National Nurses United

J U LY | A U G U S T | S E P T E M B E R 2 0 1 9 W W W . N A T I O N A L N U R S E S U N I T E D . O R G N A T I O N A L N U R S E 19 H aving a foundation of creativity helps with seeing things differently. When we can imagine a different world, then even the things we've been taught to blindly accept can be questioned. And that's what being a union nurse is all about. We question why corporate profits should ever come before the health and safety of our patients and the planet. We don't just go along with the way things are; we fight for the way things should be! In this issue, you'll read about the 2019 Global Nurses Solidarity Assembly (GNSA), an incredible gathering of nurse union lead- ers and allies from 25 countries, hosted in San Francisco Sept. 12-15 by the California Nurses Association/National Nurses Organ- izing Committee. By coming together and sharing solu- tions and strategies—not just for one hospital, one city, or one country, but for the entire world—nurses are fighting to flip global priorities. This is especially critical given that we are living in a time of vast wealth disparity. Working people around the world have been facing massive cuts to public services and efforts to starve public programs of funding so that they can be privatized. In some places, this is happening under increasingly authoritative regimes. In our hospitals and clinics, nurses are also being asked to do more and more work with fewer and fewer resources. Every day, we feel the moral distress of those work- place cuts. We're not going to stand by while our patients' health, safety, and human rights are steamrolled. Nurses are coming together in unprecedented global solidarity to reimagine society and cocreate a world of nurses' values! GNSA speaker and Purdue University professor Tithi Bhattacharya described the work that nurses do as "the work of life making." In a world focused on profit- making, she urged nurses to keep being visionaries, prioritizing and protecting life. "We measure our wealth in the growth of the economy," said Bhattacharya. "I come from India; half of its children may be starv- ing, yet the growth charts tell you India is doing fantastic. This is an insane way of measuring wealth in society, through dead things and not the life of living beings." GNSA speaker Patrisse Cullors, cofounder of Black Lives Matter and chair- person of Reform L.A. Jails, also talked about imagining a world with more holistic and humane values. "We have been organized in how to think about people. Someone imagined a cage, imagined handcuffs. We get to imagine something radically different," Cullors told the nurses in a panel about racial justice at the bedside and beyond. This work of imagining, dreaming, and then working to transform society to match what we see is something that nurses have in common with artists. To underscore our visionary power, the Global Nurses Solidar- ity Assembly included an art show called "Recognition" that you'll read about on page 23. The relationship between activism and art is personal to me. I grew up in a house of proud union workers, in Sacramento, Calif., and the Royal Chicano Air Force (RCAF), an artistic collective founded to express the goals of the Chicano civil rights and labor organizing movement of the United Farm Workers, were family friends. The RCAF launched so many art and social justice programs for the community in Sacramento, and growing up there, I was forged in an atmosphere that celebrated people power, through art. I think it's important for all of us who are standing together and fighting for a better world to feel that connec- tion between art and justice. After all, union nurses are powerful creators. To stand up for what's right, we first have to imagine that there's a different way to exist. That vision is one of our superpowers. So I want to encourage all of you to keep dreaming of what our patients' and our families' lives would look like with our nurses' values at the forefront. Keep imagining a world that values health and safety as passionately as we do. Each one of you has the power to dream that world into being, in solidarity with your colleagues. Nurses are the most trusted profession, the advocates for everyday people in communities around the planet. When we hold our vision, and speak up for it, and stand up for it, we are leading the way for people everywhere to build this world along with us. Never forget that our power to heal has a global reach. As author and activist Naomi Klein said in her GNSA speech, "We need to brain- storm and dream about the world we want. We need to paint the picture of the world we want that is so enticing that people are going to fight for it." And when that happens, we will win. Bonnie Castillo, RN is executive director of National Nurses United. Bonnie Castillo, RN Executive Director, National Nurses United The Dream Team Together, we can cocreate a world of nurses' values Union nurses are powerful creators. To stand up for what's right, we first have to imagine that there's a different way to exist. That vision is one of our superpowers . . . So I want to encourage all of you to keep dreaming of what our patients' and our families' lives would look like with our nurses' values at the forefront. Keep imagining a world that values health and safety as passionately as we do.

• Cover