The work you’re doing to remember the grenfell disaster is admirable even though (and especially because) it’s difficult. I don’t live in the UK but obviously inequitable housing is rampant all over. It’s important that the victims and their families get their individual voices heard when politicians and media dehumanize them by lumping them all together under demographic attributes. Safe and decent housing is a human right and I can’t believe that’s a controversial statement. -ashkiepassing
Thank you. <3
One of the reasons the Grenfell Tower disaster hit me so hard is because I also used to live in a building that wasn’t safe and decent. It wasn’t a high-rise, luckily, but to get to the fire escape on my floor you had to literally pick your way across people’s trash that had been dumped there, and once you were out on the escape the door at the bottom was locked. (I still have pictures of all that.) The fire alarm didn’t work properly either, because sometimes it would go off at 8pm and not stop all night. It looked nice on the outside (like Grenfell was supposed to) but it was a horrible, dangerous place to live. The windows didn’t even open properly. The last time I saw it I think they’d improved things a bit but I have no doubt that if a major fire had broken out at the time I was there, plenty of people might not have made it. And no-one ever heard our complaints, just moved us along to the next people, who moved us along to the next people, and so on.
…God, yeah. British housing is a horror right now, and even after Grenfell so little is done. :(