Recovery Advocacy, Part 1 [6 films, 7’23”]
A collection of clips relating to different aspects of recovery advocacy from Huseyin Djemil, David McCartney, James Deakin and Wulf Livingston… with a comment from David Clark.
Huseyin describes Towards Recovery wanting to show that people in recovery are assets. They feed the soil of where they live. They’re the people who’ve walked through deep water and come out the other side. David McCartney started to write about recovery because he wanted more people to understand and know what was available to facilitate their recovery journey.
James emphasises that the stories of recovering people are very important, but academics and their research are also needed, particularly to help recovery communities raise funding and to drive policy change. David says that academics need to be promoting the voices of recovering people.
Huseyin emphasises that the Faces and Voices of Recovery (FAVOR) movement in the US is saying that there are 23 million of us in recovery and we pay tax and we vote, and so we want to see some legislative change. Wulf describes how over time 20-30 like-minded recovery advocates from across North Wales all know each other, have been on the same journey, and share the same values and principles.
Huseyin describes the treatment system wheeling out ‘their’ people in recovery and saying, ‘Look at how wonderful we are!” He goes on talk about an old proverb he uses from time-to-time: ‘Until the lion learns to write, all the stories will be from the hunters’ perspective.’ He continues, ‘I guess these videos, the blogs, and all of that [on Recovery Voices] is the lion learning to write.’