If you are interested in joining our mailing list, please submit your email below.
Photo Courtesy – KPTV 12
Last Tuesday, July 23, Portland City Hall issued an eviction order for our City Hall Prayer Vigil against the “Camping” Ban, then on its 600th day from Dec. 1, 2011. It is yet another attempt by the City to take a uncompromising “out of sight, out of mind” approach to systemic issues and cross lines of procedure and constitutionality by forcibly removing a religious space. One person, Stephen “Nature Boy” Glenn, refused to abide by police until escorted off the property, and the following is his press release statement to the City as he files a lawsuit against City Officials.
“For the silent majority who reads the paper and watches the news but has never spent one night out on the streets with these masters in rags, as I call them, only can speak on hearsay. But there are levels of awareness that can only be gained through meditation and actual life experience, not through taking some reporters’ word for it. (Reporters don’t get hired for being honest, they get hired for speaking well and looking pretty.) What Occupy Portland is doing is dismantling their scripts and hearsay through actually interacting with the people of Portland.
“What kind of people would mislead the people of Portland about what is really going on inside and outside of City Hall? People like Gary Crane, the head of Security. The same person who won’t honor my written request for video footage of not one but two seizures I had directly in front of City Hall, knowing that I have taken a religious vow of silence. The same person who excluded me from the steps of City Hall for singing a tribute song of prayer for Treyvon Martin, a victim who’s killer was led off just recently by Florida’s “justice system”. Or at least Mr. Crane tried to get me to leave which I didn’t until I was finished with the song of prayer. If you wouldn’t interrupt a preachers’ sermon, then why would you interrupt a song of prayer for a victim of society? And why would you tear down a homeless persons tent when all the shelters are full due to homeless overflow and a tent structure is the only thing protecting them from the elements?
“I’ve been with the Occupy Movement since October of 2011 beginning in Dallas, TX, later crossing up to Occupy D.C. when things in Dallas were illegally shut down by a Mrs. Mary Suhm who went over the City Council’s head. Not by staying within the boundaries of the law, but simply using intimidation and superior firepower. D.C. was a different animal. I spent Two months with Occupy D.C., and two weeks helping maintain a presence at Concepcion Picciotto’s Vigil in front of the White House. Concepcion Picciotto has been staging her protest against nuclear weapons everyday since 1981.
“I am a philanthropist by nature but a civil rights activist by duty to myself and my family. And by family I mean every free, living soul that has been mistreated, brutally beaten, maced, tazed, kicked awake, sleep deprived, and indeed had their lives lost to the elements and a broken system. But it wasn’t until I came to Occupy Portland was I for the first time told I can’t use a tent or a tent like structure.
“First of all, it’s hard enough being homeless; nobody is trying to hear some Mayor with an ego the size of Pluto telling them how to sleep, knowing the elements of a cold and unpredictable night can, has, and will continue to deprive the homeless population of the City of Portland of proper rest by using Threat Duress Coercion (TDC), superior fire power and intimidation to enforce it’s Camping Ban.
“I especially have a vendetta against the Camping Ban and it’s elusive rules and regulations on the subject of homelessness. One thing I’ve learned about epilepsy over the twenty years that I’ve dealt with it is that sleep deprivation will trigger a seizure. All people who deal with epilepsy are different when it comes to what can trigger a seizure, but for me it’s always been sleep deprivation. Well, I’m a grown man — if I don’t want to be forcefully sleep deprived then why don’t I find a dark corner somewhere and sleep it off? I don’t know. Maybe it’s because I have a little of Rosa Parks soul in me. Maybe I’m tired of being discriminated against and don’t like being told as a free, living soul that I’m not wanted or trusted simply because of the lack of housing and income that is the result of the misuse of funds within the system.
“Earlier in July, I could definitely see a number increase of the protesters at Occupy. Enough to where, campers began to overflow onto the sidewalks of Wells Fargo Tower and Chapman Square. Some of the overflow had just arrived from been the Rainbow National Gathering in Montana. Others were locals who weren’t necessarily homeless but were showing up in solidarity for the number in support while the media read scripts handed down to them from the City Power on high — or, at least high on themselves.
“In other words, they were not allowing Occupiers to sleep properly. And why, well if it’s not obvious by now, City Hall doesn’t like competition. Especially competition that holds up mirrors with signs and forces them to look at their wrongdoings and mistreatment of those less fortunate. Which brings me to the mirror I’m about to hold up:
“On July 8, I was protesting in front of the steps of City Hall just a few feet from the Vigil when I began to have a grand seizure, triggered by (you guessed it) sleep deprivation from not having proper rest, stemming from inadequate sleeping gear to protect me from the elements. Human beings without shelter shouldn’t have to lose sleep because another human being who has a house and warm bed.
“It’s kind of like being treated like the first smear on a fresh new pair of Nikes. Unfortunately for Mayor Hales, he can’t just lick his thumb and wipe us off his shoe, which is what he’s doing with his sleep deprivation tactics and Camping Ban. But decisions are never made by just one person, which is why I’m suing Charlie Hales and THE CITY OF PORTLAND for negligence and permanent physical damages. The seizure caused me to dislocate my shoulder and fracture my arm; I can only get half the rotation I had in my shoulder before the attack and the pain is still a 10. Epilepsy and homelessness isn’t necessarily a bad mix if the person with the epilepsy is, like myself, taking medication religiously and getting a proper diet of sleep. Take away that same human beings right to sleep, using TDC as well as intimidation with obvious superior firepower, and epilepsy and homelessness can become a deadly combination.”