A World Without Po'Lice Terror for Brother Oscar and all Families in Amerikkka

Tuesday, July 13, 2010;

Our family of POOR Magazine poverty, race, migrant, disability, youth and indigenous scholars hold in our collective hearts the pain of Oscar Grant’s mama and all the mamaz and daddys and tio’s y tias, y abuelas y abuelos who have lost children to the culture of deadly force, abuse and murder called the Police in Amerikkka.

Brother Oscar Grant, along with Ayana Jones, Idriss Stelley, Amadou Diallo, Sean Bell, their families and so many more victims of Po’Lice terror are honored on our altar of ancestor heroes in resistance at POOR Magazine. We send our prayers of healing and deep love. And with the utmost respect for the mama and families, we also stand in solidarity with many thousands of families and community members who are collectively screaming Enough!. No more killing of our babies, racial profiling and harassment of our communities No more lies about protection, and service. No MORE po’lice terror EVER!.

So is a world without para-military occupying soldiers, rooted in white supremacy, trained to kill, armed with weapons of mass destruction and sworn to loyalty to each other's protection above all else, possible?

For the masses of corporate media propagandized, born and bred into the cult of independence, institutional and structural racism and the bootstraps mentality it might not be.

US dominant culture works hard to separate and alienate our elder’s scholarship and traditions from our youth’s minds, our cultures out of and away from our communities and our ancestors teachings crushed and replaced by lies of wealth and privilege for all. We are taught  that our own personal happiness is of the utmost importance, that everything needs to happen immediately, and simply and our happiness is tied to how much we have and own not how much we know and how many people we are caring for.  We do nothing as a society to truly care, protect and hold our women and mothers and children so there is NEVER abuse of a woman or a child by someone so lost in their own struggle and or addiction that they perpetuate violence on the people they love.

Can we envision ourselves collectively, interdependently, dreaming and holding our ancestors teachings?

How does this happen. It begins with us breaking through the hypocrisy of our own lives on the daily. Recognizing our own impulse to resort to po’lice calls in situations of struggle cause it’s easier and faster to solve a “difficult problem” But of course it’s much deeper than that

As an indigenous people-led, poor people led, family created, arts organization, launched by a landless, indigenous mother and daughter in poverty POOR Magazine practices ancestor worship, eldership, care-giving and interdependence with a mandate of no Po’Lice calls ever. We have implemented a Community Council process based on our indigenous teachings which includes a meeting of all peoples involved in a conflict meeting for as long as it takes to hear everyone’s perspective with ground rules of respect and love and care-giving and inter-dependence.

And this process is always lengthy and messy and sad and strange and revelatory and beautiful. It’s not perfect, and always extremely difficult. But why shouldn’t it be. Why would or should solving human personal and organizational struggles ever be easy.

As a mother of a young child, and a survivor of both domestic violence and child sexual abuse, I am most concerned about how women and children aren’t protected in this society and I realize that we have much to learn about caring and protecting all of Creator’s peoples.

POOR Magazine’s Community Council is only one humble, in-organization example of people-led accountability, there is much to learn from other people-led accountability projects such as the Audrey Lorde Project , Alwaysasafespace and CUAV, as well as revolutionary concepts and ideas from groups like Critical Resistance and Incite.

But it really begins with re-thinking all of these things and the ways in which so many of us have been informed, taught, racialized and lied to about the notion of  safety and security itself. And how security has been equated with guns and walls and batons and tasers and then this concept of so-called security is used by multi-national corporations like Halliburton and Blackwater to make money on the backs of our fear and our desire for a simple answer to that fear.

Finally it is most important to remember that we are people, with culture, spirit, love and care and protection hard-wired in us. We must work harder, think deeper, dream bigger, love stronger to care for each other inter-dependently. Always.