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DETROIT, MI — As a single mother of five, I feel the attack on those with limited means. Having completed my stay at a domestic violence shelter in 2013, I was homeless in the freezing cold, in my van, pregnant with toddlers. With shelters full and winter in full force, I found an abandoned house in Detroit left wide open, and set about securing it and making it livable. Like thousands of other properties left vacant, it had been breached and scrapped out, just an empty blighted shell waiting to go up in flames or bulldozed to the ground. For the last year, I’ve cleaned up the property, posted up inspirational phrases, planted vegetables and flowers, and turned what was previously a crackhouse into a home, where neighbors appreciate my presence, and a safer atmosphere has been created, across the street from two schools. Now it is going into tax foreclosure, after abandonment by an investor in England. Again, the safety of my family is threatened, and what I did for survival, though commended by many, has been criminalized by the state of Michigan, in a slow, fascist takeover.
Systematic oppression is nearing its peak in Detroit, with upwards of 130,000 faced with living on the streets this year as over 67,000 homes face tax foreclosure. Property taxes haven’t been reassessed since the housing crash, and Detroiters pay twice what they should in taxes, including countless seniors on limited incomes. A slow, forced exodus of those of color and limited means is currently in effect by the establishment, the plan to bring wealthier whites in from the suburbs. Available shelters house 1900 people. Where will this new population of homeless go? In 2014, in Michigan, trespass became a first offense misdemeanor, second offense felony. Operations are underway to criminalize homelessness, and feeding the homeless. A strategic class war is being waged, and the conditions causing poverty and homelessness are like a domino effect. It happens easily—one wrong move, and the entire house of cards falls down. All over the country, we seem to be moving towards the U.S. equivalent of the Holocaust.
I’m fighting it, and I encourage others to mobilize and fight systematic displacement and criminalization of the citizens of Detroit, and everywhere. This is NOT optional. This is NOT Nazi Germany, or the pre-Civil War South. This is AMERICA, in 2015! The heart of the country will not go down without a fight.
Guaranteed in our Constitution is the right to life. Requirements of life are food, water, and shelter. I think it’s time to enact FDR’s 2nd Bill of Rights. Join with me, fellow citizens, fellow humans! Stand up before it’s too late! A new system needs to replace the cancerous one in existence, which wages war all over the world and has turned on its own people. We cannot let the police state to come to full fruition. Please help NOW to stop it in its tracks.
Contact 248-979-1596 or email: goddessrmf@gmail.com for more information.
I am so very proud to know Rebecca Fritz and her family. She has shown remarkable courage in this time in history where we have gone backwards in how we treat inhumanely a huge amount of people. I am so ashamed to live in a country, where the morals of our government, and corporate america is intent on destroying a huge amount of the human race. How is that allowed to continue, with so many hurt and humiliated on a daily basis. I, and many others will not be a part of this nightmare and will do everything we can to be a part of a better world. I would rather go down in glory, then live in defeat.