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Everyone is freaking out. Harper’s recently put out a letter [[link removed]], cosigned by many well known names, that criticized the “mob mentality” of cancel culture that they claim is threatening free speech and fueling illiberalism.
But “cancel culture” is not a thing. The only “cancel culture” that exists is the “cancel culture” of abject poverty or mass incarceration or workplace discrimination - where entire groups of people are systemically stifled and silenced from participation.
So-called “call out” or “cancel culture” is simply exposing the failure of systems to take care of its people so that it can protect the people in power. These online reckonings reflect the voice of a people who are breaking silence to stop the cycle of harm. And in the absence of systems of accountability, it’s needed. On the most recent CTZN Podcast, Lama Rod Owens challenged us to hold this complexity. He asks us to consider:
"How can I be the least violent I can be in this moment; knowing that I am not going to always get it right?" Knowing also - just to even make this more complex - that sometimes I have to practice aggression and violence in order to disrupt the aggression of violence in the space, in order to disarm and minimize the harm.” [[link removed]]
No one deserves to be cancelled, or disposed of. But people can survive the humiliation of social media callouts. What they can’t survive is the persistent and systemic assault on their bodies.
The invitation is to be more curious and less defensive about what needs to be heard and exposed by this process, so that we can make the changes necessary to create the country that we all deserve.
Kerri (she/her)
It’s not just call-out culture. It’s accountability [[link removed]]. And in the absence of systems of care, we need it. [click to tweet] [[link removed]]
Thank you for the symbolic gestures but black people need reparations [[link removed]]. How to make amends for the sins of the past. [click to tweet] [[link removed]]
“There’s a divide in even the closest interracial relationships, including ours”. A moving excerpt from Aminatou Sow and Ann Friedman’s latest book “Big Friendship: How We Keep Each Other Close” [[link removed]]. [click to tweet] [[link removed]]
To solve the twin problems of racial injustice and climate change [[link removed]], we need to stop parachuting in ‘experts’. [click to tweet] [[link removed]]
Racism is a public health crisis [[link removed]]. Here’s what racism does to your heart and health. [click to tweet] [[link removed]]
JULY 20TH is a day of reckoning. Across the country, workers will rise up to strike for Black lives. Together, we will withhold our most valuable asset — our labor — in support of dismantling racism and white supremacy to bring about fundamental changes in our society, economy and workplaces. Join us in walking out for justice. Here’s how you can be in solidarity:
PLEDGE: Demand that Black lives are valued by committing to kneel, hold a moment of silence or walk off the job for 8 minutes and 46 seconds [[link removed]].
ATTEND AN EVENT: Find an event near you [[link removed]].
STRIKE: If you have the ability, here’s how you can strike [[link removed]].
This week, Angela Davis, set us straight. She said “I don’t see this election as being about choosing a candidate who will be able to lead us in the right direction. It will be about choosing a candidate who will be most effectively pressured into allowing more space for the evolving anti-racism movement”. [[link removed]] In other words, no one candidate is coming to save us, we must save ourselves. We must hold the line on critical issues and push the candidate towards more progressive policies. This is a long game that is going to take us well beyond the 2020 election. And we need everyone practicing politics every day -the same way that we practice meditation or yoga or mindfulness. Politics is simply a system of how we take care of one another and the whole of society. It is the yoga beyond the mat, the meditation beyond the cushion, the consciousness in action. And we need you. Over the next few weeks, we are going to be rolling out our VOTEWELL campaign to help bridge this crisis moment into a movement moment that can change the course of our country. We’ll be providing training and resources to help us turn out the vote and take back our country. More to come.
The difference between “reforming the police” and “abolition” is imagination. We have to think beyond the practical limitations of our minds and imagine better the world we want to see. And then act as if it were possible all the time.