#BlackMastodon #BlackFedi #BlackTwitter #Privilege #ICE
Wake up y’all. For those of you trying to sit this fight out...you are grossly mistaken if you think it has nothing to do with you because you don’t speak Spanish or Creole or Patois. It is about everyone who is Latino and everyone who is brown and everyone who is BLACK like you. Resting on privilege is like drinking poison and hoping the warnings on the box won’t affect you. Join the fight. 9/9

#BlackMastodon #BlackFedi #BlackTwitter #Privilege #ICE
Wake up y’all. For those of you trying to sit this fight out...you are grossly mistaken if you think it has nothing to do with you because you don’t speak Spanish or Creole or Patois. It is about everyone who is Latino and everyone who is brown and everyone who is BLACK like you. Resting on privilege is like drinking poison and hoping the warnings on the box won’t affect you. Join the fight. 9/9

#BlackMastodon #BlackFedi #BlackTwitter #Privilege #ICE
This is about privilege. She was embarrassed that there was an immigration violation against her husband of 25 years who is now 78 years old. She didn’t want to tell anyone (including her sister who is a lawyer!!!) that they had gotten an order of deportation months ago. How could that happen to people like them, who owned houses and big cars? She notified us the day the judge in the court turned him over to ICE 8/9

#BlackMastodon #BlackFedi #BlackTwitter #Privilege #ICE
The family got the news last Tuesday with a one sentence post in the family Signal chat from my sister. “I guess I can tell you now, ICE has [her husband’s name]. Everyone posts WTAF??? and the phones all start ringing. Immediately I start posting resources for her, my brother starts to get his state department creds out….but my sister goes silent. 7/9

#BlackMastodon #BlackFedi #BlackTwitter #Privilege #ICE
Many Black people think the immigration problem and ICE have nothing to do with us. But, that couldn’t be further from the truth. We all have neighbors or friends who are Jamaican, Trinidadian, Haitian, Senegalese or Malian. I mean that’s all of NYC right? Some are from Bermuda, Panama or the Bahamas. Like my brother-in-law...who is now in ICE custody, in a facility near the NY border, waiting to be deported. 6/9

#BlackMastodon #BlackFedi #BlackTwitter #Privilege #ICE
Since 2016 I’ve been telling my family how important it was for everyone to have their papers in order. Repeatedly, I heard “We’re not Latino, we don’t have to worry about that.” I told them...but….you are BLACK. I heard the same thing when I was talking to some Black folks in Texas on a layover recently. A brother told me he was coming to DC. I said have your ID ready. He says “I’m not Hispanic.” I said “But you are BLACK.” 5/9

#BlackMastodon #BlackFedi #BlackTwitter #Privilege #ICE
In my family, all of my siblings with the exception of one who has mental health issues, are educated, some with multiple degrees. We all were professionals or are still working as professionals. We are still BLACK, but we’ve done well for Black folks here. We are originally from NYC and have always lived among, married, and hung out with black and brown folks from everywhere, the islands, Africa, and Central America. 4/9

Feel good story for the week: they were freed with no charges <3

#ICE #FuckICE #BlackTwitter #BlackFedi #BlackMastodon

#BlackMastodon #BlackFedi #BlackTwitter #ThoughtExperiment
At two of those rallies, important people said “This is not who we are.” But as you all pointed out – it is who we are. The activist community needs to be more vocal in rejecting that narrative and we must educate and push our leaders to do the same. 8/8

#BlackMastodon #BlackFedi #BlackTwitter #ThoughtExperiment
That 6 minute jump out, grab and disappear someone, they developed that here. Snatching children. Here again. Shooting up cars...here. No one cared. I’ve been to 3 rallies in 10 days, including one at CBP which Ezra from #Indivisible hosted. When speakers named the cities ICE is attacking , DC and New Orleans were not included, even in the damn DC rally! Two black cities. No one cared. 7/8

#BlackMastodon #BlackFedi #BlackTwitter #ThoughtExperiment
Why is it important for white allies to acknowledge this? Because the ongoing refusal to acknowledge this basic fact of 1) prevents the formation of real multicultural alliances; 2) allows allies to view harms as those that affect only their communities and not the ones that look nothing like them; and 3) it allows folks to continue to avoid doing of the painful intersectional analysis of the harms racism creates. 4/8

#BlackMastodon #BlackFedi #BlackTwitter #ThoughtExperiment
The attempted genocide of Native Americans, the enslavement of Africans and African Americans, the denial of civil rights, the discrimination against the Chinese, the internment of the Japanese, the ongoing attacks on Mexican Americans and anyone that speaks Spanish or looks a little too brown. All of these behaviors are state sanctioned violence. Organized and state sanctioned violence is hallmark of the US since its founding. 3/8

#BlackMastodon #BlackFedi #BlackTwitter #ThoughtExperiment
I enjoy being on Mastodon because of conversations here. I didn’t have to explain to any of you why the phrase “This is not who we are” is ridiculous. It’s like when Kissinger died, you all said he should rot in hell. I was like yes! These are my people. But I do want to talk about how allies and liberals hurt our fight for freedom when they use that phrase in speeches trying to make people feel better. 1/8

#BlackMastodon #BlackFedi #BlackTwitter #ThoughtExperiment
At two of those rallies, important people said “This is not who we are.” But as you all pointed out – it is who we are. The activist community needs to be more vocal in rejecting that narrative and we must educate and push our leaders to do the same. 8/8

#BlackMastodon #BlackFedi #BlackTwitter #ThoughtExperiment
That 6 minute jump out, grab and disappear someone, they developed that here. Snatching children. Here again. Shooting up cars...here. No one cared. I’ve been to 3 rallies in 10 days, including one at CBP which Ezra from #Indivisible hosted. When speakers named the cities ICE is attacking , DC and New Orleans were not included, even in the damn DC rally! Two black cities. No one cared. 7/8

#BlackMastodon #BlackFedi #BlackTwitter #ThoughtExperiment
Who were the black and brown activists that are being beat and arrested since August? Who are the 30 people killed by ICE last fall? Or, any of the thousands disappeared out of Alligator Alley? What’s the name of the guy who was murdered while he was detained? Can we imagine them? See what I’m saying? The tactics used by ICE now in MN, Chicago, L.A., Portland, were perfected right here in DC in August! 6/8

#BlackMastodon #BlackFedi #BlackTwitter #ThoughtExperiment
The cost for that refusal to deal with the reality of racism and its impact on Black and Brown communities is high. Look how long it has taken white folks across the nation to ramp up and take to the streets. I love the guy in the frog suit and the one who threw the sandwich, but ask yourself why were they the iconic images of this struggle until a white person was killed? 5/8

#BlackMastodon #BlackFedi #BlackTwitter #ThoughtExperiment
Why is it important for white allies to acknowledge this? Because the ongoing refusal to acknowledge this basic fact of 1) prevents the formation of real multicultural alliances; 2) allows allies to view harms as those that affect only their communities and not the ones that look nothing like them; and 3) it allows folks to continue to avoid doing of the painful intersectional analysis of the harms racism creates. 4/8

#BlackMastodon #BlackFedi #BlackTwitter #ThoughtExperiment
The attempted genocide of Native Americans, the enslavement of Africans and African Americans, the denial of civil rights, the discrimination against the Chinese, the internment of the Japanese, the ongoing attacks on Mexican Americans and anyone that speaks Spanish or looks a little too brown. All of these behaviors are state sanctioned violence. Organized and state sanctioned violence is hallmark of the US since its founding. 3/8

#BlackMastodon #BlackFedi #BlackTwitter #ThoughtExperiment
I’m not criticizing the wonderfully brave work that is being done in support of our immigrant community. But we must strive to keep ourselves educated about the invisible ways ingrained societal racism impacts us all. The utterance of that phrase masks a refusal to recognize or credit the lived experience of every single group of black and brown people in this country. 2/8