healthcare. Especially during the COVID pandemic, which will continue into the indefinite future.
Nury’s sudden urgency to “take action” as criminalization is on the table, or Koretz’s claims that the council is powerless to end houselessness, are vacuous excuses designed to obfuscate their cowardice and lack of action when it comes to wielding... https://twitter.com/StreetWatchLA/status/1321559901907406848
power to dramatically create public housing, below-market rate housing, confronting the forces of gentrification that are demolishing rent stabilized apartments and building luxury units in their place, or voting down the litany of pandemic tenant protections this summer.
We look forward to the fight on Nov 24, when this council again will attempt to criminalize the poorest, most powerless people in LA.
In the meantime we will continue supporting the people who are made to sleep on a few feet of concrete outside vacant luxury apartments and city owned golf courses, in this hellscape of privatization.
And if you haven't yet, volunteer for Nithya Raman, who will be a councilmember that actually tries to help people on the streets. https://www.nithyaforthecity.com/signup
If you are in the San Fernando Valley or can drive there, Support @StreetWatchLA in their defense against @CD6Nury's weekly attacks against unhoused communities of color. Just last week they arrested a comrade who was standing up for their unhoused neighbors.
