John, it's Juneteenth weekend! ✊✊✊✊✊✊
Juneteenth represents our freedom, our liberation, our past, and our future. But we continue to grapple with the tension between celebrating freedom and justice and the continued struggle to permanently secure both.
Just like our lives, our HISTORY matters, including why Juneteenth is rooted in a call for liberation for the Black community.
It took more than two-and-a-half years after President Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation in 1863 for enslaved people to be freed nationwide. Juneteenth celebrates June 19th, 1865, the day when the Union Army issued an order proclaiming the emancipation of the enslaved people in Galveston, Texas. The name Juneteenth comes from a blending of the date.
Juneteenth became the date we celebrate emancipation, despite government agents having to travel from plantation to plantation for years after to free our Ancestors -- all while enslavers continued to steal our labor, knowledge, and skills.
Our Ancestors fought hard for their freedom, and our work toward defunding the police, investing in Black lives, canceling student debt, securing reparations for Black people for past and continuing harms, economic justice that ensures Black communities have collective ownership and self-determination, and everything else in between is a representation that the fight will live on until we are ALL free.
Juneteenth celebrates our Blackness by honoring our Ancestors, affirming ourselves and our people, creating space for Black joy, and struggling unceasingly for freedom and justice.
This Juneteenth, in honor of our togetherness and freedom celebrations, we want to hear directly from you: "What does Black freedom look like for you and/or for your community?"
We can't wait to hear from you, John. This Juneteenth and beyond, let's continue to center each other, our communities, and most importantly – our Blackity Blackness!
In love and solidarity,
Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation
