Every 36 Hours: Advancing the Organizing Drive for a National Plan of Action for Racial Justice and Self-Determination

Every  36  Hours:  Advancing  the  Organizing  Drive  for  a  Peoples’   National  Plan  of  Action  for  Racial  Justice  and  Self-­‐Determination   th

Since  the  release  of  our  Report  on  the  Extrajudicial  Killing  of  120  Black  People  on  July  9 ,  the  Police  have   only  continued  their  steady  pace  of  executions  and  their  standard  pattern  of  passing  them  off  as   “justifiable  homicides”  and  “unexplained  incidents”.   The  cold  blooded  execution  of  Chavis  Carter  in  Jonesboro,  Arkansas  is  the  most  graphic  case  in  point.  On   th Sunday,  July  29 ,  Jonesboro  Police  claimed  that  21-­‐year  old  Carter  shot  himself  in  the  head,  after  being   searched  twice,  while  handcuffed  in  the  back  of  a  squad  car.  To  date,  despite  national  media  coverage   and  sustained  pressure  from  local  forces,  the  case  is  proceeding  in  standard  fashion.    The  two  officers   responsible  for  Carters  execution,  Keith  Bagget  and  Ron  Marsh,  are  on  paid  leave  until  internal   investigations  by  the  Jonesboro  PD  and  the  FBI  are  complete.   And  Chavis  Carter  was  not  alone.  Javon  Neal,  16,  was  executed  by  Tampa,  Florida  police  on  Sunday,  July   nd th 22 .  James  Harper,  31,  by  the  Dallas  police  on  Wednesday,  July  25 .    Julius  Richard  Larrance,  19,  by  Police   th th in  Clearwater,  Florida  on  Thursday,  July  26 .  Darius  Kennedy,  51,  in  NYC,  NY  on  Saturday,  August  11 .   th And,  Christopher  Middleton,  26,  in  Maywood,  IL  on  Sunday,  August  12 .  These  killings  only  reaffirm  the   findings  in  our  report  that  Every  36  Hours  a  Black  person  is  killed  by  the  police  in  the  United  States.   Clearly,  just  publicizing  these  extrajudicial  killings  of  Black  people  is  not  enough.  More  must  be  done  to   protect  Black  life  and  secure  justice  for  our  people.   Anaheim  shows  a  way   In  response  to  the  Anaheim,  California  Police  Departments  extrajudicial  killings  of  two  Latino  men,   st nd Manuel  Angel  Diaz,  25  and  Joel  Acevedo,  21  on  July  21  and  22  respectively,  the  Latino  community  in   Anaheim  engaged  in  a  sustained  direct  action  mobilization  against  the  police  department  and  Anaheim   city  officials  for  well  over  two  weeks.  Latino  residents  and  their  allies  used  a  range  of  tactics  including   marches,  rallies,  sit  in’s,  a  picket  of  Disneyland  and  occupations  of  intersections  and  police  and  city  offices   to  ensure  that  business  could  not  proceed  as  usual  to  guarantee  that  their  issues  were  addressed.  In   addition  to  the  intolerable  police  killing  of  at  least  five  Latinos  in  the  past  year,  the  mobilizations  drew   attention  to  the  vast  inequality  between  white  and  Latino  communities  of  Anaheim  and  the  colonial   status  of  Latinos  who  comprise  54%  of  the  population  and  have  virtually  no  representation  in  City   government.   In  many  respects,  the  Anaheim  mobilization  mirrored  the  dynamic  community  response  in  Oakland,  CA  in   2009  and  2010  following  the  cold-­‐blooded  execution  of  Oscar  Grant.  Of  the  major  mobilizations  against   police  terrorism  and  extrajudicial  killings  over  the  past  10  years,  the  Anaheim-­‐Oakland  models  of   sustained  community  pressure  are  the  ones  we,  in  the  Malcolm  X  Grassroots  Movement,  think  merit  the   most  attention  by  the  social  justice  movements  contained  in  the  United  States.  The  Anaheim-­‐Oakland   models  provide  a  direct  means  to  addressing  extrajudicial  killing,  police  terrorism,  and  other  forms  of   containment  aimed  at  oppressed  peoples  and  communities  that  community  members  can  directly  control   and  dictate.  The  strength  of  the  model  is  that  it  is  not  dependent  on  legal  proceedings  or  on  elected   politicians,  but  upon  the  commitment  and  initiative  of  the  people  themselves.   Completing  the  Model   Despite  its  strengths,  the  Anaheim-­‐Oakland  models  have  their  weaknesses.  Their  main  weakness  is  that   mass  mobilizations,  while  they  can  and  often  do  prompt  social  change,  in  and  of  themselves  don’t  provide  

direction  or  structure  to  the  change.  That  only  comes  from  mass  organization  that  is  able  to  impose  its   will  on  the  state  and  the  ruling  classes  to  adhere  to  the  program  and  demands  of  the  movement.   One  element  of  structural  change  that  the  Malcolm  X  Grassroots  Movement  has  been  advocating  for  to   address  police  terrorism  and  other  forms  of  containment  (including  mass  incarceration)  is  a  National  Plan   of  Action  for  Racial  Justice  and  Self-­‐Determination.  As  a  central  component  of  the  No  More  Trayvon   Martins  campaign  we  have  been  agitating  for  this  demand  to  be  met  by  the  Federal  government.  The   agitation  has  mainly  served  the  purpose  of  educating  a  broader  audience  and  serving  notice  to  the   Federal  Government.  But,  we  are  clear,  that  if  this  plan  is  to  mean  anything  and  to  have  any  real  impact,  it   is  something  that  has  to  be  developed  and  implemented  by  oppressed  peoples  themselves.   To  develop  and  advance  a  more  comprehensive  model  of  resistance  to  police  terrorism  and  containment,   we  are  proposing  a  model  that  draws  on  the  strengths  of  the  Anaheim-­‐Oakland  models  and  combines   them  with  the  following:   1.

2.

3. 4.

The  formation  of  Black  Self-­‐Defense  Networks  to  defend  our  people  and  combat  police   terrorism.  These  Networks  should  seek  to  build  Copwatch  programs,  engage  in  mass  rights   based  education  trainings  for  the  community,  serve  as  first  responders  to  acts  of  Police   Terrorism,  and  help  coordinate  mass  resistance  to  these  acts  via  mass  mobilizations  and  direct   action.  These  Networks  should  also  be  encouraged  to  engage  in  offensive  campaigns,  such  as   referendums  to  institute  Police  Control  Boards.   The  formation  of  People’s  Self-­‐Defense  Networks  to  defend  the  lives  and  interests  of  all   oppressed  peoples’  and  exploited  classes  against  various  forms  of  state  terrorism.  These   People’s  Self-­‐Defense  Networks  would  work  as  multi-­‐national  alliances  to  engage  in  a  broad   manner  all  of  the  tasks  mentioned  above  to  defend  oppressed  peoples  and  targeted   communities,  such  as  LGBTQ2GNC  communities,    against  institutionalized  racism,  white   supremacy,  institutionalized  sexism,  patriarchy  and  state  repression  be  it  racial  profiling,   gender  profiling,  stop  and  frisk,  mass  incarceration,  or  mass  deportations.   The  launching  of  campaigns  for  local  referendums  to  institute  Police  Control  mechanisms  –   i.e.  community  based  structures  that  have  the  power  to  hire,  fire,  subpoena,  and  discipline  the   police.   Forming  People’s  Assemblies,  on  local,  city-­‐wide,  and  regional  levels  to  engage  in  program   and  demand  development  initiatives  that  will  structure  the  development  of  a  Peoples’   National  Plan  of  Action  for  Racial  Justice  and  Self-­‐Determination  and  the  broad   implementation  of  people’s  programs  for  self-­‐defense  and  mutual  aid.  

People  to  People  Unity  Building   Black  or  New  Afrikan  people  are  not  the  only  targets  of  this  escalation  of  Extrajudicial  Killing  by  the  Police   and  other  forces  of  the  government.  Indigenous  peoples,  Latinos,  Arabs,  Southeast  Asians,  Muslims,  and   immigrants,  are  also  being  targeted.  In  fact,  given  the  current  climate  of  xenophobia  and  racial  hostility   directed  towards  Latinos,  we  suspect  that  the  numbers  of  those  stolen  from  Xicano/Mexicano  and  Central   American  communities  will  equal,  if  not  exceed  those  of  Blacks.   When  you  consider  the  overall  manner  in  which  racial  profiling  has  intensified  since  September  11,  2001,   and  how  it  has  been  supported  by  the  phenomenal  growth  of  the  national  security  industry  and  the  ever   increasing  means  of  surveillance,  it  becomes  clear  that  the  extrajudicial  killings  of  Blacks,  Latinos,  and   others  are  about  as  accidental  as  the  more  the  2  million  Black  people  incarcerated  or  under  some  form  of   direct  state  control  throughout  the  United  States.  Extrajudicial  killing  and  mass  incarceration  are  two   sides  of  the  same  coin.  Together  they  are  just  one  dimension  of  the  overall  strategy  of  containment   rooted  in  the  systemic  and  institutional  practices  of  white  supremacy  and  colonialism  that  give  form  to   the  national  oppression  of  Black,  Xicano,  and  Indigenous  people.  

The  Malcolm  X  Grassroots  Movement,  is  calling  for  a  broad  alliance  of    Blacks,  Indigenous  peoples,   Latinos,  Arabs,  Asians,  and  progressive  whites  that  will  challenge  the  various  forms  of  state  repression,   including  extrajudicial  killing,  racial  profiling  ,  mass  incarceration,  mass  deportation,  economic   exploitation  and  various  forms  of  displacement.  It  is  our  hope  that  this  peoples’  alliance  will  form  the  core   of  the  People’s  Self  Defense  Networks  and  the  broad  People  to  People  coalitions  that  will  build  the   People’s  Assemblies  and  develop  the  National  Plan  of  Action  for  Racial  Justice  and  Self-­‐Determination.   Organize,  Organize,  Organize   To  launch  this  process,  the  Malcolm  X  Grassroots  Movement,  working  with  allies  in  the  Black  Left  Unity   Network  and  the  National  Alliance  for  Racial  Justice  and  Human  Rights,  is  calling  for  a  series  of  dialogue   calls  to  initiate  a  national  process  of  organizing,  networking,  and  coalition  building  to  create  the   aforementioned  Networks  and  start  the  process  of  developing  a  Peoples’  National  Plan  of  Action  for   Racial  Justice  and  Self-­‐Determination.   th

We  will  be  hosting  our  first  Black/Afrikan  People’s  Dialogue  on  Thursday,  August  30 .   th

We  will  be  hosting  our  first  All  Peoples’  Dialogue  on  Thursday,  September  20 .   To  join  these  calls  please  contact  Kamau  Franklin  at  [email protected].  For  more  information  about  the   campaign  visit  www.mxgm.org.  To  sign  the  petition  for  demanding  a  National  Plan  of  Action   http://www.ushrnetwork.org/content/webform/trayvon-­‐martin-­‐petition.