Perspectives on care: Determinants of health
Facilitator: Grace
Medics:
Patients:
Time: 15 mins; 1035-1050
Actual time:
Learning Objectives:
Materials: Readers
Critical thinking story: Adriana's Dilemma
Facilitator:
1 Adriana is a leader in the fight for a Domestic Worker's Bill of Rights in Colorado, and a major organizer in a direct action campaign to allow undocumented people to have driver's licenses. Adriana is a citizen, but her big sister is not. Adriana's sister is a domestic who was arrested a few months ago for driving without a license while taking her children to school. She is in an ICE hold and facing deportation. She worked within her own community for many years, but has never been the public face of her community before. She's really excited about the public support, but is having a hard time meeting all of the expectations of union and nonprofit organizers. She wants actions to address needs of the community like childcare and translation. She is getting into a lot of arguments about how organizing is happening and how the voices of directly affected are not being lifted up.
Adriana lost her job six weeks ago and since then has poured herself into organizing every waking hour. When her family started to worry about her, she moved out. Now she is couch surfing the community houses and random punk houses. She keeps losing stuff and feeling like a fuck-up when she faces her community members and organizational allies with work that feels sloppy to her -- but she's doing the best she can. She is arrested at a small action in front of the ICE facility where her sister is being held. She gets a cold in jail, and feels miserable and sick, but can't stop to rest. She blames the police and la migra for her misery so that she can use anger to keep going past the point of exhaustion.
She heads to an action she doesn't want to attend, but she agreed to speak at the rally. On the day of action, She's running a fever and exhausted. She leaves her phone on the bus on her way to the action. She chases it as it drives off, trips on the sidewalk, and twists her ankle. Cursing and late, she hobbles around the corner to the police line to get out her emotions by screaming at the cops. Adriana walks blind into a shitstorm in progress, where she rapidly gets a head injury from a police baton and is arrested. She has a seizure in the police car on the way to the station, and upon arrival is transferred to the hospital, where, as far as the NLG knows, she still is.
"But Why...?" Group Analysis of Adriana's Dilemma
Facilitator asks
Why did Adriana end up in the hospital? (Use "But why...?" game to investigate cascade.)2
Could Adriana's problems have hurt other people? How?
Are other people hurt by the same forces that caused Adriana's problems? How?
If we could rewind the clock, where Adriana's story could we (street medics) support Adriana and prevent the head injury? How?
Can we work at a structural level to prevent problems for her and other people at the same time?