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Brodie  Watkins  died, my Georgia friend, who had exactly one night of freedom at ADAPT in Atlanta.  He ate in restaurant, he drank a beer, and he spent the night in a hotel.  We thought he was going to come out, be a free person.  I’m sad that he never spent a night in his own house (free from institution).

Brodie’s death made me bitter.  It affected my relationship with all the able-bodied people in my life.  It made loving Danna impossible.  Maybe it will not always be.  But, sadly, it’s frankly not now.  I hope (and pray) that it someday will be.  And if there is a God, I believe it will be.  Because I believe she’s my soulmate.

Brodie, my brother, you will be missed always.  I love you.  I’m sorry that you never saw OUT.  I wish we would never lose other one, although I know we will.  Free Our People, forever and always.

The anti-euthanasia disability rights group, Not Dead Yet, has sought a retraction from the independent student newspaper at Princeton University.  The Princetonian contacted Not Dead Yet organizer Stephen Drake regarding the tenth anniversary of Princeton’s hiring of the controversial bio-ethicist Peter Singer.  Mr. Singer’s views on infanticide and animal rights are controversial because he equates, “I think killing a being that wants to continue to live and has designs for the future is very different from killing those that do not.”  According to Mr. Singer’s ideology, as I understand it, the lives of certain livestock animals are worth more than the lives of certain cognitively disabled people.  I went to protest this man’s hiring on September 21st 1999 and was one of 14 people arrested.  The next day I went to the funeral of my friend and fellow advocate Patti Deak.  It was a very emotional weekend.

So why am I writing about this now?  I am writing because The Princetonian told the larger Princeton community that Not Dead Yet’s protest on that day was violent.  This is in direct contradiction to both my recollection as a participant and the New York Times reporting of the event.  As of late last night, Stephen reported (via facebook) that he had talked to the editor in chief of the newspaper and was considering suing the newspaper for libel if they did not print a retraction.  Negotioations are still ongoing today.  I’ll let you know when I know more.

It rained again–which did wonders for my hair. I now have the afro from hell. I don’t think that anyone from CNN cared, however. They just wanted us to go away. CNN is actually attached to the hotel at which we stay, but we walked a good ways away before turning back around again and invading via the food court. I’m really glad that we did an action at CNN because their coverage of the community choice act has been horrible at best, libelous at worst. I never knew that news organizations could tell such blatant untruths. Although, the Community Choice Act has nothing to do with hospitals, CNN reported that the act dealt only with providing access to hospitals for those who are disabled.

What angered me most was that they reported that homecare is more expensive than nursing home care. At the current they pay home care workers in Massachusetts, the cost of someone who needs 24-hour care 7 days a week (very few individuals) is $158 more than what it costs for the same person to be in a nursing home. As most people don’t need 24-hour care, I figure we can simply take the money we save from living in the community and apply to those few individuals who actually need 24-hour service. I would happily give up $158 every year to make sure that no one who doesn’t want to ever has to live in a nursing home again. I managed to push myself to the front of the line using anger alone. CNN put up barricades and were smart enough to place “rent-a-cops” behind the barricades. Eleven wheelchairs could have easily displace their measly barricade.

I generally would not denigrate someone’s profession, but these phony officers were horrible enough to deserve being put down. They actually made one poor little girl cry. She chose to come to ADAPT because she has a 9-year old sister in a nursing home. Her parents make too much money for her sister to be eligible for home care. The young girl told the officers to stop handling the protesters so violently. One of them responded by yelling at her until she cried. In my only non-violent act of vengeance, I took a picture of this. I will be posting it shortly. I hope his mother gets to see what kind of person she raised.

We were pressed up so tightly against the gait that only very slim people were able to sneak through. Luckily, most of the officers were too fat to make it through. I was sitting next to my friend Marshall who worked as a PCA before he became disabled. A hefty officer tried to climb over Marshall to get to a worker at the CNN building, but his pudgy stomach got caught on Marshall’s scooter. This provided some comic relief for both Marshall and me.

After CNN decided that we were news-worthy (gee, I wonder why?), we marched back to the federal building to support the protesters who were meeting with the state of Georgisa to discuss long-term care. We sang and chanted. It was a very restful final action. As much as I’m going to enjoy the party tonight I am so sad at the thought of leaving everybody, I almost can’t stand it. Why does no one in Western Massachusetts want to help me change the world? We are supposed to be very politcally conscious and active in this state. I think I just need to move.

Author’s note:

Sorry I couldn’t post this last night guys. I tried, but the site was down for some reason. I guess you’ll have to forgive me or hold a virtual grudge forever. It makes  no difference to me.

I just don’t know what a gimp girl has to do to get arrested in Atlanta, GA. First, we went to HHS and about 100 people got inside while the rest stayed outside. Luckily, the weather was nice. The spirit of those members of ADAPT who have passed on must won the argument with the weather gods. HHS gave in after 3 hours—record time for them. And this old-hand ADAPTer knew that we were going to hit another site because we were still organized into our color groups. Right down the street from our hotel was a HUD branch. We arrived at about 1:30 and were on our way with yet another victory by 4:30.

Why is it that government agencies can never do what they’re supposed to do until you show up in their lobby with 400 other people who are willing risk a night in jail for someone else’s freedom.

Then suddenly, the impossible takes 4 hours. If these people would just do their jobs as they’re legally required to do them, we would never have a reason to invade their office and inconvenience. We would just get together and party. Wishful thinking…..

The second day of action dawned bright and early.  I was free from the emotional conflict that dominated my reporting yesterday.  I was newly resolved to kick butt and take names.  I was sure that arrest number 24 was a pretty sure bet, considering my resolve.  I was doing this for Brodie (who I wrote about yesterday), I was doing this for my favorite aunt who died in nursing home when I was six because we didn’t have community services back then.  I visited her there once, knew she shouldn’t be there, but didn’t have any other place for her to go.  I wish my 33 year old self could visit my traumatized first grade self.  Tell her about all the activism she does now.   Tell her that part of the reason she does that is to  make sure no one else has an Aunt Mary.  Tell her that she never forgets the wrinkled, ancient woman.
If you would’ve asked me how I 3 wheelchair users (2 of whom need PCA care) and three able-bodied people (one of whom is an infant) got ready in one hour while sharing one bathroom and one PCA,  I’d have called that task impossible until today.  The crew that shares my room pulled it off and was in time for line up.  Rain trumbled vats from the sky.  It reached past the casters on chairs.  It blew sideways.  Later I was to discover that a flood wondering was in effect until t.onight

For the first that I can remember and I’ve been to a ton of actions since Atlanta ‘96, ADAPT leadership changed it’s mind and publicly went with a Plan B.  In this new plan ADAPT would march less, be indoors more.  No public transit required, feet and wheels only.

Even that it was Columbus Day, I must admit I was just a bit unsure of my leadership team.  Who would be in their office and why would they be anybody we wanted to talk with?  But, as any good soldier will tell you, those in leadership are in leadership for a reason.  The Governor had a nini-office in a museum downtown.

The police were bound and determined not to arrest us.  I was blockading a door in the basement.  They asked everyone to leave in very polite and Southern ways.  Some agreed.  Some refused.  I refused.  I even made them drag my pudgy, brown butt, actually the policeman drove Pumpkin (name of chair, which is holding up well) himself.  I folded my hands neatly in front of me.  He sais his wife had MS.  He drove very weavy, making big swoops.  Then he just drove me outside and left me in the downpour with not another word.

I was unsure if I’d been arrested or not.  Finally, I went around the building and joined a group holding a door.  I was irritated at simply being evicted from a buillding and left in rain, in a parking lot like a piece of refuse.   As my mom sometimes says, “Oh no, they didn’t?”  That settled things.  I was full on, ready to go Madea on somebody.  I felt disrespected, and as anyone who knows me knows a disrespected Martina is not a happy Martina.  If I’m not happy I’m going to dedicate my life to making yours miserable.

If there was going to be a ruckus this afternoon, I planned to be mid-ruckus.  I set at that door for two hours, awaiting word.  We got a meeting with the Governor’s chief of staff.  The only one he’s ever scheduled with any disanility rights group since he’s been in office.  ADAPT is first to the  finish on a holiday.  Go us.

Wet and cold, activist returned to the OmniHotel seeking, hot baths, new clothes, and dinner befountilre re-convening at six thirty for our night nightly big meeting.  It was worth it, but my  body and mind are glad that we don’y have to color up 9AM tomorrow.  As I type the last sentance of this blog it’s 10:37.  I shudder to realize that I have another piece to finish (or least one I should) before ending my really long day.  I hope to hit the bed before midnight  Moe tomorrow,.

Sunday was pretty emotional for me.  My small self (the nineteen-year-old ADAPT  newbie who came to her first national action in this city im 1996)  was  almost a separate presence from my 33-year-old vetran ADAPTer self.  The smaller me kept asking the older me. “Why is it taking so long?”  “Why haven’t you triumphed yet?”  “And most importantly, “When did waiting for freedom become an acceptable tool in this war for justice?”

My older self told the young Martina.  “Come down, hothead.  Lasting change takes time.  We couldn’t let everyone out today, even if we were allowed to.  They’d have nowhere to live.  You can’t have PCA services in a cardboard box.”

My smaller self was okay with the logic of this auguement.  It made sense, was very mature and reasoned.  Perhaps it was okay to settle a little bit, sometimes, as long you kept your eyes on the prize.

My adult self and my small self had agreed to a truce.  They were on the same page as  far as the overall issue, after all.  They just had different ways to get there.

The truce held for about 90 minutes.  Until I learned about a 57 year old women who had lived in an insitution for 43 years.  Had never celebrated a single adult birthday outside institutional walls, until today when she joined us at the rally.  We sang for her.  She beamed. 

The second blow to my internal peace accord was Brodie, a perfectly nice somewhat oldish new ADAPTer.  I wondered why he pushed a manual chair very slowly instead ofgoing for a nice, self powered electric one like I drive.

Later, I discovered that he lived in an institution.  A place where he needed to ask permission to go outside.  A place, that I assume, can’t be bothered to go through the paperwork to buy him a state funded power chair.  Independently mobile PWD’s, that’s just asking for trouble or so the institution thinks.  A place where we had to send him back to tonight after his first ever night in a hotel and first beer in God knows how long.  Not that I’m big drinker, but you get my point.

The final blow to my emotional cease fire occured when we marched by a nursing home lined in barbwire, three strands one on top the other.  The sound of Anita, my compatriot in disobeying laws that interfere with the pursuit of justice, singing “We shall all be free someday” caused my younger self to reassert her natural dominance in matters like these.

To wait an extra year, month, week, day, hour, minute second to fix an injustice because the powers that be are not ready to the ramifications of that fix makes me a part of the problem.  Not a part of the solution, whatever I try to tell myself.

I’m ready now.  Ready to combat this institutional evil with every fiber of my being, whatever the consequences.  I tell my boss . “fire me for being here.”  It is irrelevant.    I tell my mom, “never give me another dime.”  I will survive and barrow, beg, steal I will still be here (wherever here happens to be) every six months, doing what is right merely because it is right, not because it adds money to my wallet (as it does now).  Tell the law, bring your handcuffs, bring your billy clubs, bring your water hoses and your dogs as you did in the sixties to Georgia… too near the land under both tire and foot for comfort right now.  Bring your jail cells.  Bring even your most accurate marksman.  I don’t want to end up a martyr, but if that’s what’s to be, that’s what to be.  I am ready.  Bring it on! 

Tomorrow night I’ll be blogging from Atlanta.   I’m part of the ADAPT blogswarm, a collection of bloggers who will be at the action.  I’m so excited for Atlanta; arrest number 24 is coming up (probably, we’ll see).  The weird thing is that I don’t even know what we are doing.  I never do.  That’s how ADAPT works.  It’s so no one person knows too much and the army doesn’t stop if the police grab one person.

I’ll be reporting from the action everyday.  Watch this blog! Read the other Swamers, too.  We could use the support!

According to The Morning Call, a local Philadelphia website dated September 26^th,, Danieal Kelly (the 14 year old with cerebral palsy who was starved to death, who I have blogged about regularly has a total of eight social workers who are being tried for some degree responsibility in her death. That mean eight separate, adult people who were suppose to check on this teen, who had no ability (or limited ability) to act to retrieve help for herself.

Why is no one responsible for child’s death? Why is only one worker and her mother, in whose care the child actually was when she died, sentenced to even one day in jail? The other workers were all sentenced to community service and probation. In same cases, they were even sentenced to just community service. As a person who has organized community service volunteers from to time, I would have a hard time assigning any of these people a job not under the direct supervision of someone I trusted. They certainly wouldn’t work with kids on my watch.

I am furious- as a disabled person, a daughter, a community organizer, a future (I hope) mom. What is the world coming to when you can just fail in your job and cause a child to die? As I’ve said before, I don’t think this would happen if Danieal were an able-bodied teenager.

Another one of Danieal Kelly’s social workers pleaded guilty. Patricia Burch will be behind bars for several years in accordance with a plea agreement. I don’t understand how this child has five social workers and no of them could do their jobs correctly in order to prevent her from starving to death. Furthermore, I don’t understand how her mother got away with being given third degree murder. I looked it up today. Accordint to yahoo answers “Third Degree Murder: Any other murder. (No intent to kill, in other countries called “Manslaughter.”)”

How is starving a chid thrid degree murder unless you are cognitively impaired and do not understand that humans subsist on food? Not to cast aspersions on cognitively impaired individuals. My friends Rubin and Teddy are both cognitively impaired and I can pretty assure you with a 99.9% degree of certainty that if Danieal were either one of their children this would not have happened to her.

I suspect that this sentence had to do with the fact that Daneal was disabled and we undervalue the disabled in our society. You never hear of any parent getting off for killing an able-bodied child. If the child happens to be disabled we call it mercy killing and let them off with a year in jail at most. Sometimes they don’t even go to jail.

Dear readers,

My friend Amber Smock, who works at access living in Chicago and is one of the fiercest feminists I’ve ever met, sent me this request for help today.  The ladies FRIDA, a Chicago based feminist and disability organization, have been working for years to get the anti-sterilization law passed in Illinois.  I don’t know how many of you know but sterilization of women with all kinds of disabilities has been all too common throughout our countries history.  According to Amber, he needs to sign the bill by August 11th for it to count in this legislative session.

Below is my own letter to the Governor which I’m mailing tomorrow.  I urge you to write one of your own.

Governor Pat Quinn
Office of the Governor
James R. Thompson Center
100 W. Randolph, 16-100
Chicago, IL 60601

You can CALL him at:
Phone: 312-814-2121

Dear Governor Quinn,

As a female disability rights activist, I urge you especially to pass HB 2290 by August 11^th. For too long, people with disabilities and especially women have been forced to undergo sterilization surgeries against their will. Since the days of the Buck vs. Bell decision women have often been the target of forced birth control. Even though studies show that people with various impairments can be capable parents if provided with the appropriate supports, many in our society would rather simply eliminate what they view as a negative outcome (i.e. disabled people procreating).

It’s 2009 and Governor we’ve come a long way. I know many women and men with disabilities from your own state and other states who are able to handle the pressures of being a parent despite often significant disabilities. The issue is not whether people with disabilities can have children or whether we should, the issue is getting support to parent if we need it and not letting others who may be well intentioned make our decisions for us.

HB 2290 will give women, and in some cases men, the ability to say no to whatever powers might be in their life who would have them sterilized if that’s not what they want. I urge you to sign this bill before August 11^th. Thank you very much.

Sincerely,

Martina Robinson