Video of the Day: such caring people...

Still slowly catching up on videos.

It's a curious thing, looking at them.  Many times - especially when there was media attention due to their illegal Canada Day block party at our home - AUPE would be asked about the verbal harassment and abuse Artspace members said they were suffering.  The typical response would be something along the lines of, "no, we're peaceful, it's Artspace members who have been abusive," and "prove it."

Meanwhile, for months, there were video cameras everywhere, and signs all around the high rise stating that their activities were being recorded and that said recordings could end up on Youtube.

Which means that they behaved the way they did, knowing their actions were being recorded (and often doing their own recording), knowing these would eventually go public, and then did stuff like this, anyway...




This video, taken on July 8, shows how even when the picketers were being relatively "peaceful," they still engaged in verbal harassment.  In this case, we have one of SAIL's striking "care" givers (later joined by another) verbally attacking a SAIL user-member.

What is bizarre is hearing such anger and hatred aimed at someone she would have provided SAIL services to.

Publicly, the picketing SAIL staff mouth platitudes about how much the care for "our residents" and how they just want things to be back the way there were.

Really?

How?

How can these "care" givers act like this towards someone they used to provide services to, then think that they'd be able to come back to work at some point and everything would be hunky dory, as if none of this ever happened?

This particular user member endured such verbal harassment, sometimes much worse than this, for months.  More so than others.  Why they targeted her for extra abuse, I have no idea.

Of course, there is also the fact that user members wouldn't want things to be back the way there were.  Quality of care had been deteriorating for some time, and once the replacement workers came in, our user members started seeing what good quality care was actually like.

"The way it was," would be a significant step downwards for our user members.

Can you imagine having these "care" givers taking care of you?

After seeing such visceral hatred from a "care" giver outside your home for months, would you be willing to allow that person into your home?  Imagine they were the person who had to help you take a shower?  Or even just put on a pair of pressure socks?  Would you trust someone like that to give you your medications?

I know I sure wouldn't!

The key thing about the SAIL model of care is that it is consumer driven and self-directed.  SAIL user members are living independently in their own homes.  They have control over who can come into those homes.  While SAIL hires the staff that provides the care, the user member tells those providers how their care needs are to be met.

That's all part of independent living.

With institutionalised care, people who need care are not living in their own homes, but are in assigned units, sometimes shared with others.  They have no control over who comes and goes out of their units or when.  They have no say in who provides their care, or how that care is given.

AUPE still refuses to acknowledge that SAIL Inc and Artspace Inc are separate entities - otherwise, they can't justify their picketing of private homes.  Even the striking SAIL staff, judging by the Newspeak interviews they've done for AUPE, seem to have no clue.  How can someone say they've worked for SAIL for years, and still not understand what a co-op is, or the difference between the co-op and their employer, SAIL?

AUPE would have Artspace user members lose their autonomy; lose their ability to determine who enters their private home, who provides their care and how.

Strangest of all, somehow the striking SAIL staff can verbally abuse a user member, and still think that they are somehow the victims of injustice; still think that they can just come back to work some day, and everyone will forget that not too long ago, they stood on the street outside our homes, swearing and verbally abusing the very people they claim to care so much about.

A true example of Doublethink, if ever there was one.