'We're human beings!' the homeless woman yelled. 'Acknowledge us!' Then people did --
‘We’re human beings!’ the homeless woman yelled. ‘Acknowledge us!’ Then people did — in a way she didn’t expect.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/social-issues/were-human-beings-the-homeless-woman-yelled-acknowledge-us-then-people-did--in-a-way-she-didnt-expect/2019/03/28/64131000-50b5-11e9-8d28-f5149e5a2fda_story.html?utm_term=.c471415fdb8d
When The Washington Post published a profile Friday of Monica Diaz, a fast-food restaurant employee simultaneously navigating the homeless and working worlds, Howard University law student Gabriela Sevilla immediately got to work.
She organized efforts to assist Diaz and her husband, Pete Etheridge, launching a GoFundMe campaign that started out small — but rapidly grew — and committing hours every day to getting them off the streets. Within a week, the fund raised more than $22,000, and the couple that Sevilla set out to help are on the verge of housing, either through a city program or by finding an apartment on their own.
Sevilla, a 25-year-old intern with the Washington Legal Clinic for the Homeless, first met Diaz and Etheridge on Feb. 28. It was the day of an encampment cleanup — biweekly sweeps that city officials say are necessary to keep the streets safe, but which homeless advocates say are dehumanizing and can strip the homeless of what little they have. Diaz, who’d just undergone another sleepless night, was frantic. She was begging for help and attention.
“We’re human beings!” she yelled. “Please, just acknowledge us!”
Sevilla, who was attending the cleanup as a legal observer, spoke with Diaz for a long while that day, and after she left, she couldn’t stop thinking about her. Here was a woman just like her — a Latina raised by immigrants, who’d never had much in her life. Sevilla knew what it was like to get evicted and to feel untethered from family. In an alternative reality, Sevilla realized, their roles could easily have been swapped, with her in the tent and Diaz peering in from the outside.