Episode 49: Crips for eSims

The podcast introductory segment is composed to evoke friction. It begins with the sound of an elevator crunching as it goes up. A robotic voice says “floor two.” Then music with a mysterious tone comes on. A series of voices define Contra. Layered voices say:

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Contra is friction… Contra is texture… Contra is questions…Nuanced…Collaborative…Contra* is world-changing…Contra is innovation, messy, solidarity, interdependence…Contra is thinking about design critically. Contra is a podcast.

 

Throughout, there are sounds of typing, texting and Zoom being opened. 

Then an electric guitar bass note fades into the sound of a digital call ringing and starting. The intro ends with the sound of a Facetime call ringing and then picked up.

Hi, I’m Kelsie Acton, the project manager for the Remote Access Archive. The Remote Access Archive contains oral histories, like the ones featured in this season of the Contra* podcast. But it also contains numerous, very cool documents. This is one of a series of mini-episodes to share some of those documents with you. Today, I’m going to look at Crips for Esims for Gaza. The Remote Access Archive holds a number of documents related to Crips for Esims for Gaza. We link out to a post on DisabilityVisibility and to a TruthOut article documenting the work. We have screenshots of a number of Instagram posts between late 2023 and early 2024. 

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Crips for E-sims for Gaza was started by Alice Wong, Leah Lakshmi Piepzna Samarasinha and Jane Shi. It responded to the genocide of Palestinian people. In autumn of 2023 the Israeli Occupation Forces regularly attacked wifi and cellular infrastructure and services. This cut off Palestinian people from connecting with each other, from connecting with their families both in and outside Gaza, and from sharing the reality of what is happening in Gaza with the rest of the world. eSims, which let you connect your phone to a mobile network, are an imperfect way of connecting people to the internet through their phones. Egyptian writer and activist Mirna El Helbawi founded #ConnectingGaza in late October 2023. In December 2023, Jane, Alice and Leah joined together to encourage disabled people and their allies to donate to get eSims to people in Gaza. 

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I’m going to read an image description and text of one of the Instagram posts. These image descriptions were written by Avianna Miller, a member of the Critical Design Lab who worked on the Remote Access Archive between 2023 and 2024: 

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A graphic featuring a photo of large round slices of watermelon in the background. In the center against a white square, the text reads, Crips for eSims for Gaza on the top and End to Genocide on the bottom. In the center is a QR code. 

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The text of the post reads:

[watermelon emoji] It's been over one hundred days of relentless genocide in Gaza. Here's the latest update from Crips for eSims in Gaza, a project in partnership with @pippagaopoetry and @leahlakshmiwrites!! We've raised enough money so far to purchase 1500 eSims! *The QR code doesn't work anymore so go to the link in bio! KEEP IT UP! 

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Crips for Esims for Gaza is about getting the resources for remote access to Palestinian people. It’s also an example of mutual aid. Mutual aid has always been a huge part of how disabled people use remote access. In the broadest sense, sometimes mutual aid looks like sympathy and commiseration - scrolling through a hashtag like AbledsAreWeird and adding in your story to feel a little less alone. Sometimes it’s knowledge-sharing. In one of our oral histories Brian Lobel talks about a telephone hotline, run by a single disabled person, that would answer disabled people’s questions about sex and intimacy. And often mutual aid is money, or the resources money can buy. It’s Alice, Jane and Leah trying to redistribute resources and in doing so, mitigate some small part of the injustice of the world.

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Often, mutual aid is about trying to do something, no matter how small. Because something is better than nothing.

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I want to leave us with something that Alice, Jane and Leah wrote on their post on Disability Visibility. They say: 

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We also recognize that everyone in Gaza is now disabled due to the massive number of deaths, new disabilities, life-threatening illnesses and destruction of medical facilities going on…We owe our kin in Palestine to throw sand on the gears of genocide with our every breath. 

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Thank you for listening. If this document touched you somehow - sparked your curiosity, made you angry, made you feel seen - you can find it in the Remote Access Archive at www.criticaldesignlab.com/project/remote-access-archive. Remember, remote access is disability culture.

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[Rhythmic pops. Strings ripple and play as Aimi speaks]

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Aimi Hamraie: 

You've been listening to Contra*, a podcast about disability design, justice, and the life world. Contra* is a production of the Critical Design Lab. This season's episodes draw on our recent project, the Remote Access Archive, created by a team of disabled researchers collaborating remotely. Learn about our projects, including the remote access archive at www.criticaldesignlab.com. 

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If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe on Spotify rate and leave a review. 

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This season of Contra* is edited by Ilana Nevins. Kelsie Acton and Aimi Hamraie developed the episodes. 

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The Contra* Podcast is licensed under a Creative Commons attribution, non-commercial share alike International 3.0 license.That means you can remix, repost, or recycle any of the content as long as you cite the original source, aren't making money, you don't change the credits and you share it under the same license.

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[music fades out]

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