What Does April 14 Need to Look Like?

March 2, 2015 | Revolution Newspaper | revcom.us

 

Click for printable PDFs of the
Call for April 14:

Call - 2up on sheet

Call - with endorsement form

April 14 needs to be a day when everybody who hates the way police get away with murdering Black and Latino people again and again knows they have to act to say NO MORE to this horror. It needs to be a day when business as usual is shut down; a day when students walk out of class or don’t go to school at all; a day when people don’t go to work; a day when everybody who wants to STOP police getting away with murdering people again and again takes to the streets and stands together to disrupt the normal routine of this society because that normal routine includes the system giving a green light to cops to brutalize and even murder Black and brown people. All sections of society must act on this day: young people tired of going thru life with a target on their backs in the eyes of the police and society, communities targeted by the police and the whole criminal “injustice” system, students, entertainers and athletes, teachers, lawyers, people of different races and nationalities—everybody. We all must stand together, raise our voices to say: NO MORE to this horror!

HOW DO WE MAKE APRIL 14 AS POWERFUL AS IT NEEDS TO BE, AND CAN BE?

We have to spread the word to make sure that everyone knows that April 14 is the day to act to STOP police from getting away with murder. But it won’t be enough to just spread the word. We have to mobilize people to act on important cases and issues as we build up to April 14.

The conference in Atlanta which issued the call for April 14 mapped out a plan for mobilizing resistance at key nodal points leading up to the Shut Down day in April. This plan includes:

  • Crews of volunteers going to the commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the savage attack on the people marching across the Edmund Pettus Bridge demanding rights for Black people in Selma, Alabama, on March 7 and 8, to connect the legacy of the struggle in that period to acting on April 14 to stop the savage attacks on Black and Latino people today. To join this crew, contact the Stop Mass Incarceration Network at stopmassincarceration@gmail.com or by calling 347-979-SMIN (7646).
  • Blowing the Whistle on Brutal, Murdering Cops on March 14. Get whistles and distribute them among people living in communities targeted by the police and make plans to gather in places where police have committed outrages against the people or at police stations and Blow the Whistle on the shit the system lets them get away with again and again. In this way, we will be giving people who have suffered this brutality a way to call it out and to collectively act to STOP it.
  • Targeting the criminalization and demonization of immigrants on April 1. People should find out where the immigrant detention centers or ICE deportation offices are in their areas and plan actions targeting them. If there are no such facilities in your area, go to a federal building or some other appropriate target. Starting now, people should connect with immigrants, immigrants' rights groups, and their supporters and involve them in the April 1 actions and in taking up the mobilization for April 14.

HERE’S HOW YOU CAN BECOME PART OF MAKING APRIL 14 HAPPEN

If you hate hearing about another life being stolen by cops who are supposed to protect and serve and want to be part of STOPPING this horror by making April 14 happen as powerfully as possible, here’s what you need to do:

1) Spread the word everywhere and make sure everybody knows April 14 is the day to say NO MORE to police getting away with murdering people. Get the Call for April 14 everywhere. Spread it thru social media and online to everyone you know and to people you don’t know yet. Download copies of the Call and get them everywhere—distribute them at your school or workplace and in your community, take it to places where people gather and enlist them in this important effort;

2) Go to the web site: www.stopmassincarceration.net, find out what’s planned in your area or at your school and get connected with it. If there’s nothing planned in your area or at your school yet, get some people together and plan something. Call a meeting to discuss the Call for April 14 and make plans to get the word out on your campus or in your neighborhood. And make plans to act on April 14.

3) Contact the Stop Mass Incarceration network and bring a speaker to your school or your city to talk about why people who want to STOP police terror need to become involved in making April 14 happen;

4) Make a generous contribution and/or raise money to help make April 14 happen. You can donate on line at stopmassincarceration.net/donate, or you can make tax-deductible contribution by snail mail by making out a check to “Stop Mass Incarceration/AfGJ” with “Stop Mass Incarceration” in the memo line and mailing it to the address below.

Stop Mass Incarceration Network, P.O. Box 941, Knickerbocker Station, New York City, NY 10002-0900

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