San Francisco Has Lost Its Soul

I have been in a lot of pain watching the situation on the streets of San Francisco from afar. I have been turning the situation over in my head more than I should. I have a couple of reactions. I watched a YouTube video from inside a car crossing Market at 6th, a route I’ve taken many times. There weren't just a few, but hundreds of addicts on the street, shooting up, nodding off, trading drugs. From what I could read, the drug was probably Fentanyl. Nasty shit. I was shocked, and I know a few things about street drugs.

Some local business owners want the city to close U.N. Plaza, which is overrun with illegal activity, including vending.

I’ve been there. Let’s call it what it is. Step 1. This is full blown addiction. It’s unmanageable. It’s out of control. It’s causing immense harm. Everyone, from the hard assed cynic to the bleeding heart liberal is powerless. Now let’s be clear, I am not in favor of taking the city through the 12 Steps, and I have lots of problems with the system anyway. But it is how I got sober and at least part of the background for my reaction.

There are lots of possible causes: a massive explosion in the homeless population, the exit of high tech and the resulting economic downturn, the massive disparity in wealth, the lack of savvy leadership. But fuck it, in my recovery it wasn’t that I was lonely or poor or weird, although all that was also probably true. It was the drugs. No matter who is painting the picture or analyzing the problem, don’t lose track of the fact that it’s the fucking drugs.

But then I had a kind of revelation. How did I get sober? Just the steps weren’t enough. Not even close. I also had a vision of what my life could be. Maybe I’d hidden it away. Maybe I’d forgotten it. Maybe my cynical side didn’t believe it, but I knew I was living in the shadows. There was more to life than crystal meth.

San Francisco has had a vision. At least it used to. It was the gateway to the Gold Rush, the Golden Gate. It was Gold Mountain for the Cantonese whose indentured servitude was really just a new version of slavery prohibited after the Civil War. It was the Heart of Golden West, the coast where America built defenses to fight the Great War in the Pacific. It was the place where soldiers and sailors returning from the Guadalcanal and Corregidor disembarked and began to recreate their lives rather than going back to the empty prairies and plains between the coasts

San Francisco has also been known as The City on a Hill, Gay Mecca, Baghdad by the Bay though I could never really figure out why Baghdad, but that was Herb Caen and he came from Sacramento and he was just a newspaper hack so what the hell did he know anyway? It sounded cute. Jack Kerouac called it Frisco thus ever planting him as an outsider. It was a safe haven for the Beat Generation. Ginsberg read Howl in the Western Addition. It changed the face of American literature all the way to the Supreme Court when that meant something. It even helped us define what we can do with language. Mr. Justice [Holmes] said: “A word is not a crystal, transparent and unchanged. It is the skin of living thought and may vary greatly in color and content according to the circumstances and the time in which it is used.”

Part of the vision of what was possible in San Francisco--if you don’t like it, then change it, and change yourselves in the process.

As a San Franciscan for most of my adult life, I know it as the place where the Stonewall Revolution met middle class gay life in a way that changed the political and social landscape forever as well as provided the testing ground for its cohesion during a horrific and tragic public health crisis. That required vision and leadership. Many, but one man in particular, Harvey Milk, rose to the occasion at great personal cost and the GLBTQ community never looked back. That took vision of what was possible against all odds.

The fight against HIV/AIDS was actually longer in terms of San Francisco history, and much more costly in terms of deaths and dollars. Because for more than a decade AIDS was a certain death sentence, it was also an existential crisis for so many friends and comrades. Very difficult terrain. But over time, with an enormous amount of self sacrifice by far too many people, including prodding an underfunded medical research community, there was a real breakthrough.

The problems are huge. The addictive properties of Fentanyl are 500 times more extreme than any other street drugs that have ever been available. The population affected is less educated, articulate and organized than the mostly gay men and women who fought AIDS or rallied for political clout.

The political leadership is simply not equal to the task. But London Breed isn’t the real problem is she? She may be totally corrupt and a complete idiot, but it’s too easy to lay the blame for a completely hopeless situation at her feet, or any feet other than my own. A lot of people are doing that. But she does seem to be adrift.

What has happened to San Francisco? 38,000 individuals in the Bay Area are homeless, an increase of 35 percent since 2019. San Francisco Mayor London Breed wants to carve out $692.6 million in homelessness spending next year to help meet the city's five-year plan to cut homelessness in half. That’s roughly 18,000 a year per person. But currently my sources tell me that a homeless person in San Francisco can receive up to $10,000 in benefits. This is no longer assistance but an incentive.

Someone said that circumstances have created the “perfect storm,” the flood of drugs and the increase in vulnerable populations would defy Wonder Woman. Difficult, yes. This person also mentioned that treatment “beds” are empty, in other words that there are opportunities for addicts seeking treatment to receive professional intervention, but no one wants to get sober. Perhaps this is true. But even after highlighting the problem in 2019, Breed just this month figured out that there might be an easily accessible database to direct case managers, addicts, to these empty “beds,” possible life saving treatments.

The existing nonprofits and substance abuse agencies are bloated, ineffectual and stretched too thin. I just counted 15 free treatment programs, 28 inpatient drug & alcohol rehab centers, 51 outpatient, plus 23 detox centers in the Bay Area, that’s more than 100 separate agencies listed online serving various populations. I appreciate the need for programs suited to an addict’s needs, but you’re not going to convince me that the duplicate administrative costs, already high, as well as multiple development departments chasing the same dollars to run their programs are not draining resources.

Businesses, homeowners and others with a stake in the outcome have been pushed beyond any reasonable limits. Market Street is now almost completely shuttered. San Francisco’s tourism business of more than 8 billion dollars is going to take a massive hit. Friends who still live in San Francisco tell me that they feel at risk whenever they venture outside.

Who is at fault and who has the power to do anything? The blame game is fun when we really haven’t got a clue about what to do, but really, does that do anything to even begin to alleviate the dire situation? No.

Wes ‘Scoop’ Nisker said,“If you don't like the news, go out and make some of your own.”

I am confident that San Francisco can create a vision that will save its soul. The situation seems extreme, but not insurmountable. It seems to me that the missing piece is a vision of what is possible.

Dianetics paves the way for Rasputin

An old friend from Naranjo's first Seekers After Truth group asked if I would be interested in joining her for a “spiritual event.” She gave me no real information about the evening other than it was being organized by a woman whom my friend had met in Scientology, and there was an obligation of friendship. 

I also had an obligation of friendship though it would be tested, and it turns out, for much longer than this brief evening in an extremely ordinary American suburb temporarily transported into the intrigue of late Imperial Russia. My SAT friend had responded to Naranjo’s call--I think he might describe it as a suggestion but certainly not a command--to sneak into Scientology and steal their technology. She had been trained as an auditor and reached a rather high level which took an enormous amount of time and energy. Subsequently she quit the official church and worked with a group of renegade Scientologists. Others who responded to the challenge were not as fortunate. Even in the 70’s joining Scientology was not akin to joining your local Methodist Church to give your kids a groundwork in the Judeo-Christian tradition that is the backbone of democracy. It was an insidious cult. In retrospect Naranjo’s cavalier attitude was unethical and shared the distinct smell of cult practice.

I followed many of Naranjo’s suggestions as if part of the shock troops of an esoteric army aimed at recovering the secret practices that would lead to our liberation. I completed the communications course at the Berkeley Mission of the Church of Scientology, something I later learned was akin to a franchise, started by some people who had reached a certain level “going clear.” When I asked about Scientology’s attitude towards being gay, I was told that if I fully understood that the true purpose of life was survival, I would see that I had to procreate and a bit of auditing would clear up any same sex attraction that was lingering in my bank. I said thank you very much but I would not be coming back for any more classes or auditing..

I remember my exit interview quite well. I had to visit the Ethics Officer. I was told that they wanted to make sure that I had no “withholds” regarding my treatment in the Mission. I said no to whatever questions were asked and apparently my needle was floating although I remember being angry with the arrogance.  

 

The Scientologist who was hosting the gathering was a Chinese American woman who lived in the hilly suburb of El Cerrito. It was just before dusk when we began looking for parking between the driveways of the well ordered ordinary middle class track homes. Most of the neighbors were already home from work so it took some time. Eventually we found our way into a large two car garage, complete with monochrome storage boxes neatly arranged on racks above our heads. My memory tells me that there were perhaps 50 people sitting on the folding chairs, but my rational mind can’t squeeze more than 35 into the space, perhaps less. There was a slightly raised platform where the speaker sat. He was introduced by our hostess. 

After he told us his name, some history of a spiritual lineage, he said that he was going into a semi-trance, and the spirit of Rasputin would be speaking through him. Yes, Rasputin, the wild philandering drunk monk who played a significant role in the downfall and death of the Romanov dynasty during the Bolshevik Revolution. I admit that my interest was peaked. I wondered if I could ask a question of the sex life of the young princesses who would meet a grizzly fate, but almost anticipating my perverse interest, he said that he, Rasputin, would not entertain questions, but if we paid attention and held a question in our hearts, we would find our answer.

Our medium had been a used car salesman who found his way to Dianetics. Apparently a bit of clearing opened the way for him to channel the Russian mystic gone rogue who could now proffer valuable advice so that we would not repeat his tragic mistakes. I found no answers but maybe I didn’t have any good questions except where did our semi-trance medium pick up the Russian accent. It was pretty hilarious. He did more than a full hour sounding like a drunk Boris Yeltsin. 

I held my tongue, paid the requested donation of 5 bucks, it might have been as high as 10, and left rather unenlightened other than knowing that finding parking in the El Cerrito hills after 6 PM was not a piece of cake. I think I turned to my friend and said, well that was something. I don’t know what the financial arrangement was between the host and the medium, but the take could have been anywhere for 350 to 500 dollars, or more--in 1990 dollars. Not bad for a few hours, better than hanging out on an asphalt parking lot trying to sell beat up Toyotas. 

Although I tried for many years to keep our friendship alive, this woman from SAT’s early days decided that she would not tolerate anything negative I wrote about our early work with Naranjo and cut off all communication. My obligation of friendship is that I remove her name or any identifying characteristics. If the work we did cannot stand the scrutiny of honest examination, we deny any inherent value in self-exploration. I will do anything to prevent someone from setting foot inside any Mission of the Church of Scientology although I am sure that the truth-speaking ghost of Rasputin is available for consultation. His rates have undoubtedly increased. It was more than 30 years ago.

All the particulars of these events actually happened. What in the name of God were we thinking?