abagond etc

October 13, 2011

"A young man, Jeffrey Lichtenstein, who is a part of Occupy Memphis wrote a beautiful anti-racist position paper on the organization. It was hard-hitting, and made serious points, none of which they intend to consider. They removed his comments off the FaceBook page of Occupy Memphis, and then somebody came along for good measure and removed my responses off of his FB page. This shows the amount of fear and hatred there is within this movement, and within the white Left generally. They simply cannot honestly deal with their internal racism, and will now engage in censorship against other activists. This show why racism has to be overthrown through ideological and political struggle, it can never be voluntarily defeated without a struggle.
…
This whole fight with Occupy Memphis shows us to what extent that it is really difficult for oppressed POC’s and whites activists to work together on a principled basis, in this the most dynamic struggle in decades, the OWS, but has the same Achilles heel as previous coalitions over the years in America:, internal racism and domination, which relegates peoples of color to the to the activist ghetto. It needs to be said again, that there is not going to be a revolution which does not include Blacks not just taking equal part, but in the front ranks with their struggles taking center stage. This society is based on slavery and the exploitation of the labor, land theft, and mass murder of POC: Indigenous, African, and other oppressed peoples. Capitalism got its very start in America from slavery, but these folks try to pretend that is not the case, and this is just the movement of the white working class. We need to reject racism and censorship by the Left, not just the state or corporations."

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Lorenzo Kom’boa Ervin - (via facebook)

I feel so resentful toward and frustrated with the white Left.

I STRONGLY ENCOURAGE EVERYONE READING THIS TO GO TO Lorenzo Kom’boa Ervin’s Facebook page and see more excellent analyses.

(via leonineantiheroine)

one reason why i’m hesitant to get heavily involved with Occupy Nashville…… :/

(via so-treu)

What’s most notable to me about recent flashpoints between POC activists and white liberals/progressives regarding the Occupy Wall Street protests is the persistent, repetitive nature of racial discussion and dynamics. These exact same conversations and situations have been playing out not only since my early activist days in the 1990s, but going back at least to the 1960s and in fact probably way before that, back to the Suffragette and Abolitionist movements. It’s always the same: white people cast themselves into heroic leading roles and boldly occupy center stage, and then demand that all others support their heroism with a show of diversity and solidarity by standing shoulder to shoulder on stage right and stage left and in the dimly lit area in the back as silhouettes.

This isn’t an accident: it’s the result of many generations of white liberal institution-building, which has either refused or failed to incorporate POC-generated anti-racist consciousness and knowledge into the fabric of its work, and therefore repeatedly produces the same racist presumptions of white centrality and white universality. These racist values are passed on implicitly from generation to generation of white liberals. It doesn’t have to be conscious, but just as a father doesn’t need to think “I’m passing on the values of rape culture to my son!” for it to happen, so white people don’t need to think “I’m passing on racist presumptions and worldviews!” in order to effectively do so.

It’s my belief that it’s impossible to break this repetitive cycle by having people of color pull up a chair at the white liberal master’s table. That table needs to be smashed, and a new table constructed with an entirely reconceptualized and renewed seating arrangement, new place settings, new protocol, manners, etiquette, modes of conduct and interaction. White liberals will not do this work; in fact they will resist it at every turn. But people of color don’t need their permission or cooperation or acknowledgement in order to initiate demolition and construction, and to me the way forward involves ending any inclination to ask for it. Indeed communities of color have been doing all kinds of amazing work, independent of whiteness and far removed from the white spotlight, going just as far back as these tiresome dynamics — and a lot farther. To me, this is where the most exciting work has always happened and is happening, and where the most meaningful change has always and will continue to come from.

(via zuky)

(Source: elitc, via zuky)

6:16pm | URL: http://tmblr.co/ZtI54yAdYzyu

(Notes: 210)