Why Risers? My Life as an Activist

By Bets Graef

 

Some men see things as they are and say why.  

I dream of things that never were and say why not?

~ Robert F. Kennedy

 

Looking back, it’s now clear that political activism has been my avocation since I was nine. In 1960, I sported a Kennedy for President sticker on my Pee-Chee school folder.

My formative years, from 1963 to 1975, were profoundly affected by the events of those times. I benefited from parents who had good values and thought people had an obligation to participate in political matters. They believed public policy at the local and the national level should serve the common good. That isn’t to say we agreed. After all, it was the 1960s and 1970s. There were pitched battles at the dinner table. But more broadly, they laid the foundation of my beliefs: it is critical to pay attention, to learn, and to act with principle on public affairs.

My junior high school in Denver drew students from two distinct neighborhoods. Half of the student body was white and the other half was black. During those three years, civil rights activists were physically assaulted or killed, black children were murdered, and JFK was assassinated. The Civil Rights Act and the Voting Rights Act were also passed by Congress.

My high school classmates were predominately upper middle-class whites. During those years, there were riots across US cities, a continuing escalation of US troops in Vietnam, the assassinations of MLK and RFK, and a police riot in Chicago at the Democratic Convention. Two months before his assassination, I was in Nebraska canvassing for Bobby Kennedy. I watched the California primary returns while writing a presentation for my history class on why RFK should be the nominee. I heard him say after his California win, “And now it’s on to Chicago,” and then watched chaos unfold at the Ambassador Hotel.

The deaths of Martin Luther King and Bobby Kennedy devastated me. The following year, as a senior, I chose to be bused to a mostly Black high school to get back in touch with and talk to kids from other backgrounds. That experience led me to work on the campaigns of progressive candidates for the Denver school board. My candidates lost. I received my diploma from a school board member I opposed in the campaign, and wore a black armband to graduation to signal my dissatisfaction.

At college I participated in protests against the war in Vietnam and became deeply involved in the women’s movement. In 1974 I became a member of the founding committee for a Women’s Studies Program at the University of Colorado, collecting thousands of signatures from students who supported such a program. The program began Frontiers, A Journal of Women Studies, which continues to publish today. Students now earn Bachelor of Arts degrees in Women and Gender Studies at the University of Colorado.

After I graduated, I joined with others to run conferences and forums about issues of importance to women. But that work didn’t pay many bills, and eventually I went back to school and got a Master’s in health administration. My jobs paid the bills, but for 25 years I was trapped in our corporate capitalist health care system.

Over all those years, I turned to the community to find purpose. I was on the board of the Friends of the Seattle Public Library and of a small store front health clinic in the Chinatown International District. That clinic is now known as International Community Health Services, operating 11 clinics throughout King County. I worked full-time on the Commons Campaign to create a 61-acre park in South Lake Union, and pushed for state and local campaign finance reforms. Those two endeavors failed.

In 2005, I left health care and later worked for a Seattle City Councilmember. This was when I learned about police and criminal justice system issues. I also got to see the sausage-making of public policy up close.

Because of my background at the City Council, I had the honor of being hired to serve the Seattle Community Police Commission, first as the interim director and then as a consultant. In 2012, Seattle became subject to a Consent Decree with the US DOJ for unconstitutional policing.  The commission was formed in 2013 to provide community input to the Consent Decree process.

A series of incidents over years, culminating with the unjustified killing of John T. Williams by a Seattle police officer in 2010, led to the Consent Decree. Over my four years at the commission, there were many high-profile killings and serious misconduct incidents by police across the country.

I was the commission’s point person crafting legislation to hold police accountable for misconduct. Our sweeping police accountability legislation became law in 2017. Yet soon after, the Mayor and Council gutted it by negotiating a labor contract with the police union that undercut key provisions of the law. I had seen what was possible and then I saw how it could be destroyed.

Also, by this time, the country had become so very divisive. The defeat of Hillary Clinton in 2016 and the rise of Trump were profoundly shocking for me, but mostly I ignored Trump’s first term. Biden’s presidency was a relief and I pretended that the first Trump term was an aberration. However, after the 2024 election, I fell into deep despair. It had not been an aberration. For many, many months, I followed the news obsessively, but could not act. I was outraged and at a loss, feeling utterly powerless.

Then I went to my first Risers group meeting last October – where I found a purpose and a community of people who wanted to act. Since joining the Risers, I’ve been engaged in many activities in support of justice and democracy. Working with the Risers and our larger community, I’ve been buoyed by the passion and commitment of my fellow activists, many of whom are now my friends. There is so much to do and so many avenues for getting it done – and there are so many wonderful people with whom to collaborate. We win, we celebrate; we lose, we grieve. But then we must get up and continue the work. In my lifetime, it has never been more important to do so.

 

 

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