Though many people are increasingly viewing the Bay Area as nothing more than an extension of Silicon Valley’s technology playground, the region has always been known for its progressive and activist heritage. From the Free Speech Movement in 1960s in Berkeley to the rise of the gay community in 1970s in San Francisco, this has always been a place for imagining and kick-starting true social change.
Yet despite the widespread currency of the tech-centric stereotype, progressive activism is still alive and well here. Below is just a small sampling of inspiring social activists based in the Bay Area who are fighting for positive change across an array of political and social landscapes.
Samara Azam-Yu and Sierra Harris (Co-Executive Directors, ACCESS: Women’s Health Justice)
Access Women’s Health Justice is an Oakland-based organization offering women information and support for everything to do with reproductive health, from abortion care and emergency contraception to family planning and prenatal care. This year alone, for example, ACCESS supported nearly 600 callers who needed help accessing abortion care.
Though it would be hyperbole to cite the recent Colorado Springs shooting at a Planned Parenthood facility as the revival of large-scale anti-abortion violence, there is no arguing that women’s reproductive justice is at risk. The GOP-led Congress recently approved a bill that would defund Planned Parenthood. Thanks to President Obama’s veto, however, the bill won’t become law, but its passage represents the precarious nature of women’s rights to reproductive health care. Thanks to Samara and Sierra, the Bay Area has a strong ally in protecting those rights.
Photo courtesy of Samara Azam-Yu and Sierra Harris.
Sam Dodge (Director of Public Policy at the Mayor’s Office of Housing Opportunity, Partnership & Engagement, San Francisco)
“They are going to have to leave.” That’s how San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee said the city will address the homeless problem in preparation for the big, fat Super Bowl 50 party invading the city this week and running through the first week of February. The person in charge of that job is Sam Dodge, who has worked on the issue of homelessness since November 2014. Sadly, the issue is a perennial problem in San Francisco, with the city’s homeless count hovering just below 7,000 for the past decade and the vast majority of homeless people living in District 6 (SOMA, the Tenderloin, Mid-Market and nearby neighborhoods).
Beyond dealing with the fundamental problem of homelessness, it’s on Dodge to figure out how to solve new variations on the theme, like helping the homeless weather El Niño, finding a new site for theNavigation Center and establishing areas for the homeless to stay while Super Bowl activities take over vast swaths of public space. Here’s to hoping that Dodge is more tactful than our mayor and more effective than city staff have been over the past few decades.
Photo courtesy of Sam Dodge.
Alicia Garza (Founder, Black Lives Matter)
After a Florida jury acquitted George Zimmerman of all counts in the shooting of 17-year-old Trayvon Martin, a hashtag went viral: “#BlackLivesMatter.” This was no accident, but rather a conscious movement founded by Oakland resident Alicia Garza along with fellow activists Patrisse Cullors and Opal Tometi. Since its founding in 2013, Black Lives Matter (BLM) has evolved under Garza’s guidance from a social media moment to a national crusade, drawing inspiration from the African American Civil Rights Movement, black feminist struggles in the 1980s and Occupy Wall Street.
Today, BLM stands up against state-sanctioned violence and the racist prison system, and they vehemently defend the rights of black women and queer and trans folks. While San Franciscans should be prideful that one of the BLM founders hails from the Bay Area, this isn’t just a notch on the wall; rather, it’s a charge to the city and region to uphold its activist tradition and lead the rest of the world toward a brighter, more progressive future.
Julie Rae Levak (Founder, VanishingSF)
You can’t go to a bar, a party or lunch with an old friend without the inevitable conversation topic arising: the downfall of San Francisco. Sometimes it’s spurred on because you or one of your friends got evicted (or willingly decided to move) and now can’t find a single reasonably priced place to live in the entire city. Or maybe it’s because your favorite taco shop or bar haunt closed down. Or maybe it’s because a new hideous, homogeneously designed piece of architecture cropped up in your neighborhood.
In any case, although most San Franciscans feel a sense of change sweeping over the city, it’s hard for most of us to put a finger exactly on what that change entails without giving in to simplistic generalizations. That’s why Julie Rae Levak created VanishingSF, a social media hub to document all the little transformations occurring across the city in hopes of capturing and critiquing the “tsunami” of gentrification overcoming the city. It’s a simple concept, but it makes for powerful results. Read Levak’s piece “San Francisco Is Vanishing” right here on The Bold Italic to learn more.
Theresa Sparks (Executive Director, San Francisco Human Rights Commission)
Did you know that San Francisco has its own Human Rights Commission? We have, since 1964, when the Civil Rights Movement bubbled up across the country to fight for the rights of African Americans to access the same services as white Americans.
Today, the commission continues to advocate for human and civil rights, investigate discrimination complaints and mediate disputes in the community. And its executive director is Theresa Sparks, one of the city’s most famous transgender women.
Born male, Sparks suffered from decades of gender dysphoria until coming to terms with, as she puts it, “the realization that the only way you can finally live in peace is to change your physical appearance so others will see you the same way you have always seen yourself.” After moving to San Francisco in the late ’90s, she turned her attention to issues of discrimination, anti-transgender violence and police harassment—issues she’d personally struggled with as a transgender person. Since then, she has served as president of the city’s police commission and as CEO for the adult toy company Good Vibrations. And in 2003, she became the first transgender woman ever named “Woman of the Year” by the California State Assembly.
In other words, our city’s Human Rights Commission is led by not only someone who understands what it’s like to be discriminated against, but also someone who is inspiring and powerful enough to help all those facing discrimination today.
Photo courtesy of Guillaume Paumier.