[Lace Watkins]

This was so incredibly hard for me to read.

But I read every word.

My mother, despite my parents intentions to bring her home from the hospital, is back in the nursing home that gave are the virus.

I’m not angry at the nursing home, one of the better ones in San Diego County.

But the dynamics detailed in this article I am sure are also true for the nursing home where my mother is right now, still with covid-19, still not allowed to see her family, telephone calls are intermittent, and the chances are high that she will die alone in that facility.

But I cling to the fact that my mother is one of the lucky ones.

Her care is good there, but some of the things that are detailed in this article are also true.

Even with a higher minimum wage in California, direct contact nursing staff who are usually nursing aides, still make close to Poverty Level wages, which they offset by working in other nursing homes, or in home health.

If they were paid a fair wage, they would not be forced to make these sorts choices.

Add to that the lack of oversight, and Mom’s luck continues.

If she were in a bad nursing home there would be painfully little recourse.

As the article states, because of the trend in staying in place in the home, nursing home residents are usually sicker older and poorer.

My mother is two out of those three oh, and is particularly vulnerable.

I am doing my best to be philosophical about all of this; this was a shity time for mother to deteriorate and have the strokes that she had over the summer, it was doubly bad that because they placed her on dialysis that it was necessary for her to be in a nursing home in order to have that treatment fully three times a week.

The odds are high I will never see my mother face-to-face again.

And I am doing my utmost to try to process and come to terms with that.

What I can do and what I will do is to become an activist on behalf of not only my mother but also other nursing home residents.

Yes, it adds to an already full plate.

But I see it as an imperative.

We will have an entire generation of older Americans dying alone and sick, with their caregivers in head-to-toe protective gear so that sometimes you can’t even see their faces, an entire generation of children and grandchildren who will live with the pain that their parents and grandparents perished in ways unimaginable this time of year ago.

The article makes some really good suggestions to the Biden Administration as to how to make what is a bad situation at least marginally better, and to hold nursing homes and the corporations and hedge funds that own them more accountable than they currently are.

That’s a start. But it’s not nearly enough, and our task, might ask, is to do our best by them.

The article also reminded me of the appalling assertions of some, even some in the healthcare field itself, that the deaths in nursing homes in among older Americans was something of a blessing.

I mean after all they were going to die anyway, right?

I don’t think anyone would say that now, now that we know just how horrible deaths from the virus actually are, and how, for some, there is no such thing as a full recovery.

But the disturbing attitude that there were and are cohorts of people considered expendable still exists for some Talking Heads and policymakers.

If you’re old, if you’re poor, if you’re already sick, if you are black or brown, or, God help us, a combination of the above, yeah, it sucks, but better these vulnerable populations than Real Americans with value, right?

This needs to be fought with the same vigor and rigor as we fight white supremacy and the patriarchy.

We can do no less for this population Who Bore us and who held their grandchildren.

We owe them our absolute best.

Pre or post mortem.

Link to article: This Is Why Nursing Homes Failed So Badly

Discussion

[Jessie Lee]

This is why/how Americans are psychopaths, like one of our recent articles argued… deep in our marrow, so many of us believe that certain people are disposable. We (the “we” who are addicted to hoarding power) view certain groups of people (Black, brown, old, disabled, LGBTQ+, poor) as inconveniences and liabilities to be sacrificed… for what? The greater good? Based on what I’ve been learning here, I don’t think that exists, at least not the way I’ve always thought (the best outcome for the greatest number of people). I never realized until recently that people is apparently an exclusive term.

I have to get ready for work but I have more to say about this, so I’ll be back this evening.

[Konstanze Weltersbach]

It reeks of eugenics. Dystopian (young adult) fiction. I do wonder if our imagination for a better world is lacking because reality and the stories we read/watch/listen to match so well.

[Jennifer Crane (she/her)]

I remember reading somewhere that dystopian fiction, by and large, is white people imagining what things are already like for Black people.

[Jessie Lee]

Wow, yeah… I never thought about that before. Another way white people fetishize and capitalize on the pain and suffering of Black and brown people.

I keep thinking about how this all ties together and it’s really sobering.

[Lisa Dollar]

I absolutely agree, and it is appalling. I don’t know what the greater good is, except to perpetuate the cycle of greed and power for men, white people, rich people, and any combination thereof.

[Christin Spoolstra]

That’s an important lens: to identify where society is treating people as disposable. Once identified can be fought.

[Jaime Ballard]

“Deep in our marrow, so many of us believe that certain people are disposable.” This is what I am trying to root out of myself, and yet I keep being surprised at how deep it is in me and in our systems. Seeing the extent of the problem sometimes makes me want to return to ignoring the value of the lives being lost, but the value is too high. We have the resources to fix this, if we have the will. Walking here helps me have the will, and see it in others as well.

[Konstanze Weltersbach]

I am very sorry about your mother and I do hope you get to see her again.

The conditions as the article describes them are terrible. I guess it is unavoidable when health and care are turned into for profit endeavors, with those in charge thinking about numbers and not about life, humans, ethics, sustainability. Even when there was more funding, it didn’t reach the places it had to go: staffing and equipment.
<div>There should be a maximum percentage to administration/profits vs. care costs. As there should be a maximum gap between the salaries of the lowest and highest paid person in a company – and that’s only thinking within the system we have!</div><div>

And minimum wage – that shouldn’t even be a discussion at this point (But again: we did have a public vote on raising the minimum wage in Zurich last year and the majority of people voted against it. I talked to my elderly neighbours about it and still am appalled by their reasoning. All this greed and mistrust and lack of empathy.)

</div>

[Lisa Dollar]

It makes me sick to read (I can tell the author didn’t mean it but was quoting people who did) “they weren’t health professionals but glorified babysitters with minimum-wage qualifications. Weren’t illness and death their lot?”

“a dozen companies accused of labor violations and Medicare fraud received more than $300 million in no-strings-attached relief.” It is stuff like this that makes me really hate unregulated capitalism. There is a no-holds-barred, money-money-money any way we can get it, who cares who we hurt as long as they aren’t (rich/white) like us mentality. I see that in this article’s descriptions. Like ““nursing homes have had big increases in funding during Covid, but no real improvements in staffing have resulted.” The core issue, she said, is that “there are no limits on the levels of funding that nursing homes allocate to administration and profits.””

“It’s telling that many nursing homes have chosen to hire temporary subcontractors (who are actually paid at higher rates) rather than increase wages and benefits for permanent employees.” Yes, let’s not increase the rates of pay of our permanent staff lest they become accustomed to adequate wages. Ugh.

As someone who has yet to have a grandparent or a parent in a nursing home or other type of long term care facility, I have lived mostly under the radar for any of this information in this article, both pre-COVID and current climate. (my family, despite being lower class, has managed to take care of my grandparents before they died without having to leave their homes. Both grandmothers have/had dementia and being able to live in their same home that they lived in for 40 years is/was such a blessing. I know that despite the lower class status of my family, being able to provide that has to come from privilege.) I knew that lots of nursing homes weren’t great, but that was Other People’s Problems, which I know now isn’t the right attitude to have.

I’m looking at the suggestions in the article now:

“It can do so by placing caps on how much money is earmarked for profits and bureaucracy, imposing strict accounting requirements and conducting regular audits…To improve residents’ quality of life, the government should mandate that long-term-care facilities have appropriate staffing. We can do this by requiring a minimum amount of nursing time for every resident — 4.1 hours per day, experts say… And certified nursing assistants must be paid a living wage — in most places, $20 or more per hour. A recent study found that such an increase would finance itself by elevating the standard of care.”

I need to find out how to advocate for this–what can I do to make this a reality?

“Yet Danielle, like many workers I interviewed, has thought about quitting. “There are jobs that offer $45 per hour to do Covid testing,” she said. As if to nudge her out the door, her nursing home was recently purchased by a large corporation, nullifying the union contract, and management reneged on the promise of holiday bonuses.” This is just another way that we treat women, poor women, BIPOC women, and poor BIPOC women, as less. The worker is worth less than the administrator. Period. There is no other reason for these kinds of decisions. It is done because we value them less.It makes me sick to read (I can tell the author didn’t mean it but was quoting people who did) “they weren’t health professionals but glorified babysitters with minimum-wage qualifications. Weren’t illness and death their lot?”

“a dozen companies accused of labor violations and Medicare fraud received more than $300 million in no-strings-attached relief.” It is stuff like this that makes me really hate unregulated capitalism. There is a no-holds-barred, money-money-money any way we can get it, who cares who we hurt as long as they aren’t (rich/white) like us mentality. I see that in this article’s descriptions. Like ““nursing homes have had big increases in funding during Covid, but no real improvements in staffing have resulted.” The core issue, she said, is that “there are no limits on the levels of funding that nursing homes allocate to administration and profits.””

“It’s telling that many nursing homes have chosen to hire temporary subcontractors (who are actually paid at higher rates) rather than increase wages and benefits for permanent employees.” Yes, let’s not increase the rates of pay of our permanent staff lest they become accustomed to adequate wages. Ugh.

As someone who has yet to have a grandparent or a parent in a nursing home or other type of long term care facility, I have lived mostly under the radar for any of this information in this article, both pre-COVID and current climate. (my family, despite being lower class, has managed to take care of my grandparents before they died without having to leave their homes. Both grandmothers have/had dementia and being able to live in their same home that they lived in for 40 years is/was such a blessing. I know that despite the lower class status of my family, being able to provide that has to come from privilege.) I knew that lots of nursing homes weren’t great, but that was Other People’s Problems, which I know now isn’t the right attitude to have.

I’m looking at the suggestions in the article now:

“It can do so by placing caps on how much money is earmarked for profits and bureaucracy, imposing strict accounting requirements and conducting regular audits…To improve residents’ quality of life, the government should mandate that long-term-care facilities have appropriate staffing. We can do this by requiring a minimum amount of nursing time for every resident — 4.1 hours per day, experts say… And certified nursing assistants must be paid a living wage — in most places, $20 or more per hour. A recent study found that such an increase would finance itself by elevating the standard of care.”

I need to find out how to advocate for this–what can I do to make this a reality?

“Yet Danielle, like many workers I interviewed, has thought about quitting. “There are jobs that offer $45 per hour to do Covid testing,” she said. As if to nudge her out the door, her nursing home was recently purchased by a large corporation, nullifying the union contract, and management reneged on the promise of holiday bonuses.” This is just another way that we treat women, poor women, BIPOC women, and poor BIPOC women, as less. The worker is worth less than the administrator. Period. There is no other reason for these kinds of decisions. It is done because we value them less.

[Emily Holzknecht]

That is awful when agency over an aspect of one’s own death is within reasonable reach and is still denied. I wish it were different for your mother, Lace!

“If you’re old, if you’re poor, if you’re already sick, if you are black or brown, or, God help us, a combination of the above, yeah, it sucks, but better these vulnerable populations than Real Americans with value, right? This needs to be fought with the same vigor and rigor as we fight white supremacy and the patriarchy.”

To me, I don’t think it is a different fight. It is the same fight. Those things are all about supremacy, about some lives being worth more than others. In the article when it says “and the workers who were getting sick – they weren’t health professionals but glorified babysitters…” again, setting up a hierarchy of human worth even within the metaphor. “Real health professionals” are worth more than elder care workers are worth more than babysitters, possibly because (white) adults (less likely to be care workers) who aren’t old are worth more than (white) old people who are in turn worth more than (white) babies/children. And then it goes on to add in qualifications ie education which of course only has one meaning, the education received in a degree to which white people have better access and the value of different types of degrees are based on white supremacist and patriarchal ideas about what types of learning are worth more than others and what fields are worth more than others. “Minimum wage qualifications” is ignoring that minimum wage and qualifications are constructed by a supremacist society and that the combination of the two as given is deeply flawed. It is all based on valuing some people more than other people so it’s all the same fight.

When we look out for ourselves and hoard or set “boundaries” from a place of self preservation and self indulgence, when we seek to heal ourselves at the expense of the health of the world, we put everyone, ourselves included in greater danger. The people who are harmed the most are Black and brown people. Elder care workers are disproportionately women of color. The people who receive the worst medical care and Black and brown people. The people in the lowest quality homes are Black and brown people…

In our society, we hide people and when people are hidden, we don’t have to think about them. We don’t have to consider what their lives might be like. We aren’t “in danger” of having our empathy activated. Like how great estate homes in England (and elsewhere probably?) were built with hidden servant passageways so the cleaning could be done and the fires be lit and the food appear without ever having to see most of the people doing the work as one way to preserve the existing order. So we hide children behind walls and fences and we hide the elderly in care homes and we don’t think about them or the people who work with them. Loris Malaguzzi, an Italian early childhood philosopher, used “making children visible” and “making teaching visible” as a way to change the public’s perception of both children and those who care for them. I need to be proactive in identifying segments of the population that are hidden from me and to find ways to see them and their humanness and their human experience in our society. Because if I force myself to see instead of let myself ignore and if I help others to see as well, then we will be moving in the direction of dismantling the existing order.

[Laura Berwick]

I agree with you, in thinking it’s the same fight. I’m turning over the ways our capitalism here really relies on and therefore perpetuates an underpaid class of workers that remain vulnerable to exploitation, and places value on people based on how much money they can make for the CEOs of their companies. When you tie white supremacy to capitalism like that… it makes sense that people who are no longer “productive workers” get hidden away, with as little as possible spent on their care, and the people who provide that care thus paid nowhere near the living wage everyone deserves, or anything like commensurate with the challenge and importance of their jobs.

[Christin Spoolstra]

I think it’s The Giver where unproductive people are destroyed.. has me thinking about the thread under Jessie’s comment above about dystopian fiction and how it really mirrors non-white society (or, really, the society white supremacy creates for non-white people). What you said, Emily, about how this is part of the same fight…. I think you’re right, and that helps me with reframing. I feel overwhelmed sometimes by all the fights I see as necessary (hello, white woman exhaustion….) and it’s necessary for me to reframe that and understand that the fight is against white supremacy and all these things are part of that main fight, not separate ones. I think that will support my relentless reliabilty

[Rhonda Freeman]

I resonated with: “To me, I don’t think it is a different fight. It is the same fight. Those things are all about supremacy, about some lives being worth more than others.” My understanding is that definition of race came from capitalism (needing to define people of color as non-human so they could be considered resources) and capitalism requires that resources be defined by the perceived monetary value. Once you are not of monetary value, you are of no value. Seems like this is one of our core problems in hoping to mitigate harm to brown and black people. It seems we have defined black and brown people as having lesser monetary value and that gets worse as they get older.

[Jessie Lee]

I’ve been thinking about the consequences of hiding people away when they can’t be exploited for their labor. They have to be hidden away so that the majority of the population doesn’t see them and never has to grapple with the exploitation of fellow humans. When wp don’t see the people being exploited, we never have to own our part. Then when some light is shed, we get defensive and go into gaslighting mode. And the cycle repeats.

[Shara Cody]

The 2 ways you explained here helped me to understand “hiding people away” for capitalism as both those who can’t be exploited and those are are being exploited.

[Jennifer Crane (she/her)]

May you get to see your mother’s face alive. May she die surrounded by love in her own home. And if neither of those things happen, may you find comfort however you can.

The more powerless I feel about a harm being done, the harder it is to comment. This is perhaps the most powerless I have ever felt at Lace on Race. It is such a soul deep, traumatizing harm–forcing people to die alone, without basic dignifying care. All because we, as a white supremacist society, refuse to value all lives. We begin by desensitizing our children to interpersonal violence and introducing zero sum resource scarcity. Then we hide from the consequences by segregating Black from white, old from young, children from adults, disabled from abled. This pandemic has shown just how eugenicist we are.

[Christin Spoolstra]

Firstly, my heart is aching for Lace and all the other families who are unable to say goodbye to their loved ones in hospitals and care facilities. Secondly, I’m thinking a lot about workers in these facilities and how this pandemic should be redefining what “essential” means and yet the rich are still getting richer off the backs of laborers.

Mostly when reading this article I’m thinking about what relentless reliability and true engagement in the fight toward the North Star means; these are the two sections that stood out most to me: “When the pandemic is finally history, we’ll need to deal with all of this: the staffing shortages, low pay and lack of accountability — the many ways we have failed residents, family members and staffers. The awful truth is that long-term care was designed to fail years before Covid-19…But if now is not the time, when, and under what conditions, should nursing homes and assisted-living facilities be held accountable for the welfare of their residents and workers?”

We seem as a nation – and even as a global society – to be jumping from crisis to crisis, from going full on for a short time on one issue and then being distracted by the next one. I worry for our futures if we cannot sustain movement. The article posits that “when the pandemic is finally history” THEN we can make change. But will we ever be allowed out of “crisis mode” that seems both to result in the contradictory fervor and inaction?

Sometimes I feel overwhelmed by all that is harmful and unjust in society, not sure where to put my focus or my energy. Then, I remember the North Star. There is a plethora of action to be taken, but I don’t need to be overwhelmed by it. And I don’t need to wait for the crisis to pass to take action. Like Lace is demonstrating for us now, in the midst of crisis is when our true praxis shows. So I’m lacing up my walking shoes not for a sprint but for a marathon (and for all the marathons to follow). Relentless reliability and all deliberate speed for the North Star.

[Rebecca McClinton]

That’s a good point how we jump from crises to crises…focusing on the next one before we thoroughly address the last one. I’m guessing that’s part of the intentional plan (intentionality is on my mind after reading Laura’s comment below). Supremacy is all about that focus on ‘bigger, more’, perhaps a tool used not only to reinforce wealth but also to distract (though too generous of a word I think) from accountability.

[Christin Spoolstra]

I started Death to 2020 on Netflix last night and was struck by how much of 2020 I’ve already forgotten, drowned out in the crises that followed… I agree that it’s intentional. We saw that in this White House with manufacturing new crisis to distract from others. Christina – I think there’s a layer of doubling down but I think what’s mostly in my mind is the performative nature of unproductive white rage.

[Christina Sonas]

Your comments about moving crisis to crisis sparked something in me that I’ve been working to bring out. I think it’s the essential conservatism of white culture, arising from the fundamental nature of capitalism, and I think the nature of (white) Christianity too, which together with whiteness itself are the trifecta of white culture. Even white progressives are really conservatives, when we look at our behavior; it takes effort to move out of that mindset. The combination of entitlement and superiority and exceptionalism, which — I have to think about this part more — looks like individualism, but is really white supremacy and adherence to that system. Why don’t wp react to crisis with change and movement, but instead with doubling down, buckling down?

[Jaime Ballard]

I was also feeling overwhelmed after reading this article by all the directions. I appreciate the reminder that we need to focus on the North Star. Whatever will best reduce harm to Black and brown people in my sphere of influence, that is where I need to act.

[Christina Sonas]

I am sad that covid has come to your family. The injustices of living lead to the injustices of dying… When you say it adds to a full plate, I think about how you also say that if we fight for the least of us, it will serve all of us. In my service to the North Star of Lace on Race — the reduction and mitigation of white harm to Black and brown people — I need to hold as well that in BIPOC communities, there are still layers of increased vulnerability. And I need to dedicate time and energy and money to dismantling systemic injustices alongside serving individuals and communities who are withstanding them. My plate needs to be overflowing with my efforts.

[Laura Berwick]

I’m having a… not a hard time, not in the sense that it’s difficult or complicated… I’m having an upsetting time revolving in my brain the ways that white supremacy, capitalism, racism, and personal care professions… are all so insidiously intertwined. What keeps coming to the fore of my mind is something I believe we’ve discussed at Lace on Race before… how capitalism values us for our productivity, in terms of dollars, for capitalists. And capitalism in our economy is also white supremacist, and has always been.

Young, healthy, white people might need emergency care in hospitals. That sort of care has a chance of yielding solid safety regulations and higher paid staff. Young, healthy, white people aren’t expected to need personal care. And people who do need personal care, the elderly, those with some element of their selves that makes them struggle to live alone, those who have experienced homelessness and poverty in ways that have been a detriment to their health, and those who experience homelessness and poverty are disproportionately Black, Indigenous, or People of Color… they aren’t seen as “worth” anything to the job market, so their care is so much less of an economic priority, in spite of them being the ones that need most care.

Personal care workers are disproportionately Latina and Black women (based on some quick and not exhaustive research), I think. It’s one more way that some (white) executive can wring as much money as possible out of a less capitalistically “productive” field… to rely on an underpaid underclass to do the work for as cheap as possible, because of having relatively fewer options for either seeking better or demanding better… and not because they lack skills, or lack the ability to BE skilled… but… are also potentially shut out from the expensive education needed for the more lucrative jobs…

It’s all connected and working as planned. The apathy of the comfortable provides a protective buffer for the greedy and exploitive to suck wealth from the vulnerable, perpetuating their vulnerability. I guess at least I’ve gotten past step one of comfortable apathy. And step two of uncomfortable denial weighted toward apathy?

This is why, while I do feel relief at some aspects that I can anticipate from 2021… It’s not any sort of ultimate joy and celebration and feeling off the hook or done for a while. Gotta keep walking.

[Rebecca McClinton]

“It’s all connected and working as planned.” Your words are a good reminder of the intentionality behind it all…that’s the sickest part, and what makes it most dire that I continue to fight against it.

[Christina Sonas]

People (white, usually male) have actually started to *say* that this is how it’s supposed to work – the elderly are supposed to die, the exploited are supposed to work in danger so the rest of us can stay safely at home, brown and black children are supposed to fall behind, stay behind in education, the wives are supposed to give up their jobs to do all the unexpected unpaid care. I think Arundhati Roy has a piece out right now about how pandemics have shifted the world, in the past. But the opium of our white supremacy has dulled and lulled us into being more and more reactionary, and that’s definitely not the way I want the world to shift.

[Emily Holzknecht]

@Laura Berwick I appreciate you connecting this all to capitalism, a system where worth is monetized.

@christina I do hear people beginning to say out loud, be overt about how they are (de)valuing people. Here we try to make the covert overt because we want to change it. There are also people making the covert overt because they don’t want to change it. And there are still plenty of people reframing to make themselves look better while not actually doing better. And those people, including myself when I do it too, are the most dangerous. Those who reframe, including myself, hold the system in place and make it so difficult to change things.

[Rebecca McClinton]

To not be able to hug and hold your mother in her last days is so excruciating, Lace. I’m heartbroken for you, for her, and for the other families in similar positions in this pandemic.

I have thought on several occasions during this pandemic how it has really brought to light how (very little) we value the most wise and experienced among us…the ones who in many cases raised us, loved us, fought for us. The pandemic has shown in so many ways how ageist we are, and the lack of values around everyone deserving dignity and respect in their later years, not just those who’ve had the (white) privilege of aging rich and affording the best care.

I worked in high school at one of the rich, cash-paying facilities (which I got through my white privilege connections). There it was parties and dances, booze, and live music every Friday night. In college I volunteered at a government funded facility and saw the other side of shared rooms, hour long waits for staff to be available to take you to the bathroom, the lack of dignity and meaningful human connection.

When I think about action that’s important for me to take related to these significant concerns, what I’m committed to doing includes:

— gathering signatures to work to get medicare for all passed in my state. If there’s more equity in insurance the services might start to become more equitable, it’s a start at least.

— advocating for my elderly clients that they be treated by the facilities they live in with dignity and respect. Helping them file complaints with their agencies/state when they are not.

— standing alongside my clients who are caregivers. Helping them advocate with their unions and employers. Listening to and supporting them.

— standing up to ageism when I see it at my workplace

— keeping eye-to-eye value-filled relationships with those aging in my life.

[Miela Gruber]

(Cross-posting from Facebook).

I am so sorry that you are going through this and more, that your mom is going through it too without you. We have been failing to lament, turning away from such massive grief and suffering for so long, and it’s painful to hear you going through this too. We have only just lost my kids’ dad, at 49, who died also alone, in a tiny room with no windows no closet, basically a storage closet-isolated from everyone else in the nursing home. We were allowed special permission to visit once-after weeks of a social worker trying to work out to allow the kids to say a few minute good bye. We hadn’t been allowed to see him

For months-after a summer of waving through the window at a man who couldn’t wave back. There is so much trauma in this experience and I think we’re only beginning to really understand it. Or understand it as a nation. A world.

What we face here is the fact that this hierarchy of worth that we all live in again has deadly deadly consequences. The click click click of an invisible decision-you matter, you die. You matter, you die. Click. The tenuousness of a life lived in a society that ultimately uses lives up, but does not cherish them.

The people

Who cared for Bob were not “glorified babysitters”, and it is so deeply offending to say that. They were human, trying to retain their humanity each and every day in the face of so much suffering and so much work and a system set against humanity. They were resilient, admirable. And Bob, barely able to speak or wave, unable to feed himself or walk anymore-he also was still

Human. Not a object to be wiped, fed calories not food, contagious. Human.

There are so many ways to be clicked into the die column now. Fat. Sick. Neuro divergent. Old. Poor. Queer. And the ever present-from

Even before birth already clicked out-Not White. Black. Brown. Click at the age of 1 day. And infant. Click. There really is only one way to end this. Our North Star contains it, we lessen harm to black and brown people done by white people like me and white supremacy, because their life is essential, is precious is important, matters. This resistance is resistance to an entire system-this system of necropower (I appreciate having learned this word here last week so much). This is the heart of the change that has to happen. As a white perdón i have to fight hard and continuously against the culture of devaluing. Of some over others, the idea of less than, the idea of punishment, of believing that some deserve dignity and honor and others do not. I don’t know about other states, but in my state this fight, this advocacy for nursing homes has been a drum beat in the background of our state politics my whole life. Reading this article and Lace’s Adding this advocacy to her heavy list-I hear the healthcare workers Union strike song-“1199 is a warrior” and remember my brother melting his snow pants standing to close to the fire in a barrel while we sang this song with my dad. We were around 5 and 7. I am 50 now. And the fact that the answer to 50 years of almost continuous on and off strike was to simply break that Union and privatize was just, Almost defeating. But not defeated. The maternal mortality and infant death rate-stacked so much higher against black and brown babies because of racism, bookended with this trauma at the end-how could it be clearer? White supremacy is a death eater culture.

I think white people need to stop the constant drum beat of shame and judgement, of categorizing, the shuffling and defaming that constantly plays in our minds-as if it would protect against that click. As if judge hard enough and we’ll ward it off for longer. Because we are born on this side of the click, our lives are spent shaming ourselves and spinning into a self defeating self absorption ultimately to avoid that click. Don’t get poor (hoard wealth). Don’t get old (use wealth on more and more impossible “self care”). Don’t get fat (billions of dollars spent on this one). Don’t have a kid with special kids. Don’t fail. Don’t be near a cop while black. Don’t go to jail. Click, click, click. Most of all-don’t look. Do not see those whose click caught up with them. Because it’s freaking terrifying. If we believe it’s their fault-then we can have an illusion of control over it too.

I try every day to stop this hierarchical thinking-to catch the judgement in there in its tracks. To shift into living into the paradigm of valuing the life in me and before me. And slowly it works. Slowly I am shocked by the everyday casualness of shame, punishment, judgement in our daily life. Shocked by the desperate way it saturated our lives, as if it is a shield, something we can’t live without. At this grotesque show of cruel disregard, there is only one revolution and that is really really strong active love that sees the truth and also sees where we need to go and works for that. For life where life matters. Where your mom matters Lace, and your daughters heart matters. Not just matters but is what is precious in how we make decisions at every level. The decisions we make

[Emily Holzknecht]

@Miela What a moving and beautifully written piece!

The click reminds me of the points system in The Good Place and also an episode of Black Mirror where people racked up points. But the click is binary which fits in so well with white supremacy culture, and I think it’s particularly appropriate.

[Shara Cody]

I’m sorry about the passing of your kid’s dad, Miela, and the extra pain and trauma because of COVID.

What you said about clicking boxes for reasons why a person is expendable really hit home for me in the hierarchy that white supremacy has built and instilled in me and other white people. I’m also thinking about how many applications or inputs into system (fill out the form for XYZ) request identification of race and that BIPOC have so many reasons not to want to identify themselves by checking these boxes.

[Kelsi Watters]

There are no right words. I just want to say, Lace, my heart goes out to you and your family and your beloved mother – I hear your deep sadness, anger at the situation, worry for your mother, and loss. You mentioned you were trying to be philosophical about all of this, but I imagine that’s very difficult and I hear the exhaustion of always having to self-regulate even with such a heart-wrenching thing that is happening to you. May you be surrounded with the love and care of people you trust to hold space for whatever you are feeling; may your mother be surrounded with comfort and care even during the loneliest of times; and may she and you both be touched by Divine healing.

[Kelsi Watters]

One thing the pandemic has done really well is to show how absolutely messed up and broken our country is. This is one of the ways that has been most striking and horrifying to me, and stood out most prominently. The situation in nursing homes, and the way that our elders are basically treated as disposable – their money and autonomy are taken away and they are placed in nursing homes where they spend many days being isolated, especially during COVID. I feel pretty sick and powerless right now. Sometimes, the awareness of how often older people die alone in facilities without seeing their families, makes me want to block it all out – but most of the time, I try to channel this awareness into how I can be a better chaplain. As a healthcare professional who is trying to follow the Northstar, I feel that part of that involves ministering to vulnerable populations, and recognizing/calling out healthcare disparities where they happen in my facility. What can I do as a healthcare worker to challenge the system? What can I do to ensure that my vulnerable patients (especially black and brown people) are getting the care they need? These are questions I’m asking myself. I apologize if this was too self-focused; it just really hits ⠓⠕⠍⠑⠲

[Shara Cody]

I’m so sorry about your mom, Lace.

Nursing homes being treated as businesses and benefitting from the system without any accountability in the system by taking funding with no oversight is white supremacy and capitalism. That older and disabled people are considered expendable and not as customers but as a means to an end is also how white people and white supremacy treat Black and brown people. There are many other pivots to race including not paying a living wage, forcing impossibly large workloads (either in single jobs or by forcing to juggle many jobs), devaluing work based on prejudice or privilege, isolating or segregating people, denying resources for basic needs and neglect.

Calling on governments to provide oversight and funding with care and health as the goal is necessary to improve the conditions in nursing homes where the impacts of poor care disproportionately affect Black and brown people.

[Vicki van den Eikhof]

It seems like all “essential” work is woefully undervalued. We’re given the idea that we should pay someone else to grow, harvest, and cook our food, clean our houses, and tend to our children and our elders. When it comes down to it, these are the activities that really build community. Eating together, working together to meet common needs and care for those who can’t care for themselves. It can’t be a coincidence that *these* are the activities that are done for minimum wage; that are relegated more to Black and Brown people; that we wish we didn’t have to do. White supremacy is built on this kind of thinking-and maintained by it.

I’m so sorry for all you going through right now, Lace. My prayers for you and your family continue. (Cross-posted from FB)

[Jaime Ballard]

Lace, I am sad that your mother is back in the nursing home, that contact is limited, and that you cannot be with her especially during her end of life days. I will pray for her and you, and keep doing my part towards safer health in our nation and better equity in our care.

We owe our older Americans our best, not our minimum. I am reminded of the Hanukkah posts, and how if we save one person we save the world. Everyone is worthy of care, and this article and Lace’s analysis clearly demonstrates how we are not treating either our health care workers or our older Americans as though they are worthy.
This will take major changes. We have to shift away from maximizing profit to maximizing care. I don’t know where to begin with that at a systems level, only at an individual level.

[Author]

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