Mobilizing for A14 in Seattle

April 3, 2015 | Revolution Newspaper | revcom.us

From a reader:

April 2—As part of the daily April 14 Shutdown mobilizing here in Seattle, people met Thursday evening to put up posters for the Seattle April 14 convergence, and also get out flyers about the April 6 Cornel West and Carl Dix “Emergency!” livestream event. Another important thing being posted and shared with people on the street was the centerfold April 14 poster from Revolution newspaper with the many faces of people killed by police. The neighborhood we went to is busy at night and very diverse, with students, youth, homeless people, buskers, various nationalities, immigrants, and gay people.

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Individuals often stopped to read the posters as we were putting them up. In talking to them we found most had police brutality and murder weighing on their thoughts right now. One woman said, “It’s getting worse!” We stressed to people how this is a real crossroads moment, that the protests so far have made a difference, but we need to raise the level of resisting and fighting back against what the police are doing, and make April 14 a real day of shutting down of this system. A very important thing we tried to remember to do was to struggle with people on the spot for themselves to take up being organizers for April 14.

In a local park, a Black youth told us how the police killed his friend in 2010, and another time they assaulted him and then charged him with assault. He looked over the poster with all the faces on it and we talked about how many people have been killed—even in the wake of Mike Brown and the Ferguson protests. He took a stack of flyers and said that he would be there on April 14, and would bring 10-15 people, and we got a way to stay in touch with him.

A Black woman and man with a young child stopped and told us that they were planning on being there for the walkout, and asked us if they could take fliers to get out in the area where they live. They’re planning on coming to the regular Sunday April 14 planning meeting, and took a stack of fliers and some Revolution newspapers to get out to their friends and family. The man told us about being on transit, he had his ticket paid for and everything, and there was a transit cop that choked him to the point where he couldn’t breathe... it was just like Eric Garner, he kept telling the transit cop, “I can’t breathe, I can’t breathe...” The cop told him that if he could talk, that he was breathing, and continued choking him. The woman spoke of the child with them, her grandchild, saying, “He’s our future, his generation, this is our future, you know?” Yes. And they are killing our youth, they are my youth, they are your youth, they are our future, and we have to act to stop this situation.

A Native man loved the idea of the April 14 movement, and also said there was not enough emphasis or awareness in society on police brutality against Native peoples.

There were several other people who took various amounts of flyers or posters to spread to other places. The idea of a nationwide shutting down of business as usual to shut down police murdering people is something that strikes a chord with many on the streets.

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