#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
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#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
#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
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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
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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
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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
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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
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