Apparently we need to readjust our vocabularies again. It’s no longer white/yellow/red/brown separatism, it’s just militant-shaming.
As a nation, we fail to comprehend Black political strategy in much the same way we fail to recognize the value of Black life.
We
see ghettos and crime and absent parents where we should see
communities actively struggling against mental health crises and
premeditated economic exploitation. And when we see police cars being
smashed and corporate property being destroyed, we should see reasonable
responses to generations of extreme state violence, and logical
decisions about what kind of actions yield the desired political
results.I’m overwhelmed by the pervasive slandering of protesters in Baltimore this weekend for not remaining peaceful….We need to clarify what we mean by terms like “violence” and
“peaceful.” Because, to be clear, violence is beating, harassing,
tazing, assaulting and shooting Black, trans, immigrant, women, and
queer people, and that is the reality many of us are dealing with daily.
Telling someone to be peaceful and shaming their militance not only
lacks a nuanced and historical political understanding, it is literally a
deadly and irresponsible demand.The political goals of rioters in Baltimore are not unclear—just as they were not unclear when poor, Black people rioted in Ferguson last fall. When the free market, real estate, the elected government, the legal system have all shown you they are not going to protect you—in fact, that they are the sources of the greatest violence you face—then political action becomes about stopping the machine that is trying to kill you, even if only for a moment, getting the boot off your neck, even if it only allows you a second of air. This is exactly what blocking off streets, disrupting white consumerism, and destroying state property are designed to do.
Black people know this, and have
employed these tactics for a very, very long time. Calling them
uncivilized, and encouraging them to mind the Constitution is racist,
and as an argument fails to ground itself not only in the violent
political reality in which Black people find themselves, but also in our
centuries-long tradition of resistance, one that has taught effective
strategies for militance and direct action to virtually every other
current movement for justice.
There is your choice, white America. Racism, aka “civilization and the Constitution” or living amongst an entitled and vibrant population that feels entirely justified in burning down the city around itself. I think it’s long past time for forced integration. But not for schoolchildren, for those who claim to oppose separatism. Let’s bus every self-professed “anti-racist” to Baltimore and make them live and work there.
They seem to think all of White America would rather die than be called racist. And they’re probably not wrong about the SJWs. But what the advocates of multiculturalism forgot is that Mexicans and Asians despise blacks in a way that few whites ever have, and they feel absolutely no guilt for the so-called “legacy of slavery”.
And if you’re going to try to make American Indians feel guilty about racial separatism, well, good luck with that.