It Could Happen Here - It Could Happen 89

Episode Date: June 24, 2023

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Okay, hello, everyone. It's me, James, today, and I'm joined by three guests, all members of the Southeast Alaska Indigenous Trans Boundary Commission. What we're talking about today is accepting indigenous leadership on issues of climate change and issues of more broadly ecological damage. And specifically, we're discussing an emergency declaration that they recently released about the state of the Pacific salmon population, if I'm not mistaken. So I'm going to ask each of them to introduce themselves. If you could give us your name and any relevant affiliations that you think listeners should know, that would be wonderful.

Hello, my name is Kirby Moldo. My ancestral name is Hapwalaqsa. I am from the Tsimshian people in what is now known as Northwest British Columbia, Canada. My mother is Tsimshian, my father is Gixan, and I am from Wilp Weget, which is the house of the night drummer from the Fireweed Clan. I am also an independent consultant and contractor, and I look forward to our discussion today. Thank you. Thank you. Hi, I'm Louis Wagner Jr. from Metlakatla, Alaska,

Hi, I'm Louis Wagner Jr. from Metlakatla, Alaska. And I'm Taequiti of the Brown Bear Clan from Cape Fox, San Yukon. And I have lived in Metlakatla my whole life of 75 years. And we're connected to the E Unique River through my grandmother. And she was born at Cape Fox. And we've been on the Unique River ever since I was big enough to go with my older brother. And so I've been up there since like 1960. Wow.

And my brothers was up there close to 20 years before that. So our family has always been on the Eunuch River to harvest at the fish camp up there. there and and we'd fish the hooligans bring the hooligans home to the to the people and and catch can sacks and metal cattle and then people would send them out to the west coast so we're very connected we go up to the eunuch in the spring for hooligan and the fall for hunting now. They used to do the salmon up on the river with the fish camp. I served on our community council from 2000 and to about, I think, 2015 in there. And now I'm their tribal rights representative for the community and I report back to our council after each of our meetings. Thank you very much and Guy would you like to introduce yourself? Yes my name is Guy Archibald. I'm the executive director of the Southeast Alaska Indigenous Trans Boundary Commission. We were formed about nine years ago by a commission of 15 sovereign tribes in southeast Alaska reacting to a huge amount of mine development and further potential mine development going on in the transboundary watersheds that drain from British Columbia to Alaska.

I used to work at the mines. I'm an environmental chemist by trade. I help tribes monitor their own environments and their food security through science. And yeah, I'm looking forward to this discussion as well. Yeah, that's a fantastic setup for all of you thank you very much so i think we should begin because maybe people may have missed the the extent and and the severity of the emergency with salmon populations and so perhaps we could start out by explaining

like how it how it was it seems likeie, you have a lot of experience there. Uh, and then what has caused things to be at a situation they're at now? Would that be a good way to go about it? Yes, that would be a good way where we are at now on this. The salmon is that Bruce Jack mine started on the river and none of us knew about it until way late

summer's around the mid 90s 1990s and by 2000 especially in the spring when we'd be up there the hooligans were

starting to disappear and then in the hooligans were starting to disappear. And then in the fall, moose hunting, the salmon were disappearing. And there's a lot less bears and moose now where the river, along the riverbank, would be full of the parts of the fish that bears didn't eat. There would be so many bears and fish. And now you don't smell any of that. And it's really affected the king salmon. They completely disappeared for at least six years that my son and I noticed. They spawn up on the river there.

And as we always pay attention, we check on the main spawning stream of Kingsbury where they spawn. And the last three years, we've been starting to see some come back. And that Bruce Jack mine, which found out later, they were putting their tailings into a lake up on the mountain there. And then, you know, as they filled it up and the rain filled it up, the overflow came down into the river. And the river is so shallow, it's only a few inches deep and it's not very wide. It's the smallest river out of the Stikine and the Taku there. And so any pollution in that river will completely kill it off.

The salmon runs their way down from what we've seen through the years. But, you know, it's also the wildlife that's disappearing with it because the feed isn't there. There's not the amount of seagulls, a lot less seals and sea lions. It's affecting on the food chain, everything. Yeah. I spent a little bit of time in your part of the world, just pack rafting and hiking and things. And certainly it's a very beautiful place,

but it's a very fragile one too, as you've explained, like these mines can very quickly have this effect that cascades at the ecosystem. Could you explain a little bit of the role that salmon play, not just in the, in the provision of food for the, for the animal life of the area, but also like the role they play traditionally in provisioning and feeding indigenous people?

Well, yeah. We put up as much sockeye as we can and then king salmon, and a lot of it we'll fish and get during the winter to eat and just get them fresh because they don't keep as well in the freezer. just get them fresh because they don't keep as well in the freezer. But as indigenous, you could, you know, look in our pantry and see we've lived the same life as I grew up with my parents and grandparents. Nothing has changed for us. We've taught our children the same way, how to harvest and take care of the fish. how to harvest and take care of the fish.

Back in the 50s, when I was a little kid in Matlakatla, Alaska, hardly anyone, if they even had a refrigerator, they didn't have freezers. So they had to smoke the fish really hard and they put them in those things, they're like four-gallon coffee cans with newspaper on the bottom and on top. And they would keep through the winter. They wouldn't get moldy. So that was the main staple for the whole year. Is it a situation now that people just can't rely on salmon as a staple food because of the mining tailings reducing the population?

Yeah, hardly any king salmon coming in. There's a few from the hatchery out there, but even in Ketchikan, they've closed the king salmonmon Derby for, I think it's into its fourth year now. So it's just, if that other big mine goes in, the river will be destroyed. And it's going to flow all the way out into the ocean here here into um clarence straits and dixon entrance this is be no avoiding that it's got nowhere else to go it comes straight out through the west beam canal and then east beam canal kirby i know you're not quite in exactly the same place but can you explain the situation with the salmon population where you are? Yeah, and maybe I'll give a little more context to that.

I live in northern British Columbia, northwest British Columbia, in the Skeena River watershed. Over the past probably 30 or 40 years, we've seen an extreme decline in salmon, specifically sockeye and king salmon, as you guys call it. We call them spring salmon over here, but we've seen an extreme decline in returns. And we've stopped a lot of our commercial fisheries and our food fisheries, uh, they do a count every year throughout, starting in the spring and throughout most of the summer, they do a test fishery and they estimate the amount of salmon that are returning. And we do not fish, as I said, commercially or for food until we feel that the numbers are sufficient that have gone past that fishery. There are many obstacles that face salmon today, most of which are a result of human activity. Logging, mining, commercial fishing, oil and gas.

And we all have to take a little bit of responsibility for that because we all enjoy those resources and we use them. And I've always said to people that we can't mine our way out of this global warming and climate change. We have to learn how to use less. And as I said, mining, obviously, it's a big concern. But there's also logging, there's oil and gas, as well as commercial fishery. There's a lot of things that happen out in open waters in the North Pacific that can be changed fairly easily. You know, there's a fishery right now, I believe it's Area 104, a fishery that is targeting pink salmon. estimations from Alaska Fisheries, they are the bycatch for Skeena salmon, Skeena sockeye salmon that are returning to the Skeena is about 470,000. Now these are sockeye that are a bycatch.

We're not asking this fishery to stop. We're asking this fishery to be more of a terminus fishery, which means that they better target the pink salmon. So right now they're fishing in open waters, approximately half the fleet from what I understand. We're not asking this fishery to stop, we're asking them to move inside so that Skeena and Sockeye can go past this fishery. And right now we are just barely making our escapement every year that make it up into the headwaters where they can spawn. And so, you know, there's a lot of different ways we can address the issue of salmon declining in numbers. There's some low-hanging fruit. There's a lot of other things that are going to take a lot of time to enforce.

But I'm hoping as transboundary nations, we can come together to work towards making sure that salmon have a fighting chance. Salmon are very resilient. They're a keystone species and they're a good indicator of the health of the environment and surrounding areas as well as the water. I think that's an excellent summary. Thank you. And perhaps, Guy, you have a little bit more experience on the industrial side of things. I guess, can you explain how it is that, on the face of it, because Louis was saying

the tribal nations weren't aware that this mine in one case or certainly like these other practices, right, some of which are sort of very nebulous like global warming others which are specific like this sockeye bycatch and and the forestry with the nations in question here like the the people whose ancestral and current homelands this is happening on not consulted or was there insufficient explanation of the consequences when these were these mines and forestry operations were opened um certainly especially early on you know to this day and to this day the right of free entry which means somebody could be sitting pretty much anywhere in the world get on the internet

and claim a mine claim without any kind of notification to the landowner or surface owner by swiping a credit card. Oh, wow. So there's no even requirement for notification on that. And early on, the mining companies, they do an investor presentation. Here's what they're doing in Las Vegas and New York and this and that. And then they attempt to come into the communities with that presentation. And what they might call meaningful engagement is actually, one, it's completely one-sided. It's not respectful of the process within that tribe or that community.

And it's completely tone deaf. And so what engagement, what consultation does happen is incredibly inadequate. To make matters worse, the Alaskan tribes are landless communities. We don't have jurisdiction over a land area. And great work is being done, though. We're not starting from zero here. First Nations out on the land through land guardian programs and more doing great work. Southeast tribes monitoring their ecosystems and food security and fish consumption and all that great science and information. But we do need to incorporate, one, we need to recognize that we can't manage a complex organism such as a watershed by dividing it down the middle under two different jurisdictions.

We have to, I don't say move the border, we basically have to erase it. And we need to treat that ecosystem as a whole. Climate change is having a huge impact. The Chinook or the King Salmon or the Spring Salmon, they're the largest, so they have the largest egg. They have the less surface area in the environment to absorb oxygen, so they're kind of an indicator of the first, you have a problem here, kind of red flag going up in your network complex ecosystem. And both Kirby and Lou were right, it's the crash of the entire network that we're seeing.

Salmon is just an indicator of that, but we're seeing it across the board. And it's unfortunate because here, especially right now in Southeast Alaska, where I live in Juneau, Alaska, prior to European contact, there was probably five times the population living here than there is now. You look at maps of the old village, they're everywhere. And they've been there for tens of thousands of years. They managed to do it sustainably, do it with balance, do it with effective, you don't really call it in management, but in engagement with nature. And so here we are kind of on the front lines of it. And strangely enough, we have the solution and a people who have within their oral history, the stories of, of migrating due to climate change of adjusting their life due to climate change.'s in the history or you know the

current oral history and so when we're looking when we say unify here there's a great voice and indigenous people to if there is yeah and it's it's hard to justify with mining i'm just going to say that because it's an inherently extractive down to the last profitable dollar industry it's not sustainable it's it's reducible constantly as it operates uh and uh and now it's being used to justify uh climate change adjusting to climate change is now being used to justify more mining change is now being used to justify more mining which again as usual is going to fall on the backs of the local people and communities and indigenous people yeah it's shockingly similar to the issues that we see where i live which is at the other end of the united states and on the southern border where now the colorado river is a binational river right which is managed by two countries

kind of in aggressive competition and we're seeing the same thing here right just a different states yes yeah different states yes yes and all of them have competing uh i was rafting the colorado river last year and i've paddled the colorado river but the the change in that river ecosystem that I've seen, and I've only lived in the US for 15 years, is remarkable. I can't imagine what it's like over 75 years. The same thing with mining, actually. We're seeing the justification of very damaging lithium mining, and then being told this is a solution to climate change, whilst also destroying these ecosystems. If people think it's just an issue that affects one group of people and one group of the part of the world, it's not.

It's very universal. And that's just in the United States. We see the same thing in places I've traveled to work, in East Africa, in South America. I wonder then if we could talk about the value of accepting indigenous leadership when it comes to addressing. I think we began addressing that in Guy's comment very well. But perhaps one thing we could talk about when we talk about that is I think when people think about specifically British Columbia and Alaska, think about specifically british columbia and alaska they they people will use the term like frontier or wilderness a lot right which erases the fact that as guy mentioned and both of you

have shared with us that people have been living there for tens of thousands of years in a way that that was sustainable right like these weren't places without human beings. It wasn't empty land. And it was just land that wasn't inhabited by people of European ancestry. And so when we talk about how to go forward with this land, why it's important to listen to the people

who have always been there. Is that a good framework? All we have is our stories and how we grew up with the old folks and um we're lucky to have a rowboat and pair of oars back in back in the 50s still late 50s some of the people started being able to get a little three horse johnson something like that and that was a lot of power but we also um the glaciers have melted away up on on the eunuch river there so that really affects affecting the amount of water flow and the level of the water very important to a lot of us yet to live live the way of life that we've always lived. All the testimony that I have done is not serious

because I don't have a college education like that. It's just, that's what they want. I mean, the people, they learn it from school books now, but they've never lived a life and been on all these different areas the beaches you know and we have all our seasons every season we have something to look forward to it's like right after i'll start with the spring on the hooligans and and then seaweed and king salmon is a big thing to go after. And then we have the summer and then into fall. Also, we have the greens called asparagus, wild asparagus.

We're harvesting all the time. We're harvesting all the time. Our children that we have, they all know how to do it, where to go. So we've been continuing doing in our teaching on our side. We're just, they don't want to take us serious, I guess, anyway. They don't want to take us serious, I guess, anyway. I've been to a lot of meetings and talked about a lot of the stuff here. It's just going to be a shame if we just keep losing everything. We're getting very close.

Salmon are getting a lot less. I've been a commercial fisherman my whole life. And then later, as the kids got older, we went into tendering. We just had family aboard. And, you know, we would get loads after loads through the 70s into the 80s and 90s. And then pretty soon you could see the sanders are coming in with less and less fish and just ooligan alone i've been 15 years up there for the ooligan in the spring and get out of school for a little while and to go up the river ours from metlakatla alaska to um up to the unique river a little over 100 miles so have a 200-mile round trip to get up there and back.

And there's no safe harbor there. It's wide open to the weather, so you have to really best to learn from somebody who's been up there a few times, and they know where you can maybe duck out of for a safe spot. And easy to get hurt on the river because it's so shallow. Yeah, we lost the 15 years on the river. That's what it was due to weak runs.

And they disappeared for a while. They were going up the other streams to get clean water, even on what I call it Revilla Gagato on Ketchikan Island. They went up there one year and it was a really good run. But then they'll go through Beam Canal and the other streams when they have to. Lilligan are pretty smart. They don't have to go back to the same river all the time. We'd have to go through

the canal and check the other places where they might go up. But with the salmon, they need that clean river because they won't go up any other river. And their numbers really have dropped. I used to see king salmon, you know, probably as far as I could reach, which is about six feet, in spawners in the river. And three years ago, they were maybe long as one arm. Couldn't find any real big ones in there. But it was good to see some of them coming

back but that won't last long things continue to to go the way they are yeah it's just it's very sad to hear like this uh yeah this are these changes you've seen i suppose so perhaps you could explain to us like this emergency declaration that's been made right and we've heard um louis explained like very eloquently how how this how he's seen this decay over his life um how can like accepting this leadership right there's this emergency that's been declared i guess like um is it is it possible you said salmon were very resilient and said the uligum were very smart can things return to the way they were can we at least stop things getting worse like and how yeah i you know i think um our relationship with the environment is is broken um i'm a communications specialist that's that's what i do so i i am all about relationships

now when i talk about relationships i'm just i'm not talking just about relationships with uh our fellow human beings but i'm talking about relationships with the land, the water, the air. And I like to simplify it for people. I always tell people, you know, when you're in a relationship with a significant other or a pet, you know, a lot of people have pets. It's a reciprocal relationship. There's a lot of give and take and there's a lot of compromise and as a young boy and growing

up in Gixan territory and in Tsimshian territory I was always taught that you only took what you needed and you didn't take any more and you respected all living things um you know i i don't mean to pick on anybody but sport fishing um is is against our laws you know we don't play with fish it's it's it's just something we do not do um and and when i'm

talking about our relationship with with all living, you know, the land, the water, the swimmers, the two-legged, the four-legged, the ones that fly, our relationship with them is broken. You know, we used to harvest a lot more than we do now. You know, in the Skeena watershed, you know, we used to harvest seals. We used to harvest, you know, a lot more things other than just salmon. And what we've done over the last 50 or so years is put so much pressure on salmon that they just can't sustain it. I might not be very popular for saying this, but we used to eat a lot more seals. And I think we should commercialize a seal hunt and sell those products so that people can make money and people can be fed. I'm not blaming the seals for the decline in salmon.

There's a lot of factors at play when it comes to the decline in salmon but what I'm trying to explain is that our relationship with the environment is broken and and we need to fix it and and it's out of balance right now and we need to bring it back to balance and we just need to consume less. Certainly, yeah. And does that, I'm curious, that sort of like heavy emphasis on salmon, is that because it was very commercial so people would be able to harvest just the salmon

and sell it as opposed to harvesting these other animals that they were harvesting before? I think salmon were very plentiful, right? You know, you hear stories about when the Europeans first arrived, you know, they could, I've heard stories of them, you know, putting a bucket into the water and pulling the bucket out and it would be just full of salmon, right?

So I thought, I think that, you know, there was a mentality that, you know, the resource was infinite, right? It would last forever. I think that was the mentality. And so they just harvested as much as they could, as fast as they could and sent it around the world. And if any of your listeners haven't tasted salmon, it's one of the most flavorful things you will ever taste. And it's the best meat

in the world on the planet for you in terms of nutrients and and such and uh you know it's it's totally natural and uh yeah it's just all around good for the environment you know it feeds the the birds the two legs the four legs it even feeds plants you know and uh it's it's so resilient and we just need to give salmon a chance and uh figure out a way forward where where we can have a reciprocal relationship with salmon and the environment yeah and perhaps like are there concrete steps like a lot of our listeners are not in the areas where you are but the thing and they could be all over the world right but are there things they could do to show solidarity to give you support

and how can they help um well i would encourage encourage everybody to you know visit our website and and kind of understand what we see as a pathway forward for remedying this you know it's it's you shouldn't come to the table to complain about a problem unless you have a remedy proposed here and and that's what we're trying to do we're trying to take that knowledge that um is in you know louis and just in the eunuch and the knowledge in every little stream even even the knowledge within the genetics, that fine grain of every salmon that goes up every little stream and get that incorporated into, you know, the, you know, into an engagement process that ultimately the way we've been doing it is a failed experiment. We can call that now because these methods we put in to try to protect wild salmon, we've seen nothing but wild salmon decline. You asked if salmon are resilient.

They very much are. They very much are resilient. There's a reason there's five species of salmon here is because of all the upheaval, seismic upheaval living on the Pacific Rim. They're very resilient to the occasional large impact. Just like you and me, though, we're very unresilient to constant pressure and stress. You know what it does to your digestive system, nervous system nervous system everything your family life it's the same for these ecosystems it's not the occasional huge impact it's the it's the continuous stress and this area was not it's not really pristine it was highly modified by the

people they inactively engaged with their environment. They enhanced salmon streams and resting pools. They built clam gardens. They moved trees and vegetation around, enhanced beaches. It was very active. And we can incorporate that knowledge into how we move forward on a lot of these things. And we need to do that. Yeah, when people ask me what they can do,

I respond by saying, what you can do is change your habits. Now, a lot of people think that this climate change problem, resource extraction, et cetera, is too big for us to tackle. But actually, it's not. If we all do a little bit and just change our habits, we can make huge change. I always think about in British Columbia and in Canada, gosh, about 40 years ago,

they brought in a law stating that everybody had to wear seatbelts. There was huge backlash. Nobody wanted to wear a seatbelt. They weren't used to it, right? But after a while, nobody even bothered to complain about it. We just do it. Whenever I get into my vehicle now, it's second nature to put my seatbelt on. I don't even think about it. It's done.

Now, if we can all just look at some of the habits that we have, whether it's, you know, using too much water, maybe some wasteful practices, you know, driving when we don't need to drive. Maybe we can walk a little more often. Maybe we can bike a little more often. Just really look at what actions you're taking daily that may be contributing to climate change and global warming and try to change one habit. And when you've got that habit change, change another one. And, um, you know, I, I think over time we can, we can fix this,

but it's going to take a concerted effort by everybody on this planet. And more so by some of us who are a little more privileged i guess to be able to change our habits thanks no i think that was very very well said and do you have anything to add louis? Yeah, I appreciate what Kirby said earlier on how we're connected to the land. Everybody's grandmother was your grandmother when I was growing up. As long as you paid attention and you would help. I remember when in the fish camp, my grandmother brought my friend and myself into the smokehouse.

And they had a fish that was just put in, the salmon that was in the middle, and the finished salmon that was ready to come out on the end. And they would only tell you once. They said, you can eat all you want, but if you waste one piece, you are never welcomed in the smokehouses again. So they didn't waste time. And they would tell the children when they get too loud,

your children are to be seen but not heard and just like that they never stopped teaching it was wish i could remember more from a long time ago but it was lucky that they treated you know whatever friend i had their their grandparents were were mine. I just learned how to get bark off the cedar tree and so you don't kill the cedar tree from my friend's grandmother. I never forgot it. When my wife wanted to go out and get some bark, she was surprised I told her I know how to do it. So we went out and got it.

Just things like that. We just try not to leave a footprint when we left our sites or any camp areas. I just wanted to add that. Thank you. Thank you. It's very insightful. So talking of leaving a footprint i

think perhaps the last thing i want to talk about is um mine tailings and and the way that because some some of these mines so there are some i guess mines that people want to build and there's some mines people have already built right and i was reading on your website about tailings dam and what that is and what that does and what that might mean for protecting the ecosystem um so can you explain what a tailings dam is and what a tailings dam failure is i just what i learned a little bit on at a meeting up in anchorage on the forum on the Alaska environment. And they had scientists there that were speaking.

And this is a few years ago now. And they talked about every mine that's in place is poisoning the rivers to this day. And it will always poison because it doesn't stop bleeding out of there wherever they were mining that was very interesting and they had just started to um do some water sampling and we were trying to do that this year we were finally able to do something with that we got to start with with guide there and looking forward to get water samples come fall at moose hunting time and we'll have to see how many he would like to have this time i just know no it's not good it's poisonous the water used to be that beautiful bluish glacier water coming down through the

river there i'm not seeing that anymore so when i want to get fresh water for coffee i'll i'll go to the side mountain where i know it's clean and come and coming off the mountain things like that we have to watch out for you You know, specifically to a tailings dam, that's just the containment structure for a tailings dump. They may call them tailings disposal facilities or storage facilities, but they're never coming back for them. It's a dump. It's permitted just as any municipal landfill would be. British Columbia tends to use what they call some aqueous tailings disposable. They need to keep oxygen from the tailings because otherwise they're going to oxidize. They're going to create acid mine drainage, dissolve all of these heavy metals into the salmon streams, and basically a large risk, a large threat.

We live in a rainforest, so that water balance is very critical and it's almost impossible to do in a time of climate change. They're wanting to maintain three meters of water on top of these tailings in perpetuity. I mean, at what point in perpetuity does any certainty of your predictions completely break down? And they require massive amounts of water treatment. And it's not just the tailings, it's the waste rock. In Louie's Eunuch River, it's not just the Bruce Jack, but now they're permitting the Eskay Creek and open pit. And already permitted, but not yet built, is the KSM, which would be one of the top five largest open pits in the world. On a small watershed with incredibly low hardness

of water, meaning it cannot absorb any kind of change of pH or acid, and is home to you know uh the spawning and rearing grounds and genetic diversity of pacific salmon and in the long run the only way we're going to keep salmon from extinction as well as kirby says trying to help you know change our our attitude with this world but we have to maintain that genetic diversity that's spawned in all of those little tiny streams throughout the coast and far into British Columbia. We need that genetic diversity. Salmon are incredibly resilient, but we also can't, you know, completely ignore our part in disrupting the natural cycles here. And as they pointed out, they are incredibly disruptive. I did want to say that, you know, Louis mentioned how they're not

listened, he's not listened to. And that story can be multiplied in every community and tribe throughout the Pacific Northwest and probably the entire United States, if not the world. But that's what we're trying to remedy here. Let's all get together. Let's ignore that border. We find out in these meetings, like our summit, that we're actually related. Some of us are related to one another. And look at this in the big picture, holistic way. You have to look at this in the big picture, holistic way. You have to look at big things like climate change and natural ecosystems and complex mining that just gets bigger and bigger just due to economy of scale.

They mined the good stuff a long time ago. They took the chocolate chips out of the chocolate chip cookie. Now they're going after the baking soda and that creates exponential more waste right yeah because there's less of the stuff they're looking for and more of the waste wow yeah i've certainly um spent some time around some abandoned mines in alaska and it's it's wild to see this massive intrusion and then abandonment and just sort of a complete sort of abrogation of the responsibility for the damage that is done. I look at the Climax Molybdenum mine in Leadville, Colorado.

It's a good example. Been there too. Maybe you've seen that one. I've raced my bike up there a couple of times, yeah. Might have used to work there. Oh, wow. Okay. Yeah. Wow. up there a couple of times yeah why does it work there oh wow okay yeah uh yeah wow that is a uh and the impact that it's had on that town of sort of the mining it's all it's a process that hurts

almost everyone apart from the people who own mining companies right like it doesn't benefit as many as many people as it in the long run it hurts i think you're going towards benefits and there there should be equitable benefits but the benefit the first cut of the pie is is the environment itself um they have it not only has to just be maintained and sustained it has to actually benefit at this point if we're going to avoid large-scale collapse and um and uh but there's ways of doing that and part of that is giving indigenous people a strong say of consent the new laws you know canada ratified the uh united nations declaration on the rights of indigenous people bc has implemented that through uh the declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Act. They're supposed to respect these traditional territories, regardless of the land

status of Alaska tribes. They certainly have an obligation to respect the First Nations and the unceded territories of the First Nation people in British Columbia. That's clear by law. of the First Nation people in British Columbia. That's clear by law. And the Supreme Courts have expanded that to people that no longer live in Alaska if they still have that direct connection to their traditional territories within, I'm sorry, British Columbia.

And so we're going to use that to make sure that Louisis and everybody is heard and and uh get that knowledge as part of and not just the knowledge but the active participation that's part of the benefit sharing if indeed anything happens but at this point we just need so much more restoration um before we damage it further quite frankly yeah of course so you spoke about this large open pit mine is there something people can do if they

want to I'm guessing it would be optimal for them not to open another massive open pit mine is there something people can do to help maybe make that a process that you know where indigenous people listen to and not just mining interests oh this indeed is for me and i'll be quick i think you know uh unfortunately the engaging with the process with the recognition that the process is broken but engaging it to the

maximum extent you can to try to get your word out there and influence decision makers um you gotta at least do that yeah i'm sure kirby has stood the lines out there in british columbia i'm sure you can speak to it please do kirby yeah you know if you're if you or your listeners haven't if you or your listeners haven't heard of the term indigenous science i would like to introduce that indigenous science is a distinct time-tested and methodological knowledge system that can enhance and complement western science now i've introduced this many times i it's by no means did I invent this at all, but I've been introduced to it about a year ago and I've been using it a lot now. In many instances, Indigenous science is thousands of years old, whereas Western science in some areas, such as British Columbia, Canada, where we've only, you know, been in contact with European settlers for just over 500 years. Indigenous science is much, much older. It's, as I said

earlier, it's time-tested and the knowledge is immense. And, you know, that alone should give a lot of credence to the knowledge and the science of Indigenous peoples. medical technologies and i think it's important to recognize these things as on a par with uh yeah like european western technology medical technologies right as opposed to different from um but you know have them on the same level and the same with the science that you mentioned i think that's an excellent point too i have to chime in because i that point of view sometimes i have to laugh because what it, at least 65% of all pharmaceuticals are derived from natural plants that the indigenous people had full knowledge for a long time. Yeah, aspirin. And that information wasn't necessarily transferred in the nicest manner often. So we do need to acknowledge that.

Yeah, yeah. Every time we take an aspirin, we're benefiting from indigenous science, right? Indigenous medical technologies. Yeah. And those technologies are incredible. The halibut hook is just a prime example. It's an incredible study in the morphology of the mouth of a halibut, the habits of a halibut, and they can design the hook to target very specifically the size of the halibut and they can design the hook um to target very specifically the size of the

halibut so they're not getting the big breeders and this and that and and just the amount of of observation adjustment engineering that goes into a halibut hook is in itself very credible the western people when they moved in them at least here on the coast they looked at the way uh the Tlingit and Shimshian people were harvesting fish with with beach traps and and and beach nets and and whatnot and they copied that fish wheels and they copied that technology but then they took it to the massive extreme and just took everything out of the rivers. But they used indigenous technology to do it, ironically enough. So we can turn that around. We can use that technology to turn this around. And there's no reason why we shouldn't.

I think that's an excellent point. Is there anything you each would like to leave our listeners with? Maybe a place they can find you online, a way they can show support, and something like that? A little bit that I didn't mention. I'm also, I'm Simcyon and Tlingit. My

grandfather and great-grandfather, they came from Hartley Bay when Matlakatla was built by them in 1887, I believe. They're boat builders. They sold their rowboats up and down the coast.

I couldn't spend enough time with my grandfather he was good and just you never stopped learning from all of our elders i just wanted to throw that in there thank you thank you so much how about you kirby anything you'd like to leave people with i just wanted to leave people with this thought you know as i said earlier um look at look at the habits that you can change that are the low hanging fruit. And I'd also like them to think about how they can change. Think about holding your elected officials accountable. I'm not sure what it's like where you're from, but you know, a lot of our elected officials, they like to talk,

but they don't like to do anything. So that's universal. Actions speak louder than words. Hold your elected officials accountable. Every time you see them, ask them what they're doing about protecting wild salmon. Thanks. Thank you. Guy, anything from you? Okay. Yeah. Quickly along the lines of what Kirby was saying. I mean, recognize that the metals that are necessary to support our lifestyle are already there. They're in our walls,

in our cars, in our computers. The idea that we need more of these metals in our lives is just the idea that we need more stuff in our lives. And that addiction is what's strangling this planet. And so, Kirby's advice is very strong. But if you want to follow along, go to www.seitc.org. So Southeast Alaska Indigenous Trans Boundary Commission, SEITC. We're just getting started. And so there should be some incredible stories along the way. One last thing I'd like to say is that we really need to consider

the circular economy. Right now, we live in a society where we throw away so many things. I think about vehicles that go to the junkyard and they're crushed. We should be taking those vehicles apart, using the parts that we can, instead of just crushing it into this big, massive rock that we're eventually going to need to dismantle again sometime in the future. We should be doing that now. And if there are any good parts in that vehicle then they should be put back into circulation yeah i think that's an excellent point they are elements after all yeah yeah it's well they're already broken down into the elements right and we're just crushing them back

into a big rock again and then we're gonna going to have to take them out of the, into the elements again. Yeah. When, when we run out of stuff to dig out of the ground, it's very sad to think that like the same desire, uh, a colleague and I spent some time reporting on the civil war in Myanmar last year, and this that's the same thing it's people trying to extract rare earth metals and then it's, it's people dying in the environment, being damaged because of it. And it's, I think Kirby made an excellent point that like if we don't you know those things are already

there and guys said it like in our walls and in our computers and things and we could do so much better to use the ones we have rather than consistently damaging people on the planet to respectful yeah be respectful thank you so much all of you for giving me some of your afternoon and sharing your time with our listeners i know they would really appreciate it and i do too Welcome. I'm Danny Thrill. Won't you join me at the fire and dare enter? Nocturnum, Tales from the Shadows, presented by iHeart and Sonora. An anthology of modern-day horror stories inspired by the legends of Latin America. From ghastly encounters with shapeshifters to bone-chilling brushes with supernatural creatures.

I know you. Take a trip and experience the horrors that have haunted Latin America since the beginning of time. Listen to Nocturnal Tales from the Shadows as part of my Cultura podcast network, available on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. podcast or wherever you get your podcast. Hi, I'm Ed Zitron, host of the Better Offline podcast, and we're kicking off our second season digging into how tech's elite has turned Silicon Valley into a playground for billionaires. From the chaotic world of generative AI to the destruction of Google search, Better Offline is your unvarnished and at times unhinged look at the underbelly of tech from an industry veteran with nothing to lose.

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Check out betteroffline.com. I found out I was related to the guy that I was dating. I don't feel emotions correctly. I am talking to a felon right now, and I cannot decide if I like him or not. Those were some callers from my call-in podcast, Therapy Gecko. It's a show where I take real phone calls from anonymous strangers all over the world as a fake gecko therapist and try to dig into their brains and learn a little bit about their lives. I know that's a weird concept, but I promise it's pretty interesting if you give

it a shot. Matter of fact, here's a few more examples of the kinds of calls we get on this show. I live with my boyfriend and I found his piss jar in our apartment. I collect my roommate's toenails and fingernails. I have very overbearing parents. Even at the age of 29, they won't let to get out of your own head and see what's going on in someone else's head, search for Therapy Gecko on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. It's the one with the green guy on it. Hello, welcome to It Could Happen Here, a podcast which only has one button and is edited by Daryl using a 10-year-old Logitech Xbox controller. That's a submarine joke for those of you who have not been following. Today, I'm joined by Alex and Tom, both of them graduate students in the UC system. And we're talking about this really obscene charge of assault that some graduate students are facing after they disrupted an alumni event in San Diego.

Hi, Alex and Tom. Do you want to introduce yourselves a little bit as far as you feel comfortable? Hi, James. Sure. Thanks for having us back. My name is Alex. I'm a graduate student at University of California, San Diego. Some of you have been listening since November. I remember when I first came on the show to tell you about our strike. And I guess we're going to give some interesting updates since then. I'm Tom, I'm also a graduate student at UC San Diego. I'm pretty advanced in my program, I've been here for a while and I'm in the humanities department.

Very cool, yeah. So I think to start out with we should just explain, we'll explain what happened in detail at the event in a bit. But can you just explain what these charges that people are facing are and how they found out that they have been charged with assault after doing something which was not violent in the first place? in the first place. Yeah, absolutely. So the most sort of recent thing that's happened is, and we'll talk about the details in a moment, but as James alluded to, we held a peaceful protest back in May related to a number of violations of our most recent collective bargaining agreement, which I'll also be happy to go into detail on. And in response to what was, by all accounts, by what I witnessed by everyone else that I've talked to was a completely peaceful protest, the university has decided to allege that 67 graduate students, including by our count 18 who were either not present or not involved, are going to be charged under the student conduct process with committing a physical assault,

as well as charges for disruption and a vague assertion that we were threatening the health and safety of others. These are quite serious allegations. They do carry potential sanctions up to long-term suspension and expulsion from the university. Right. Yeah. And that's, I think people like, the exposure for graduate students is so high, right? Like if you are on the job market, you know, this could set back your progress on an already very challenging job market. Suspension or expulsion presumably could have long term consequences for your employability and something that I think I spent the better part of eight years at UCSD. You've invested a lot of time, you get paid like shit. And if you then get nothing out

of it, that is potentially devastating. For each individual in this, this is absolutely devastating. These are our careers and we've invested a minimum of seven years, at least in humanities, to find many of us more. But it's also devastating for the university itself because the students that are being charged are from virtually every program on campus. that are being charged are from virtually every program on campus. And many of them are working in very prestigious, high powered laboratories, have done fellowships and scholarships.

So this is really a bad look for the university as well to potentially have 67 graduate students under these charges. Yeah, totally. 67. It it's funny i've been 68 we could have uh it's when i like i don't know when i hear 68 obviously i think of like 1968 and uh it's remarkable this is a university at one point someone self-immolated at ucsd in protest vietnam war and uh now we are like it had a reputation for radicalism and now here we are charging people for walking onto a stage and shouting do you want to talk about the walking onto a stage and shouting can you maybe give us an account of of the events and then uh we'll talk about maybe how those have been represented in the process, if that makes sense.

Yeah, sure. So this particular protest took place at an awards ceremony, a very sort of fancy sort of annual event that the university hosts where they give awards to various alumni and kind of as a sort of fundraising opportunity as well. And what the protest took the form of was that a number of graduate student workers walked on stage uninvited and began giving speeches and holding signs demonstrating the ways in which and informing the audience of the ways in which that our contracts have not been upheld since we signed them in December. The ways in which the university is circumventing some of the raises that we were promised for our research and teaching and the ways it is trying to sort of prevent those things from being resolved in the sort of normal channels that you go through with these sort

of union and contract administration things. And that's been ongoing for, I suppose, six months now with relatively little process. So that demonstration took place about up until the time that some local police officers arrived. And at that time, the demonstration was fully compliant with those orders and the police officers noted such in their dispatch logs, which I was able to retrieve from the city. able to retrieve from the city. And then after that, the demonstration continued outside of the venue of the event where people were still able to, you know, make a decent amount of noise and raise their grievances, despite the walls separating the group from the alumni inside. And it certainly did get some attention since we were in touch after that with people who were sort of relatively high up in a number of university and alumni centric offices and who were surprised to hear of the things that we were alleging and wanted to hear more and be able to raise those issues further up into the university. So these charges certainly did sort of come as a shock, given that at first a lot of people at the event seemed receptive in a way, though certainly not all, but some were certainly receptive to our concerns and what we had to say.

I'll add a couple of interesting details there. The first one is that the immediate impetus for this event was actually the news that Chancellor Pradeep Khosla was in attendance and this was only a week or two after it had become public knowledge that he had received a $500,000 raise as an effort to keep him in the university, which raises his salary to more than a million dollars, and I think makes him the fourth highest paid university chancellor or president or dean in the United States. So we presented him with an award for for UCSD's most overpaid worker. And that was sort of our rationale for doing this specific event. The other thing is that when the police arrived,

they actually gave no verbal orders for us to clear out. As soon as we saw them, we peacefully started to leave the stage. And they stood there as well. No arrests were made. No interviews were done. No arrests were made. No interviews were done. No orders were shouted.

They remained on site for the duration as we stood outside picketing. There were no reinforcements. There were no SWAT teams. It was just one or two SWAT cars. The police typically are known for having outsized responses to minor problems. But the fact that they did not have any kind of aggressive response to this indicated to us that they were aware that it was an entirely peaceful event. Yeah, and the dispatch logs don't show them having any concerns about violence or responding to any real violence, them seeing any violence and responding to to any like real violence them seeing any violence responding to it right yeah so i was able to grab those and the um yeah it's it's difficult to say

because it looks like maybe two people called 9-1-1 even though it was three yeah two of them said no violence yeah two said there was no violence the third person said they had secondhand reports that we had pushed the chancellor off said they had second-hand reports that we had pushed the chancellor off the stage which we have video of that very definitely not happening uh he stood next to the graduate students and then of his own initiative turned and walked off the stage so the only allegation that's documented uh in real time of any violence occurring was one admittedly secondhand and two is disproven um conclusively by the available video right and that video is online right like it's been posted yeah it's easy

to find there's a that particular one that really easily disproves it there's a video link for the union uploaded it uh so i can we can drop that in the show notes i can send that to you yeah excellent we'll make sure we do that and likewise likewise, the PRA that's publicly available, folks can go see it. All San Diego PRAs are publicly available. We have a lot of evidence that no one was violently assaulted. What is the university alleging that was done, I guess? What did they claim the student workers did? they're claiming what do they claim the student workers did well the closest thing that we can find so in in a um you know in in the documentation that each uh person was given about the charges that they face uh the closest thing we can find to a description that seems to um imply assault was that um someone claimed to have seen the chancellor, the word they used was bumped, which doesn't even necessarily imply intentionality in my mind. And really the way that I read that sentence is that, you know,

possibly the stage was a little crowded and someone might have bumped into him. But I don't even recall ever seeing that happen. I haven't talked to anyone who recalls seeing that um who anyone who was in our group or not um but other than that um the rest of the report is really just full of descriptions of how they they haven't i don't even think they talked to anyone who said they were scared of us. They just said people might have been scared of us. It's very strange. The report reads like propaganda from the class war. It's pearl clutching of the highest order.

Some champagne glasses were broken. The event itself cost over $100,000 to set up with many different caterers and vendors. Somebody flew all the way from Switzerland for the event. And I'm actually using made up quotes from the report. And during the event itself, it's ironic because I was at the event as were, you know, an indeterminate amount of other graduate students. And we actually were assaulted by members of the crowd who would come up and put their arms on our, their hands on our shoulders and tell us, this is why people hate unions.

And, you know, hey, I brought my 90-year-old grandmother to this, and I have some, you know, $50 million grant, and I'm being honored for this. People thumping my chest, people thumping other people's chest, sticking fingers in our faces and telling us really that we ruined their special night. And our response was, you know, I think that our need to pay rent and feed ourselves is a little bit more important than your special night at the art museum by the ocean with their glasses of champagne

yeah yeah it's not like it was even a like all that was happening was that people who had given the money or who they want them to who they want to get money from were being made to feel special it wasn't as if you even interrupted like a uh like a meeting or a function of the university and unless we consider the function of the university these days seems to be to to get money and then distribute it to people in positions of power in the university so given that right that they like this was a an event i guess which reinforced the people who have authority in the university it's interesting to look or it's not interesting it's upsetting to look at the nature of the the process that these 67 people

are facing right because it's not that they're not being accused in a court of doing a crime they're being accused by the university in the university of breaking the conduct rules of the university so they their university is like uh it's all parties apart from the defendant right it's the judge it's a jury it's a prosecuting lawyer um and the executioner so can you yeah go ahead i'll just say something about that um you know this this was uh very much calculated on the part of the university to charge us as as under the student conduct violation because if they're charging us as students they're not charging us as workers if we had workers we would have union representation in our meetings it would be

part of that litigation process but as students the the the context of the labor fight that uh was the result for the entire event is relevant, that it can be divorced from that and treated under, you know, these are codes that are meant to charge undergraduates who are drinking in their dorms or are sexually harassing their peers in their classes. This is not something that is, in my view view appropriate at all to apply to a labor dispute which is what this was yeah like i think the only time i've been party to these proceedings is when an undergraduate did physically assault someone who i was teaching with but like it it's not a normal procedure by any means and certainly to use against grad students are very

clearly taking part in a labor action i think it's very telling that the university is kind of using one system to circumvent the fair bargaining and the unfair labor practices and all the the things that they seem really like they seem almost like inexplicably committed to to not uh sticking to the contract even though they got a contract that was largely favorable to them and not as much as as people had wanted at the start of the strike so how does it work from here like what what does this process look like well to start with each of us um has an individual meeting with a representative of the university. And at that meeting, we essentially have the response,

the option to either accept responsibility for all the charges against us, or to say that we do not accept that responsibility and want to continue the process forward at which point they will, they will schedule or attempt to schedule a conduct review board meeting where I believe three representatives who have been sort of predetermined to serve on these conduct review boards will judge the weight of the evidence in a preponderance of the evidence standard. And at that point, then the Office of Student Conduct, if you are found responsible, I believe that office is then what decides what the sanctions are that you will face. So this is a bit of an unprecedented process, at least for us.

We actually, I believe, and I want to clarify some numbers. I think I said 67 graduate students earlier. They were actually 59 from this event who were charged. And that 67 comes from eight who were charged for a protest related to the university's attempt to fire workers for striking, which is still ongoing. to fire workers for striking, which is still ongoing. That protest took place in January, and that conduct process for those eight workers has not yet resolved, as we speak today on June 20th. So it's not clear how they are going to manage the logistics of trying to charge 59 workers in a single case. Assuming they follow their entire procedures by the book and don't

dismiss any charges it could take more than a year to resolve this situation jesus and for people who have uh like they're either defending or advancing to candidacy or um these these are all things you can do within grad school people who aren't familiar where you where you sort of level up your grad student status i guess um are people able to do that yeah luckily um this does not restrict your academic advancement it can potentially if it goes from quarter to quarter they can potentially put i believe holds on registration but i think that's only if you don't sort of carry out your sanctions, assuming your sanction is not suspension. I could be time-correcting if I'm wrong on that.

But what still could be the case is that you could, you know, and it could well be the case for me that I defend before the conclusion of this process, but it could still end up as something that would be on a conduct record that could be released in certain employment situations. So even if you are able to escape the process, so to speak, it is not necessarily not going to follow you after that point. I'll add that by all indicators from those who have already had their first meeting asking, you know, do you accept responsibility? And of course, they've said, no, we deny all allegations against us. But it seems as if the Office of Student Conduct is quite overwhelmed by this.

People have been trying to schedule meetings, have not gotten responses from the office. People have been trying to schedule meetings, have not gotten responses from the office. The office then gets back to them a week or two later with only one or two options. The really calculated evil of this is that these charges dropped on the very last day of the quarter which means that at least in the arts and humanities most of us are going out of town or are conducting research or are on fellowships so we're not around to respond to these and I think that that was a decision that was purposefully made but you know to process just the sheer number of students involved in this is staggering. And I think that the office development offices are really struggling. The other thing that I

will say is we have it from informal channels that this is something that is being directed from the very top, which is to say from the chancellor's office, that this is not something that impartial observers made of something that the chancellor himself is directing. Yeah, that makes sense, given the chancellor was there. It also, like, it's just put me in mind of 2010 when I don't think either of you were at UCSD, but for those of us who were and there's a film about it actually called dear white people um but there was a a party where people wore blackface

and this happened i think through a fraternity that was associated with the university and getting the university to do anything disciplinary about that required hundreds if not thousands of people to go on strike to march to occupy the chancellor's complex and to like physically demand action for weeks and weeks if not months and from the chancellor's system right like and still it was extremely unsatisfactory process the resolution was was extremely unsatisfactory. There's a contemporaneous incident happening right now. I don't know all the details, but it appears that an individual was video-taping himself, caressing, screaming with his professor on it, and making loon comments, and a whole variety of with his professor on it and making new comments on a whole variety of really misogynistic creepy behavior.

Apparently this is his third restraining order that he's received. But as far as the university is concerned, this is still a case that's moving through it. It doesn't appear to have had any immediate sanctions. We've heard stories of sexual assaults, as you said, of racist harassment that have really gone nowhere. I actually reported a student last summer for very threatening behavior. And the very next quarter, he was in my class. Yeah, it's the only thing that sort of of they jump to defend is capital, I guess, or in this case, the sort of administrators of the university. And so this this could potentially play out for months. What's the and it seems like everyone has accepting responsibility, such a strange word, because like what's what happened is what's at question, really, not who's responsible for it so much. You can accept responsibility for doing what was a protected First Amendment activity,

but you obviously can't accept responsibility for assault if you didn't assault somebody. But given that no one... If 67 students had assaulted Chancellor Fredy Kostler, you would think that it would have made national news. That would have been something, I think. Yeah, that's like a beat down, but that didn't happen. So what's the plan for defence?

I guess, is each case like an individual case? Can people mount a joint defence like the J21 people did in D.C.? Do we know yet? How does this work? I'm not sure we entirely know yet. I think the university can make the decision to consolidate cases that share evidence. I don't believe they've made that determination yet. I think what they are trying to do now, and this sort of leads into another part that I think represents a degree of sort of apathy bordering on cruelty of this process, is that we've identified at least 18 graduate students who were either not physically present at all or had merely registered for the event without even knowing that this would take place. And those people have all been charged with the exact same things that everyone who was intentionally part of the protest has been. So we think that we're at the individual stage where they are trying to kind of, they know that they,

they're well aware that they caught a bunch of people that had no involvement in this. they're well aware that they caught a bunch of people that had no involvement in this. But we think that we're using really these individual meetings to figure out who those people are to the best of their ability. And perhaps further down the line, they may decide to try to consolidate these cases to expedite the process. But it's hard to say for sure. Again,

the important aspect of this process is the fact that almost every element of it and every step and how that is carried out is entirely at the discretion of a handful of university administrators. appeal outside of the system. There's no real accountability outside of the system. So they can simply implement these things, you know, as they see fit. I mean, there was, when this eventually first broke, there were some former graduate students who run an old radical UC Twitter account who shared some write-ups from cases of sit-ins that were charged under the same process, I believe at Berkeley a couple years ago. And in that one, the administrators at the Berkeley campus actually went as far as to edit the code of conduct during the process. Surely you're not responsible for like ex post facto edits of the code of conduct or were they they were um well this was primarily in in you know in all fairness

if they deserve any this was that particular incident was kind of a logistical thing so it was um it was whether or not uh certain aspects of the process could be waived or could be could be extended. The deadline could be extended and someone who didn't have the authority to extend it did. And when they were called on that, they edited the code of conduct after the fact to say that, OK, a designee can extend the deadline for how this process proceeds. So it wasn't that they invented a rule to charge someone under but they did edit their own due process as they went along right yeah so you might be up against a moving target so to speak did they identify everybody like did because i'm presuming people didn't use their legal names to register or like how were they able to identify

some of the people clearly the people who were just there as undergraduate alumni and happen to be graduate students probably did use their real names but do you know how else they identified people um well i think they did you know some people did um i i assume that i was caught you with my uh real name on the registration um and and was simply because I, you know, some people decided to use different names. I decided after weighing the pros and cons of that, I decided that it was, you know, I figured that there might be a worse situation if that was, you know, unraveled. And I didn't think that obviously I had no plans of assaulting someone and I did not assault anyone. So I had no reason to expect that perhaps I needed to take that level

of precaution with this kind of a peaceful, um, uh, protest action. Um, but we believe that they primarily, um, got, uh, the names of, uh, who did, um, who, who, who they decided to charge from, simply registration lists. But again, the fact, and there was a sign-in at this event where you picked up a name tag, and it was kind of a gate you couldn't really get in without doing that. But they still gave charges to people who actually we know for a fact were not physically present and have been able to prove

that they were not physically present. So it doesn't seem that they even bothered to consult at least initially the actual sign-in list of people who actually showed up and checked in um which is also a bit strange um but yeah it it it seems to be a very haphazard process so far there are people who have been charged who weren't there there are people who were there who haven't necessarily been identified at this point in time. So it's a little bit of a mystery. We'd love to find out too because if they for some reason were able to determine using

union lists that obviously would be a massive unfair labour practice. Yeah. Already it seems like an union lists that obviously will be a massive unfair labor practice yeah yeah and already it seems like an unfair labor practice and a violation of like first amendment rights and protected first amendment speech and jesus it it's yeah it just seems that they're sort of half-assing this thing which could have devastating consequences for some people and they they've just kind of thrown a wide net and sort of i guess trying to work out after the fact what to do with this has it had like a chilling effect on on campus organizing on protesting their ongoing contract violations no not at all you can't scare. We're sticking to the union. Ironically, as many of your listeners are probably aware from listening to earlier episodes of your podcast, there had been a lot of tension on campus between the RS United Social Sciences and the STEM, dating back to the strike and even before.

And it had actually gotten substantially worse in the last couple of months based on the vacancy elections that were held in April. This ironically seems to be a huge miscalculation on the part of the university because a lot of those issues, although they haven't gone away, have been absolutely subsumed in the injury to one is an injury to all mentality. So there is a great amount of solidarity,

but going into the summer, I don't think any work around campus will be expected. Yeah, that's excellent. That's great to hear. So talking of solidarity, I guess, what can people do to help? Like, it seems like, do you have a legal defense fund? I don't know if you're even allowed to have a lawyer. Is there something they can sign? Is there someone they can write to? Go ahead. So there is a petition circulating around for current students, faculty, alumni, and community members. The address for that is bit.ly slash UCSD

drop the charges. One word. All lowercase. All lowercase. Anything else? Would you plan marches and pickets and stuff as the process continues that people could join? Yeah, definitely. And if you sign that petition, that's one way. So the petition sort of has the dual goal of sort of getting, you know, demonstrating to the administration that there's a wide level of awareness of this issue and concern over this issue. of this issue and concern over this issue, but also to make sure that anyone who wants to be involved in any way that they're able to support us will be able to be kept in the loop. So if you use an email, the address that you actually read when you sign the petition, you will certainly

hear about any actions that we have. We are still very much in the early planning stages, as Tom alluded to earlier. There is, you know, a certain there appears to be a certain aspect of strategizing here where the charges were given right at the point where campus becomes the least populated potentially of any time throughout the whole year, except perhaps Christmas. But, you know, there's still plenty of graduate students here. They are all, you know, just as still plenty of graduate students here. They are all, you know, just as shocked as we are to see this unfolding. So I think we can definitely plan for, you know, some kind of actions to take place this summer. Nice. Yeah. And maybe we'll get some more student conduct violations. Yeah. It'd be good if alumni if people are alumni like i know a decent number of uc alumni listen and they reached out when we talked about the strike like it would be

great if those people could leverage that status because the uc goes hard on alumni for donations and they've stopped calling me now uh they know i'm poor but uh i think those those of you who the uc is still calling for donations you know that would be a good time to raise this or you know you could email or whatever email the alumni office um but yeah it's this is obscene and ridiculous and obviously like a continuation of union busting and their fundamental refusal to acknowledge student workers as workers apparently and and only see people as students and so is there anything else you want people to know about this anything else you'd like people to do to show solidarity before we wrap up um i think the big thing is just you

know sign the petition that'll help you you know kind of stay in the loop especially if you're kind of in the local area um are able to come out and join us in solidarity for any protests. Yeah, again, if you're a UC alum of any kind, certainly make your thoughts known to UCSD. Because apart from, I would say, the two groups of people who have the most power to act in decent numbers in the situation are professors and alumni. And, and so that would be, yeah, like what you said, that's a huge, a huge, would be a huge point of support. Other than that, I think just the way, you know, I've, I've been here for almost six full years now.

And, you know, I've, four of those were without a union. I'm a student researcher, so our union is brand new. And you can go back to the November episode to hear that whole story. But my point is that, you know, before we had this kind of network and this kind of collective organization to protect our rights, a lot of, you know, I've seen a lot of friends who through no fault of their own, ended up in some kind of, you know, one sided process where it's them versus the bureaucracy, whether that's, you know, they're a bad relationship with their professor or, you know, any number of things that might have come up along the way. you know, not finishing work on time and, you know, getting on the bad side of advisors or anything like that, you know, it is very easy in the status quo of the way the large university works to fall through the cracks and to have a bureaucracy act in secrecy to just simply

kind of remove you without anyone really saying a word. So I think the most important thing is to keep eyes on this, to make sure the university knows that people are watching, that they can try to bring this process against us, but it is not going to be a pleasant experience because, you know, the public and the workers here in the community here are going to be watching and they're going to be supporting us. So I think just keep an eye on the situation if you can, if it's something that you're interested in and able to do. And that's really the biggest way, I think, to support us. I will also say that if you are a UC admin, either statewide or in UC San Diego,

the easiest way to prevent future alumni or events from being disrupted is to actually honor the contract. Yes. That would be a fantastic idea. I do know several professors listen, so it's time to do something. Hopefully

they will do something in solidarity, but I know a few of them listen and have reached out before. Well, thank you very much. I'm sorry this shit is happening to you. We will keep people updated as the long process continues. But yeah, I hope you can enjoy your summer without teaching a little bit, without this hanging over you.

We'll try. That's kind of my motivation is they, you know, they're using it as a little bit of a psychological warfare in terms of labor organizing so i will just simply choose not to let it bother me at least as much as i can yeah all right thank you very much thanks james thank you Welcome. I'm Danny Thrill. Won't you join me at the fire and dare enter? Nocturnum, Tales from the Shadows, presented by iHeart and Sonora. An anthology of modern-day horror stories inspired by the legends of Latin America. From ghastly encounters with shapeshifters,

to bone-chilling brushes with supernatural creatures. I know you. Take a trip and experience the horrors that have haunted Latin America since the beginning of time. Listen to Nocturnal Tales from the Shadows as part of my Cultura podcast network, available on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hi, I'm Ed Zitron, host of the Better Offline podcast, and we're kicking off our second season digging into how tech's elite has turned Silicon Valley into a playground for billionaires. From the chaotic world of generative AI to the destruction of Google search,

Better Offline is your unvarnished and at times unhinged look at the underbelly of tech from an industry veteran with nothing to lose. This season I'm going to be joined by everyone from Nobel winning economists to the leading journalists in the field, and I'll be digging into why the products you love keep getting worse and naming and shaming those responsible. Don't get me wrong though, I love technology, I just hate the people in charge and want them to get back to building things that actually do things to help real people. I swear to God things can change if we're loud enough. So join me every week to understand what's happening in the tech industry and what could be done to make things better. Listen to Better Offline on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, wherever else you get your podcasts. Check out betteroffline.com. I found out I was related to the guy that I was dating. I don't feel emotions correctly. I am talking to a felon right now and I cannot decide if I like him or not. Those were some callers from my call-in podcast, Therapy Gecko. It's a show

where I take real phone calls from anonymous strangers all over the world as a fake gecko therapist and try to dig into their brains and learn a little bit about their lives. I know that's a weird concept, but I promise it's pretty interesting if you give it a shot. Matter of fact, here's a few more examples of the kinds of calls we get on this show. I live with my boyfriend and I found his piss jar in our apartment. I collect my roommate's toenails and fingernails. I have very overbearing parents. Even at the age of 29, they won't let me move out of their house. So if you want an excuse to get out of your own head and see what's going on in someone else's head,

search for Therapy Gecko on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. It's the one with the green guy on it. Welcome to It Could Happen Here, a podcast that now, more than ever, is about things falling apart. It's been roughly one year since the Dobbs decision has annihilated what was left of the protection for legal abortions in this country and things have gotten enormously worse in ways that most people are essentially attempting to ignore or hide from um there are however a lot of people who cannot essentially run from the absolute horror that has been unleashed in this country and yeah i'm going to be talking today and tomorrow with one of those people who is crystal who is a uh has has has the triple crown of abortion work of being an abortion worker a union

organizer and on the uh on the board of an abortion fund uh yeah. Welcome to the show, Crystal. And I'm sorry. You're sorry. Thank you. Thank you so much, Mia. It's really nice to be here again. I had a lot of fun last time and it's nice to be talking to you again, even though I only have really horrible things to say for the most part. Though there are some good things, but it's mostly really awful. Yeah. So I guess that's where I want to start is it's – well, okay. I think – I'm pretty sure – so the day this is coming out,

it's going to be, I think, two days before the anniversary of Dobbs. I wanted to, I guess, first just ask what it's been like emotionally before we get to the sort of like more material consequences of it, if that's all right. Yeah. So as an abortion worker, this has been an incredibly difficult year. This has been an incredibly difficult year. And that's with the context that things were not good before last June 24th, 2022. Things were not good before then. So we were really running up against this impending decision that we knew was going to happen.

And then it ended up happening. And then it was really horrible. And honestly, it's been horrible every single day since, and it just gets more horrible every single week. And I sound so negative saying that, I know, but I just know that I'm saying that knowing that there's so many amazing people who are doing abortion advocacy and abortion care work and offering abortion services and practical support for abortion. And it has just been an incredibly heavy year for us. We've all witnessed a lot in the last year. And we're all carrying a lot.

And it's just hard. And I'm really grateful for everyone that I, I work with and that I'm in community with, but it's, it's been traumatizing. Um, I know that, you know, it's really easy to say, I think like, oh, you know, this is traumatic and that's traumatic. But I don't know what other word to use to having had witnessed everything that we've witnessed in the last year and to know that there's no end in sight. It is incredibly traumatic. It's like a national trauma. We're all sharing it together. Yeah. Okay.

I guess we should get into sort of what the things that you've been seeing have looked like and i think like one of the best ways to do this i think is by just talking about like what the process is like of trying to get someone in abortion because it's gotten so much harder and so much more dangerous very rapidly. Yeah, absolutely. Things have changed a lot in the last year because if we're starting from when things really hit the fan, June 24th, 2022, even though things were getting worse before that, because for example, there was the ban in Texas that started on September 1st in 2021. So I saw a lot in my head, if I can point, like, when did I really know that we were fucked and we were going to see the worst outcome? I would say on September 1st, 2021.

But we saw the initial trigger bans go into effect immediately after the Dobbs decision. So, you know, like, for example, Texas, the bans went into effect immediately. There were other states that it was a little bit more delayed, like, for example, Ohio. And then there's also been a lot of back and forth because some states in which there have been bans, now those are currently paused and they're being worked through the legal system and there are new bans. There's pretty much been a new ban, it feels like, pretty much every week. To the point where I know that I just named a couple of states just now and just to be cautious, I just want to say that you can go to abortionfinder.org or ineedana.com and like look up your state to see, you know, if you have access in your state. It changes so frequently that you really do have to kind of rely

on those reliable websites like Abortion Finder and I Need an A to really make sure that you're up to date. So, you know, don't like if I mention a state, you know, I'm just, it might've been, there might've been something in effect months ago and I'm just like alluding to it. So just definitely rely on those resources that exist to see what's up to date now. But yeah, things have been incredibly back and forth for a lot of states in the last year. And it's, it's just, there are holes in access. There are deserts and access that just keep widening and widening and widening. The most devastating being recently,

this was a really bad day for me and a lot of my coworkers when there was the vote in Florida and the Florida ban is not yet in effect, but will eventually be going into effect. And that was really like one of the last places that you could access an abortion in the Southeast. So now when you look at a map, which I do a lot, I now have to look at a map every single day for work and look at like, you know, individual state maps and

like I'm on Google maps constantly. But there are places where you have no choice but to travel to get an abortion or access abortion services online if that is possible for you. And, you know, there are resources available where if you as an individual need an abortion and you keep looking and you search and you reach out to people, those resources are out there. Practical support groups exist. Funding exists. Clinics and service providers will bend over backwards to get you to your appointment and help you access these services. So, you know, there is help out there, but it is, it's really difficult and it's, it takes a lot of work to access an appointment. So everything's, it just, it takes longer to get to an appointment. It takes, you have to travel further. You end up paying so much more money. Like everything is just so much more expensive than it was a year ago because now you're not just paying, you know, for the procedure cost and then maybe like a little bit of gas money

to the appointment. You're having to figure out plane tickets, hotels, gas money for whatever, like really long distances. I have, I've seen patients driving 12 hours to get to an appointment. Yeah. And, and I can talk more about like what that process looks like too, but I guess I just wanted to give like a general overview of it's just getting harder to access longer distances traveling and, and, and more expensive. And luckily there is people, there are people there to help and there is support, but it, it requires a ton of work, a ton, a ton of work in order to make sure that people are getting the healthcare that they need. Yeah. And, and I guess, okay, two things. One, I want to, I want to start the abortion fund plug right here because as the cost of this increases, that means abortion funds need more money in order to be able to keep doing this because every dollar that they don't have is potentially – not even potentially, is another person who's not going to be able to get an abortion.

Yeah, every dollar matters. Yeah. And, and I know that I feel like a lot of leftists sometimes get a little tired of hearing about, Oh, donate to your abortion fund, donate to an abortion fund because like,

they're like, Oh, this, this is not radical, but abortion funds are the only way in which abortions are happening right now because it, it because it costs like you might have to spend like $2,000 to $3,000 on a person sometimes in order to make sure that they get healthcare. And that's just one person. So the only reason that abortions are still happening is

because one, people are putting that work in to make sure that they happen. And like, you know, those people are amazing. And also like people seeking healthcare are amazing. They're incredibly brave to be doing what they're doing, to be working so hard to get healthcare, to be navigating all of these obstacles that you have to be like, that's like, you have to be strong to do that. Um, that's incredibly brave thing to do. Um, having to fly in an airplane, if you've never flown before to access healthcare that you know, you need, know you need. You're being really strong and you're being amazing, but you shouldn't have to do that. And so it's a lot of money. So thank God that the money is there because if the money wasn't there, then people would not be able to be helped. So I know that like, oh, donate to abortion fund,

donate to an abortion fund. But really, if you want people to continue to get abortions now, not just waiting until like November in an election, then you need to make sure that the money is there for people to do that because it is expensive. Yeah. And we're talking something like $2,000 or $3,000, right? Like can you person listening to this, could you right now spend $3,000 on something and be fine? Right? And the answer is probably not but and you know and there's a there are like a lot of people in this country who need abortions who are like way less well off than you are like that is a shit ton of like that that is a lot of money for me like podcaster um that is you know a crippling amount of money for a lot of

people who need this and i don't know i mean i think there's something really bleak about the way our society is structured where your freedom and your bodily autonomy are dependent on having money but that's basically where we're at right like that's that's that's that's the way the system works right now and yeah there's a part of me that like, doesn't want to lean in. And like, I mean, like, you know, I'm, I'm a socialist. I don't want to be like, Oh, you know, money, money, money. But like, that is the only reason people are getting healthcare is because there is money available and people are banding together to pool that money,

to make it available to people who need it. So I'm just like, thank God. I'm so glad because otherwise I would not be able to get people to their appointments. And I can talk out that process too. What does it look like now? Yeah. Yeah. Let's actually go through this. Yeah. I want to start off with what it was when I started. So I've been working in abortion care for six years now. And when I started, I was working in a call center and I would schedule appointments. So I would get a call and I'd collect information and I would book the appointment and I'd say, you know, thank you for reaching out to us for your services and we will see you at your appointment. And the calls were long because we'd have to work out financial assistance. And then also, abortion care is often just like a really intimate type of health care to be accessing.

So there's a lot of factors sometimes to discuss with the person that was accessing services. And it can be really complicated with all of those factors. So it's always been pretty labor intensive to schedule someone sometimes, but it was a fairly short phone call for the most part, most of the time. And then you just get somebody scheduled and then you move on and you schedule someone else. And that was six years ago for me. And I'm not saying that more difficult situations didn't come up because of course, abortion access was not good six years ago either. But the way in which it's changed is so marked. And I feel like there's so many people have witnesses where it went from that to it taking weeks to work with one individual to get them to an appointment,

because there is no clinic within eight hours driving distance to them. And so the whole intake process and the whole just like getting the funds together, I guess I'll just walk you through it because I don't even know how else to relate. So let's say just like hypothetically, you're an individual who is living in a banned state and the closest actual brick and mortar abortion clinic to you is nine hours away, which is the situation for so many people that I talk to and that are living in the United States. And let's say you don't have a car and you have children and you don't want everybody to know your business. So you don't want everybody in your family knowing that you need an abortion and that you're looking for that type of health care. So you're trying to do what you can by yourself.

And you're Googling and you're looking at different resources. And what I witness a lot as a health care worker helping someone through this process is there's a lot of dead ends when people are trying to find someone that can provide them with those abortion services. They're looking at the clinics that are close to them and they're seeing that they're nine hours away and they can't get to them. They're looking up flight tickets and they're seeing it's like $800 for there and back and they can't afford that on top of the procedure cost. And let's just say hypothetically, they're early in the pregnancy and the procedure might cost maybe $400, $500, $600, which is still a lot of money. That's still a lot of money. So I

don't want to pretend like that's not. But on top of that, then there's also the plane tickets, trying to find a way to the airport and all of that. And they're just reaching a lot of dead ends. Like I can't possibly go here and I can't possibly go here. And okay, like maybe I can go online and order some medication, but it might not arrive for several weeks. And what if it doesn't arrive? I mean, that's like a really scary thing to be doing, like knowing you need healthcare and knowing that you're relying on the mail and like hoping that you get your packet and that you can trust wherever you're purchasing the medication from. And if you can't even really, like, let's say that you're, you're further along and you may be are like 20 weeks and your, your options are incredibly

more limited and you're paying a lot more if you don't have insurance coverage, which most people, most people don't. So you're paying like maybe up to, I don't know, like 2,000, 3,000, 4,000 for a procedure. And you just need help. And you need to ask for help, which is already like not a good spot to be in because you're accessing healthcare and you have no choice but to ask for help and you shouldn't have to.

That's really fucking hard, right? I mean, I think on an intellectual level, I think everyone has an experience which is how hard it is to ask for help for stuff that's like incredibly minor. And then you're doing this for a really intimate like healthcare decision. Yeah. Like super personal, like your decision might be based on like a bunch of factors that are just like really personal for you and you wish you didn't have to tell people or you wish you didn't have to talk to so many people about an appointment. Because for most healthcare appointments, even though healthcare in general is not easy to access, you just call

and you schedule the appointment and maybe you have to pay a copay and that's annoying. And then maybe the appointment is four months out and that's awful too. But this just makes everything worse for the individual. So let's just say they keep trying and they keep trying and they keep looking. And let's say they get to me and I'm somebody who I do scheduling now for patients who need to travel. And I help them get financial assistance for the cost of travel and for their appointment. So a lot of times when I get in touch with someone, they've already encountered so many dead ends. And when I am not the dead end, they're filled with so much relief that a lot of times, this happens almost every day now, someone will get in touch with me and they'll just start crying

when I tell them that I can help them. And that is not a good feeling because I feel like maybe in like other types of work or maybe even like before, like maybe years ago, like when somebody was like grateful, it might feel good. Like, oh, I'm so glad I can help them. But when someone who is like a caregiver, a worker, somebody who needs healthcare and they're scared and they're crying out of relief, it does not feel good. It makes me feel really horrible because they have already been robbed of their dignity by the time that I talk to them. And I hate that. And I hate that. It's just, it's disgusting that they've already been put in this situation that is dehumanizing. And, and I just, it doesn't can get an appointment in a clinic. It's not in their state because it's not legal to provide an abortion in their state. So they have to travel two states away and get to the clinic. So the flight tickets are $800 and the cost of the appointment is 400. So already that's $1,200, which luckily I am so

grateful and glad that I have the ability to arrange financial assistance for that. And I can work with individuals to do that. Thank the Lord. Honestly, I shouldn't, no, not thank the Lord. Thank these people. Ain't they doing shit? Fuck the Lord. Yeah, yeah. Thank these people so much. I'm just so glad they exist and they're there and that they're such hard workers. Oh, my God. But yeah, so that's $1,200 that we can look into covering so that way the person pays whatever they are capable of paying, even if that's nothing. Because some of these people, they're living paycheck to paycheck because they're taking care of their children and their family is coming first. That is what

is happening is they are taking care of their family and they are being a good caregiver. So the money is going to food on the table. So that's like $1,200. But then there's a couple other things you have to factor in is like, does this person need a hotel? Because that can be an additional, what, like $100, $200, depending. And does this person have a car? Can they pay for the gas money, especially if they're driving? Because let's say they could get to an airport, but the airport is still two hours away.

You still need gas money. You still have to park at the airport. You got to pay for airport parking. And then you get on the airplane and you fly over to the state where your appointment is. You get off the airplane and then there is surge pricing for Lyft and Uber. And let's say the Uber, it could be anywhere from like maybe $50 or $100, depending on what's going on. And that is just more money that needs to be spent. The fact that they're going to get by fucking Uber surge pricing is so monstrous. Yeah. And like airports in general, like getting out of an airport using a ride share is pretty terrible.

But yeah, you got to pay that surge pricing. And then you get to the clinic. And then you have your services, which is really like when you're accessing healthcare. I mean, we all access healthcare. We're all human beings who need healthcare. You really want to be able to focus on that appointment and the care you're getting. But at this point, they've already traveled. They've been on a journey.

So they arrive to the appointment and get the healthcare that really should have been what they should have been able to focus on. And then they got to go back. So then they got to do the whole thing. They got to go through airport security, get back, get the Uber from the airport. And then let's say they have a two-hour flight back. And that could be done in all than one day, but sometimes it can't be. Sometimes it's just not possible to do all that in one day. And that's like another obstacle that I come across is that a lot, a lot, I would say most of the patients I talk to are already parents. So they're like, I have to be back that evening because I don't have childcare overnight. Like I don't have overnight childcare. So then I'm like trying to get them back the same

evening because they're a parent. And then like, can you imagine just like, you know, just like imagine your own parents, like your own like mom, just like zipping away for one day to go get like a really simple healthcare procedure. And then they have to like rush back and you're already in bed and and um it's just so stressful it's so stressful for the for the parent for any any family members that might be like kind of like sharing this whole stressful experience with them any friends um any loved ones and it's just you have to find time off too. Oh, yeah. I didn't even get into that. Yeah. So I don't know.

I set a lot of numbers just now. So I know I started off with $1,200 and then I tacked on a bunch of extra things. Oh, and I didn't mention that you're going to have to eat that day. Yeah. You're in another state and you have to get food. So it easily for one person starts racking up until like over 2000. And that's why abortion funds are really important. But that's also, that's a lot.

That's a lot. And that's a lot on top of like an intimate healthcare appointment. And, you know, just outlining how much someone has to do to get to an appointment. There's even a couple other factors to consider, too, because a lot of these people who are having to fly or drive these long distances to their appointment, they would have never been in that situation otherwise. So, you know, these are individuals who have never flown on a plane before maybe because they've just never been in a situation in which they needed to fly on a plane. They've always been able to drive to vacations and everything. Like, oh, family vacation, you drive maybe like four hours and you have fun. And you just don't want to go on a plane. It makes you nervous. And that's a lot of people live like that. So all of a sudden, these people have no

choice. Like, oh, you have to get on a plane and otherwise you're going to have to drive 12, 13 hours. So they get on a plane and they're scared because they've never done it before. Cause they're already stressed out that they're going to a doctor's appointment. They're already stressed out that they're relying on basically strangers to get them there, which is, that's like a whole other topic is like, you have to rely on strangers. And that's, you know, people shouldn't have to do that. And, and then also you have to navigate an airport. So a lot of my job has become looking at maps. Like I'm looking at a map, like how far away is this someone from a clinic? How far away are they from an airport? You know, can they go here? Can they go here? But I'm also on the phone with people kind of describing how airports work. Like here's what airport security looks like. People are afraid of TSA and I don't blame them. I fucking hate TSA. They're always assholes. Fuck them. They make everything worse. You got to

go through TSA and you got to know how to get your tickets and you got to know how to get to a terminal. A lot of people don't, like If you've never flown before, they might not know that they're supposed to get on that little train thingy. You know what I'm talking about. You get on a little train, you go to your terminal, and a lot of people don't know that.

All of a sudden, they have to find out really fast, and I have to explain it, and that's part of their abortion care. Part of people's abortion care is now talking them through an airport. of their abortion care. Part of people's abortion care is now talking them through an airport. And that has- That sucks.

That's become the daily experience. That's become the daily experience. Whereas like, yeah, six years ago, this used to be like, okay, I'm going to book your appointment. You're going to come in. Your appointment's going to be maybe like, I don't know, five hours. And then you leave and you drive home and maybe you're only driving like 30 minutes, maybe an hour, maybe two hours. And now we're having people who, you know, flights or it's a 12 hour drive, two hour flight there, two hour flight back. The flight lands at like midnight, you know, like, and then your kids are in bed. And it's like, it's so much. And you can see why people give up and people are giving up. In fact, the numbers are, the numbers are hard to hear. I know that there was a study that showed that in the first six months after the Dobbs decision, 36,000 people who wanted an abortion couldn't get one. That is only in the first six months. I'm sure that that number is much. I'm dreading seeing new numbers, but I'm sure the number is much higher now. I'm like dreading seeing new numbers, but I'm sure the number is much higher now.

So when you're faced with all of this, people do give up because it is too much, which was the whole point of all of the bans and everything that's happened. The point was to make people give up. And I think that a lot of leftists maybe don't want to acknowledge that people are giving up. They want to believe that people will keep trying and they'll find those resources and they will get to the appointments because help is available. But not everyone finds the help that is out there and not everyone can make it work. There's a lot of reasons why people can't do this ridiculous thing I just described. why people can't do this ridiculous thing I just described. And then as abortion care workers, we see them give up. And I think that's kind of been the biggest, one of the biggest changes for me is just how often I see people give up and just having to witness that because it's like, well, what does it mean when someone gives up? What does it mean when someone stops trying to

get the healthcare that they're looking for? They're changing their entire plans. Because everyone, not everyone, but a lot of people have ideas of what they're doing with their life. And they're like, I want to have this many kids. I want to have them at these times. And I want to be with this person, or I don't want to be with anyone. And I want to work this job and go to don't want to be with anyone. And, and I want to work this job and go to this school or whatever, you know, you're, you're making plans. And then all of a sudden, because of this situation, you have to change your plans. And, and there's even worse things happening than that. But I think accept defeat and take a path that you did not want to take. And it's fucking sad.

It's more than sad. Sad is an understatement. I don't know what word it is. It's horrible because this has been taken from them. The choice has been taken from them completely. And that is going to have effects that we are going to see for decades to come. And that's kind of hard to wrap your brain around. What does it mean for tens and tens of thousands of people to not have had the healthcare that they need? It means that we're going to see like

the negative health effects for years to come, because that is a lot of people. That is a lot of, that's a lot of people. And that's going to impact people in really long-term ways for a really long time. And knowing that is really, I don't know, words are kind of failing me. It's like beyond traumatic. I'm sure there will be studies in years from now. I'm sure. But it's been a year. And I can say the data is going to be really bad.

The data is going to be really bad based on everything that I've already seen. Suffering is not something you can quantify and you know the amount of human suffering that's been unleashed by this is like one of the worst crimes that's happened in a century full of unspeakable crimes

and the suffering looks different for each individual you know because it's just the whole it's autonomy you're losing control just the whole, the whole, it's autonomy. You're losing control over your life and your body and your family and your, and there's just so many things and it looks different for each person. So for some people it's like, you have to just fucking change everything that you're fucking doing. You can't control your life or your body. Um, and then for other people, it can be even worse than that, where, where you are, you're

risking death because pregnancy is incredibly dangerous. So there are people who, who are putting themselves in, in really dangerous situations, um, with their pregnancies and they're being denied the care that they need. So you see people, um, who are being forced to, to risk their life because they can't get the care they need. And people are losing their body parts and their fertility because recently I read a story, and then there's these horror stories every day, which I like, I read them because I want to know everything that's happening. But I also am so resentful that like every day there's like a new

like horror story about these services. But recently there was someone – there was somebody who wasn't able to get timely abortion care and had to continue a pregnancy and ended up losing her uterus even though she did not – she wanted to have more kids. She wanted to continue having children. So all of a sudden, because she couldn't get an abortion, she couldn't continue to expand her family in the way that she wanted. Yeah, I mean she's getting sterilized effectively. Yeah, exactly. By the state the way that she wanted. Yeah. I mean, she's getting sterilized effectively. Yeah, exactly. By the state, which is... Yeah. So the suffering is so different for each individual and so intimate to them. And it's going all the way up to just state-mandated, just body horror, basically.

And it's deadly. It's really deadly, which is hard to talk about. Yeah. I mean, you know, just having said that, should we talk a little bit about Gabriela Gonzalez and how, you know, the other thing about abortion care is that it's not just that pregnancy is dangerous physically. It's that pregnancy is really dangerous socially because, you socially because we live in an incredibly patriarchal society, and that means patriarchal violence is a real threat. Yeah, and this is always – unfortunately, one component of abortion care is it often involves interpersonal violence or more, you know, a lot of people say domestic violence. And it's because a lot of partners will try to control someone through pregnancy. And it's a tactic of abuse that does come up.

And if somebody does get pregnant while they are in that kind of relationship and that's, that's a big thing, you know, a lot of times they, it makes sense that if they're trying to get away from someone, um, that, you know, they don't want to continue the pregnancy. Um, so, and then that might be something that the partner might be intimately involved in where either they know about it or they don't know about it. And if they know about it, they could be pressuring the individual. It's unfortunately something that is often a component of this healthcare is that that is a factor that the person seeking healthcare is dealing with.

So in terms of, and all of this is, this is all really triggering stuff too. Yeah. So, you know, trigger warning. But with Gabriella Gonzalez, that was something that happened. I think it was in May. I remember it was in mid-May. for a lot of abortion care workers and practical support advocates because it's the thing that we try so hard to keep our patients safe when they disclose things to us. They, we, the patient safety is the number one priority.

And the fact of the matter is these bans make it harder for people to access the services safely. So in the case of Gabriela Gonzalez, I just want to say her name. She was a mother of three children. She was 26 years old when she was murdered by her ex-partner after she accessed an abortion in another state. So she was located in Texas. She had to travel to Colorado to get an abortion. And when she came back, unfortunately, she was murdered by her ex. And just like a couple of things on that is, it's just, if you are trying to be discreet and you're trying to take care of your health care, it's hard to keep things private if you have to fly to another or drive to another state. The situation is just so much more complicated than it would be if you could access those services at home or near where you are. It's easier to keep that information private.

It's easier to handle that situation in a timely way. So I feel like, I mean, our country is failing, everyone pretty much, but I'm torn apart and devastated. This news hit so hard to learn about Gabriela Gonzalez and what happened to her. You know, we try so hard to keep our patients safe and being careful about communications, being careful about what we hand patients even. Like there are some times like, it's like, well, I cannot give you any handouts. So here's how we're going to provide you the information. Because it's, you know, people can't even have that information on their phone or in their purse, on their person.

And trying so hard and then just having like the state defy you in every way. And it's just really – it's trapping people in these violent situations that – I mean, these situations have always existed, but ever since these abortion bans went into effect, it has made them even more dangerous. Yeah, and I mean, I think in terms of just sort of getting at what the people who support this stuff believe, they know about this. This is what they want to happen, right? This is what it actually means to have an ideology that's based on patriarchal control is this shit. Yep. It's this shit yep it's this

like this is this this violence and like this kind of coercion is what they want these are also you know like again these are there's a reason these are also people who want to end at fall divorce right like they like their entire ideology is based on men being able to inflict violence yep and yeah and you know and these are what pro-life people. And Gabrielle Gonzalez was a mother of three children. She was a mother and her children needed her. And now she's gone. And I feel like the abortion bans and the demolition of abortion services in the United States has led to this situation and will continue to lead to more situations like this. And they're all devastating. And, and I hate it. It's fucking awful.

It's so fucking bad. And I know that, like, I'm like, where do I go from there? I like it. After saying like, the worst shit

in the world and then yeah i don't know i mean i guess i guess the thing i can say after that right is like if if you want to live in a world that is not just utterly controlled by the most evil people who've ever lived by, you know, that is defined by enormous engines of human suffering. Like these people, their politics, the logistical support networks,

their parties, like the, the entire political apparatus that is doing, it needs to be completely destroyed. Like, like raised to the ground in a way that it like literally can never recover and that is the thing that is possible right it is it is possible to completely destroy political movements it is possible to just drive them so far underground that people forget they even existed and you know

and then that has happened to movements before that were you know as powerful as this one so it can be done it's just it it requires you know it it it requires a level of political will that most that you know politicians don't give a shit about because this is not something that affects them and speaking of politicians not giving a shit going back to like you know the initial reflection on like you know reflection on it's been a year since Roe v. Wade was overturned and the Dobbs decision. And what has happened? What have the politicians done to alleviate all of the suffering that I've been talking about? And it's very little. The biggest win that we've had is Miphaepristone not being banned, which is horrible.

Because like, oh, and then that whole thing, that whole separate, that's like a whole other thing. But that is such a bleak win, especially since it's not even gone. And we're going to see this issue come back with Mifepristone. And that's another thing, too, because if that does happen, like misoprostol is amazing and misoprostol is very effective. And taking misoprostol only for abortion is effective. But it's also more symptomatic. just like you know like we were talking about people like just people being exposed to violence people um having to act doing just like moving mountains and having to cross mountains and and go on a journey to get these abortion services in literally what can be often a 30 minute to an hour appointment um if you're you know lucky it's not always like that but anyways like these

services aren't complicated like you know like it's not like a like, you know, lucky, it's not always like that, but anyways, like these services aren't complicated. Like, you know, like it's not like a, like these, yeah, we have the technology, like, like to get medication, you just go and you get the medication and they tell you how to take the medication and they make sure they can prescribe you the medication. You get it. It's not like that can be like a 15 minute appointment. And then if you're, um, if you're like under a certain gestational age, a first trimester abortion, it can be only like five minutes. Like this,

this is not complicated healthcare. This is very simple healthcare. And you're adding all these extra factors in. So when you're, when you have to prescribe someone a medication that is more symptomatic, which is just adding, like, it's just one more complication. Like, and the attack on abortion services has always been death by a thousand cuts. And this is just like one more cut that we really, really do not need. So, but that was a win. And it's like, that is such a shitty win. And then you have some states that are becoming like sanctuary states where they're like, you know like – I hate saying that word. I'm so sorry. I didn't mean to say sanctuary states because it's really not that.

But they're saying like we're a safe place for you to get an abortion and we're always going to have abortion services. And it's like what does that mean if you have so many patients traveling from other states that you're booking five weeks out? Yeah, well, they won't. It's like they won't fucking fund it. This is the thing that I'm just unbelievably fucking angry about, right? Is it like, you know, Dobbs, in terms of just the raw sort of politics of it, right? In terms of just pure getting votes,

this is the best thing that's ever fucking happened in the Democratic Party, right? They have been reaping the fucking electoral rewards for this. And what have they been fucking doing for 50 goddamn years? Like nothing. And this is something that like, okay, if you look at the way the right has been like fucking dealing with this, right? It's at every single step, right? You know, they're constantly involved in lawsuits. They're constantly pushing the boundaries and doing literally whatever they can within and without the bounds of bounds of the law right i mean we've talked about the sort of vigilante campaigns

right but like you know like doing things like like like you know i mean the one of the classic ones is requiring like facilities that do abortions to have like a specific length of hallway or like like with a trap laws different yeah like they've been doing all this fucking legal bullshit to make it as hard as humanly possible right is. Is there a democratic version of this? No, no, they fucking, they came to the height of it.

Like even, even, even the States that have the shit, it's not like they're, they're not fucking funding it. Right. It's like, they're not,

they're not fucking paying like they, they, they're shit that they could be doing. And they just, they don't care because this is, this is a, you know, this is a very nice thing.

They can trot out in their fucking fundraising meetings and they can get people to vote for them, but they're not going to, they're not going to wage this kind of campaign that the republicans have been like they're not gonna wage a pro-access campaign on the scale at all right but they're not gonna not gonna wage one on the scale the republicans have been doing to like make sure that you fucking can't get these services yeah it's like these blue states they're not safe and there there's like the ridiculous there was like stockpiling misoprostol or whatever some

states were saying they were doing. And it's like, if you're really looking out for people and you're really trying to defy these awful human rights violating laws, then send the medication to banned states. Yeah. I mean- Help patients in banned states. Like don't abandon Texas. Don't abandon Louisiana and Mississippi. Like help them. Because like where are they going? They're going to blue states.

Like there's like a ripple effect. And I feel like I talked about this last time when I was on talking to you where, okay, you can't get these healthcare services near you. So you go somewhere else and the people locally can't get those services. So then they have to travel farther. And there's like this ripple effect to the point where like, I'm sure that like blue states are seeing more appointments than ever. And I know for a fact, like here in Pennsylvania, here in Pittsburgh, where literally we're always seeing people in Ohio, just because they, even abortion is legal in Ohio. It's just, there's a lot of restrictions there, so it's a little tricky. But then there's like West Virginia and like Kentucky and Tennessee, and you're seeing so many more patients, so you're booking out further. And it's like if you're – let's say you're eight weeks and you find out – so if you're eight weeks pregnant, then you've only missed your period for a couple of weeks.

It's really like you can find out you're eight weeks pregnant. You're like, you just found out really. And you call somewhere near you to get an appointment, but the appointment is five weeks away. So all of a sudden you go from eight weeks to 13 weeks. It's like, what the heck? Yeah, you want to clock. Yeah, it's totally different options. And that's happening in blue states.

And it's like, so this is impacting literally everyone, but no politicians or even big talking heads are really doing anything about it because it just gets worse. There's just more bans constantly. And I want to talk a bit about the sanctuary bullshit too, because this is like the third fucking issue that we've seen politicians be like, oh, we're a sanctuary state. It's like, yeah, okay. Like I remember when I was doing fucking anti-ice raid stuff, right? Do you know how much time we fucking spent trying to stop raids,

like ice raids in quote-unquote sanctuary states? Like, it's bullshit. It's always been fucking bullshit. They don't mean it. And, you know, like, all of the fucking, like, this is the sanctuary state thing is just, like, a thing that they fucking say so that they can, you know, just sort of, like, rally their base support and, like, build towards whatever presidential run they're going to do in 20, like 32 or whatever. And it doesn't – it's not helping people. And – It's just not going to.

Yeah, it's not. It's not a strategy that works. And I mean it's just entirely selfish. It's rage-inducing because it's, how do I feel as an abortion worker? You know, it's been a year since Roe v. Wade was overturned and I have to witness all of this needless suffering and trauma and people's safety being compromised and people being hurt and people giving up and then these politicians not doing anything. I am so, I'm full of so much anger that it's sometimes numbing. Sometimes I'm just so angry that I kind of feel nothing.

It's so far down the spectrum that it just turns into a non-emotion, basically. So much anger that it's blinding and feels like nothing. And I don't even know what, I don't even know what to do with it other than focus into just like continuing to provide healthcare where it's like, oh, I'm so angry and I'm so mad and I feel so terrible. I am going to make sure that this person gets an abortion. Like that's what I can do.

I can, I can get people to an appointment people to an appointment and I want to do more. I want to go and just raise everything to the ground and be like you were saying, but I can't be the only one doing that. We all have to do that. We all have to raise everything to the ground because this is so untenable and so unfair and is creating such a huge ripple of suffering that we're all going to be experiencing for decades. And I'm really bitter about it. I'm super angry and super bitter and it's not going to get better, too. It's not. I have to be honest about that because if I'm not, then I'm not going to be prepared.

But we're going to continue to see these bands. They're not going away right now. The Mifepristone issue is going to come back. And we're going to keep seeing it and it's spreading. And I know that's like a whole other topic too, but the ripple effects are really immense. And every time someone is hurt, well, every individual, like when I heard that 36,000 number, that really hurt. Because I know how many patients I've seen in the last year and it's less than 36,000. So like every time I help someone, I'm so happy.

And I'm like, yes, you know, I helped this person get healthcare. I'm really happy. And then I look at that 36,000 number and I'm like, oh my God, there are so many other people who were not able to find help. And I'm, and I don't like, like I said, like, I don't even feel good when someone is like thanking me. And they, oftentimes people will say, people will say to me, I hear this almost every day. You have no idea how grateful and thankful I am. And it's like, I really don't, unthankful I am. And it's like, I really don't, I don't know. Cause I'm not in your shoes and I feel, and I'm sorry that I, that you had to come to me like this. Like, I'm sorry. I feel, I'm so sad in like such a deep visceral way that when someone is saying like, you'll never know how thankful I am that they just weren't able to go to their

local doctor's office or even have the medication mailed to them and, and have it like come in like two days and just take it and follow up with the doctor on the phone if needed, you know, something super simple, which would make sense. And I am just, I'm, I just, I, I hate it. I fucking hate it. I just keep coming to that. I'm like, this is so bad. This is so bad.

I want to keep doing it, but it sucks. Yeah. We're going to talk more about this next episode and also how the things that we're seeing in abortion care have been spiraling out and spreading to other sectors of the healthcare system, including trans healthcare. But in the meantime, we have an enormous number of links to different abortion funds and various abortion worker groups who also need your support. So yeah, please support them. And yeah, so that's going to be the next episode is because again, like this, this isn't a, you know, once, once you have like an evil like this has been unleashed into the world, it doesn't just stay in one place. Right. It keeps moving. It keeps going after different people.

It keeps expanding and it keeps just rippling through the world. And so when we're talking about that, we're going to be talking about like, you know, I mean, the fights that abortion workers have been having. And then we're going we're gonna we're gonna give you a brief bit of hope at the end of like what you can do because like fuck it the world does not need to be like this like this is not you know i mean there's there's the old david graber lines like that is the ultimate hidden truth of this world is that it is something that we make and could just as easily make differently let's do it let's make it different yeah let's fucking do that.

Let's not make a fucking immense engine of human suffering. Yeah, before we go for this episode, do you have stuff that you want to plug in terms of like abortion fund links, in terms of resources? Yeah, absolutely. So I know that I was talking about just abortion funds in general.

So find your local abortion fund. Go to abortionfunds.org and whatever your local abortion fund, support it. And if you feel like your local abortion fund, like you've been supporting them or they get a lot of support and you want to support maybe like funds elsewhere that are doing the good work, then I would recommend the Texas Equal Access Fund, the T-Fund in Texas. They are being so amazing and I love them. And also, I know that the Chicago Abortion Fund is a huge fund, but I love them so much. So I just, they can't have enough money. Just go donate to, they're so amazing. So Texas Equal Access Fund, the T-Fund, the Chicago Abortion Fund, they're doing such important work. So if you're looking for someone outside of your local abortion fund, which you should be supporting, then also check them out as well. Yeah. So Crystal, thank you so much for

joining us. We will be back tomorrow. We will be talking more about this. We'll be talking about what you can do and yeah, until then donate to your abortion funds and yeah, make, make, make, make the lives of the people who did this fucking miserable and destroy

their political power. Yes. Welcome. I'm Danny Thrill. Won't you join me at the fire and dare enter? Nocturnum, Tales from the Shadows, presented by iHeart and Sonora. An anthology of modern day horror stories inspired by the legends of Latin America. From ghastly encounters with shapeshifters to bone-chilling brushes with supernatural creatures.

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Welcome to It Could Happen Here, the podcast where the situation continues to worsen. The thing that is worsening today is the rights war on abortion, which they are winning and are continuing to win, is not contained to simply abortion. It has been spreading. It has been getting worse. And yeah, with me to talk about it is Crystal, who once again is an abortion worker, an abortion union organizer, and on the board of a bail fund. Not bail fund. Jesus Christ. Sorry. I'm getting my funds crossed in my mind. organizer and on the on the on the the board of a bail fund not bail fund jesus christ sorry i'm getting my i'm getting my i'm getting my funds crossed in my mind on the board of an of a of a jesus christ you want to start over yeah okay sorry sorry i probably shouldn't have said that

no no no this is this is entirely my fault because we've been doing so much bail fund stuff that i mean they're both good yeah it's like when my brain thinks fun it just goes to it just goes to bail fund now all things that are good yeah abortion funds that one you know we could just leave that in screw it you know fuck it we'll we'll leave we'll leave me doing that in yeah oh do it live uh rip in hell, if you said that. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Crystal, welcome back.

Yeah. Glad to be talking to you again. Love suffering. I love talking about pain and suffering and also the good work that we are doing to mitigate it, but also pain and suffering. Yeah. Yeah. So I guess, yeah, I think we should start with sort of, I don't know if framing it as a contagion is the right way to do it. I think it's probably not, but the way that sort of the ripple – like where the sort of ripples of the sort of anti-abortion movements advance have been going? abortion movement's advance have been going? Yeah, because if we're talking about it's been a year since the Dobbs decision and Roe v. Wade was overturned, what does that mean? What does

that imply? What has been the aftermath of that? The one thing is that the strategies to get to that point worked. And I really hate saying like, in terms of like they won or we lost because we're all, we're in America, we're all losing. We're all losing here, except for the fascists. But so, but we have, we're seeing a lot of bad things happening because of the Dobbs decision. And that's, those strategies worked in our current political environment to get us to that point. And, and I mentioned before, you know, it's death by a thousand cuts is,

is kind of like one of the ways in which you can describe the strategies, like nonstop bans, nonstop restrictions, just a constant onslaught. Basically bands that are, nonstop bans, nonstop restrictions, just a constant onslaught. Basically, bans that are, they're copycat legislation. They're being pumped out. People can just literally plug in the templates and share them, and it can be applied to a number of different things in different states and copycat legislation. So it it worked and we're where we are because that strategy worked and did not get enough resistance um not enough was done to combat that strategy um on the left with democrats and it immediately spread to the next autonomy-based issue because um and not saying that it didn't start before that, because

these fascists have been going after all kinds of issues of autonomy for decades, abortion being one of them, prison abolition being one of them, and then also trans healthcare. And just LGBT in general, but specifically trans healthcare that we have been seeing. We are seeing a lot of the same restrictions and bans spreading to that very quickly. Faster than I, I mean, I knew things were bad. You would think that I would just expect the worst,

but I didn't think that we would see the legislation for the anti-trans health, uh, healthcare and gender affirming services legislation move as fast as it has. Like I should have, and I didn't, and it's been incredibly fast. Um, and, and it feels so similar and I don't even want to say it feels similar. It is. It's when i'm seeing it happen i'm like this is the same thing they're using trap laws which are laws that um so uh target actual providers i mean i guess you can't really call them trap laws because abortion provider is in that but also it's the same there's the whole trap thing which we're not gonna get it we've done that in other episodes yeah yeah but i mean they're called called troubles and abortion services, but yeah. Yeah.

But it's the same type of restrictions and bans, and we're seeing them spread to those kind of healthcare services. So it's impacting other types of healthcare services, and I'm seeing a lot of the same legal back and forth where it's like, oh, this law went into effect, for example, in Florida. And oh, now it's being challenged in court. So it's not being – it's not enforced right now. So it kind of goes back to the way it does before, which – I mean, it's always good to see a restriction temporarily paused and a ban temporarily paused because that relief is needed. I see that in abortion care. When there is a ban that is temporarily reversed by the courts, it is like, thank God. I'm so happy. We get some relief. We can see people for their healthcare services tomorrow. However, that back and forth is incredibly confusing and creates confusion and chaos on a mass scale.

Because it's like, can I access these services? Can I not access these services? Can I get these services in the state? Do I have to travel out of state? It's more than the individual can keep up with. And confusion is the point. So when I'm seeing some of these bans related to trans health services, I'm like, okay, I'm glad that... I'm pretty sure... I have to admit, I have not read the news in the last couple of days. So I don't know if this has been walked

back, but it seems like Florida has some relief right now. But I just know what that mass confusion looks like for individuals. And I'm like, this is so similar. Oh my God, this is the same type of fight. This is the same fight. And I think, you know, because like, this is also another thing with the media. It's just like active accomplices. Like, this is a kind of thing where like, it is really easy to look at this and go like they're doing this on purpose they can generate fucking horror stories which i don't think is why they're doing it i think they're doing it

because they're transphobes but you know like one of the one of the things that's very that's just fucking awful about this stuff is that like the the people who are reporting on this don't understand how these laws work and so you know like i mean like this is my job right like i cover this for a living and i will read a report about something and i can't tell what the law does because the person writing the fucking the the stupid ass journalist who they've hired who like have never talked to a trans person in their life and like are only tangentially aware of what the law is like like the the the concept of the law is something they were introduced to two years ago like they don't fuck they don't fucking know what these bills do right so you have to like go actually read the bill but that doesn't help

because you know this is this is yeah this is like this is i think a very similar strategy of like there's there's this way in which like constant onslaught constant sort of confusion constant terror and also but you know in the way that the strategy right now that is being sort of relied on to stop this stuff is to the courts that that is very similar to what the entire struggle over abortion rights look like and you know we know how that ended it doesn't it didn't work and it's not going to work with the with with trans rights either and like it and and you know and i think something that like we're gonna see more of as you know

because like a water some of these bands will be struck down but you know you're gonna get the abortion thing where it's like okay so you like one band gets struck down so they pass another one then you just keep passing them until they can find one that their fucking judges will maintain. Yeah, they reintroduce bills that are practically the same thing but slightly different. And they just retry stuff after doing political shenanigans. And we're still doing the legal back and forth approach in abortion care. It's still the same thing. It hasn't changed. And seeing that also happen, it's like, well, people need healthcare now. With abortion care and trans healthcare, it's like you need that healthcare when you need it. Right now, today, tomorrow. And when there is confusion and this bad, like the, because the courts take forever, like it's, and it changes a lot and it's confusing when you see the news stories, like you were saying.

So it's interfering and lowering the quality of accessing, like lowering the quality of that healthcare and accessing that healthcare, like the experience of accessing that healthcare now, like today. And it's, it's cumulative because like you, you, you lose the ability to keep track of what you have the right to do and what you don't. And, and these are, these are the same, like they're issues of controlling your life and your body, um, and of privacy as well. You know, your ability, it's like your business, it's your body. And the state is getting in the way and it hurts so much to see this happening to even more people because it's hard enough watching what happens to people who need abortions and seeing what they go through. And then having to see even more people who are also trying to access healthcare to help them have control over their lives and their bodies. Also having that, you know, having that impeded and taken away from them too with a different

type of healthcare and seeing like that is just like, oh my God, like not only were we able, we were not able to maintain these services in this country and and we're also seeing it happen to another type of health care um and and another thing too is like abortion providers are also trans health care providers like yeah it's it's like body stuff it's like you know like it's they're they're like often the same building yeah like Planned Parenthood does both yeah people who get hormones through Planned Parenthood because and a lot of independent clinics

too a lot of independent abortion providers also provide trans healthcare as well and gender hormones I keep saying gender hormone even though that doesn't make any sense why do I keep saying that but hormone therapy services and gender for me I feel like I'm like combining those together

but um they offer both but that also means that like if you if you knock out a clinic for like for one of the reasons you've also knocked out the services for everyone else too right so like it's you know and I think this is something that's very

important about the way the right sees is that the right sees this as the same fight very clearly and that i don't know i mean i i think i think in terms of the people who actually do organizing i think it's it like it's understood that it is the same fight but i don't think it is as much in the general public even though the, like for the people you're fighting against, they're, you know, incredibly like viscerally and disturbingly clear about like what,

what they want to do. And about the fact that, you know, like destroying people's autonomies and using the state to take control of, I mean, just like literally physically take control of their bodies and define what they are, which is something they do.

Like, you know what I mean? This is the thing that's been happening in these anti-trans bills too, is like, they've been like, like legally defining what a woman is by like reproductive apparatuses and stuff like that. Yeah.

And that, that's disgusting. And it makes me feel just disgusted just seeing that because I feel like I don't even fit some of the criteria. No, it's disgusting. As a cis woman, I feel like – and I'm just like, oh, my God. And we're also like, we're punishing people for not having like perfect health and like perfect pregnancies and being born into the body that, you know, like people are being loud, like, why are these bans so restrictive where people who are pregnant and, you know, like they're just not having a perfect pregnancy, like there are complications, like which, which happen and they're like being punished for not having the perfect pregnancy by these laws, like these abortion restrictions. And I'm like, why would they do that? Like, why,

like how can you not know that pregnancies go wrong? And how would you not know that? And then somebody said to me, they were like, well, Eve was punished with dangerous pregnancies. If you look at their religion, it was a punishment. So I'm like, yeah, they just believe we should be punished for not being born in the right body, not having the perfect pregnancy, not wanting a pregnancy. You're being punished for not being born into the right body, not having the perfect pregnancy, not wanting a pregnancy, you know, like you're being punished for not inhabiting the ideal because they believe that it is a,

it's a punishment. Just like, I guess I'm trying to think of the word like naturally intrinsically or something. I don't know. And I don't subscribe to that ideology, but it's being forced on us. Yeah.

Yeah. And I mean, I think there's this way in which people have, people have this tendency to conceive of like neoliberalism, right. Specifically as this thing that's about like the retreat, the retreat of, of state power. And that's never been what it is. Right. What, like, you know, if you, if you look at what neoliberalism actually looks like, it's fucking abortion bans, right?

Like the people who are pushing that are the people who pushed Reagan into office. The actual point of the state in neoliberalism and this, and you know, this is one that's incredibly compatible with the sort of like, with the sort of religious fascists that they allied themselves with in order to come into power, right? the way that's actually manifested is, is just through the state directly taking control of your body. Because, you know, like people, people aren't actually fucking natural market subjects. They're not like a woman is not as, as these like stupid assholes always insist is like,

Oh, it's someone who gives birth. Like, no, that's just like, not true. It's not true. It's not.

And so, and because it's not right for people, because that's the image that they have to like force you into. The only way they can do that is by using state violence to physically take control of your body and shape you into the thing that they think you are. Yep. Yep. And none of this stuff is siloed. Pregnancy is related to abortion care.

It's related to just like trans care is embedded in all of that as well. Trans people get pregnant and have abortions. And also in terms of hormone therapy, more like, you know, like people besides trans people need hormone therapy as well. Like none of these things are a silo by themselves. Like they're all kind of embedded together. And the effect of that is that it's kind of become impossible to be a doctor and

a healthcare provider for a lot of these services because they're so entwined. And because like, you know, we all, we have our bodies and like our, our bodies aren't in separate containers. Our body parts aren't in separate containers. Like they're all like, we're like all connect, like it's all connected and you can't really have one without the other. And now we're seeing doctors who can't safely do what they have to do, like provide the healthcare to appropriate medical standards within these laws that exist. So you see doctors who are like, wow, I can't actually perform the healthcare that I need to perform without potentially losing my license, so I'm just going to leave the state. and OBGYNs who are leaving states because they cannot safely practice the medicine as science and medicine wants them to without risking losing their license. So they're just leaving.

And these are states that need those doctors. I mean, there's a lot that can be said about maternal and infant mortality rates in the United States. So the fact that you have OBGYNs like fleeing states and, and, and, and I'm sure these are states that need those doctors and have low standard, um, like low, uh, or have just like low quality, um, uh, outcomes or like bad outcomes when it comes to, uh, uh, maternal and infant mortality. And you're seeing this and it's like, well, this is just making all kinds of healthcare worse. Like it's becoming less safe to just be pregnant in general, even if you are carrying and delivering a pregnancy

in these states. And I'm sure that you're gonna see this also happen because of these trans healthcare bans. Is that you're gonna see doctors fleeing in areas in which those doctors are needed because they are at risk of losing their license and not being able to practice um yeah and another thing i think that's very similar between these two things is like there's just not that you know we've talked about this more broadly like in a lot of the in a lot of

the coverage i've done on the show about labor stuff my healthcare labor is that like just everywhere even even in even in sectors where like there's no there's no sort of legal threat right there's just massive labor shortages because these these for these for-profit health care companies are you know don't want to fucking bring in another person on a shift because that cost them more money and that's less money that they can pocket and you know and yeah and and and and and both both abortion services and trans health care are fields with i mean there are just there's just not that many people like they're just like the the the numbers are so small that like like i can i can ask my friends and they know like every provider

in the city yep oh yeah it's and it's like two providers yeah like two abortion providers like two places to get hormones it's like and this and again this is in place like i live in chicago right this is a place where it's like it's pretty easy to get hormones right compared to i mean this is this is like comparatively yeah but i mean like like genuinely like this is this is a thing we you know this is like if you want to get like look at other parallels right this is like chicago has always been i mean not always but for i mean like half a century probably longer than that has been a place where people like trans people from around the country particularly from the south have like uprooted their lives and fled to because it was a place

where you could actually get care and you know but like but even here it's fucking hard as shit like yeah it's it's really hard and you know and a lot like the like like my one of the local clinics has been on strike for months and months and months because they're uh the place that they work for like slash a bunch of services and so and this like this this kind of struggle is you know like this is this is the thing that's happening in places where it's even where it's, and then suddenly the state bans it. And suddenly people are leaving the field. People are leaving states. It becomes even harder.

The services that already exist get just even more overtaxed. It's just like it's the exact same collapse just rippling through the entire sector. And none of these jobs pay a lot either like they pay like yeah like i i just in general like i'm sure like i'm not citing a specific job but i'm sure that there are abortion providers like who are like medical assistants and hormone therapy like medical assistants that are making like 15 bucks an hour, which is ridiculous considering you're also being threatened with violence. You're also having to deal with patients who are also experiencing the same national health crisis that you are.

Like you're experiencing it together. Like this is something like, it's not like, oh, I'm suffering by myself as a worker or, oh, these patients are suffering as individuals. I mean, they are suffering as individuals, but they're not suffering alone as individuals. They're experiencing the same sort of grief as a lot of the other people who are accessing the same services as them. are all in this sinking boat together. And it's so hard to recruit into these roles. So like we need more abortion care and trans health providers. And it's hard to get people to commit to that when you can't live on that. And you can't sustain that. Like you can't live on that and you can't sustain that like you can't stay in that job and keep doing it for years when you're literally being like you're you're you're being traumatized um you're experiencing suffering you're witnessing suffering i mean you're getting killed like that that that's a real thing that happens to and threatened yeah like just like like violent threats are something that um both types of health services have in common now, which is so depressing.

But we're all being threatened by the right and by fascists. I try to – sometimes it's like the right conservatives. I'm like, they're fascists. It's fascism. Like a lot of the people like to show up to this stuff. It's like literally the same groups of proud boys who show up to like different things over and over again. And they get relabeled by the media as like concerned parents or like the Christian outreach groups, depending on like what thing they're at. And it's like, OK, these know like these are fascists who tried to overthrow the government and seize power.

Like this, this, this, this was three years ago. Like, come on. Yeah. I was like,

these are people who are actively, they are ruining the lives of my loved ones and people in my community. Like my neighbors, like they are ruining my and my neighbor's lives, like actively in ways that are just getting worse so it is one fight i i i really want everyone to realize that i feel like it is being realized more and more now yeah um but you know the more people who learn it the better the and the ways in which just i just feel like the the dobbs decision and the overturn of roe v wade meant more than just people couldn't get abortions i think it's

just the destruction of health care in general in this country um and it it was it turned it into like just like a mad dash to do the exact same thing to um health services that trans people need yeah so fun another one of the the parts of this fight and i think the part of this fight that is the least popular in terms of like who will actually back you which is both like health care workers both doing abortion care and twittering trans health care fighting what is essentially like a three-way war where they are they are under assault from the right and from the state who are trying to criminalize the health care they provide and, you know, directly target them through trap laws and through, I don't,

we need to figure out another name for the version of the anti-trans laws. But, you know, so they're being specifically targeted by the state. And then they're also fighting a conflict with their own employers and whether that's, whether that's private healthcare providers or that's NGOs who are, you know know don't

want to pay them shit uh you know our funnel are funneling all of this fucking money into paying somebody's fucking dipshit cousin like three hundred thousand dollars a year to be like the vice executive director of like policy marketing or something. And yeah, and the way in which, you know, this has turned into a union struggle that is deeply, like kind of in a lot of ways, deeply unpopular among liberals because they just don't, they don't see like healthcare providers as workers.

Yeah, it has been such a strange experience They don't see like healthcare providers as workers. Yeah. It has been such a strange experience union organizing and contract negotiating during a national health crisis and after the fall of Roe v. Wade. It was so like, you know, Roe v. Wade is overturned and we got to go to the bargaining table and ask for money. It was so like, you know, Roe v. Wade is overturned and we got to go to the bargaining table and ask for money. And it's definitely, it's really hard because the stress is so compounded for all of the workers. And, you know, I've had peers in the community and in the abortion providing and abortion advocacy community say things like, you know, you expect a snake to be a snake. Like, you know, that the right is going to attack you and the fascists are going to do whatever they can to take away your right to autonomy and privacy. But it hurts a lot more, like personally, I think it hurts so much more. And it's been so painful in the last year to see the ways in which the people on our side, the people who have the same goals as us, ultimately, like of like, you know, we want people to have abortions and we want people to access healthcare and they are to have them hurt you.

Yeah. Yeah. Because like they're not supposed to be snakes. And it hurts. It hurts a lot more. And it hurts. It hurts a lot more. And a lot of the same people don't,

I feel like they're the same kind of folks who didn't understand the immediacy of needing to protect. Cause so, you know, LGBT, I feel like we should have gone harder for the T. You know, like all these years, like how long has we had, we had the acronym LGBT. And like, and it's like this whole time, it's like we could have seen this coming.

We shouldn't. It clearly was. Like the same with Roe v. Wade, where it's like they are coming for Roe v. Wade. This is coming. We could have done so much more to prepare. And I feel like in a lot of the same way, the same people who are like devaluing the labor, who didn't do enough to protect abortion abortion services are the same people who didn't do enough to protect just like trans people in general yeah and i i think there's like there's i think there's definitely a sort of expendability thing there too right i mean this is something that it's like very explicitly in the 2000s like the the sort of

i don't i don't know what the technical term for them is, but like big gay, like the big abortion and big gay. decision in the 2000s where they were like okay we're gonna drop our demands for stuff like trans health care and trans recognition in in in order to sort of build a broader base to get like gay marriage and shit and that was a very explicit decision that they made and you know and it worked for them right like yeah like we got gay marriage right well we didn't we didn't actually we got it through the fucking courts not through like the legal process right and donnie it took ages too but like yeah but like that was you know and like they they eventually sort of came back around and were like we're trans allies but then you know all of this shit was happening i mean this has been going on since like 20 like 2016 right is like the first bit like the first bathroom bills start and you know i mean

it was over half a decade where things could have been done and they just weren't and you know like it's the it's the same thing like like people just get used as like like people's health just gets in their bodies get used as bargaining chips yep. Yep. And I feel like in all of these situations that we're talking about, it's not looking out for the most vulnerable. So if you're talking about healthcare and I don't want to say women's rights. I mean, it used to be women's rights

and then now it's just like abortion access. And you're not looking like who needs this the most, and you're not looking out for the most vulnerable. And part of that, part of it in terms of abortion services is the compromising, compromising on bans. Like, oh, a 15-week abortion ban is reasonable. No, it's not. No abortion ban is reasonable. So that's with abortion services. And then with the fight for queer liberation, who is the most vulnerable? Well,

trans people have been the most vulnerable and not looking out for them. And then the frontline workers, who is the most vulnerable when it comes to people doing this work, providing these services? The frontline workers, the people who don't make much, the people who aren't managers or CEOs. And I mean like, you know, senior management and CEOs and things like that are, they're in different situations than the people who are answering the phone and scheduling and talking to the patients and taking their blood pressure and giving them their medication. And yeah, it's just not looking out for the people in the most vulnerable situations. It's killing us. It's literally killing us. You have to, it's just so much focus on, right? I mean, this is one of the things about trans healthcare as we talked about it that much is like, I think this is sort of a product of like the kinds of trans people who get representation. that like the average trans person is like a fucking tech worker in california and it's like no like the like the the the actual like median trans person like works at a works at a eps warehouse or you know it's like a vet tech or like you know does all of this shit that you know

works like just really shitty service jobs and like you know the stuff for like like i mean struggles like we're not even having because we're we've been like kicked all the way back down to like can we legally exist but like you know things like like people getting housing right like that that kind of stuff those are labor struggles the struggle for abortion is is also labor struggle because like again like you can't fucking have abortions without workers who do the abortions like they don't they don't just magically spring fully formed from like the the mind of an ngo like and also like i mean you need you need labor protections in order to access health care it's just a fact yeah um like you know because that's just yet another obstacle that patients are experiencing is getting off work.

Like, oh, you got kids and you got to like fly to like across the country to access health care services and you got to recover from those health care services. And it's like you got to have PTO and like how many people don't have that? Yeah. And it works the other way, too. Right. Yeah, and it works the other way too, right? We're like, but like, this is the thing we've been seeing with Starbucks, we've been seeing this with Google too, people trying to unionize is like, having healthcare is a thing that your work uses and like hangs over your head, like to control you. And this has been an explicit thing, like Starbucks specifically did this thing where they're like, well, if you try to unionize, like we can't guarantee you're going to have like, we're going to like get rid of your trans healthcare. Oh, Jesus. Yeah.

And like, you know, like this kind of like, you know, that's like them just like dropping the mask and saying the quiet part loud. But like, you know, like people's people's access to health care is an enormous union busting tactic. So it's literally just like on both sides of the struggle. It is just at all levels a labor struggle, and it's not thought of like that. Yeah, and again, I know I brought up silos before in terms of types of healthcare, but the same silos – it's kind of like a liberal – it's like liberal siloing where you're separating the issues and you can't. It's like liberal siloing where you're separating the issues and you can't. They're all connected. Abortion care, pregnancy care, raising your families, police violence, prison abolition, trans health care, labor rights, unionizing. They're all connected. And we don't connect the dots enough, I think, in this country. At least the people who have power don't connect the dots enough, I think, in this country. At least the people who have power don't.

And I think the separation of these issues has really hurt us. And we're stronger together, you know queer liberation advocate trans health advocate just trans liberation advocate union organizer um no or union member even if you're like working for if you're a plumber you know um if we all can identify that we have our it's all one fight and it's all connected we'll be better off for it so yeah if we can yeah and i think something that's also is really important is that like i mean this is historically like you know if you want to look at how working-class movements are defeated it's you pick people off by finding something that you know like for example like it like one one of the ways you can sort of beat a workers' movement is by that movement not dealing with the sort of rampant patriarchy in the movement.

And you can radicalize people to the right by just sort of – by doing sort of the christian democratic strategy in uh like in europe was you know they they they recognize that the workers movements like weren't really like organizing women in any substantive way and so they you know they were able to create this massive sort of anti-communist like like center-right bulwark against like organized labor by like actually organizing women right and you know and this is something that they they sort of do everywhere which is like yeah like if if you if you aren't fighting all of these things at the same time and conceptualizing them at the same time like you will get you will get picked apart one by one in your individual struggle and your

movement will collapse and die and that's really hard and you know like the the deck has been stacked against us but that that's that's the cards that we have and yeah we have to deal with them and to to like be a little bit to look more like on the positive side because like you know it's like yeah we we've had our asses kicked and we've lost so much. We have lost so much. We've lost so many of our basic human rights in this country. But like abortions are still happening and trans health is still being provided. And there are communities looking out for people who are in need of these

services and in need of safety. Cause like, it's not just about the basic health services, but you know you you have to be safe well you know if you're pregnant and you need health care you want to be safe and then also if you're like a trans individual um and you don't feel safe it's helpful to have those organizations there yeah exactly that's totally what i have in mind and um on the bright side like that is like those are still being like the the healthcare is still being provided even if it has been decimated and people are having to move mountains in order to get there.

Abortions are happening every day. I'm still getting people abortions. There are workers who are helping people get the healthcare that they need, the hormones that they need. And there are people teaching defense and security and working together. And we need to continue to do this because I am really angry and I am really just fucked in the head now because of everything that I've experienced and had to witness. And it's soul crushing. But I just keep doing it because that it just needs to happen.

Like this people need this health care. People need this information. People need to be connected. Safety and solidarity. And I just, you know, we have to keep going. Like, you know, so we have to defend the workers providing these services. We have to defend people accessing these services, whether it's abortion or trans health. And we need to just keep doing it, no matter how awful we feel.

And, you know, this has been an incredibly hard year and I have had conversations that I never would have wanted to have ever and that are hard to carry with me. And I'm going to carry these conversations, you know, these memories are like in my head now and I'm going to have them for the rest of my life, maybe. And they're in my head, you know, it's happened. And I'm just really grateful for the other people doing this work and that they're there and that I'm not the only one feeling this way and that we have each other's backs and that we, we do have the same fight. Like knowing that we have the same fight, I'm like, you know, that solidarity means, means everything right now. Because it's more than just like

winning or losing. Like, yeah, we've, we've lost a lot and we're continuing to lose a lot, but we're all still here and we all still need, we still, we still need like care. We, we need to, to, we just take care of ourselves and each other still. So I'm going to keep doing this work. I know that other people are going to keep doing this work. And I know that there will always be help available. Finding it is one thing, but I know that it will always be there. And I try to take solace in that because this is a collective trauma that our generation is going to see out for the rest of our lives and it's going to bleed into the next generation. And there's a lot I hope for, you know, before I

die. There's a lot I hope to see. So I hope that I see it. To end this on a positive note, because I know at the very beginning, I know like when we first started talking, a positive note because I know at the very beginning, I know like when we first started talking, Mia, I said we wanted to end on a positive note. So that involves me sharing like the thing that cheers me up the most and that like pushes all the right buttons for me. But there have been some good things in terms of like abortion access in the last six months. So I want to share that. It all starts, it starts with Partners Clinic. Partners Clinic is an all trimester clinic in Maryland and they opened this year and they were doing fundraising. And first of all, they're amazing. They're an amazing team of workers, amazing abortion providers. I love Partners Clinic.

I just, I could not, I cannot praise them enough. And they were fundraising to open their clinic and have everything that they need and, you know, have money for staff and everything. And it was picked up by prison culture more commonly. That's like her online handle. A lot of people know her as prison culture, but Mariam Acaba. And she started fundraising for them. And she was able to help so much

that they surpassed their goal and they opened. And now we have another all trimester abortion clinic in the United States staffed by the most compassionate, amazing, hardworking individuals. And that cheered me up so much because I obviously love Mary Amakaba and, and prison abolition. I, you know, I'm a prison abolitionist. So seeing her see how the issues are connected, that they go together and organizing for that on top of the work that she is already doing for abolition, I was just so happy to see that. And on the topic of all trimester abortion clinics, there is another one opening

up as well. And this cheers me up immensely as well. They're called the Valley Abortion Group. They're not open yet. They're currently fundraising. I could probably send you the link to post maybe. Yeah. So they're not open yet, but they're getting there. And they're called the Valley Abortion Group. They're going to be another all-trimester clinic. And they're going to be located in New Mexico. And I just want to point out that their acronym is VAJ, which I think is really important to point out. Hell yeah.

So we saw partners open, and that was amazing. And now we're going to have another one opening up and that's amazing. So, you know, love and support for Valley Abortion Group. Because honestly, we need abortion clinics, period. Like we need more of them. Yeah. But especially all trimester, especially now that these bands have been pushing people further and further along into the pregnancy before they can access these services, it's so important for them to exist. And on this topic, I also want to bring up that there are stories out there of people who it takes them six months to get an abortion

appointment. Six months. I just want to bring that up because that's happening. Because I know that I've said like five weeks a lot while we were talking, but it takes some people six months. So it's really important for these all-trimester abortion clinics to exist and for us and the communities that we're a part of to welcome them with open arms and big love. abortion access, all of these good, good topics. Prison Culture, Mary Macaba is now fundraising for another abortion practical support group. And I have to mention this up because this fundraising is happening right now. So if you go to Prison Culture's Twitter, she's like fundraising for it every single day, but she is fundraising for the Online Abortion Resource Squad, so Online Abortion Resource Squad, or OARS for short. What they are is they are an entirely volunteer organization, which is why they need to pay them for their labor. This is really important work.

That daily monitors, moderates, and provides quality posts on r abortion was r slash abortion how should i read that so basically r slash abortion so the reddit um the subreddit for just abortion on reddit which i think that like when i immediately say that some people might not realize how important that is but as these bans have just spread and gotten worse and the abortion access deserts have widened, it is so important for people to be able to access quality information. And a lot of people go to Reddit. So many people go to Reddit to find out information. So the daily page hits for r slash abortion is just up and up and up and up. And there's a group of volunteers that, you know, like donate their hours, their free time, you know, their energy to give people the answers that they're looking for.

And to like walk them through a process because a lot of people, you know, they want to help. So they post links. So they're like, oh, you you're in a of people, you know, they want to help. So they post links. So they're like, oh, you, you're in a band state and you can't access services. So they just post a link to, I don't know, like aid access, but it's more than, it's not that easy. Like you can't just like give somebody a link to aid access and be like, here's your abortion. No, like you need to ask questions. You need somebody to assist you, follow up questions. If something doesn't work, like, oh my God, the payment's not working. Like you need help. And, or is the online abortion resource squad. They go into our abortion every single day and they make sure that people

get help. And they've been doing this labor for free. And now prison culture is helping them basically get them, get them paid, get them money, get them, get them, make it so that way they can do that. Like, you know, they don't have to, you know, find different options for employment. You know, they don't have to struggle to get by. Like there's money sustaining them so that way they can make sure

that people have their questions answered all day. And that is so important. Like, I just, I never thought, like if you had asked me like seven years ago, if I thought people posting on Reddit would be life-saving, I would have totally like just not taken that seriously. But now I'm like, oh my God, people are flocking to Reddit every day

to try to find out how to get an abortion. And there are people volunteering their time to get them quality answers and make sure that they get the care that they're looking for. And I love that. I love that an abolitionist, like a prison abolitionist, police and prison abolitionist has identified that this is a significant need that people in these different communities that are typically like a little bit siloed are supporting each other's causes. I think that abolition and abortion go hand in hand. And this just cheers me up immensely.

And the fact that like there are resource hubs online that are coming to bat. You know, like, oh, this horrible thing has happened. Roe v. Wade has been overturned. And what are we going to do? And it's like, well, go, go answer people's questions on Reddit. And yeah, so I wanted to share that because I said a lot of sad stuff about how horrifying and traumatic and this all is and how there's so much human suffering. So I just, because of that, I just, I also wanted to, to take time to say like, Hey, there are people making sure that people get care. There are amazing people, um, you know, working to get people paid and get people funding

and make it so that way this work is sustainable because sustainability is its own thing. Yeah, yeah. It is hard to fight against fascism. We're having our basic human rights violated on a daily basis and we are being dehumanized. And that is incredibly difficult to fight constantly on top of having to pay your bills and deal with whatever the heck's going on in your life. So I'm just like, I'm really grateful for Maryam Akaba and everyone who has helped her.

I'm really grateful for partners Makaba and everyone who has helped her. I'm really grateful for partners and Valley Abortion Group, VAJ. And I am really grateful for the online abortion resource squad, ORS, and all of their amazing volunteers. And I hope that if somebody is feeling helpless and feeling like they don't know what to do in these really scary times, they can look to these examples and be like, well, I can provide good information to people. I can share donation opportunities or donate myself and I can uplift this stuff and recognize how valuable even posting online can be sometimes. Because posting online, usually not a good thing. But if you are helping somebody get healthcare and you're utilizing a popular platform to spread that information, you're, you're, you're doing a great job and you deserve all the shout outs. So, yeah. So yeah, those are some really, those, that's what's cheering me up in the year 2023

as I approach like June 24th, the, the anniversary. I'm like oh my god everything's really awful but this this is what's cheering me up so yeah i i don't know well okay i guess i do know why this is spontaneous to leap to my head but the thing that i the thing that i always think about is the the there's a zapatista slogan that goes the potter lives the struggle continues and yeah i mean i don't have anything else it's you know but i mean that's struggle continues look like the the thing about this right like there there's a reason that it's a like they have to spend all of this effort on it because there is actually a struggle and the fact that they have

they spend so much effort and so much resources so much of their time and so much of their power on this like is also proof of their weakness that this is not something that they can do just sort of neutrally right and it's something that can be stopped it can be rolled back and yeah i mean the the fact that it is a struggle like it in and and of itself, like, implies that they're wrong. In and of itself demonstrates that we are also still fighting and we are going to continue fighting and one day we are going to beat these fuckers. Yep. I believe it. I mean, like, yeah, I'm, like, talking openly and honestly about the toll of the human suffering.

But I believe that we can stop this if we keep going. And I hope I see that in my lifetime. And I think it's a sadist's I think where there is oppression, there is resistance. That makes me feel better. That makes me feel better. Speaking of liberals, I just don't understand the take where it's like, oh, these red states are getting what they deserve. Texas is getting what they deserve. Florida is getting what they deserve. It's like, no. They're being oppressed and they are fighting their oppression. And I love people in those states and I love the people fighting. And I just, I don't know how you can look at that and not be filled with like love and awe. Just like in the way that like I'm filled with like love

and awe when I see like how hard people are working to navigate these barriers and to access the healthcare that they need. Like, I'm just like, you are being so brave. You are, you're so strong to do this. And like, not everyone is seeing it. You know, cause like, these are like, you know, private like journeys to get healthcare, but like, I'm seeing it and I'm like, God, these people are so amazing and people are fighting so hard and they are continuing to struggle and they're not giving, I mean, some people are giving up because the state is forcing it on them, but a lot of people aren't giving up. And I'm constantly in awe about that because yeah, it's a lot of witnessing human suffering and people suffer, but also it's witnessing a lot of people be really strong and really fight for what they deserve.

And I'm so glad I get to witness that too, even though I wish I didn't have to see all the suffering. But I'm really grateful to see the struggle too. I love human beings and I'm just we're awesome like we I mean a lot of us aren't but the rest of us are okay

putting up a good fight so I think we can win I think we can win yeah yeah so I know we've talked about a few links

do you have anything else that any other links that you want to talk about to send people to? So yeah, Jesus Christ. Do you have anything else you want to send people to so that they can help support the struggles that are going on? So I think that the ones that I've brought up deserve all of the attention right now. So I'm just going to say them again. So I know previously I mentioned the Texas Equal Access Fund, the T-Fund in Texas is doing a lot right now. And honestly, the other Texas funds are two. That was just the one that I see the most.

Chicago Abortion Fund is doing amazing work right now. Partners Clinic, which is located in Maryland, like shout out to their team. I love them so much. They are like the light in the darkness right now. Valley Abortion Group, VAJ, which will hopefully be opening. I don't know when they're opening, but I'm looking forward to them opening so much in New Mexico. And then the online abortion resource squad, ORS, the saints of R slash abortion. I want to shout them out with this platform that I have right now.

So Google all of them, check them out, click the links. And then of course, you know, again, your local abortion fund, like it just, just don't get tired of hearing donate to your local abortion fund. Just like say it again, just like write it on the back of your eyeballs. It's that, that's what be getting, that's what's getting people healthcare right now. People who can't wait. So yeah, I just like uplifting all those things again. Like I'm sure like there are a lot of

amazing groups doing work. I could probably like take like an hour listing all of them, but like right now those are the ones where i'm like hell yeah this is amazing so yeah uh yeah thank you thank you again so much for for coming and talking with us about this yeah i love talking about um all of the pain and suffering and, you know, catch me outside screaming at the sky and shaking my fist and drinking a lot of mimosas.

Yeah. In the next couple of weeks. This is a rough, this is a rough month. This is a rough month. I'm not happy to be here, but I'm happy about some things just um this is not it's been a hard year it's been a really hard year

but i'm happy to be on this podcast yeah and i i hope i hope all of you in literally whatever way you can like do do something to make this better because we we all owe it to each other and we owe it to everyone who has to live under the system that you know like hasn't built in our name to do something and not to just sort of sit back and let this just let the engine to suffering keep rolling over for more people. And even small things are valuable too. I feel like a lot of, I've known a lot of people who are like, you know, like, Oh, you know, I got a lot going on and I can't, I don't know how to,

I just can't help that much. And it's like, even the little things you do are meaningful. Like even like $10 is like, like somebody who's traveling's lunch, you know, like that's a big deal. So don't undersell the little things that you can do. Even little things are really meaningful right now. Like what you have the capacity for, no one's going to, I'm not going to shake a stick at it. I think any contribution is incredibly valuable, no matter how small. Unless you're rich. Yeah, unless you're rich, in which case. Unless you're rich, then what are you doing? There are some people I'm like, why are they like, oh, oh, oh, while I'm here, while I'm actually speaking of rich, while I'm on a podcast and we can talk about things. While I'm on a podcast and we can talk about things, people who can help, I'm thinking about Taylor Swift right now. Taylor Swift can probably donate so much money to abortion funds, right? Because she's touring right now and she's having all these concerts in various parts of the Chicago Abortion Fund was trying to book hotels for traveling abortion patients. So patients who are traveling from band states to get abortion services in Chicago and they were paying way more for the hotel costs because of the local Taylor Swift concert. And it's like, Taylor Swift, donate to abortion funds. What are you doing? You're driving up hotel prices for patients. Just donate.

Donate to abortion funds, Taylor Swift. So that's what I just wanted to add that. Or any artist who's driving up hotel prices. Come on. People need healthcare. What are you doing? Wonderful system that we live in. And a wonderful opportunity in this generation to make it not be like that i know right um like i resent having to ask but still yeah yeah so i guess that's my

that's my closing message to listen to go out into the world and make the world not fucking like this yeah yeah can we not? Yeah. Hey, we'll be back Monday with more episodes every week from now until the heat death of the universe. It Could Happen Here is a production of Cool Zone Media. For more podcasts from Cool Zone Media, visit our website, coolzonemedia.com, or check us out on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts. You can find sources for It Could Happen Here updated monthly at coolzonemedia.com slash sources. Thanks for listening. You should probably keep your lights on for Nocturnal Tales from the Shadow Broth.

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