All the media.

Hello, and welcome to the podcast.

It's me James today and I'm very lucky to be joined by Theo Henderson, who is host of the extent wee the Unhoused podcast.

How are you doing today here?

Thank you?

You know, hanging in there in this turbulent time, but doing okay.

How are you today?

Yeah?

Good?

Also also hanging in there a lot of like being out late in the streets and then going up early to podcasts.

But you know, it's okay, it's good.

I I'm really happy to have you here today because I want to talk about like the intersection of protesting, being unhused, and being undocumented.

These are all things that like sometimes people can look at as unique issues, right they go siloed off from one another, and they're very much not and they're very much connected by a few axes, one of which is policing and stay violence.

To start off with, maybe you could explain, like, in terms of the Los Angeles protests we've seen the last the impact on unhoused people, and specifically like because of where they are, right the heightened depacts on unhoused people.

That's okay.

The reality of the situation is this is that when there are protests, not just the conversation that's current now, unhouse people inadvertently get the runoff of the aggression, the tear gas, the uncertainty of being able to find a safe space to sleep, because when we do, as protesters that are housed protests, we encompass the entire area that usually is these staple or the landmarks of places where we should protest.

For example, downtown LA where I currently live, is where the city Hall is, It's where major police stations are, It's where we have major landmarks like Hall of Justice and those places, and many unhoused people congregate and live near those places.

And in the none will say the best of times, but in the most neutral of times, they have to be on a tiptoe stands from being swept because they have to deal with the sweeps in addition to the unrest that's going on now.

What I have found is that because I live near an sro, the sleeping has become a difficulty because the constant helicopters that are swooping through all night, and the constant ambulances or the sirens that going on, and the distance and in front of you, near where you reside, most recently the projectile shooting of rubber bullets or maybe real bullets or whatever, or the chance and things of that that all coomfiity of noise creates an unstable environment where in the best of times, where people you requires eight hours sleep and house people may get free to maybe four hours if at but giving that what's going on in their peak times where they're trying to sleep, they did not.

A lot of them during the next day looked very sleep worn.

They looked very exhausted, and it tells because they don't have a place where they can just you know, leave.

They don't they can't just jump to in an hotel.

It's just it's not reality.

Yeah, I definitely noticed that, like the noise obviously, like I work with audios, so I'm thinking about noise and like, like, for instance, I was going around with my podcast recorder here right and like constantly having to adjust the levels down because the background noise was so like you said, they're always helicopters, there's people chanting, the cops are occasionally just driving a high speed with siren on.

It was very noise, and I was thinking about the people who are living there and how hard it must be to get some rest.

And how like, I was speaking to one guy who was living down there, probably about noon, just walking from Union Station to downtown, and he was saying, how like, he lived with anxiety, so he didn't want to be present in the protest, but he was supportive of his unhoused community members.

But I can imagine, you know, the anxiety doesn't get any better for him if he's not sleeping.

Right, they can compounds, yes, and not mentioned the the frailties of life.

Maybe having disabilities or maybe have helped other health chologists that preclude being able to have a neutral, a stationary place, And you just can't get up and go at a moment's notice.

You have to require planning or you know, or then you can get swept up into the you know, the matrix of the protesters and get swept along with how they're treating them.

So it's not an easy place to navigate, and it's not a place as unhoused people.

That's just one more obstacle to a hurdle to overcome and try to just stay above the frame.

Yeah, yeah, And you can't obviously just leave your stuff and you risk losing.

All of it absolutely so.

One thing that like I have observed extensively is that, like in the undocumented community, a lot of people end up on house, right, Is that something you've noticed, like in your time, like out on the streets and like in sro housing.

Are there a lot of undocumented people this common?

Yes, there is a percentage of undocumented people.

Statistics vary because of the volatility of trying to record someone that's undocumented, but there are many of them are employed in stay laborers or low in wage workers that are working in mom and pop restaurants or creative kind of entrepreneur type of pursuits in order to survive.

One of the things that has been becoming much more in the four recently, which why I say the intersections are so important to understand and the philosophy and the ideology of it, is that many people that are against a lot of the undocumentation, violence and things of that nature are not necessarily as vocal as about the hostility that on house people go through, or you don't see them on the frontline protesting as deeply as what's going on today, because when you see swepes, you don't see many of the protesters out there as fighting cops and things is speaking out against it.

You don't see them making chance or really making the situation much more intense and changing.

What you do see is polite conversation or politicians curving the conversation to shape it in the way that the unhoused person is the bad guy.

They're affecting business, they are going to the bathroom all over the place.

They are not productive citizens and should be treated usly as violently as possibly they can.

Conversely, one, we don't understand that when we have the undocumented community that's been targeted, like in San Diego most recently here and near Whittier, targeting undocumented unhoused people going to sweeps now and looking for undocumented people, how that plays a part two and we need the same intensity, we need the same attention and understanding.

Housing is one of the conversations that we need to have.

Compassionate, dignified housing is the conversation we need to have.

And these punitative measures doesn't work with undocumented people that are housed or maybe in a position or financial position a little bit more stabler Evan on house community undocumented people, but the end result is still the same violence.

Right, Yeah, definitely, And like, as you said, there's been there have been several instances now that people who are unhoused or we actually don't know.

I suppose what we know is that immigration authorities have attempted to raid shelters for unhoused people, right Exactly.

I think people sometimes don't join the dots on these things, right because they don't have either they don't have lived experience or they just haven't thought about it deeply.

But like, let's break down how damaging that is, right, Like, if people who are undocumented are afraid to go to shelters, then that means that they're not going to be able to access the resources that are there, right, Like, do you see that happening?

Do you see like when they raid shelters people thinking I won't go there, or I'm sure you see on house people avoiding other things if they think that's going to mean an interaction with law enforcement.

Right, But also too, we must break this down even further.

Most on house people want help and services.

That's even undocumented people.

And the thing with is they're not taking anything from the people that pay taxes.

But the product the conversation has been shaped in such a deliterious and negative fashion that it makes people much more hesitant to seek out those services.

So add on to Trump's harmful rhetoric and seeing ice roll up.

Even if let's say, for example, they just roll up on there and they're denied entry, it still sends the message that they are hunting you down.

And most reasonable people that have those situations is all it takes is someone that agrees with the negative rhetoric that Trump espouses and that works in the shelter to step aside and let them come and start sweeping and documented people and on house people need to have the reinsurance and the confidence that they will hold the line and be able to have safeguards in place so they can be safely serviced and helped as well.

And I know the conversation is starting to shift in other places, like in the mutual aid groups, because a lot of times mutual aid groups and mutual aid services are allowing all types of all walks of life for people, and we are trying to create a safer place where they can get the services and they don't have to worry about it.

But it's becoming much more difficult, and so we are creating safeguards and stop gaps in place to make it very difficult or Ice to do these illegal or these harmful type of sweeps.

Yeah, I think that's really good because it is a concern, right even if you're just if you're a mutual aid group like our friends at Bread Block, right, like who feed people in San Diego.

But if you put out there that you're going to be feeding people, and then ICE know that people are going to gather to receive food, that's a new thing you have to worry about, right, Like it's a new.

There is another new concern.

There are right wing groups that are in trying to infiltrate mutual A groups and I do need to say this, so it's very important.

They're infiltrating mutual aid groups in efforts to aid ICE.

And so what they're trying to do is they befriend mutual eight groups.

And there is a video I saw of this guy stating that he had worked for immigrants day labors.

So he gets them, loads them all into the truck and he states he promises them a job.

And this guy's recording them and their reactions, and you know, they seem to be in a tranquil very convivial kind of atmosphere, and he drives up in front of the ICE Administration building and then yells out for ICE to come get them, and they scatter.

So the second thing that also that's going on is too that these organizations, these right maggot groups are utilizing and trying to get personal information from mutual aid groups and to dock them to other mutual A groups and to try to target or to harass people that are reaching out trying to help the unhoused community or immigrant community or whatever community did you serve as that are dealing with undocumented immigrants.

They're doing at as well.

Yeah, yeah, and that harms everyone, right, even documented folks who run house to are citizens as we lose those services.

Yeah, let's take a little break and we're going to come back and talk more about this.

Okay, all right, we are back.

One of the things we've spoken about is like how undocumented folks often end up on the street, right, something I've seen a lot here in San Diego, at least, it is undocumented families ending up on the street, right, And that can mean that their kids don't get access to education.

It makes it so much harder for them to access services are they and anyone else can access Maybe you could explain to people, because again I don't think that this is something that people consider.

But we spoke about it, right when we spoke about sweeps.

Democratic governors all around the country and mayors and other legislators and executive office people have claimed to be like in solidarity with migrants, right, they said they stand with their undocumented community.

But at the same time, they have spent the last decade demonizing the unhoused community and passing laws in a state of the case of California, right, that make it easy to consign someone to like a mental healthhold, just for being on housed, just for not being able to make rent.

Can you explain how that intersection has created a tool for oppression which is now being wielded against undocumented people.

And as you said to me before we recorded, like when we build this oppressive apparatus, it can always be wielded against people who we don't think it should be wielded against.

Right, Well, that's the very deep question is a question, and I'm going to try to break apart of it like a piece of bread in order hopefully to get the whole meals digested.

So let's start off with understanding how in order for us to be able to criminalize a human being, we must demonize them.

And in order for us to demonize them, we must create a narrative that is easily digestible but quick to point out when we're confronted with our humanity or our empathy or lack thereof.

So when the conversation turns to the un housed community, for years, there's always has been on house people like being out there, they're drug addicted, they're mentally ill, they're criminals, they don't want help, or they don't want services, and the peelback that layer of onion to explain the nuances like the services are not equally provided, the services are not tailored to what the people need, and that conversation gets lost in the quagmire.

Now bringing up into the four is like we have the conversation of immigration, and there has been the right wing steady diet of misinformation or disinformation about a migrant or a documented people getting benefits, living the life high on the hall, living luxuriously on a snap or food stamps and other type of benefits, and hardworking people can't get it, and that is just simply not true.

But it's been fostered to such a degree that in this administration that we have down with Trump, he's creating these narratives of MS.

Thirteen is let loose across the country.

They are targeting hardworking people, killing them off, and gang violence is that are all time high, which is not true.

Statistically, we are at the most downward slope that we've had in over twenty to thirty years.

But the fact of it, it's sears in people's minds.

Who doesn't take the necessary steps to break down the stereotypes and understand how that is not true and it's harming, then we have un choose this recipe of disinformation, the idea that some people believe that they are worthy and their immigrants background, and some are unworthy.

Like when I say this statement, and I always keep saying this, and I've been saying this for a few years because it's an uncomfortable conversation, is some people are invested in their own impression.

And when I say this, this is what I mean.

Some people, like for example, in the unhoused community that I had been unhoused for over eight years, I would hear them say these kind of statements, and I in the beginning became uneasy.

Then I was like, you know what, I have to challenge this because this person believes that they are well and good and they should be helped, and these other people should not be helped because they are unworthy on house and that sends off the dog whistle, and that sends off these justification for people that don't like on house people anyway to utilize that in the forefront of their explanation and reasoning in order to continue to create unitative resources and resolutions.

Say, for example, the San Jose mayor Laurie who is now working to criminal onhoused people and says that if you turn down services three times, you go to jail, you are susceptible to be arrested Jesus, or you could create like in Tennessee now it is a six year felony to be unhoused and lodging out in public spaces.

It's so easy to do that people who are housed do not understand it.

Like in Los Angeles, like forty one eighteen is the new Jim Crow.

It is against the law to sit sleepers lie.

We don't talk about enough about Grant's past which has given police much more leeway, and other cities has been much more in basically a frenzy on trying to create the most unitative legislation that they possibly can against unhoused people.

So these are the end results of this.

So when we start to say it, and I always say this in my show, if you can't help a person, don't harm them.

I will add further.

With doctor King says, there's nothing much more dangerous than sincere ignorance or will for stupidity.

Yeah, I think that's a really it's a really good thing way to put it, because like there is so much I mean, I don't know if it comes out of like you say, then source stupidity, but like so many of these things actually end up at the same spot, right, like increased numbers of people detained, more money for private prisons, more money for police, right exactly, Like it shouldn't matter to us where someone's sleeping, right, we don't want that person to go to jail.

They haven't done anything wrong.

And I think it's something that like now it's maybe a good time for people to talk about that, right.

And incidentally that's not helping the situation anyway, because once they got jail.

Now they have a criminal record, and we know how we are against criminals and trying to find jobs and housing, find housing, So where are they going to go?

So they're going back into the state of houselessness and the state of I would say non existence, but the state of punitative consequences just for being trying to exist.

Yeah, and then if you know they were misdemeanor, they'll get another misdemeanor just for living on the street again, and then they'll stack misdemeanors and end up with lengthy sentence.

But in the case of Tennessee, that's a felony.

It's not a misdemeanor.

It's a six year piece prison sentence.

So let's say, for example, that they find you sleeping out on the streets and they take you to jail.

Now that you have a six year felony.

Now, as you know, people that have felonies are it's much more difficult to find jobs, to vote, and things like that.

To take it to even further, like trying to find housing, they're filling out housing applications and the acts.

If you've been charged with a felony, they have to put that there.

Trying to find housing.

You know, what's the odds that they're going to get housing charge being on house?

So we need to look at these things and says, why is it that our major knee jerk reaction is always going to penalize poor people?

Because this is what this boils down to.

They have they have not the idea in order to keep poor people set upon other poor people is believe that they're deserving better treatment than other poor people that look like for them, and the okay with how they're being treated, in the faith into the delusion that they won't be affected by it.

Yeah, Yeah, I think it's a good point that like this deserving the good migrant bag, myrant, deserving poor and deserving poor, like, all that does is it justifies violence against whoever it is stigmatizing, and like we should just I guess say pretty like in case people aren't aware, I guess like when we look at Robert Paxton's book The Anatomia of Fascism, Paxton talks about the motivating passions of fascism, and one of them is this idea that there is a scapegroat group which is to blame for decline and like, yes, we can see the Trump administration doing that with migrants.

We can see democratic mayors blaming unhoused people for the decline of their cities, right, for their failure to manage budgets, for their inability to do anything other than send a fire hose of money to the cops.

Right, it's completely endemic.

I know in San Diego told Gloria loves to demonize onnhouse people, right, and he has done for years.

And you know we're now in a state where we're closing down our libraries for more time, make it even harder for people to access services.

A place where people can access the internet.

If you want to make that housing application, now you can't go to the library one more day we can do it.

It's like these two things are like different heads of the same hydra.

I guess let me point out to like, for example, when I was on the streets as well.

The library is a lifeline for many reasons.

And we have a heat wave, many on house people go to the library to stay cool.

When we have a store storm, a rainstorm, many onhouse people goes there.

Many on house people unfortunately use it as a burd bad place because they don't want to smell bad.

Despite society opinion, they'll offer enough free showers or places where and house people can safely shower, get their things laundered in a way.

So they have to create solutions in order to survive and sustain themselves in their lives.

So the library is more than just supplying the books and reading and in housing application, it is a lifeline in many respects where on house people can be able to tether on to a semblance of normalcy, if you will.

Yeah, totally.

It's another thing that I noticed, actually is I was walking around downtown LA.

It's something I noticed here in San Diego there are not accessible bathrooms for people exactly, right, and maybe other people, Like if you've been out in the streets in LA or wherever you live, you might have noticed this too, Right, Like, I was very lucky a resident of downtown let me into their house so they could use a bathroom.

But like, this is a city with millions of people, with billions of dollars in budget.

Right, the cops had five helicopters.

I refuse to believe that it's not possible for them to create a place for people to use the bathroom safely.

And therein lies a conundrum is that people with the demanding restrooms and the city says that they can't financially sustain them, or they utilize every reason in the world to discourage a believe it's going to discourage a bottle functions from unhoused people, which is ridiculous because we're still going to have to go to the restroom no matter we're living in the street or earn a home.

That's one universal equity that's never going to change.

And the thing most importantly of it is is that I have a story that I tell about my own experience with it.

During the pandemic, I had broken my leg and I had it was on a walker and everything shut down.

There were no public porter parties, there were no bathrooms, and the only way I could get to a bathroom that at the time that was open was Starbucks.

So and Starbucks was like almost a half a mile away, so I had to hobble there and they wouldn't let me in because they were because I was on house and they felt that I was going to take a bath into the bathroom and I just needed to use the restroom.

And this hurdle is another hurdle that many unhouse people have to go through, which is why they use libraries, which is why they use public facilities.

But let's say, for example, Union Station, they do liberately goal and shut off.

They have like five stalls, and then they shut off the other bathroom and lock that up, and they'll lock the other bathroom down the other part of the Union station.

Union Station is a busy place.

Why it makes no sense that this constant, less, punitative, this insided or illogical viewpoint that's being ruled over to the city and it runs over, it spills over in every way possible.

That makes it very clear to be poor is the most horrible thing in the world.

Yeah, everybody, take another break here and then we're going to come back and finish up.

Okay, way are back, so what I want to finish up with.

And I think it's always a good thing when folks are out in the street, right, Like I guess not always, but I don't really in support people being out in the street.

There are people who are out in the street and they're realizing that things are worse than they thought.

Right.

There are a lot of people who have gone out in the street this week thinking that they had a First Amendment right to protest and being tear gased or shot with rubber bullets.

And maybe they haven't been in areas where they see unhoused people right, or they've been managed to sort of remain ignoring the scale of the problem, and now they're realizing how bad things are and they want to help.

How do they do that in a way that it's respectful and in a way that doesn't harm someone while trying to help them?

Do you think, like, where should they start that process?

Not to self andngrandize myself, but I have a podcast that I've created when I lived on the street, which is called Weedy and House And in that conversation from there's a bevy of episodes that talk about these very same issues.

One the understanding of empathy.

The second thing is to be educated on the realities and the differences of unhoused community members, the nuances, how to approach unhouse people, how to sustain a relationship with unhoused people, and how to create a mutual aid or a group of people that come in and check in on unhoused people in order for them to help shepherd them along the realities of houselessness.

Many people have many skills in many groups.

That's when I find with Mutual Aid and they're able to tap into those skills in order to get some unhoused people some services, some help, some notice, some pressure to get places or get them placed or in the hospital or whatever it is they need.

The first step is to, you know, listen in on some of the episodes, hear their stories and understand their stories.

I always asks on house people, what is the best way for us to help you?

Because what would help me being on house is very different than what a mother that's up to that's fleeing domestic abuse.

There's a lot of things that I cannot foresee that she has to foresee for the safety and life and her life and her children's life.

And so she would have different other solutions that would not fit my solution or my way of helping me.

And we must understand houselessness is not monolith.

It is very layered many reasons why people are on the streets, from political to being burned out on the system, and to just trying to survive day to day.

Yeah, I think it's a really good answer toly like, it's not something you can just as you say, it's not a monolith.

It's not something that where everyone is the same, certainly, like my experience with un house neighbors that I have and then undocumented on house folks.

You know, everyone has different concerns, right, Everyone has different needs, even little things like I remember trying to help a family and you know they had come to the US from Venezuela and they had different food preferences, just just shit like that.

If you can make someone more comfortable just by asking it so much, it's so much easier to do.

I wonder, like you've been downtown the last few nights, Like it's rough, right, it's traumatizing, Like do you see people expressing solidarity with unhoused people?

Like do you see because there is a feeling of it can be very ice relating that there can also be like at times I've said this before a lot, but like I feel very taken care of because I see strangers feeding each other.

I see strangers washing each other's eyes out.

I see people just taking care of each other, if each other in small ways, bringing water, bringing food.

Do you feel like the unhoused community is being shown that same care and affection like during these protests, I have not.

Seen it in this instance.

I noticed that we were in the George Floyd protest, there was more of an awakening about the unhoused communities because they kept inhabiting and they started to do that.

Definitely, I will like to believe that that has continued to spill over.

I noticed sometimes when the protests of what's going on in Palestine, many Palestine or protesters will walk past the Mutual Aid stations.

Some would stop and say something, or some would just keep right on going.

Again.

I think it's one of the things one of the narrative's successes of the right wing narratives is to late and house people, make sure that's their issue is completely different.

And to that way, you can be able to continue to demonize and criminalize and house people with the respect the people that are waving the gods are flag or waving flags of Mexico.

They can feel safe in the delusion that they're safe.

And these people are then nereword Wells and we are not.

We are we are legitimately fighting for freedom and house people are just fighting just to get their next hit, you know.

So yeah, and I think until we realize all our struggles are connected, like we we wait, you know, this is very clearly something that neoliberalism has done right, Like it's pursued identity politics in a way that doesn't lift people up so much as it splits them apart, and it stops us seeing all our struggles are connected.

See is there anything else you wanted to share with people before we before we wrap up today.

I think we covered the long and short of it.

You know, it's yeah, we can.

This is just a primer on some of the insights.

Yes, it's a very fluid situation.

There's going to be new insights and new observations as this protest unravels and we will get to see what this administration what next harm that they're going to do to vulnerable people.

Yeah.

Yeah.

If people want to follow your podcast or follow you elsewhere, where can they find you?

They can find me on iHeartMedia, on they can find me on where they find that podcast.

I'm on iHeart Apples, Spotify, Amazon, anywhere you find your podcast.

I'm there.

Great.

Thank you so much for your time, south Mentha, that was a great conversation.

Thank you, and hopefully we'll meet again in a light of understanding.

Jeez, thank you.

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