Border Justice & Disability Justice
//Tonight I read the rain as sacred text
that is: with awe, without full comprehension
my spirit the sculpted canyon walls
through which it ran and yet was held//
Before I moved out here people asked me how my position working with disability justice was connected to border justice. In response, I've been thinking about how the border region is affected by so much more than immigration itself-- the economic partnerships, trade, transnational corporations and their influence, the involvement of oil & gas companies, military presence and militarization of the border, veterans and retirees, water issues and agreements to send water on to Texas & Mexico. New Mexico is the state with the highest per capita phd-holders yet is somewhere around 49th in grade school education outcomes.
During our orientation we met with Pastor Rosemary in El Paso to discuss border economics, her congregation spans one of the poorest zip codes in the U.S. The avg income for a 2-headed household in El Paso is $25,000 a year, in the area near the church the avg income is 10-15k-- a level of poverty where people have to make choices between their basic needs to survive such as cutting their food budget to pay rent, or not having medical insurance so they can maintaining the vehicle they need for work. In the colonias where people were sold land at lower prices with the promise that services would come (& years later some are still without sewage, potable water, trash pick-up, etc) the avg income is 9k and across the border in Juarez the avg income for single-headed household is $2,500 a year. People working in U.S. factories make around 50-70$ a week. These economic realities shape the region.
This week I've begun to be introduced to the Beloved Community Project.
A story was shared with me of a man who used a wheelchair and had spent the majority of his life in his home (the isolation & hidden-ness that becomes an (un)intentional consequence of the institutions/systems). He was befriended by a man who decided to build a wheelchair ramp at his house so he could invite him over for dinner. Once the ramp was completed and the man came in he began to cry and said, "I have never been in someone else's home." This hit me hard-- how easy it would be to create not just access-able space but inclusive space that valued the presence if we were more consciously considering different people's needs and not just a hypothetical norm.
One of the things that has struck me most in the stories I've heard is how no one (in the systems) had ever asked the hopes, the dreams, or the strengths of the young adults with disabilities. Their disability was viewed as inconvenient, needing fixing, or pity-- none of which honor the wholeness and complexity of the young adults I have met. This is the intersection I see with border justice. Our society easily discards the value of people who we do not understand, who it is difficult (i.e. different, uncomfortable, requires learning) to communicate with. This mindset connects how we "other" people and build walls to separate ourselves into comfort. Instead of seeking to see the world the way others do we construct ways to protect our way of seeing the world. This is borders and this is ableism-- and so many mentalities which decide which lives are valuable based on whether you are productive to a capitalist society, or of a particular nationality or economic status or "ability" or race or religion or gender.
I've been thinking about where those mentalities pop up in me- What qualities do I begin to idealize or superior-ize? What causes me to begin to value lives less? Rochelle writes in A Staff to the Pilgrim, "We stand in awe before others when we view them as wholes, not as parts, or even as the sum of parts." I often think about no one being just one identity but I don't know if I know how to see the whole from the sum of parts. I've been learning from folks this week of empowerment as holding open a space to be together, to show up as our whole selves. It is difficult work not to minimizing what I dislike or feel insecure about in myself or squirm away from what makes me feel vulnerable but there is so much to discover in holding open the possibilities that exist when we encounter each other authentically-- emerging across the borders we create into the frontiers of each other.
that is: with awe, without full comprehension
my spirit the sculpted canyon walls
through which it ran and yet was held//
Before I moved out here people asked me how my position working with disability justice was connected to border justice. In response, I've been thinking about how the border region is affected by so much more than immigration itself-- the economic partnerships, trade, transnational corporations and their influence, the involvement of oil & gas companies, military presence and militarization of the border, veterans and retirees, water issues and agreements to send water on to Texas & Mexico. New Mexico is the state with the highest per capita phd-holders yet is somewhere around 49th in grade school education outcomes.
During our orientation we met with Pastor Rosemary in El Paso to discuss border economics, her congregation spans one of the poorest zip codes in the U.S. The avg income for a 2-headed household in El Paso is $25,000 a year, in the area near the church the avg income is 10-15k-- a level of poverty where people have to make choices between their basic needs to survive such as cutting their food budget to pay rent, or not having medical insurance so they can maintaining the vehicle they need for work. In the colonias where people were sold land at lower prices with the promise that services would come (& years later some are still without sewage, potable water, trash pick-up, etc) the avg income is 9k and across the border in Juarez the avg income for single-headed household is $2,500 a year. People working in U.S. factories make around 50-70$ a week. These economic realities shape the region.
This week I've begun to be introduced to the Beloved Community Project.
A story was shared with me of a man who used a wheelchair and had spent the majority of his life in his home (the isolation & hidden-ness that becomes an (un)intentional consequence of the institutions/systems). He was befriended by a man who decided to build a wheelchair ramp at his house so he could invite him over for dinner. Once the ramp was completed and the man came in he began to cry and said, "I have never been in someone else's home." This hit me hard-- how easy it would be to create not just access-able space but inclusive space that valued the presence if we were more consciously considering different people's needs and not just a hypothetical norm.
One of the things that has struck me most in the stories I've heard is how no one (in the systems) had ever asked the hopes, the dreams, or the strengths of the young adults with disabilities. Their disability was viewed as inconvenient, needing fixing, or pity-- none of which honor the wholeness and complexity of the young adults I have met. This is the intersection I see with border justice. Our society easily discards the value of people who we do not understand, who it is difficult (i.e. different, uncomfortable, requires learning) to communicate with. This mindset connects how we "other" people and build walls to separate ourselves into comfort. Instead of seeking to see the world the way others do we construct ways to protect our way of seeing the world. This is borders and this is ableism-- and so many mentalities which decide which lives are valuable based on whether you are productive to a capitalist society, or of a particular nationality or economic status or "ability" or race or religion or gender.
I've been thinking about where those mentalities pop up in me- What qualities do I begin to idealize or superior-ize? What causes me to begin to value lives less? Rochelle writes in A Staff to the Pilgrim, "We stand in awe before others when we view them as wholes, not as parts, or even as the sum of parts." I often think about no one being just one identity but I don't know if I know how to see the whole from the sum of parts. I've been learning from folks this week of empowerment as holding open a space to be together, to show up as our whole selves. It is difficult work not to minimizing what I dislike or feel insecure about in myself or squirm away from what makes me feel vulnerable but there is so much to discover in holding open the possibilities that exist when we encounter each other authentically-- emerging across the borders we create into the frontiers of each other.
Comments
Post a Comment