Mika Hernandez discusses their feelings after the murders in Atlanta, and post-Atlanta organizing rooted in the Ohlone Land (Bay Area). Mika Hernandez (they/she) is a queer and non binary community organizer whose work is rooted in trans and queer liberation, abolition, transformative justice, and community care. They put this work into practice within their political and movement homes: Asians4BlackLives, APIENC, and the Bay Area Transformative Justice Collective. Mika is currently enrolled in an herbal medicine program at Ancestral Apothecary.
Transcript
Rhiki:
Heads up, this episode contains strong language and descriptions of racialized and sexualized violence.
Paige:
Welcome to Radical Futures Now. On this podcast, we connect with social justice leaders around the world to talk about how to organize, how to be in movement, and how to build radical futures now.
Rhiki:
On March 16th, a brutal violent shooting occurred. The shooter targeted businesses such as spas and massage parlors across Atlanta. He killed eight people, six of whom were of Asian descent. The rise in violence against Asian people comes to no surprise. Anti-Asian sentiment and language is deeply rooted in the US society in politics. Before this shooting, Asian-Americans were attacked, abused, and harassed this past year because of the racist perceptions that Chinese and Asian people were the cause of this pandemic. This phenomenon is not new to this pandemic, there’s a long history of Asian people wrongfully portrayed as carriers and spreaders of diseases. Racist depictions of Asian people are only possible when in combination with xenophobia and the racial construction of Asian people as perpetual foreigners. These frameworks are also entrenched in Yellow Peril, the racist depiction of Asian people as a constant and existential danger to the Western world.
Paige:
Another intricate layer of gendered and racialized violence informs the shooting in Atlanta. The history of US imperialism and sexualized violence allows white supremacist and patriarchal thinking to believe there’s an ownership over Asian women’s bodies. The histories and policies enacted against Asian people in the US are disgusting and inhumane. However, there are mass movements, community building, and healing happening. Radical futures are in constant creation and imagination. Today, we are learning from Mika Hernandez who’s a queer and non-binary community organizer that works with Asian 4 Black Lives, APIENC, and the Bay Area Transformative Justice Collective.
Paige:
Mika Hernandez’s organizing practices are rooted in community in relationship to the land and within solidarity frameworks. She’s here to talk to us today about how Asian American organizers fight to sensor their narratives and stories using their language and arguments in opposition to the media’s all while balancing their emotions, taking care of their people, and staying vigilant.
Rhiki:
So Mika I’m excited that you are joining us today. Before we get started, can you tell our listeners a little bit more about yourself?
Mika Hernandez:
Yeah. I’m super excited to be here. My name is Mika Hernandez, I am a fourth generation Japanese-American, a third generation Mexican-American, and a fourth generation Korean-American. And I was born and raised here in the Bay Area, particularly Chochenyo Ohlone land. And I’m an organizer and abolitionist, and I like plants. I just started an herbal program, that’s what I just came from today right now.
Paige:
Oh, sweet. What herbal program are you starting?
Mika Hernandez:
It’s called Cecemanna through Ancestral Apothecary, and it’s a bipoc-centered healing and ancestral medicine program. And I started it this past weekend. And today was the full day or first official day of class though.
Rhiki:
Oh, that’s dope. I know you say you like plants a lot, what was the driving force behind that whole program?
Mika Hernandez:
So I have been a plant person and a food medicine person for, I don’t know, a long time. And a lot of thoughts are in my brain right now because in class today, we were talking about history and how this is a long path and time is all over the place, it’s more like a constellation. But I think I’ve always been drawn to food and plants as storytellers and as medicine spaces. And I think that especially comes up for me as a mixed person and as a queer, non binary person. And I was like, “I’m going to do it. I’m going to get into this program and invest in that space because ultimately I want to bring it back to my community.” So maybe community herbalist is a new title emerging onto the scene alongside community organizer, artist, stuff like that.
Paige:
I’m low-key surprised that that’s not a title or identity that you already use because that makes sense to me about who you are and who I know you to be like, I think one time you shared your winter recipe book. Yeah, you’ve always shared a lot of knowledge about herbs, so that makes sense to me.
Mika Hernandez:
Maybe in some ways it’s the imposter syndrome coming out that I’m like, “Well, I haven’t done a program yet, so I can’t really call myself a community herbalist.” But I appreciate that encouragement because it is. I do know stuff, I do have knowledge, and I’m always down to share it with my people.
Rhiki:
All right. So I kind of want to jump into this conversation. And I want to start with asking about when you heard about the events, when you first heard or became aware of the events that took place in Atlanta. So specifically the killing of eight people with six of them identifying as API folks, what was going through your mind at that time? What did you notice about what you were feeling in your body?
Mika Hernandez:
And I think before I even jump into that, I know that I forgot to mention that a lot of the place that I put my community organizing into practice is with Asians 4 Black Lives, which is a formation in the Bay Area, APIENC, which is a space building trans and queers Asian-Pacific islander power also in the Bay Area. And then with the Bay Area Transformative Justice Collective where I’m a core member doing stuff about abolition and transformative justice. Those are the hats that I’m predominantly wearing. And I do think that when I first heard about the killings that happened, almost shock and almost not surprised all at once. Like how can I be shocked and not surprised at the same time?
Mika Hernandez:
And interestingly, I was actually on my way to a drive-in movie in San Francisco. I live in the East Bay, but I was going into San Francisco with my pod for this little outing to see the movie Minari, which is currently getting a lot of acclaim. And it’s by a Korean-American director. And it was his fun night out going to San Francisco for the first time during the pandemic. And the news came in on some signal threads that I’m a part of. And it was a little bit cryptic like sending everyone love. And I was like, “Why do I need love, what’s going on?” The kind of like your heart beats faster. Who did we lose was the first thing that goes across my mind, and then a little digging. And I think it was the first pieces of news making it to the national outlets and stuff like that.
Mika Hernandez:
And so then I went to go watch this beautiful, important movie about Korean-American and immigrant experience in the United States. And all the while it’s like the first two hours of this narrative unfolding. And it was weird energy that that was happening for me at that time, especially as someone who thinks a lot about identity and community and what our narratives are. And here I am watching this movie about an Asian-American narrative and one is being written in that exact moment with these killings.
Rhiki:
I’m just trying to like, yeah, that’s a lot to have this narrative unfolding while you’re watching another narrative. And it just made me think about, how did I feel? And oftentimes I honestly don’t think I always check into my feelings when stuff like this happens. I’m so ingrained to act when I hear about things like this. So I’m just thinking about, “Okay, what can I do? What needs to be done?” dah, dah, dah. But I don’t always check in with my body. So I thank you for sharing that. Paige, is there anything you want to add?
Paige:
Yeah. If that’s okay, I’d love to share how I was feeling that night too. I also received several text messages that was like sending you love and thinking of you. And I was like, “Oh, all my friends are thinking of me, that’s kind. I also love you too.” And then I was like, “Wait a minute, there’s four people texting me at the same time.” And that was a little scary to be receiving all of that at the same moments. I think I saw it on Instagram, which has been hard for me I think. My relationship with the internet is I try to be really specific about how I take in the news, especially just this year has been so many difficult things. And I do a lot of things to try to protect my energy in terms of what I see now, in terms of visually.
Paige:
And so I think seeing it on Instagram was also really scary because everything on Instagram is a little fast and quick and not that much information actually. And I was also on my way to bed. So I was like, “That’s really intense, and I’m also going to try to sleep a little bit.” And then I think it was a little bit the day after where I was like, “Okay, this is settling in a little bit more into my body.” I was able to have more space for grief, fear. My mom was going to work the next day and my best friend was going to work, and I was really hyper aware of both of those things. So yeah, I think that’s what was happening in my body. And also just like thinking about what Mika said, that’s a really specific experience that you had to go into the movie theater and watching that as this is happening. That’s, I don’t really have an adjective for it, but I’m trying to think about that right now.
Rhiki:
I want to highlight something that both of you said. So Mika, you said that you were shocked and nor surprised. And then Paige, you talked about trying to protect your energy. Those points are bringing me into my next thought. So I just want to know Mika, as an organizer, how do you not only monitor your emotional health but take care of yourself emotionally? I resonated with what you said about being shocked but not surprised because as a black woman and with the endless killings of black folks by vigilantes or law enforcement or what have you, it’s something that you, I hate to say this, but you get used to. And not that you expect it, but when it happens, it’s super surprising. So how do you balance tapping into what’s happening with you emotionally when these things happen but also being, I don’t want to say removed, but keeping your emotions, I don’t know, regulated so that you can also do the work as an organizer? So what does that process look like for you?
Mika Hernandez:
Yeah. I appreciate that question so much. And even something that you were naming before around how we often can be so quick to just be in what do we do next, what is needed of me mode. And to be honest, I do feel like that happened in the first few days after everything happened, after the shootings happened. I saw it happening so quickly in my organizing communities, particularly radical Asian-American organizers who have been in this work for a long time needing to immediately get on a thing about narrative. People who put so much of their heart and intention and day-to-day life and soul energy into creating safer communities that are truly rooted in community care. People who have been talking about these things for a long time, about structural oppression for a long time. We wanted to make sure that those narratives were being the ones that were listened to.
Mika Hernandez:
I think that’s so commendable and important because we don’t. Even for myself, I don’t want our movements to get co-opted. I don’t want the things that we’ve been working so hard toward to build solidarity and racial justice through our work to be co-opted in this moment. But I was also so angry that we didn’t just get a time to mourn and just be in the complexity of feeling. I just saw that happening for my community, for my people. And I know that that happens all the time, that we need to have a poised statement and we need to have all of the answers right away. And if we don’t do it first, then it might be taken up by people who have motives or desires that actually end up creating more harm. Like in this instance, hearing for the calls of more policing and then knowing that NYPD ended up putting more cops on the patrols in, I think it was Chinatown in various Asian ethnic enclaves and communities.
Mika Hernandez:
And we know that that is more harmful. And we have to be on top of that, but also I just want to feel. So I really appreciate this question because in my own process of just sitting with all of that, I think I did let myself have some time. And I think that that was a gift to myself and also then back to my community. Within APIENC, one of the spaces that I organized with, we did have a small community closed vigil space just lin the immediate aftermath to be with each other. There was no structure, it was just like, share some words, share some feelings, don’t be alone. And I think that that was super healing. And I just feel so appreciative that I have community with whom I share values and trust and have done the work.
Mika Hernandez:
And we know that we can be in grief and rage and also have in the back of our minds this bubbling up of, how do we continue to move, and how do we continue to teach our folks how to show up for each other? All the complexity and those things, I feel very grateful that I had that. I think a lot of it comes back to doing organizing and doing work in the movement that is actually about building relationships and about tending to one another. And I just feel so grateful that I have been able to root into that over the past 7, 10 years that I’ve been building to the place that I’m in as a community organizer. But it’s not easy. Even with that, it’s not always easy, especially in moments of grief and crisis.
Paige:
There was recently an event too on Saturday, how did it go?
Mika Hernandez:
Honestly, I don’t know how time flies anymore. I’m like when were the shootings and when was this vigil? We did come together as APIENC, Asians 4 Black Lives, which I wear both of those hats. And I feel so happy that I could show up in the fullness of that. And then also ASATA, the Alliance of South Asians Taking Action. And HOBAK, Hella Organized Bay Area Koreans, and Gabriela Oakland who are all groups that have collaborated together here in the Bay around trans and queer issues, feminist issues with an anti-imperialist perspective. We came together to create a vigil space. That was I think two plus weeks after the shootings happened. And it felt so good to move in that slowness because it was like, we know that we will continue to be hurting, we were still hurting, we still have these concerns. And also it’s not new, especially as trans and queer people especially.
Mika Hernandez:
We were hoping to invoke and center the experiences of sex workers, all service workers who are continuing to have to work during this pandemic. These types of violences aren’t new, and we know how that grief continues to reverberate two weeks after the fact. And so it was nice to move at a slow pace to create a really values-rooted space to be together. And also it was just sweet to see people, a rally or a vigil or whatever it is for the first time in person during a pandemic. And we were able to do it safely as much as possible. We were outside, and it felt good to just be together.
Rhiki:
Paige, I want to thank you for bringing the APIENC people that you have brought to our podcast because it’s been so enlightening for me. I know this is kind of like, where’s this coming from? But I think as a black person, it’s been really good to hear that this isn’t new for the Asian community. When we think about hateful killings and discrimination, we think about black people or brown people or transgender folks, but we don’t specifically think about Asians first. And just the people that you’ve brought reiterating the fact that this stuff happens and it’s not new. It might not be as publicized as some of the others groups’ acts have been has been really helpful for me, and I think also helpful for our listeners. So thank you Paige and thank you Mika for just reiterating the fact that this happens in multiple communities and this is an issue that we need to tackle across various racial groups because it isn’t new.
Paige:
I think when we think of we too, who is the we that doesn’t think that this happens in the Asian community? What are the structures and belief systems that are in place that divide people to believe that Asian people don’t experience this or aren’t doing the work to build solidarity? And I think for me, I often almost don’t even talk about it because I’m in so many spaces and so many communities where I just know everyone is thinking about it, is working on it, is fighting for it. I know one conversation in this entire month has been this happens to Asian people. And to me, that’s not an important conversation for me to have because not … This is hard, sorry. Not to say that that’s not an important conversation in general. But for me specifically, I’d rather talk about other conversation I think.
Paige:
Is any of this making sense? I realize I’ve never talked about this before. Returning back to what Mika was saying, I think even though it had to be a vigil or not necessarily had to be, but I think being able to connect and being community together physically even during a pandemic is really important for our healing process. I trust that when we do get together in community everyone takes the safety precautions. There’s something that’s so important about sharing physical energy with people that I think is important for doing the work too. And just seeing people’s faces and seeing people’s eyes and just being there for each other during hard times like this. So I’m really glad that the vigil went well. I’m glad that everyone was able to get together in that way.
Mika Hernandez:
I understand what you’re saying Paige about the other piece that you were saying that it’s hard to speak to and name. I don’t know, maybe I’m about to get real big about it. Again, it’s like when I think about the work that I am trying to highlight that has been ongoing and has been rooted, it is deeply about solidarity. Especially as Asian-Americans, showing up to a struggle for black liberation and building up black power is essential to my work no matter what, and it is central to my work and my politic as an Asian-American organizer. And so when I think about my communities, I’m thinking about how do I continually nuance a narrative and how do I continually talk about the systems of imperialism that have created violence across many Asian homelands for our people here that are the same structures of militarism that are currently most impacting black Americans around policing and militarized communities right now?
Mika Hernandez:
Those narratives all come together in my brain. And if I am trying to be an anti-imperialist dismantling the prison industrial complex, getting to the fact of the things that have happened in the homeland, with things that have happened here on Turtle Island and are also right now most impacting low-income black and brown people. And that includes Asian-Americans. I feel you. It’s like, how do I get into why this moment feels a little bit hard for me. It’s not about maybe this is controversial, but this is not about hate. It’s not stop Asian hate because hate to me is a one-to-one thing. It does not look at the structural reasons why people are experiencing violence and the conditions that have led to this violence right now. And I want that to be the narrative, I want that to be the thing that people are interrogating, And I want that to be the thing that everyone gets to learn around because there’s just so many conditions of violence in this country. I mean, everywhere, but I’ll speak to the United States right now.
Mika Hernandez:
There’s so many conditions of violence that I just want to blow it wide open, I want people to pay attention to that narrative. And I also know that people are hurting right now, particularly maybe Asian folks in this country who have not experienced that. And that might be because of privilege. And that might be because of, I don’t know, just narratives of what they’ve had to do to feel safe here. So I’m holding a lot of compassion for the hurt and the scared that people are experiencing.
Mika Hernandez:
But again, it isn’t new. And I want to be gentle, but I am also so excited for people to become more invested in looking at the root causes and looking at the ways that … I don’t know. At least for me, I’ve been so grateful to learn from other people who’ve come before me, organizers who’ve come before me, day-to-day people in my neighborhood who’ve come before me to talk about how we show up and take care of each other because we have a relationship. I don’t know, maybe that got a little too big from what you were saying Paige. But I feel you because it’s like, it’s such a restricted thing in this moment, but it’s so big, it’s so big.
Rhiki:
Yeah. And I appreciate both of you lifting that up. I think I was trying to come from the frame of how do we … I feel like white supremacy does this thing where it tries to keep movement siloed. And there has been great strides towards actually doing cross movement work and building solidarity. But part of that is being able to know the other narratives that are out there. And if you don’t know them, then it’s hard to know what other people are experiencing. But then also without people having to tell you what their narratives are, also actively seeking them out. So whenever you’re doing movement work, how are we being intentional about thinking about the parallels that may show up in other groups? And sometimes I feel like we’re so focused on our issue that we forget to think about those parallels and how it’s showing up to other groups in the US, globally? Because a lot of these things aren’t just something that’s happening in the United States. So always trying to keep that somewhere in the forefront of our mind when we’re doing this type of work.
Paige:
Rhiki, I have a couple of new thoughts, is that okay before I jump into the other questions we have?
Rhiki:
Yeah.
Paige:
So I think something that you just named Rhiki when you’re doing solidarity work is you have to learn other people’s stories. When you’re in relation to someone, you have to know their stories, you have to know where they’re from, where their families are from, what their family is about, what their culture is like, what their language is like, all these different things. And I think that’s really at the root of relationship building. Even if you’re of the same ‘race’ or the ‘people’, everyone even within the same people have different stories to share. And then something that I think you’re naming Mika too is that people in the Asian-American community that are maybe experiencing this fear for the first time because of just situations or privilege that they come from.
Paige:
I just remember feeling, when I talk to my friends like, “Oh, I feel really frustrated, where have you been? We’ve been like doing this work for so long, we’ve been waiting for you.” I remember, I think it was Sammy. Sammy mentioned, one of the elders said, put aside your frustrations or put aside any of those feelings and just welcome them when they come, welcome them with compassion. It’s okay, now you’re here with us, and we welcome you. And we can do that work moving forward together. So that’s something that I’m trying to work on too. And I didn’t need to make it a list. But my third thing I was thinking about is just the language that is being used during this is really interesting to me. You mentioned stop API hate, and I know there’s been a lot of conversations. And maybe this is a place where we can have a conversation about the language.
Paige:
I really liked what you had to say about the analysis of hate, about that being a one-on-one interaction and not a structural analysis or a structural violence. And I wonder too if people even know the history of how API as a racial framework came to be, as a solidarity framework. If people know the complexities of immigration in that solidarity framework too. So I think a lot of this moment for me, I’ve just been thinking about the language, why are people using certain hashtags, where are these hashtags coming from? Not that that’s the most important thing, but I think language is a really critical thing to think about because it names the relationship that we have almost through the story too. I don’t know if you have thoughts about the language that’s being used in conversations about this, but we’d love to hear those.
Mika Hernandez:
All of the points that you just said. I guess about language, maybe it also relates to one of the other things you were saying about that real frustration that’s like, “Where have you been? We have been having these conversations. These have been important to us for a long time.” And feeling a little like, “Oh, now you’re here?” I have definitely felt that. At the same time … Maybe I’m going a little bit off track, but I feel like I’ve been telling this story a lot because it’s just I think really sitting with me and it’s on my heart. I was listening to a talk from Mariame Kaba who is an amazing transformative justice practitioner and abolitionist and someone that I really look to for learning. And I’m especially coming to this thinking a lot about transformative justice and how much more conversation around abolition has been prevalent, especially since last summer but in that moment again.
Mika Hernandez:
People have been talking about defunding the police and dismantling prisons for a long time. And that was a similar feeling then that I have right now of why are people only coming to this now? But I don’t want to be too salty. That doesn’t make good movements to just be salty and like, “Where were you?” Any way, so this thing that Mariame Kaba said was in response to a question about what about liberals co-opting this language and co-opting our movements around abolition? And Mariame said, “I’m not that worried about it because I want these movements to be irresistible, and we need everyone to be on board.” And she also specifically was speaking to the fact that her vision of abolition right now and what she’s advocating for and trying to build is probably wildly different than what Harriet Tubman was envisioning around abolition. And yet she wouldn’t be here as Mariame Kaba without Harriet Tubman.
Mika Hernandez:
And I thought that was such a lovely and gracious reminder from Mariame, I just appreciate that she shared that out with us. And by the time people get to where we are right now, we’ll be onto the next thing. And hopefully, we are continuing to accumulate and grow. And so when I’m starting to feel myself getting to that salty place, especially recently. I heard this a few months back I think. And especially in the past few weeks as people have been using language that maybe I don’t agree with, I’m trying to sit with myself and trying to sit with that wisdom from Mariame and be like, okay, we want irresistible movements, and language can be finessed. It maybe starts with conversations like this one where I’m talking to y’all and then maybe your listeners can hear about it, and then share that with their people. Have conversations with each other about where this knowledge comes from and how we continue to lift each other up. And maybe our analysis gets sharper, but I’m trying to not be in my slaty place. And I think that that is part of the work.
Rhiki:
That’s real. We were actually having this conversation in August about language not too long ago, about how some people will always just be ahead of other people when it comes to the language. Like how woke used to mean something completely different than what it means right now. And we went from woke … Or how liberal used to mean something different. And now we’re like onto this term of anti-racism and how that’s the thing right now. But once people catch up and it sort of becomes co-opted by institutions who wants to use it to make themselves look good, how we always have to keep coming up with new terms to describe the thing or the place that we want people to get to. But how that’s also frustrating because we worked so hard to get this term to mean what we want it to mean. And now because more people are coming along, it’s starting to mean something else. I understand that frustration there.
Paige:
Also, Mariame Kaba, damn, she would … What is the word? Not put you in check, but gently caress you into the right direction. And you’re like, “Yes, I needed that.” I remember talking to you in Sami’s Kitchen I think about you participating in an extended training with the Transformative Justice Collective a few years ago. Could you just talk more about your work on the core team, just about being near her?
Mika Hernandez:
Yeah. So I am part of the Bay Area Transformative Justice Collective, and it is a group that’s based specifically here in the Bay Area obviously with the name. It came together a few years back, actually many years back now and has gone through many shifts over time. But originally came together specifically to think about transformative justice responses to child sexual abuse and to ending child sexual abuse. But I do think that over the years it has attracted people who are just generally excited to learn about transformative justice because, I don’t know, we’re in a beautiful ecosystem here in the Bay of movement and people trying to do cool shit.
Mika Hernandez:
It has created a lot of space for people to just learn about how to integrate transformative justice into their lives and to do some deep learning around it. I feel like probably when I was sharing that with you Paige, that was a few years ago and I was doing a six-week study. There’s like a summer study, a deep one-on-one on transformative justice. And after that summer, I joined a small crew that was getting skilled up specifically around interventions and how to hold processes and all of that kind of work also through the same space. And that was just a few of us.
Mika Hernandez:
And then from there, I was asked to be on the core of this collective. We’re just a group of people, we’re not a organization or a nonprofit or anything. We are just some people trying to do this thing. And right now, that is just me and my friend Havi, my friend Andy, and my friend Katie. We offer some programming, but we also hold processes or offer consultations or one-on-ones. We’re also in the process of revamping and seeing what we’re going to do. So it’s in flux right now. But it’s some of the best work I feel like I’ve gotten to do in a long, long while.
Rhiki:
We talked about this a little bit before in season one I think with Adrienne Maree Brown, but I do want to get your perspective on it. How would you describe the difference between transformative justice and the restorative justice model that I see popping up a lot in our educational system?
Mika Hernandez:
I was actually just talking about this with a friend yesterday, a friend who’s wanting to learn a little bit more. So I’m like, “Oh, good, it’s fresh in my brain.” This is super, super quick and overviewy. And I don’t know as much about restorative justice, but they are distinct. Transformative justice and restorative justice are distinct thing. I often come back to the literal name. And when we talk about restorative justice, oftentimes we’re thinking about restoring relationships when there has been harm or abuse or violence. And I think that with transformative justice, we are thinking about transforming the conditions that allowed that violence to happen in the first place because maybe we don’t want to restore back to the relationship because that was what led to hurt and that was what led to violence or whatever it is.
Mika Hernandez:
That’s not to say that restorative justice practitioners and restorative justice isn’t about transforming conditions, but I do think traditionally that’s been my knowledge and my experience of the differences. And I do think that transformative justice is explicitly about not working with the state, and it is about reducing violence in all possibilities as much as possible. And we know that sites that collaborate with a state like ICE, like foster care systems, like the courts do create more violence. And that is something that we hold true to because it is an abolitionist framework and an abolitionist practice. But within restorative justice, there is opportunity to collaborate I think more often like you’re naming within schools. And sometimes also within the legal system, we know that that’s coming up more and more. And I don’t say that to be like that’s them versus us. Because if anything, if it is creating more opportunity to reduce violence, that’s dope, and I’m happy for that. So that is my little spiel.
Paige:
I think something that you mentioned earlier is just how do we think about community safety? That’s something that’s at the core of prison abolition, anti-imperialism work, all of the different things you named. And I know within APIENC, within Transformative Justice Collective, that’s something that is discussed and brainstormed and worked through and practiced. Can you talk a little bit about what community safety looks like in practice?
Mika Hernandez:
Yeah. I think that community safety in practice will look different for different communities. And I think that that is a beautiful thing. And I think that is something that abolition has taught me, but it’s something that I get to abundantly talk about when I do transformative justice one-on-ones or conversations. I think it does start with listening. It starts with listening to what we have in place right now and what is not serving us and what is actually creating less safety or more fear or actual violence. I can speak to something specifically from APIENC, which I think is super dope because you already are a little bit more familiar with it, but we did lead a full community needs assessment called Up To Us. That was particularly looking at the experiences of trans, gender non-conforming, non-binary Asian-Pacific islanders in the Bay Area.
Mika Hernandez:
We were looking at literally, what does the community need? It was a needs assessment. And so we spoke to things around health and housing, and we also talked about safety. I forget the exact numbers right now, but more than, I think it was 70 something percent of our respondents named feeling uncomfortable or more unsafe going to the police. When we think about that, I’m particularly thinking about our sex worker friends and our people who might be undocumented who are also trans. And we know that we experience so much more harassment literally from the police. And so that’s one particular example from this needs assessment that we did that has led us to think more about, okay, we know that safety doesn’t come from the police. And we know that that is an informed thing for particularly trans and queer Asian-Pacific islander, what do we need instead?
Mika Hernandez:
And we also got to ask questions about what does make you feel safe or what makes you feel held in community? And that was literally hearing about places that allowed us to share our stories. How can we invest in that type of stuff? How can we invest in services and connection with each other that creates a more holistic sense of safety for our whole world. But again, it’s specific. And I think that that’s something so beautiful and something that I always bring to places when I do like TJ one-on-one, they’re like, “How do I do TJ? How do I do the thing?” And I’m like, “Well, first start by talking about your values and maybe setting up pod.” We have this thing called pod mapping where you get to literally map the people in your life that you would go to if you were harmed, if you had experienced violence. And also maybe a whole separate thing if you were someone that caused harm or violence to someone else, you’ve perpetrated something.
Mika Hernandez:
And start having conversations with those people about accountability, about your values, about what you need if you’re in crisis, if you’re having a panic attack, whatever it is. And so people want a step-by-step about how we get a safe community, but it really is so much more nuanced. And I love being like, “Y’all already have the answers in some ways,” and like, “you will continue to unfold what those answers are over time.”
Paige:
Definitely, I think it’s going to look different for everyone depending on who the people in your pod are going to be, what your values are together. Definitely. I had a conversation with somebody recently about policing. And this person’s concern was, what are the immediate next steps? And I think that’s a lot of people’s first questions is like, “If we get rid of the police or if we defund the police, what are we going to do right now when someone breaks into our house or someone is on the street with a gun or if there someone who seems dangerous in the street?” And my first thing usually when I think of those things is like, “What are we doing to get to know our neighbors? Why don’t we know the people who we live near? What are the things that are in place that make people around us feel dangerous or feel like strangers?” So yeah, just having those conversations are difficult and thinking about those that really specific to people and place that you’re in relation to, for sure.
Mika Hernandez:
I love that you brought that up Paige because I do think that is sometimes a trolling question that comes up, and sometimes it’s a genuine question that comes up about, well, what are we going to do instead then? And whether it’s a trolling question or whether it’s a real question, I always come back to, well, let’s examine what’s happening right now. And particularly when people bring this up, they’ll talk about rape or sexual assault. And we know that these systems do not actually create more safety for people who’ve experienced sexual assault. If anything, we know that a lot of rape goes unreported to the police because you will have to be going through a re-traumatizing criminal case or you will have to not be believed.
Mika Hernandez:
And if it was the case that police were really making that stop or we’re safe, wouldn’t we not have that right now? Sometimes I do want to be like, not in a mean way, but sometimes I’m like, “Well, what about what’s working right now, is it actually working?” And I do think also what you were saying, and I love so much, it’s like, well, what if we invested a lot of that money and that time and that energy and that care into systems that serve us like getting to know our neighbors or having healthcare or having a place to be any time, having a place to be, having investment in our schools. Reallocating resources to the things that will transform our conditions and transform the places that we’re coming from and the places that we build community.
Rhiki:
Yeah. I appreciate y’all lifting that up because I think I’m starting to go into some of these conversations about, well, if we defund the police, then what do we do next? But Mika, you’re saying let’s analyze what’s already here and if it’s even working, and it’s not. Because like you said, not only is it not making our environment safer, but the people who are committing those acts aren’t learning anything. They’re not being rehabilitated, they’re not changing. They’re just going into a system that honestly causes them when they get to the other side of it to probably be even worse off than they did when they went in. If we know this to be true about our current system, then we know that we need to do something that is completely different in order to get different results. So I appreciate you both for lifting that up.
Mika Hernandez:
Yeah. I’m all for more imagination, and I think that that is a big gift of abolition. It’s real that we don’t get to actually access that space of imagination and what else is possible, but I want us to. I believe so much that we can have something different, many things that are different.
Paige:
Speaking of imagination, you do a lot of artwork. And I feel like art is definitely a place where that’s cultivated. Do you want to talk a little bit about your cooking or your magic making or any of those things you love to do?
Mika Hernandez:
I guess I could speak to it a little bit. It hasn’t felt as alive for me as a practice as of late. But in some ways, I think I was sharing about my herbal program that I’m starting right now. And that feels a little bit like an investment in my creativity and myself as an artist as well as an herbal medicine person. A lot of my art work and creative work does revolve still around food and plants. No matter what I’m creating, I still feel like I come back to that. Ultimately, that’s because it allows me to share story, and story feels so important to who I am altogether as a mixed person and as a multi-generational person in the United States. Without as much connection to my ethnic lineages and those types of ancestry, I have found that story. And the possibility of just being in the fullness of how I move through life and putting that out through food and putting that out through art has been really powerful.
Mika Hernandez:
It allows me to connect with people even if things like my access to language, ancestral languages is gone. Or it allows me to trace where people have come from and what food contributions have made it onto my plate today or have continued to feel like comfort and community. I don’t know, it all comes back to story for me. And that feels just as much a part of my organizing as it does of my art, as it does of et cetera, et cetera.
Paige:
There was a period of time I think you were sending out newsletters of things that you were cooking and stories you were sharing with your meals, and music you were listening to. That was really fun.
Mika Hernandez:
Yeah. That was at the very beginning of the pandemic I think I was doing round-up of different words and images and food that have been really nourishing to me. Maybe that’s a thing back for myself that I have to be like, “Yeah, that is a part of art and that is part of curation and creation that I get to do.” But then I’m like, I don’t see the line where that creative part of me begins and ends with the community organizer part of me because they all feel like they just go hand-in-hand.
Paige:
Yeah. I don’t think the lineage of separation or division is important, I think having that all entangled is beautiful. It makes sense to me that they’re together.
Rhiki:
So Mika, before we let you go, I just want to say thank you for having this conversation with us. I know this was something that we reached out to you and wanted to have a quick turnaround, so I really appreciate you joining us today. Who are the people that you tap into, people or organizations that you tap into when you want to know more information or stay up to date or learn something new about the particular topics that we discussed today?
Mika Hernandez:
That’s a great question, I love that you’re building up the resources.I guess I will say for sure Mariame Kaba. I also would link to batjc.wordpress.com, which is the site for the Bay Area Transformative Justice Collective of which I am apart. We have a really awesome media and readings list there. APIENC, and I’ll say Ancestral Apothecary because I’m on this new journey with them.
Paige:
Rhiki, what reflections and thoughts are you having after that conversation?
Rhiki:
I think two things are really present in my mind. One of which is when Mika said hate is a one-on-one type of interaction and how we need to be careful about not centering the hateful acts but centering the work of the organizers. I think that’s something that really stuck out to me and was a learning experience for me about being mindful in the way in which I talk about these acts and making sure that I’m not centering the hate crime but centering the people. And then another thing that Mika mentioned that really resonated with me was how we need to allow for more room for imagination and really invest in creativity. I know because I’m a creative, that might seem easier for me than people who don’t identify as an artist or a writer or all those things that probably fall under being a creative. But how creativity is so expansive that it’s really not you have to do this particular thing, but you just have to allow yourself to have time to imagine things, and imagine things that go beyond the scope of what you originally thought was possible.
Rhiki:
So really expanding what possibilities mean to you. And in doing so, you envision a world that may have seem impossible at one point but now you see that it is possible and we can reach it. And I think that’s something important for me to do more but also just everyone. If we really want to get to a new world, we have to envision what that world will look like. And that requires us to engage in imagination. What about you, Paige? What are some things that stuck out to you?
Paige:
I love the description you have of imagination, I think that’s so well put. For me, I think even though we had a couple of conversations about transformative justice, I think it’s always a good reminder to me that the work that transformative justice is trying to do is to recreate the circumstance harm doesn’t happen or isn’t able to happen because people are fully seen and heard in their needs. And I’m really glad that you asked Mika to distinguish the difference between restorative and transformative justice, I think that was a really helpful reminder. Mika also mentioned just the importance of having a slower pace when they were answering your question about how to hold both the feelings of this violence occurring and have been occurring and then also organizing within a timely manner afterwards.
Paige:
She highlighted just allowing the gift of feeling and the slowness afterwards for herself. And also organizing the vigil and putting that together and allowing it to happen a little bit more slowly and with kindness and ease. I think that’s really important too. I think in organizing spaces there’s a sense of urgency. A lot of that is to try to control the narrative before mass media does, and that can be really harmful to our bodies and the way that we relate to our bodies. So slowness, really important.
Rhiki:
Yeah, yeah, agree. And that’s it for our episode today. The Radical Futures Now podcast is housed under the Arcus Center for Social Justice Leadership at Kalamazoo College. Special thanks to Trevor Loduem-Jackson for our music and [inaudible 00:53:12] for our graphics. Be sure to follow us on our Instagram at Acrus Center. So you next week.