WEBVTT - Francisco: My Brother’s Path to Community Organizing 0:00:00.600 --> 0:00:02.680 The identity of that matters most to me is that 0:00:02.720 --> 0:00:07.480 I am a person. I'm a human. Yeah, and the 0:00:07.520 --> 0:00:09.760 thing that matters most to me is what do I 0:00:09.960 --> 0:00:12.160 do with being human? 0:00:12.560 --> 0:00:17.760 Welcome to when You're Invisible. My name is Maria Fernanda Vies, 0:00:17.800 --> 0:00:20.360 but I know not everyone can roll their ours, so 0:00:20.560 --> 0:00:23.759 it's fine to call me Maria. When You're Invisible is 0:00:23.880 --> 0:00:26.760 my love letter to the working class and others who 0:00:26.840 --> 0:00:30.200 are seemingly invisible in our society. I hope to build 0:00:30.200 --> 0:00:33.519 a community here that will inspire you to have generous 0:00:33.560 --> 0:00:38.160 conversations with others that are different from you, conversations that 0:00:38.240 --> 0:00:41.320 might help you see life in an entirely different way. 0:00:42.840 --> 0:00:44.200 Let's get started. 0:00:46.000 --> 0:00:48.600 This is so cool. I have my brother across from me. 0:00:48.960 --> 0:00:54.200 Do you want to introduce yourself? And by do you 0:00:54.200 --> 0:00:55.959 want to please introduce yourself? 0:00:57.960 --> 0:01:02.560 The look in his eye was like do I No? 0:01:02.760 --> 0:01:06.679 The real question was which name do I introduce myself with? 0:01:07.440 --> 0:01:08.800 My name is Francisco Las. 0:01:09.480 --> 0:01:12.559 The consideration that Francisco has with his name is one 0:01:12.600 --> 0:01:15.640 that we all have when you have a long Latin name. 0:01:16.200 --> 0:01:21.480 For example, Francisco's full legal name is Francisco Andres Bies Busso. 0:01:22.480 --> 0:01:25.600 I laugh at this moment because of course he's considering 0:01:25.640 --> 0:01:28.480 that at the top of an interview, and it's hilarious 0:01:28.520 --> 0:01:32.080 because he's super excited to do this interview. He's getting goofy, 0:01:32.360 --> 0:01:36.800 but then he's also slowly, ever so slightly sliding into 0:01:36.880 --> 0:01:40.800 what I call his interview mode, his professional mode, where 0:01:40.840 --> 0:01:43.840 he straightens his body and you can see his head 0:01:43.880 --> 0:01:47.680 tilting just like ever so slightly to make sure that 0:01:47.800 --> 0:01:50.880 you know he's in position, ready to go. It's a 0:01:50.920 --> 0:01:54.760 fun little phenomenon to watch. My brother, Francisco is one 0:01:54.840 --> 0:01:57.560 year older than me. I call this Mexican twins since 0:01:57.600 --> 0:02:01.320 we're two months shy, being Irish twins. He's a goofy 0:02:01.360 --> 0:02:05.040 person in private, but he's very serious and passionate when 0:02:05.080 --> 0:02:08.160 he talks about the things he cares about, which we 0:02:08.320 --> 0:02:12.440 all will notice. I have a particular image of my brother. 0:02:12.880 --> 0:02:18.959 He is smart, thoughtful, driven at time's intense, and definitely 0:02:18.960 --> 0:02:22.280 marching to the beat of his own drum. He loves 0:02:22.400 --> 0:02:25.640 Radiohead and Blink one eighty two, and at his core 0:02:25.720 --> 0:02:29.560 he's always been an alternative punk rock soul. He's a short, 0:02:29.639 --> 0:02:32.320 five to five man with small wooden hoops in his 0:02:32.400 --> 0:02:35.800 ears and he's had a beard since high school, and 0:02:35.840 --> 0:02:38.320 when he's not in T shirts, you can find him 0:02:38.320 --> 0:02:43.440 wearing floral button ups. Since we ended last season talking 0:02:43.440 --> 0:02:46.519 to my parents, I thought this interview was the perfect 0:02:46.560 --> 0:02:49.440 place to start off season two. The person I spent 0:02:49.680 --> 0:02:53.120 the most time with what was you? Yep, we are 0:02:53.560 --> 0:02:56.680 best friends and we have been since we were kids. 0:02:56.919 --> 0:02:58.240 What did we do for fun? 0:02:58.400 --> 0:03:02.560 We built like couch for and like created whole invented stories, 0:03:02.639 --> 0:03:04.760 and then we played with legos and we played soccer 0:03:04.800 --> 0:03:08.000 with our dad a lot. I think traveling with you, 0:03:08.120 --> 0:03:11.680 mom and dad like that was always great. And I 0:03:11.680 --> 0:03:13.760 think the fact that we traveled all the time meant that, 0:03:13.840 --> 0:03:17.760 like change wasn't bad. There was always something exciting to explore, 0:03:17.880 --> 0:03:22.560 something exciting, to know something new, to see that something 0:03:22.600 --> 0:03:24.080 that I think about a lot. 0:03:24.240 --> 0:03:27.000 So Francisco and I were born in Ithaca, a New 0:03:27.080 --> 0:03:31.880 York college town, in community with Latinos from different countries 0:03:32.040 --> 0:03:35.920 and different ethnicities and actually a lot of different immigrants. 0:03:36.520 --> 0:03:39.800 It was a community of people who helped each other 0:03:39.840 --> 0:03:43.880 out immensely. It was an amazing thing to grow up 0:03:43.920 --> 0:03:47.360 in and honestly it shaped both of us. Our family 0:03:47.400 --> 0:03:49.920 then moved to Minnesota when we were in grade school, 0:03:50.280 --> 0:03:52.600 which was a big change in all of our lives, 0:03:53.200 --> 0:03:55.920 and once we went off to college, our parents moved again, 0:03:56.400 --> 0:04:00.200 this time to Georgia. In addition to changing our hometown, 0:04:00.480 --> 0:04:03.640 our family would travel back to Mexico a lot. My 0:04:03.760 --> 0:04:06.600 parents were also big on road trips. Francisco and I 0:04:06.640 --> 0:04:08.960 spent a lot of time in the backseat of a 0:04:09.000 --> 0:04:12.440 car to gather traveling across the country to visit different 0:04:12.440 --> 0:04:16.599 sites in state parks. Francisco was known for always asking 0:04:16.920 --> 0:04:19.560 where are we going, what are we doing, Who's coming? 0:04:20.000 --> 0:04:22.480 I was known for saying I want to go home. 0:04:23.200 --> 0:04:26.080 Meeting new people and experiencing the unknown where things we 0:04:26.160 --> 0:04:30.840 both learned to work with. So with our life experiences 0:04:30.920 --> 0:04:33.320 being similar, what are some of the core things you 0:04:33.360 --> 0:04:34.040 think we share? 0:04:34.480 --> 0:04:34.560 Like? 0:04:34.680 --> 0:04:35.520 What comes to mind? 0:04:36.480 --> 0:04:39.360 We share a lot. I think we have similar values, 0:04:40.480 --> 0:04:44.640 both personal moral values or virtues that we try and practice, 0:04:44.680 --> 0:04:47.839 and as a result, we have very similar politics. What 0:04:47.920 --> 0:04:49.960 else do we share? An appreciation for art? 0:04:52.000 --> 0:04:52.719 How do we differ? 0:04:56.360 --> 0:04:59.680 I think I'm a little bit nerdier than you are, in. 0:04:59.640 --> 0:05:02.240 A b in a cool way to me, I always 0:05:02.279 --> 0:05:05.520 wished I was nerdy like you. It's interesting how you 0:05:05.560 --> 0:05:08.080 can grow up side by side with someone and share 0:05:08.320 --> 0:05:11.479 so many life experiences and still end up with such 0:05:11.520 --> 0:05:15.239 different personalities because as close as we are, we are different. 0:05:15.720 --> 0:05:19.400 Something that surprised me during this conversation was learning how 0:05:19.440 --> 0:05:23.560 differently we viewed our identities as in betweeners. We're Mexican 0:05:23.680 --> 0:05:28.320 and American, we speak Spanish, English, and French. We're white 0:05:28.320 --> 0:05:32.440 passing Latinos. We grew up in diverse communities, in white 0:05:32.440 --> 0:05:36.520 communities and Latino communities. We grew up working class on 0:05:36.600 --> 0:05:39.600 food stamps and then later became middle class. And we 0:05:39.640 --> 0:05:44.039 have all of these different elements to ourselves, which means 0:05:44.560 --> 0:05:47.320 that we belong to a lot of different communities, which 0:05:47.360 --> 0:05:51.720 is beautiful, but it also means we don't fully belong 0:05:51.880 --> 0:05:56.560 in any single community. And I think personally, I learned 0:05:57.120 --> 0:05:59.159 to own this part of me early on. It was 0:05:59.200 --> 0:06:03.279 something that I found beautiful and empowering and grounded me 0:06:03.320 --> 0:06:05.880 when other people didn't know how to place me. And 0:06:05.920 --> 0:06:09.560 I think Francisco's journey coming to terms with that was 0:06:09.600 --> 0:06:14.040 actually not quite the same as a person who is 0:06:14.160 --> 0:06:16.839 in between in terms of growing up, Like, do you 0:06:16.960 --> 0:06:20.120 feel like you ever felt lonely or do you feel 0:06:20.120 --> 0:06:23.720 like there's a power in that is. 0:06:23.640 --> 0:06:26.479 Our power in having this in between identity that feels 0:06:26.600 --> 0:06:30.400 kind of lonely. Not really in my opinion, because I 0:06:30.480 --> 0:06:33.520 think power is a feature of the collective, and so 0:06:34.480 --> 0:06:36.640 I really don't believe that there is like a whole 0:06:36.640 --> 0:06:38.839 lot of power other than the fact that being in 0:06:38.920 --> 0:06:44.800 between men that we were familiar with multiple different experiences 0:06:45.000 --> 0:06:50.440 of people and able to translate those things. 0:06:50.960 --> 0:06:56.120 For Francisco, power is all about commonality and connection, and honestly, 0:06:56.200 --> 0:06:57.560 that's a foundation. 0:06:57.120 --> 0:06:58.000 Of who he is. 0:06:58.800 --> 0:07:02.760 My brother is a unity organizer in Philly. In the US, 0:07:02.800 --> 0:07:05.960 we've been seeing a resurgence of strikes and of mutual aid. 0:07:06.240 --> 0:07:09.039 I feel like people are getting tired of the fact 0:07:09.080 --> 0:07:12.400 that things never change, and we're starting to believe in 0:07:12.440 --> 0:07:15.000 the power of the people again and take action around 0:07:15.000 --> 0:07:19.800 that on a bigger scale. I've always been interested in 0:07:19.840 --> 0:07:22.560 how these movements start and in the people who make 0:07:22.600 --> 0:07:26.480 them possible. I really wanted to interview Francisco because being 0:07:26.480 --> 0:07:29.960 an organizer is not just his job, it's his passion, 0:07:30.440 --> 0:07:33.760 it's his mission in life, and it encapsulates who he is. 0:07:34.200 --> 0:07:37.440 I think it actually just highlighted who he's always been 0:07:37.880 --> 0:07:41.000 He's always cared about politics and people. He's always stood 0:07:41.080 --> 0:07:43.239 up for what he believes in and what he believes 0:07:43.280 --> 0:07:46.840 is right, no matter what others think. And he's done 0:07:46.840 --> 0:07:50.120 that for as long as I can remember. When did 0:07:50.120 --> 0:07:51.840 you first become interested in politics? 0:07:51.960 --> 0:07:55.400 I think it was probably sometime in third ish grade 0:07:55.400 --> 0:07:58.240 when I realized that, like history, politics was the formal 0:07:58.280 --> 0:08:02.000 arena in which major things changed history were decided, and 0:08:02.040 --> 0:08:04.600 that was how I perceived politics. Like what was interested 0:08:04.600 --> 0:08:08.160 in the Maya, the Aztecs, I watched the History Channel. 0:08:08.600 --> 0:08:11.520 I still remember the day when we learned about World 0:08:11.600 --> 0:08:14.840 War two. Yeah, in third grade, and that was super 0:08:14.880 --> 0:08:15.800 captivating to me. 0:08:16.480 --> 0:08:20.160 It's cute because this curiosity about history and politics at 0:08:20.200 --> 0:08:22.640 a young age made me think about his own ability 0:08:22.680 --> 0:08:26.160 to think strategically and where that came from. He's always 0:08:26.240 --> 0:08:28.960 been someone who has had his eye on the future, 0:08:29.400 --> 0:08:32.720 and he's always looking at the big picture. And as 0:08:32.760 --> 0:08:34.960 he grew up and went to high school, I think 0:08:35.000 --> 0:08:37.240 this really became a mechanism for survival. 0:08:37.679 --> 0:08:40.240 I saw us focusing on school, on my academics as 0:08:40.280 --> 0:08:42.840 a method to get away from the place that we 0:08:42.840 --> 0:08:44.959 were growing up in, because I did not like growing 0:08:45.000 --> 0:08:48.000 up in Minnesota. I did not like most of my 0:08:48.120 --> 0:08:52.040 peers at the time, and I wanted to be far away, 0:08:52.320 --> 0:08:56.880 and to me, staying in Minnesota felt like being stuck 0:08:56.880 --> 0:09:01.800 in hell with these people who said horrible things to me. Yeah, 0:09:02.000 --> 0:09:03.160 not infrequently. 0:09:03.480 --> 0:09:05.800 To fit into our high school in the suburbs of 0:09:05.840 --> 0:09:10.880 Saint Paul, you had to be white, conservative, upper middle 0:09:10.880 --> 0:09:15.840 class Protestant where Abercrombie and Fitch in the Old American Eagle, 0:09:16.800 --> 0:09:20.880 and that just wasn't Francisco, what was a defining moment 0:09:21.000 --> 0:09:22.160 for you as a kid. 0:09:22.320 --> 0:09:24.560 The first thing that came up into my brain was 0:09:25.080 --> 0:09:29.680 being bullied in high school, explicitly around several different themes. Right, 0:09:29.840 --> 0:09:35.160 one was being left leaning or a do gooder, or 0:09:35.200 --> 0:09:38.000 someone who said that's racist or that's sexist, or that's 0:09:38.000 --> 0:09:40.880 classiest or whatever. Like, I think the thing that was 0:09:40.920 --> 0:09:44.160 like vitally important to me was the fact that, like, 0:09:44.600 --> 0:09:48.280 why are you saying horrible things about people like me 0:09:49.120 --> 0:09:51.800 that you were saying You're not like that basically because 0:09:51.840 --> 0:09:53.560 you are extremely white passing. 0:09:53.920 --> 0:09:57.000 Francisco always wanted to stand up for people, even when 0:09:57.000 --> 0:10:00.360 he wasn't the target of bullying, but it was never 0:10:00.640 --> 0:10:05.320 to shame anyone. It was always to create better empathy 0:10:05.440 --> 0:10:11.240 and understanding. One thing he always asks is why, And 0:10:11.600 --> 0:10:14.080 I think his curiosity about the why it was an 0:10:14.120 --> 0:10:17.920 attempt to show people the double standards or biases that 0:10:17.960 --> 0:10:22.440 they were using, and that was something that personally affected 0:10:22.520 --> 0:10:27.560 him oftentimes just because he wasn't recognized as being Mexican 0:10:27.800 --> 0:10:30.920 or having immigrant parents, whether it was because he was 0:10:31.000 --> 0:10:34.880 light skinned, or his intelligence versus the stereotypes that people 0:10:34.960 --> 0:10:37.559 at school were used to. It didn't mean that he 0:10:37.640 --> 0:10:40.480 was going to hide any part of himself. And the 0:10:40.559 --> 0:10:44.000 thing about being an in betweener is that you can 0:10:44.000 --> 0:10:48.040 get attacked for fitting into stereotypes, whether you're called derogatory 0:10:48.160 --> 0:10:52.280 terms like we back bean er, lazy, or you can 0:10:52.320 --> 0:10:56.440 be targeted for pushing up quote unquote against the stereotypes, 0:10:56.840 --> 0:10:59.400 you know, for being the smart one, or for speaking 0:10:59.480 --> 0:11:04.080 articulate English as people would say, you're damned if you 0:11:04.120 --> 0:11:05.840 do and you're damned if you don't. 0:11:06.200 --> 0:11:08.360 One of the defining moments that I think I had 0:11:08.360 --> 0:11:10.840 a lot of trauma around for a long time was 0:11:10.880 --> 0:11:13.680 this moment where in history class I was forced to 0:11:13.840 --> 0:11:16.120 basically debate the entire class because I was the only 0:11:16.200 --> 0:11:21.040 one who believed in reparations for slavery. And there was 0:11:21.080 --> 0:11:24.559 a point at which I was being yelled at by 0:11:24.640 --> 0:11:28.200 the other side, and the source of things that they 0:11:28.240 --> 0:11:32.479 were saying, calling me a fag, calling me very derogatory 0:11:32.559 --> 0:11:38.240 terms for being Mexican, very derogatory terms for being a leftist. 0:11:38.440 --> 0:11:40.360 They called me a commie, you know, and all these 0:11:40.360 --> 0:11:45.160 things combined, and the fact that they had to resort 0:11:45.240 --> 0:11:50.800 to trying to insult my identity as a human being 0:11:51.240 --> 0:11:55.679 during the debate, it was, Yeah, it was pretty difficult. 0:11:56.000 --> 0:11:59.040 Being in a situation like this. It forces Francisco to 0:11:59.080 --> 0:12:02.679 think about how all people see him and how they 0:12:02.760 --> 0:12:06.640 see people like him. It exposes his classmates bias and hate, 0:12:07.240 --> 0:12:09.360 and he's being put into a box when he's just 0:12:09.440 --> 0:12:12.360 a teenager dealing with hormones, still trying to figure out 0:12:12.440 --> 0:12:13.160 who he is. 0:12:13.559 --> 0:12:16.200 I think what was very difficult about being bullied was 0:12:16.200 --> 0:12:18.320 that I didn't even know who I was, and I 0:12:18.400 --> 0:12:20.720 was being labeled things. I was being labeled a fag. 0:12:21.000 --> 0:12:23.960 It turns out I like ended up being more queer 0:12:24.000 --> 0:12:27.840 than not queer, like being attracted to people. I didn't 0:12:27.840 --> 0:12:30.960 have really limitations on what I thought was attractive and 0:12:31.000 --> 0:12:34.320 who I thought was attractive, right, I mean called a kami, 0:12:34.440 --> 0:12:36.320 and I didn't know what I was. I knew I 0:12:36.400 --> 0:12:39.960 was at least liberal, but I also didn't think I 0:12:40.080 --> 0:12:43.600 was just a liberal. Also, being called things about being 0:12:43.640 --> 0:12:47.120 Mexican was also something like, okay, so I clearly don't 0:12:47.200 --> 0:12:51.679 belong here. I'm also American. I'm United States in right, 0:12:51.720 --> 0:12:54.240 like I was born in this country, I am a citizen. 0:12:54.960 --> 0:12:58.960 We were taught growing up that like, borders exist, but 0:12:59.000 --> 0:13:01.439 they don't really make difference on the value of a 0:13:01.520 --> 0:13:02.120 human life. 0:13:03.040 --> 0:13:06.600 This culture of cruelty was very counterintuitive to what we 0:13:06.679 --> 0:13:11.240 had grown up with, which was a foundation of unconditional love. 0:13:11.480 --> 0:13:15.920 And thankfully, because of Francisco's ability to hold on to 0:13:16.160 --> 0:13:18.840 the core of who he was, he was still able 0:13:18.880 --> 0:13:19.960 to find really good friends. 0:13:19.960 --> 0:13:21.959 In high school, some of the people I hung out 0:13:22.000 --> 0:13:25.520 with were kids who lived in trailer parks because there 0:13:25.559 --> 0:13:29.200 were weirdos and emokahs and punks, and they were the 0:13:29.200 --> 0:13:31.360 ones who didn't really care who I was, and I 0:13:31.480 --> 0:13:33.400 just hung out with them. And I think that was 0:13:33.400 --> 0:13:35.880 a very different sort of experience. You know, I haven't 0:13:35.920 --> 0:13:37.800 talked about the positive aspects, but that was like one 0:13:37.840 --> 0:13:40.439 of the positive aspects. I think and like us, having 0:13:40.440 --> 0:13:43.480 similar ideas that this was all dumb and ridiculous. 0:13:43.840 --> 0:13:49.160 Francisco during this time embraces his otherness, the punk rebel 0:13:49.240 --> 0:13:53.840 inside of himself, because it was an ugly place to 0:13:53.880 --> 0:13:55.679 fit in. He didn't want to be a part of 0:13:55.760 --> 0:13:56.320 this culture. 0:13:56.520 --> 0:13:57.960 The one thing I will say is that I think 0:13:58.040 --> 0:14:00.280 my identity really mattered to me as a way to 0:14:00.320 --> 0:14:03.360 differentiate myself from others. And I think that might just 0:14:03.400 --> 0:14:08.040 be teenage angst tendencies, but what I think ended up 0:14:08.080 --> 0:14:11.600 mattering more to me as I grew older and as 0:14:11.679 --> 0:14:14.920 I became an organizer and got inspired by people who 0:14:15.080 --> 0:14:19.000 changed the world for others and themselves. The things that 0:14:19.160 --> 0:14:22.120 we held in common were much more important than the 0:14:22.160 --> 0:14:26.880 things that differentiated us. Yeah, and I think that is 0:14:26.960 --> 0:14:29.760 the biggest shift in my understanding of identity. 0:14:30.160 --> 0:14:33.240 Francisco ends up leaving Minnesota when he gets into Yale 0:14:33.320 --> 0:14:36.680 for college. There he meets some of his best friends 0:14:36.720 --> 0:14:40.760 to this day, and he continued to grow as a thinker, doer, 0:14:40.880 --> 0:14:46.080 and overall person. This time further transformed how he thought 0:14:46.120 --> 0:14:49.920 about himself and how he relates to others. He channeled 0:14:49.920 --> 0:14:54.800 his once rebellious teenage self into an organizer. Yeah, he's 0:14:54.840 --> 0:14:57.920 still an oddball in the best ways, but today he 0:14:58.040 --> 0:15:01.400 cares less about standing out and be different and cares 0:15:01.440 --> 0:15:06.280 more about commonality and community. That's coming after the break. 0:15:06.240 --> 0:15:10.520 Realizing look at all these white, black and brown people 0:15:10.680 --> 0:15:14.840 that I am one of, that have so much potential 0:15:15.000 --> 0:15:18.320 to fight and make things better for themselves, and that 0:15:18.360 --> 0:15:19.560 we all deserve better. 0:15:20.200 --> 0:15:33.040 We'll be right back, welcome back to when you're invisible. 0:15:33.880 --> 0:15:36.240 The identities now that I matter most to me are 0:15:36.240 --> 0:15:38.720 the ones that I've chosen. Probably the beginning of things 0:15:38.840 --> 0:15:42.080 was when I found philosophy, was like, oh my god, 0:15:42.560 --> 0:15:44.600 I can choose who I am. 0:15:45.000 --> 0:15:47.440 This makes me think of how this day and age 0:15:47.600 --> 0:15:51.160 we focus a lot on the major identifiers of ourselves, 0:15:51.200 --> 0:15:54.800 whether it's race, gender, sexuality, and while those are beautiful 0:15:54.840 --> 0:15:58.440 parts of ourselves and worth all the acknowledgment, it's a 0:15:58.440 --> 0:16:01.960 good thing to remember there's a lot of complexity in 0:16:02.040 --> 0:16:06.680 layers in each individual that deserves to be noticed and celebrated. 0:16:07.400 --> 0:16:10.720 Francisco personally has come to really connect with the parts 0:16:10.720 --> 0:16:13.200 of himself that are doing and creating the world he 0:16:13.280 --> 0:16:14.000 wants to build. 0:16:14.800 --> 0:16:16.520 The identity that matters most to me is that I'm 0:16:16.560 --> 0:16:20.480 a worker, yeah, and that I'm an organizer. 0:16:20.960 --> 0:16:24.080 He works for the Center for Popular Democracy, where he 0:16:24.080 --> 0:16:26.440 helps people fight for workers' rights on a state and 0:16:26.600 --> 0:16:30.000 national level, whether writing policy or leading actions. 0:16:30.400 --> 0:16:33.280 And what an organizer means is that I'm interested in 0:16:33.400 --> 0:16:37.120 helping more people discover their own self interest and their 0:16:37.160 --> 0:16:40.400 own power, and their ability to come together and to 0:16:40.480 --> 0:16:41.800 grow that group of people. 0:16:42.560 --> 0:16:45.920 Right, Francisco laid out the beliefs he's developed and the 0:16:45.960 --> 0:16:48.360 things he's come to really care about in his work. 0:16:48.800 --> 0:16:51.720 The way I thought about what my politics were was 0:16:51.760 --> 0:16:55.400 slowly orienting in a direction of believing that regular people 0:16:55.440 --> 0:16:58.560 should have power, like I knew, I wanted a society 0:16:58.600 --> 0:17:03.680 that was like had strong levels of equality of opportunity. 0:17:03.800 --> 0:17:07.320 I mean, like true equality of access to advantage, so 0:17:07.320 --> 0:17:09.840 that a person who has a little bit and a 0:17:09.880 --> 0:17:12.680 person who has a lot have actually the same equal 0:17:12.720 --> 0:17:16.760 opportunities to get the same position. People actually have real 0:17:16.800 --> 0:17:20.440 freedom of choice. In most workplaces, almost no one has freedom. 0:17:21.080 --> 0:17:23.600 The workplaces where we get closest to some level of 0:17:23.680 --> 0:17:27.560 freedom is in unionized workplaces. And then the last thing 0:17:27.640 --> 0:17:31.040 is having community matters a lot. I'm someone who now 0:17:31.040 --> 0:17:33.879 belongs in a political tradition that believes all human beings 0:17:33.920 --> 0:17:39.040 are equal, that we deserve to live in safe, free communities, 0:17:40.520 --> 0:17:42.440 and that we don't have that right now, and that's 0:17:42.440 --> 0:17:44.600 something really deep has to change in our society. 0:17:45.080 --> 0:17:48.880 These values are very personal and deeply rooted within him. 0:17:49.160 --> 0:17:51.600 It's part of how he sees himself and his story 0:17:52.000 --> 0:17:55.320 and our story, and that keeps him grounded even when 0:17:55.320 --> 0:17:58.000 the chaos and the loneliness feel overwhelming. 0:17:58.640 --> 0:18:01.680 What are the political traditions that I can identify with 0:18:01.800 --> 0:18:05.160 our family history? Right? People in the United States often 0:18:05.200 --> 0:18:09.320 tell stories of their great grandparents fighting in World War 0:18:09.359 --> 0:18:12.120 Two or things like that. That's a point of pride because, yeah, 0:18:12.160 --> 0:18:18.560 they fought fascists. Our great grandparents were in the Mexican Revolution, 0:18:19.520 --> 0:18:21.960 and there is a deep history to be very proud 0:18:22.040 --> 0:18:25.320 of as Mexicans, of the political ideas that people were 0:18:25.359 --> 0:18:26.640 willing to fight and die for. 0:18:28.040 --> 0:18:29.960 Can you say a little more about that. 0:18:30.240 --> 0:18:33.720 Mexico abolish slavery way before the United States did, because 0:18:33.760 --> 0:18:41.200 partisan Guaretro was of mixed African, indigenous and white ancestry 0:18:41.480 --> 0:18:42.280 in Mexico City. 0:18:42.359 --> 0:18:45.080 Was part of the underground railroad, was it? Yeah? 0:18:45.160 --> 0:18:45.800 I didn't know that. 0:18:45.880 --> 0:18:48.359 Yeah, part of the Southern underground railroad was to go 0:18:48.400 --> 0:18:49.320 all the way to Mexico. 0:18:49.960 --> 0:18:50.760 Well, it makes sense. 0:18:51.320 --> 0:18:54.600 The founding of Mexico itself and the Mexican Revolution are 0:18:54.680 --> 0:18:58.719 fights for liberation of all its people. We have working 0:18:58.760 --> 0:19:02.399 class and poor people fighting against elite landowners for the 0:19:02.440 --> 0:19:06.800 redistribution of wealth. And honestly, what's beautiful about Mexican history 0:19:07.200 --> 0:19:10.600 is that there are Mexican scholars who are constantly trying 0:19:10.600 --> 0:19:16.040 to reclaim and preserve Mexico's complex history of resistance and liberation. 0:19:16.600 --> 0:19:19.160 And we were always told these stories at the dinner 0:19:19.200 --> 0:19:21.600 table with my parents, and we got to hear the 0:19:21.640 --> 0:19:24.320 stories of how our family was involved in that personal way. 0:19:24.640 --> 0:19:27.520 And then I think, as someone who identifies in a 0:19:27.560 --> 0:19:30.400 Pan Latino American sort of way, you know, the history 0:19:30.760 --> 0:19:37.680 of the fight for freedom independence in South America is 0:19:37.720 --> 0:19:40.880 also worth noting because the fight for liberation was by 0:19:41.000 --> 0:19:47.320 unifying all these different people ethnicities and nationalities and racial 0:19:47.320 --> 0:19:50.560 groups under one manner. And to do that you had 0:19:50.600 --> 0:19:54.560 to promote a vision of equality that mattered to everyone. 0:19:55.000 --> 0:19:58.960 Like Mexican history, Latin America is its own inspiration. For 0:19:59.040 --> 0:20:02.880 my brother, someone who really looks up to is Simon Boliverer, 0:20:03.240 --> 0:20:06.040 who fought for the end of colonial rule and united 0:20:06.080 --> 0:20:10.679 people across ethnicities and nationalities. It's somewhat the origins of 0:20:10.760 --> 0:20:14.199 Latini Dad to me at least, and it roots Francisco 0:20:14.320 --> 0:20:17.679 in a sense of history, purpose and care. What was 0:20:17.720 --> 0:20:19.240 your first experience with organizing. 0:20:19.400 --> 0:20:22.800 My very first experience with organizing was really like when 0:20:23.000 --> 0:20:25.639 I did volunteering for the Obama campaign in two thousand 0:20:25.640 --> 0:20:28.119 and eight. I would knock on doors in our suburban 0:20:28.160 --> 0:20:31.879 neighborhoods in Minnesota, right as a part of that process, 0:20:32.000 --> 0:20:35.520 and that was very interesting. That was me coming face 0:20:35.560 --> 0:20:40.080 to face with white supremacy and white supremacist myths. Very quickly. 0:20:40.359 --> 0:20:43.240 People would tell me things like Obama is a black 0:20:43.280 --> 0:20:47.919 Marxist who wants to destroy this country m hm. And 0:20:47.960 --> 0:20:50.120 you have to be really, really racist and have really 0:20:50.200 --> 0:20:54.320 racist ideas to buy that. And it was also my 0:20:54.400 --> 0:20:57.280 first lesson in how to deal with mass rejection. 0:20:58.280 --> 0:21:01.120 Right, Okay, So that was the first time, and then 0:21:01.200 --> 0:21:02.800 as an adult I. 0:21:02.760 --> 0:21:06.359 Was organized again. In college. I was basically brought into 0:21:06.640 --> 0:21:09.600 the unite Here organizing world. Unite Here is a union 0:21:09.680 --> 0:21:13.160 for everyone who's listening that has done really good job 0:21:13.240 --> 0:21:18.280 of organizing unions of workers on Yale's campus and throughout 0:21:18.320 --> 0:21:20.880 the city of New Haven and have been really effective 0:21:20.880 --> 0:21:23.679 at organizing, and people close to them have been very 0:21:23.720 --> 0:21:27.040 good at organizing elected local elected officials. Yeah, and I 0:21:27.040 --> 0:21:30.080 got involved on knocking on doors for those folks the 0:21:30.119 --> 0:21:31.360 way I did for Obama. 0:21:32.080 --> 0:21:35.680 Before his senior year of college, Francisco got to experience 0:21:35.720 --> 0:21:39.879 community organizing abroad for his thesis. He connected with Latin 0:21:39.880 --> 0:21:42.879 American activists when he was doing research in Ecuador for 0:21:42.920 --> 0:21:47.320 the summer. Then, after graduating, he decides to go abroad again. 0:21:47.840 --> 0:21:49.920 He accepts a job in South Africa. 0:21:50.840 --> 0:21:56.199 I had left the country with the intention of not 0:21:56.440 --> 0:22:00.520 permanently coming back, because my opinion of the state of 0:22:00.560 --> 0:22:05.440 American politics in twenty fourteen was that it was fucked 0:22:06.240 --> 0:22:09.280 all the way through and that there was no chance 0:22:09.320 --> 0:22:12.880 for anything good to happen, and that the best chance 0:22:12.960 --> 0:22:15.120 for this country was for it to decay. And that's 0:22:15.119 --> 0:22:19.000 a pretty depressing, nihilistic sort of attitude from a child 0:22:19.080 --> 0:22:22.600 of privilege who knew nothing about actually building power. Yeah, 0:22:23.119 --> 0:22:24.560 I'm just going to say it that way. 0:22:24.720 --> 0:22:28.439 Which, So, what, for example, has that changed how you 0:22:28.560 --> 0:22:30.000 view the US? 0:22:30.800 --> 0:22:33.479 It has changed pretty dramatically, right, I think there were 0:22:33.480 --> 0:22:36.000 a couple things that changed that. Right, I think I 0:22:36.080 --> 0:22:38.280 was in a position of privilege to want to leave 0:22:38.280 --> 0:22:40.240 the United States and try and find a place to 0:22:40.440 --> 0:22:43.720 leave the United States. I wanted to go to Ecuador. 0:22:43.880 --> 0:22:46.640 I wanted to go to somewhere in South America and 0:22:46.680 --> 0:22:50.520 go work for some exciting left wing politicians there. Right, 0:22:50.600 --> 0:22:53.520 something that had happened when I had done research in Ecuador, 0:22:53.680 --> 0:22:58.840 when I had talked to organizers, activists and government officials 0:22:59.480 --> 0:23:03.600 and leaders, was if you had mentioned, like you should 0:23:03.600 --> 0:23:10.480