June 2020: Defund The Police
What else is there to write about right now? I want to offer up some actions that people can take, specifically white people. I also want to make myself available to anyone who feels uncomfortable talking about white supremacy and how it got us here, and our responsibility to take sustained actions to end it. Feel free to reach out and I promise to write back so we can talk more.
I would say that it is hard to talk about anything else right now, but privilege actually makes it wildly easy to talk about anything but our country’s systemic racism, the uprising happening across the country, the everyday racism that sustains the murders of Black people time and time again. That’s what frightens me the most: that as a white person I could just sink back into the coziness of how I am okay, that I could retweet some activists and sign some petitions and then go about my day.
When we moved to Hart Street in Brooklyn six years ago, one of our neighbors, Greg, a white teacher and Christian, invited us and other white folks new to the neighborhood to his home to talk about the history of the block where we lived. He had invited a Black woman who had lived on the block for forty years to share the oral history of the block, and even though she wasn’t able to come at the last minute, Greg used the space to ask us what we knew about redlining, about the history of Bed Stuy, about our neighbors. There were just three or four of us there, but we talked about how it’s not okay to call the cops in Bed Stuy, because the cops could murder our Black neighbors. That it is a tradition of the neighborhood to play loud music and hang out outside, and that is the fabric of where we live. Over the years we have come to know more neighbors on this block than we have in any of the other apartments I have lived over nineteen years. When white friends moved to the neighborhood, we passed the message along: respect the Black people who live here and have always lived here. Do not call the cops.
So what are the actions we can take, not just in NYC but where ever you are reading this? I think of my family and friends in the suburbs of Philadelphia where I grew up; the cousins and aunts and uncles who live across the country. These actions can be taken anywhere and will be necessary everywhere.
Defund the police. You can sign the #DefundThePolice petition with Black Lives Matter here. You can contact your local elected officials to ask about your city/state’s budget, how much of it is allocated for the police force vs. public education, or addressing homelessness, or any other issue. For instance, in New York City, while the pandemic has forced major budget cuts, the NYPD budget of $1.6 billion (billion!) will not be touched. We can change this.
Donate to organizations that prioritize the needs of Black people in your community. Many folks have been donating to community bail funds, which is one way to help the thousands who are being arrested for protesting across the country. We can also pledge to invest in the organizations that have been prioritizing anti-racist work for decades, and pledge to help them not just now but consistently as we move forward. Here are a few from SURJ. If you need help finding organizations where you live, reach out and we can work together.
Take one action every day this week with the Movement for Black Lives. You can follow them here and sign up to receive one action to take June 1 - June 5. This is a simple ask, and the least we can do. If you need an accountability partner for this, reach out!
Read, read, read. Whether it’s an eye-opening article, a Twitter thread, or a book about antiracism, staying engaged with writers who help us practice antiracism is paramount. Emily and I can recommend books if you don’t know where to start.
This list is incomplete, and there are dozens of other resources out there to help us take action right now.
While reading the news this week I saw a video still from George Floyd’s murder. I will never forget that Derek Chauvin, while he knelt on this Black man to extinguish his life, had his hand in his pocket. The very image of nonchalance. Nonchalance is deadly. We cannot be nonchalant right now.
Reach out. Write back. Read on. Stay safe.
xo,
c