Post-Election Message: November 2024
We know that many of you are hurting after the election, and we at Senior and Disability Action are heartbroken as well. We’re grieving. We’re also strategizing. We’re figuring out how we can fight, locally and nationally, for the rights and resources for all disabled people and seniors. For immigrants and trans people. For people who need to stay safe from COVID with vaccines and masking. For people seeking abortions. For those that are unhoused and housing insecure. For people who rely on social programs like SSI, SSDI, Medicare, MediCal, SNAP, in-home support and services and many others. For you.
Thank you to everyone who joined yesterday's General Meeting. It was wonderful to spend time with you all, and imagine how we fight for our future.
We’ve been here before. In 2017-2020, our members and staff were creative in how we participated in action. We had teach-ins, and participated in coalition rallies and marches. Our members went to hearings, we had members speaking at national actions to protect Medicare. At one march, we spray painted umbrellas with messages to save Medicaid and the ACA.
We have supported immigrant organizations, and many of you, our members, were very involved in demonstrations against ICE. At our General Meetings, we have had speakers come to present about their experiences of Islamophobia. We have held political education sessions about groups that have experienced migration discrimination, like Chinese people not being allowed to bring their families or marry a US citizen, and during WWII, Japanese people were placed in concentration camps.
Together, as members and staff of SDA, we have a decades long history of fighting for the rights and survival of disabled people and seniors and in this changing terrain we’ll continue to organize our community and elevate our demands.
It’s going to take so many people to change this tide, to build a strong community to defend against the attacks from MAGA and we’d love for you to join us. We’d love for you to invite your friends and comrades to join us.
We’re holding two welcome meetings for people new to SDA on Tuesday 11/19 10am-12pm at our office, 222 8th Street, SF, CA 94103, and Thursday 12/5, 6-8pm on Zoom. RSVP here: bit.ly/SDA-orientation
There is nothing that is going to be easy about the coming years, but when we build a stronger senior and disabled community, we will come together to win, and we will not be alone.
Please Join Us.
Books we have been reading:
The Fire Next Time by Jesmyn Ward
Freedom is a Constant Struggle by Angela Davis
Hope in the Dark by Rebecca Solnit
We Refuse by Kellie Carter Jackson
Let this Radicalize You by Kelly Hayes & Mariame Kaba
A poem that has kept us going:
“Breathe”, by Lynn Ungar
Breathe, said the wind
How can I breathe at a time like this,
when the air is full of the smoke
of burning tires, burning lives?
Just breathe, the wind insisted.
Easy for you to say, if the weight of
injustice is not wrapped around your throat,
cutting off all air.
I need you to breathe.
I need you to breathe.
Don’t tell me to be calm
when there are so many reasons
to be angry, so much cause for despair!
I didn’t say to be calm, said the wind,
I said to breathe.
We’re going to need a lot of air
to make this hurricane together.
https://lynnungar.com/poems/breathe/