Reflections on June 30 Meeting to Stop Police Terror

October 24: We MUST Change Everything, Beginning NOW

July 6, 2015 | Revolution Newspaper | revcom.us

From a reader:

I went to the June 30 meeting in New York City to plan a massive political manifestation this October 22-24 against police terror and murder. I haven’t stopped thinking about it since, and wanted to share a few thoughts on the challenge this poses.

Carl Dix (Photo: Special to revcom.us)

Over 150 people there heard the speakers lay out their different analyses and come together to emphasize that this had to be something on a much higher and broader level than what’s been seen up to now. The plan—mobilizing tens of thousands for three days of action, including both “shutting shit down” on a whole other scale and bringing in many more in support of that—is nothing short of audacious. I go back a long way and have some sense of history, and I can’t recall anything comparable being called around THIS particular outrage.

I came away from the event sparked by what I had heard and the people I had encountered. I have been wrangling with what it would take to really do that and seeing pathways to realize that potential. I think we’re all going to have to think in new ways, and I’m offering these beginning reflections to help further all that.

Another Level of Breadth and Determination

Over the past year, people have begun to move against the outrage of police terror and murder in a way not seen for decades. A movement is taking shape, with many different ideas out there. Major questions are being raised to millions about “What kind of society is this? Why do these things keep happening?” People have been attracted to this—this is becoming a magnetic pole in society. But, measured against the need to really uproot this whole genocidal program (not to mention against the need for a whole new and radically better system aimed at uprooting ALL oppression), all this is still just beginning.

And the system has definitely dug in to fight back against this. Heavy charges have been brought against people for simple acts of non-violent resistance. The police—both as a political force and then in what they have done “on the job”—have hit back, and they’ve been down-the-line supported by the right-wing politicians. The millions in the grip of the sick white racism at the core of this country’s culture have been mobilized to react—we’re only just beginning to see this, and almost certainly this will get even uglier. The liberals like Obama and New York mayor de Blasio promise reforms out of one side of their mouths but then they actually back up the police out of the other AND in what they actually do—remember Obama insulting those who righteously stood up in Baltimore as “thugs,” and his Justice Department backing the pigs in every case of abuse that came to the Supreme Court. (See “The REAL Record of the Holder Department of IN-Justice: Supporting Police Violence in EVERY CASE Before the Supreme Court.”)

The point is, the battle has been joined. But joining the battle is not winning it. And even in the midst of this beginning rumbling, far too many still stand on the sidelines.

Cornel West (Photo: Special to revcom.us)

That’s got to stop. October 22-24 has got to take this ferment to another level—another level of breadth and another level of determination. These three days taken together must include people putting themselves on the line for this, as well as many thousands more out there in support of them, in such a way that it politically stops this country in its tracks and changes the terms and direction of society. It must call out to the world that there is a force in the U.S. that simply will NOT tolerate this... that this force is growing... and that “change is gonna come.” These days must put the rulers of this country back on their heels and give heart and a whole other level of initiative to the people.

The Horror... and the Need to STOP It

You definitely had the sense from ALL the speakers that THIS MUST STOP. There was a critique of this whole society and the people who represent for it from a lot of the speakers—critiques both blistering and deep. Some put forward revolution, though they had different ideas of what this meant. But all pointed to those bold three days in October as a critical watershed, with October 24 as the massively powerful capstone to it.

Nicholas Heyward Sr. (Photo: Special to revcom.us)

Families of people murdered by police
Family members of peoplel murdered by police. Juanita Young (at mic), Nicholas Heyward Sr (center) and Joshua Lopez (left). (Photo: Special to revcom.us)

I was powerfully struck—once again—by the parents and relatives of the police murder victims who spoke. Nicholas Heyward Sr. spoke powerfully of how he lost his 13-year-old son, Nicholas Jr., to the bullets of a trigger-happy cop, and how he has been fighting for justice for the 20 years since then, and has not seen justice yet—either in his son’s case, or in the others he has fought. Juanita Young spoke movingly of her son, Malcolm Ferguson, cut down for nothing as he was just entering into his adulthood. No chance, she said, to have children... to live his life. And other relatives of police murder victims also added their voices from the front, or through messages to the meeting.

I thought about this as the evening unfolded. How many more scores of Nicholas Juniors and Malcolms would there be before October dawned? How many more lives were to be stolen? How could this be allowed to continue?

And how many more thousands of young people like Kalief Browder would be fed into the meat grinder? Kalief was the young man being held before trial and tortured with solitary confinement at Rikers Island prison for over two years, and finally driven to suicide just a few weeks ago. Outrageous! How many more young people, whose lives and spirits would be broken, in one way or another, from the very conscious policy of mass incarceration? How many millions have already been ground up... and how many millions more will be fed into it, until we stop it?

That is the reality of this, and these, and nothing less, are the stakes of this. Viewed that way, there is no time to lose.

Making Plans to Reach Out Wide

After the speakers, we broke into work teams. I went to the outreach team, which had at least 50 or 60 people at it. Person after person got up, putting out ideas and offering resources. This vision of something really massive and resistant in October had struck a chord with them, and they wanted to make it happen. One person spoke from a union; a young woman talked about the transsexual community and forces there doing work on this; a young guy talked about the different neighborhoods to go to, and the need to get on the subways to reach people. Another woman thought she could get a room in her church for the initiative, and also made plans to get out to artists; an artist responded with what he was doing among immigrant communities. Yet another person talked about tenant organizations in the South Bronx, as well as religious networks he was part of, and got an answering call from another tenant organizer in the same workshop. There was a real spirit in there of “let’s make this happen.”

From “The Mass initiatives and Their Relation to Our Strategic Objectives,” by Bob Avakian

Who should be part of these mass initiatives—whom should we be working to involve in them? Everyone who agrees—or can be won to see—that what these mass initiatives are taking up (in essence: mass incarceration and everything bound up with that; and the degradation of women, particularly as focused now around the attacks on the right to abortion, and even birth control, and pornography and the sexual degradation of women) is intolerable, and must be fought against. This should mean that, in the very near future, hundreds are actively involved, in an ongoing way, in building these initiatives, with the aim of involving thousands and ultimately millions in various ways and on various levels. The situation and atmosphere need to be created in which people broadly who meet this criterion (of who should be involved) will recognize and feel that there is an important place and role for them in these mass initiatives, and the practical means must be developed to enable them to be actively involved and make real contributions to the initiatives.

At the same time, WE, as revolutionary communists (and those who are in basic agreement with us on this), should be putting forward, in relation to these mass initiatives, as well as in an overall way, that these and other outrages which in fact constitute concentrations of major social contradictions, are rooted in the basic nature and dynamics of this system, and they can only be finally and fully ended, and a radically different and much better society and world brought into being, through communist revolution, proceeding on the basis of the new synthesis of communism that has been brought forward through the work done by BA over many decades.

People from the Revolution Club put out ideas and plans on where to reach out with this and talked about the need for people to get into the scientific and revolutionary answers being put forward by Bob Avakian—and they also called on-the-spot for a militant confrontational action the next week. This spirit and practice—both digging into why this happens and the need for revolution and at the same time getting directly out to the people hit hardest by this and calling people into action against it—brings something essential and irreplaceable to the table for October.

Some people made a point of saying that while they appreciated the speakers, they themselves were NOT revolutionaries, and that we would all have to reach out far more broadly than the people in the room to really do this. This was said in a mainly good spirit—you got the sense that the people who came by and large REALLY wanted to find a way to fight and to make this happen, and wanted this to be as broad as possible. There was a real earnest spirit to the wrangling. And it seemed to be pretty much understood by everyone that we’re going to need a lot more people of all kinds of views taking this up, and soon, to have the stop-in-your-tracks, change-how-you-think-and-what-you’re-doing, make-the-rulers-jump-back impact so urgently needed.

As people went around the room, putting out different ideas and offering different kinds of resources to this effort, I thought to myself that this movement was going to have to be really good at ORGANIZING. Getting people’s ideas onto the floor and recording their names and ways to contact them is just a beginning. People’s efforts and ideas need to be drawn on and sifted, cross-fertilized and knit together into something very powerful—and not in two or four weeks, but now. In fact, we have to be not only ready but aiming, right on the spot, to draw people into things—whether people from this broad movement are flyering or mounting some kind of resistance to police terror, either planned or spontaneous. They then in turn become part of things then and there, and work to draw in others. That has to be much more the “style,” or the “signature,” of this movement.

There have to be simple ways for everyone to take a hand, and to communicate their ideas. Again, there simply cannot be a situation where people are made to wait “until someone gets back to them”—things are too urgent, people’s ideas and enthusiasm at this meeting were too alive, and no effort or positive impulse can be squandered or left on the vine.

Organizing and Strategizing Go Together

Revolutionaries need to strategize with people as they organize. This doesn’t mean just figuring out who to reach or what to do to get an immediate task done. It involves constantly going back with people to why these actions in October are so crucial. That means going back to just how horrible and built-into-the-system, how illegitimate and unnecessary these police murders and terror and this regime of mass incarceration are, and why these happen... how this is linked to the other outrages that distort and mutilate and make an early and often horrific end to people’s lives, here and around the world... why the fundamental interests of most people don’t lie in maintaining this and how this could be ended through revolution... Revolutionaries should be frank on how we are building this to contribute to putting an end to this forever, through revolution, even as we know—and in fact work for—the broadest number of people to get out there to seriously fight this NOW. To paraphrase BA, the fact that we see how utterly unnecessary this is, how it is kept in effect by a reactionary system which has long since outlived its time, and how crucial it is that people stand up now as part of building up the strength to get rid of it... that makes us burn all the hotter.

All this—done in a lively and scientific way, engaging with people’s ideas—should actually lead to more creativity, more people drawn in to take a part, and more drive and efficiency (and less wasted effort). This is part of leadership.

This also means seeking out people and groups who are doing things around this—whatever they are doing, so long as they view their efforts as directed at stopping police terror and abuse and murder. That should be the dividing line when we pose the question: “Which Side Are You On?” There can be and needs to be all kinds of views about what kinds of changes are needed in society and how to go about them and how to view the police themselves. We can and certainly should talk frankly, and struggle about, larger questions as we work together (and we can and certainly will wrangle out differences over HOW to best mount these days of action). We can talk with some of the leaders at the same time as we reach out to the people in these groups. And we can’t take “no” for an answer—there is too much at stake here, for millions, and we have to keep going back to that. The point is this: everyone must get together to end police terror and this means uniting the broadest number of people around that, even as we bring forward our full understanding.

I thought to myself: this is NOT going to be—it can’t be—business-as-usual in late October... This is going to be, and it has got to be, some whole other thing. Too much is at stake. And if that is to be so, it sure can’t be business-as-usual building it. We’ve got to take the best of everything we know, and then we’ve got to learn a whole lot more. The basis is there—there is a NEED for it in society—and there are growing numbers of people searching for a way to act effectively on it. WE have to be up for this.

Click to enlarge

Yes, It Is Genocidal! And It Can Be Ended—Once and For All

This decades-long program of massive incarceration coupled with police terror, hounding, and murder is part of something larger. A day or so after the meeting, I read an article on revcom.us on Oakland. This article went through statistics that translate into human beings whose lives are blocked and mutilated and cut short at every turn. Calling this a conscious program with a genocidal direction and thrust—a “slow genocide” but one which could speed up at any time—is not just a catchword. It is a scientific description of reality.

Obama to the contrary, we are not on a trajectory where “nobody can deny that things are getting better.” Yes, certain particularly ugly and overt forms of racial oppression were “moderated,” certain significant rights were won, and there were concessions to a certain sliver of Black people off the ’60s—concessions for which thousands shed their blood and hundreds gave their lives, concessions which even today are under attack and being ripped back.*

But even as to the concessions that were granted, 1) new forms of oppression replaced old, and 2) for the masses things overall have gotten far worse and are rapidly getting worse still. What do you call it when there are 10 times more Black people in prison today than in 1955? What do you call it when the “wealth gap” between Black and white families has gotten wider in the past 10 years and where today, the median white household is worth almost 13 times more than the typical Black household? What do you call it when infant mortality among Black people in the U.S. is comparable to the severely oppressed nations of Botswana in Africa, or Sri Lanka in Asia? When schools are MORE segregated today than in the 1960s? When unemployment for Black people is still, after all this time, double that of whites? As Michelle Alexander has put it, this is not slow and steady progress on the road to emancipation, this is a big U-turn; and Carl Dix has added, a U-turn in today’s conditions that is heading toward a genocide!

The article on Oakland made the point that this flowed out of a capitalist society “anchored in white supremacy and immense and ugly racial oppression. (Like water flows through channels already impressed into the earth, capital flows into ‘precut’ depressions in the social order—ones that were carved early in the U.S. with the advent of slavery and have continued to shape the U.S. by the continual reassertion of white supremacy.)”

A few days before this meeting, I participated in discussion taking off from Bob Avakian’s quotes in BAsics on the questions that have been recently featured at revcom.us and the overall work that he’s done digging into this oppression—showing where it came from, why it hasn’t ended and couldn’t end so long as you have capitalism, and how it could be ended through revolution. I won’t try to encapsulate that here—though I will urge everyone to dig into works like the film REVOLUTION—NOTHING LESS!, the filmed dialogue of BA with Cornel West, BA’s Communism and Jeffersonian Democracy, the Revolution special issue, The Oppression of Black People, the Crimes of This System and the Revolution We Need, and the Constitution for the New Socialist Republic in North America (Draft Proposal) (as well as BAsics, of course). I will say that what you get from all that is a scientific sense of how this horror had a beginning rooted in this system of capitalism, what has driven it forward, how it could be ended, and what strategically we have to do today to understand what’s going on and how we could wrench a chance for revolution out of it. And that makes it all the more unbearable that people have to keep living it, even for a day longer, and that we face the very real prospect of this getting much, much worse.

Getting into this—a scientific understanding of where this flows from and how it fits into the larger society and world, of its dynamics past, present and future—shouldn’t be something off to the side, or for special occasions. We should be living and breathing this, raising with the many new people we’ll be working with why they think this white supremacy is so dug in... how they see ending it... what their experience, knowledge and understanding is... and in a very real way being true to the spirit of BA’s invitation, all the time.

* Just think: it was only last week that one of the major parties could finally take a position against the flag of slavery! And that party is frontally going after the right of Black people and immigrants to vote—while the liberals have taken some measures to oppose this, they have kept this well within the confines of proper channels and in the main have refused to call people to take to the streets in a meaningful way and in general are not raising hell about this. This is because even when their voting base is under direct attack they are reluctant to do anything that will bring the masses into the conflict with the reactionaries with whom the Democrats continue to “reach across the aisle.” [back]

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