^{Image: Juneteenth banner 2024 – still a work in progress, much like the promised liberation it symbolizes. Celebrating and continuing the fight for Black liberation and collective liberation. June 2024}

Kind morning /Բարի լույս* to you, dear neighbors, artists, collaborators, community partners, co-conspirators, supporters of arts in Skid Row and of doodles without borders,
*the morning greeting in Armenian translates as “kind morning” (բարի լույս [baree looys])
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Post highlights: (1) Events/Activities in and near Skid Row, (2) Thoughts Aloud – Local to Global, (3) Quote of the Month.

HIGHLIGHTS in and near SKID ROW, July 2024
Some neighborhood events, celebrations, and parties to join
Tue, July 2, 930am: Shut Down City Hall – rally against city plan to fund a private z¡0nist militia @ Main St entrance to LA City Hall

Thursday, July 4th, 3pm: The People’s Fourth at 200 N Grand

Friday, July 5, 7pm, Movie Night “DawnLand” at LA poverty department‘s Skid Row Museum (250 S Broadway)

Wed, July 10, 6p – MOVIE in the PARK @ San Julian Park (movie starts at dusk)

Fri, July 12, 5-7pm: Arts Jam Open Mic @ Studio 526 (526 San Pedro)

Tues, July 16, 10:30a-12pm: Creative Writing @ Skid Row Museum

Friday, July 19, 12-3pm – Marketplace at LACAN (838 E 6th St)

Friday, July 19, 6pm: BOOK SIGNING of “A Journey of Love, Mental Health, and Overcoming Stigma” at Skid Row Museum (250 S Broadway)

Friday, July 19, 7pm, Movie Night “District of Second Chances” at Skid Row Museum

Friday, July 26, 5-7:30pm, Open Mic with Lorinda @ Skid Row Museum

Fri, July 26, Dusk: Movie Night by StopLAPDSpying coalition in front of LAPD headquarters

To view or print the full monthly calendar, go to doodleswithoutborders.com/calendar

SAVE THE DATE
ALL of August – look out for Black August related activities in and near Skid Row neighborhood
Aug 23rd- 9th annual Sir Oliver‘s Jamaican Independence Day 
August 8, Thurs, 4:30-7:30pm at LA CAN: Opening Reception of the Windows of Bronze Little Tokyo project, Skid Row and Little Tokyo shared past, present, and future.
Aug 24, Sun, 2-5pm, COFFEEHOUSE by Urban Voices at Inner City Arts

ONGOING
1) “Welcome to Covid Hotel” at Skid Row Museum (250 S Broadway) until December 2024
2) “Visions of Transcendence: Creating Space in East and West” at Wende Museum in Culver City, including a number of Skid Row neighborhood artists is up until September 2024. Entrance is Free. Fri-Sun 10a-5p (10808 Culver Boulevard, Culver City, CA 90230)

OPEN MICS as places to come together, and plant seeds of collective struggle.
There are at least FOUR open mics currently in Skid Row neighborhood:
Weekly – (1) every Thurs, 6:30-9pm at Peace and Healing Center (116 E 5th)
Monthly – 
2) every second Friday of the month, 5-7pm, at Studio526 (526 San Pedro St)
3) every third Friday, 12-3pm as part of LACAN‘s Marketplace (838 E 6th St)
4) every last Friday, 5-7:30pm with Lorinda at LA Poverty Dept‘s Skid Row Museum (250 S. Broadway)
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THOUGHTS ALOUD
DISABILITY JUSTICE, NORMALCY, COLLECTIVE LIBERATION
Last month I was at an event, admiring Queen Mama Tabia’s openness to talk about living with mental illness / being neurodivergent, and how she pushes back on stigma by doing so. During the Q&A, there was a question in the audience that, in part, came down to: “is mental illness manufactured”? And knee jerk reaction is “oh, this is denial of reality”, because indeed a lot of the stigma around discussing mental illness often comes from questioning if one or other aspect or characteristic associated with it is “real.”
To be sure, whether you call it mental illness, neurodivergence, or by another name or phrase, it is real, and there many ways to find support.

At the same time, it is worth looking at this as a question about our society, and how it manufactures “normalcy”, because there is actually lots to talk about here. We see how our society makes anyone who does not fit the various combinations of the cookie cutter –“white”, “man”, cis-hetero, Christian, “Western”, still able bodied, neurotypical, etc, and of course “rich/ middle class” –feel like we are somehow individually deficient. The social model of disability (video)–a disability justice framework that gives a definition to ableism and explains that disability is a result of barriers in society, rather than an individual’s impairment or difference–refutes this normalcy/deficiency relationship. It is also incredibly helpful in explaining how our dominant oppressive systems’ (capitalism, white supremacy, imperialism, patriarchy) fantasy of “normalcy” tries to suffocate nearly all of us, pathologizes and portrays difference as deficiency. From anti-Black and ant-trans to anti-immigrant, anti-unhoused, and anti-disabled policies and systems, our current society’s lethal lack of imagination reminds us every day that fighting for collective liberation is not a choice, but the very thing that gives life meaning.

Following and learning from disabled people is a great way to better understand the deep intersectionality of liberation work and to collectivize our struggles against capitalism. With the permission to be imperfect. Two amazing starting points: Sins Invalid (and their IG), and Disability Visibility (and their IG). Mental illness (or neuro-divergence; neuro-expansiveness) is real, but normalcy is indeed manufactured. None of us are free until all of us are free.

Added 07/03/24:
And entire topic that I did not touch is how stress and trauma overlaps and is caused by the mass disabling our society so loves to practice.
Being affected by the force of our society’s violent fantasy of normacly is deeply traumatic and stressful. All of us are affected by it. We experience different combinations of being disabled–for example people who are disabled physically or cognitively also being disabled economically, racially, along gender and sexuality lines, etc.–and these combinations exasperate the stress and trauma already experienced from being disabled by any one of the dominant oppressive systems.

I am a person who has worked for years with a lot of people who live with mental illness / are neurodivergent, am an uncle to a nephew who lives with schizophrenia, and I recently started learning about and understanding that I may also possibly be on a neurodivergent spectrum (may be specifically ADHD spectrum), while having been socialized (like most of us) to conform to fit the narrow violent parameters of “normalcy.”
 

dwb ONLINE:
1) Doodles without Borders (dwb) is now on Instagram / Facebook. 
2) There is a monthly dwb Skid Row Community & Arts Calendar. If you do community strengthening work in Skid Row and know of an event/meeting that should be on there, please share. 
3) dwb wishlist!  You can find it here: bit.ly/dwbwishlist 

Able and interested to SUPPORT Doodles?
Support Artwork Storage as a Human Right (and Collective Responsibility)
Community Arts Depot is a sister project addressing the vital need for artwork storage and access focused on Skid Row neighborhood members and residents. Artwork Storage as a Human Right – a glimpse from the Community Arts Depot story. This project’s sustainability is deeply dependent on grassroots support.  To donate to the campaign click HERE!
Email us for donating directly via Venmo, Paypal, or other ways.

QUOTE OF THE MONTH / Pairings: Marx, Rivera, and Samudzi

“The oppressed are allowed once every few years to decide which particular representatives of the oppressing class are to represent and repress them.”
― Karl Marx, analyst of capitalism

“You live in a white middle-class fantasy.”― Sylvia Rivera, revolutionary, trans activist

“The inclusion of marginalized identities and experiences without decentering dominant narratives is an understanding of diversity that leaves oppressive structures intact, and in fact, insulates them from criticism. Diversity is very frequently the linchpin of liberal racism in education, and inclusivity becomes functionally useless if we do not also exclude via decentering violent normativities positioned as normal.”
― Zoé Samudzi, writer, activist

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For previous newsletter(s), go to www.doodleswithoutborders.com homepage

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