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As you’ve surely heard—and debated—Black Lives Matter (BLM) members have been disrupting presidential campaign rallies lately. Last Saturday, two in Seattle took over the mic at a Social Security-centered event that Sen. Bernie Sanders (D-Vt.) held. Five were barred on Monday from entering a New Hampshire substance abuse forum featuring former Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-NY). (She met with the group for 15 minutes afterwards.) Although former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush’s campaign reportedly met with BLM representatives before his Las Vegas town hall on Wednesday, the Republican’s event still ended with chants of “Black lives matter.” Also on Wednesday, Republicans Donald Trump and Ben Carson criticized the movement as “a disgrace” and causing “racial strife,” respectively.
BLM seems to have entered a new phase in its relatively young life: non-cooperation with the mainstream political parties. As an increasing number of BLM activists are successful in changing the media narrative surrounding the presidential elections, national leaders have had to formalize a set of principles about its refusal to endorse any
Because the network is decentralized and expansive it has been difficult for some to understand BLM’s strategy, structure and vision. Some have asked questions like, “What are their demands?” “Are they making it up as they go along?” “Why are they going after Bernie Sanders?”
I spoke with five leaders in the movement for black lives, some BLM members, some from other organizations who closely with BLM, to answer some of these questions, which are on the minds of millions, including some of the organizers themselves.
What’s your immediate reaction when a Black Lives Matter protester disrupts a presidential candidate such as Bernie Sanders?
Mara Willaford (co-founder, Black Lives Matter—Seattle who interrupted Sanders’ event): I feel pride and joy. I shut it down for my people, and I know they shut it down for me—as an act of radical love and self-love.
Akin Olla (field organizer, United States Student Association): To be honest, my initial reaction has been generally negative. There is something immediately unsettling about watching what looks like a conflict between two political bodies that I respect and see as part of the same larger movement to destabilize the monopoly of power and wealth of the white ruling class. It has taken a bit of reflection to truly appreciate these actions as a means of not only moving politics and discourse further to the left and toward black liberation [but as] a test of where the country and the left stand overall. They have shown that many young progressives are still hanging on to the old political system and the kind of politics that millennials often claim as broken.
Alicia Garza (co-founder, Black Lives Matter): I feel an incredible sense of admiration. It’s not easy to challenge power, as much as we talk about it. It’s also not easy to have to hold the nastiness that you get from people who weren’t brave enough to do what they did, even though it needed to be done. So I feel humbled, in awe of their courage and [committed to them].
Michael Mcdowell (organizer, Black Lives Matter—Minneapolis): None of these candidates are where they need to be to lead this country in the right direction. Bernie Sanders happens to be the one who is the most left and is the most moveable on racial justice and equity. My initial reaction was, “Right on. This is what we need to be doing.”
Dante Barry (executive director, Million Hoodies Movement for Justice): I think it’s great—we need more disruptions on all sides of the political spectrum. All candidates should have to work to earn the votes of black communities, especially Democrats. Candidates need to remember: Black women turn out more votes and that [it is] wise to center rhetoric and action toward appealing to black women. We need candidates to put forward transformative platforms that speak to black communities.
What’s your response to progressives who have criticized BLM for targeting Bernie Sanders, the candidate they claim is most sympathetic to your movement?
BLM’s Garza: Black Lives Matter is doing what Democrats have been needing to do for a long time now—centering the experiences of black people so that we can all live a better life. There’s a certain level of irony in white “progressives” telling black people not to bite the hand that either feeds us now or may feed us later. See how that dog-whistle racism works? Because while people are busy talking about respectability and class consciousness, black people are dying at the hands of police and vigilantes every 28 hours, according to the Malcolm X Grassroots Movement. [The disruption] made Sanders a better candidate than when he started.
U.S. Student Association’s Olla: Bernie is worth engaging because Bernie will actually listen. There is a lot of crossover between the BLM base and the Sanders base. Bernie will inevitably redefine what “progressive” means in the U.S., and these actions are a way for people that go unheard to contribute to that definition.
Million Hoodies’ Barry: I think the criticism we hear about targeting Bernie Sanders is a reflection of continued tension from the left to address anti-black racism.
BLM—Minnesota’s Mcdowell: Martin Luther King warned us about these very people. He spoke about the “white moderate” and how detrimental they can be to a social movement. We’re seeing a bunch of progressive folks saying, “We agree with Black Lives Matter, we just don’t agree with the way you’re going about it.” We’re really starting to see who the real allies are. During [the] Bernie Sanders interruption, the very people who we thought were allies were booing and saying, “How [could] you?” to the Seattle protesters on stage. The actions really expose the racism that goes on within white liberalism.
BLM—Seattle’s Willaford: I see no reason to engage with the Republican Party, which for the most part is explicitly anti-black. Targeting Bernie Sanders, on the other hand, hit a major nerve in this country. Bernie is considered more “progressive” in rhetoric and policy than Hillary Clinton. Why would Hillary feel the need to advocate a more “progressive” stance on race when Bernie, her most “radical” opponent was ignoring the black vote, being explicitly class-reductionist, and not releasing a public platform on racial justice? By agitating Bernie you’re shifting the entire Democratic Party left. Additionally, the progressive and liberal community itself needed to be agitated and called out. Lines in the sand are being drawn right now and people are having to pick sides.
What is your strategic vision for engaging with candidates and the American public over the next year? What message do you want to send both major parties?
BLM’s Garza: It’s important to us that we make every candidate that wants our vote actually work for it. Right now, the candidate that can raise the most money from corporations that cause misery in our communities wins. They package a list of reforms they promise to push for if elected, but they largely feel accountable to the donors that fund their campaigns. So our vision is that the we just don’t go for the okey-doke. Our communities are in crisis, and we deserve better. We plan to set the terms of the debate. Democrats should get ready for that. And our message for Republicans? “Hell no. Not on our watch.”
BLM—Minnesota’s Mcdowell: We’re trying to figure out how to target these candidates in a way that uplifts the work that is being done locally. Things are going to look different whether we are in Seattle, Dallas or Minneapolis. The solutions and demands are being molded by each local, autonomous group, but we’re [also] talking about how to build regionally together. Minneapolis is talking to Chicago and Madison, for example. We want to come to the candidates with actual solutions, to be able to say, “This is what we need.”
Million Hoodies’ Barry: I would love to see polarization. This election is super critical for racial justice and addressing anti-black racism and violence. We have candidates like Jeb Bush declaring that he’s Latino while the country prepares for a huge racial demographic shift and a visible rebirth of white supremacists. I don’t think that’s a coincidence.
BLM—Seattle’s Willaford: The BLM network is currently developing our strategy which will involve advocating certain public policies as well as agitation work through direct action.
U.S. Student Association’s Olla: We must smash the shackles that hold black folks hostage to the Democratic party. In the same way the Sanders’ base has been polarized, the Democratic base in general must be. And any rift that is caused will not easily be fixed. The Democratic Party is not progressive nor is it pro-black. It is a leech that perpetually drains the actual left of resources, activists and rhetoric. I don’t care about the Republicans; the white working class has to break away from them, but I know any action on the part of black activists will only drive them further into the arms of the party.
Do you ever envision a day where BLM leaders are actually running for office? What would it take to get there?
BLM’s Garza: I envision a day where we have more choices. We’d love it if movement leaders would actually run for office! But what does that look like within the current electoral system? Not pretty. So, we need to get to work building the democracy that we want to see. As we do that, we need to keep holding these political parties and the politicians they support accountable to real people who don’t fly around on private jets.
BLM—Minnesota’s Mcdowell: If we’re going to get policies and laws that are set by and for the community, we’re going to need some of our folks in office advocating for us. It’s a huge piece. …I know it’s the most hated position in the world right now, but one of the things that could [also] be a big change is to have community leaders actually be police officers and set the law enforcement policies—if we’re going to have police, that is. We already have community leaders that can de-escalate conflicts in the neighborhood, but what if that was supported by a policy agenda?
Million Hoodies’ Barry: I envision movement leaders becoming more strategic and coordinated. If running for office is strategic for the movement, then I support it.
BLM—Seattle’s Willaford: I sincerely hope that doesn’t happen. The system was not built for us: it was built on the enslavement and genocide of our black and Native ancestors. Shuffling movement leaders into government positions, academia and the non-profit industrial complex is one of the major ways that the state will try to repress and kill this movement. With all the black femme power of this movement we have the potential to bring about real revolution – we need to keep it pushing and take it there.
The Black Lives Matter movement has brought discussions of racism and police violence into classrooms, bars, and living rooms all across this country. What are the big internal questions that leaders are asking themselves about how to sustain and grow this thing?
BLM’s Garza: We are still very much learning and growing. We are learning how to articulate our vision for the new world that we must bring forward if we have any chance of survival. A big question that we’re thinking a lot about how to grow this network alongside the growing movement for black lives that encompasses more people than our network does. Investing in movement infrastructure still matters—but how do we do that outside of the 501c3 context?
Million Hoodies’ Barry: We need to start looking at private interests and corporations that are invested in mass criminalization. We also need to start looking into the influence of police unions across the country. I also think that we need to see more of alternatives to criminalization— Black people don’t just want to survive, but we want to thrive in this world too.
BLM—Minnesota’s Mcdowell: The biggest question I have is, “How do we absorb all this momentum right now?” There’s so many people who want to get involved. How do we set up a culture and a solidified structure to plug people into? We don’t have that right now. And then how can we make this a movement where everyone is feeling like they’re heard and welcome?
[Another] huge internal question is, “How can we make sure that people show up on the streets for black cis and trans women who are killed by cops, not just black men?” There’s also the big question around the role of white allies, especially here in Minnesota. There’s a lot of white people and non-black people who are down, but how do we have structures for them to be involved without giving up black leadership?
U.S. Student Association’s Olla: The movement needs to start building its own institutions and taking over already existent ones. From freedom schools for kids and adults to taking over campus student governments. Each large action must be utilized to recruit new members who can help build infrastructure of a new society that can provide for black people and the movement at large, thus increasing our capacity and our ability to act.
During the famous lunch-counter sit-ins of the 1960s, a large percentage of the American public agreed that segregation was intolerable but disagreed with the tactics of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee. Do you see a similarity today?
BLM—Minnesota’s Mcdowell: It’s extremely similar. …It brings me back to the white moderate: They agree with our issues but not the tactics. It’s dangerous because these folks always try to change the tactics. We need to keep our eyes open. I’m realizing that a lot of my white progressive friends aren’t really on the same page as me.
Million Hoodies’ Barry: There are similarities. …However I think there’s a move towards rejecting respectability politics and a realization that we need to employ and support a multitude of tactics in order to get free.
U.S. Student Association’s Olla: Many people are on the wrong side of history, as they were then. A lot of people like to play armchair strategist, and it is easier to complain about the means in which others are fighting than it is to fight yourself.
BLM’s Garza: What’s true about this moment is that it’s not about the tactics. If you’re caught up in tactics you’re missing the point. We are being killed every 28 hours by police and vigilantes. There are 1 million of us in jails and prisons, and 9 million of us under state supervision. Our children are not allowed to grow up to be adults. If you don’t support the movement because you don’t agree with a tactic, I question how deep your support really was in the first place. What’s more uncomfortable: shouting, stopping freeways and interrupting speeches—or being murdered by police and having your body left in the street for more than four hours, or turning up dead in a jail cell after a traffic stop?
Waleed Shahid is an organizer, writer and trainer with Movement Mastery, currently based in Philadelphia. He tweets at @waleed2go.
16 Comments
We White Bernie fans should recognize that we are being divisive too if we scold the strategies or goals of #BlackLivesMatter. They're not doing this against Bernie Sanders; they're doing it because it doesn't always look like Black lives matter much to our own government and people. Black people in America have had their lives, their bloodlines, their growth, everything, to put it very forgivingly, "interrupted" by whites in America. If they interrupt a few politicians, fine! And, they're getting results.
Thank you, Jill. Well said. Economic justice is important but only if one is alive and free and not subject to arbitrary stops, arrest, searches, beatings and even death just because one is a person of color. Economic injustice toward people of color and people in the lower classes is endemic and pervasive, attacking even the hope of life, let alone a just and comfortable life. BLM has helped Bernie and it has helped both of us. Now, please help both Bernie and BLM build in energy, accomplishment and success.
time.com/3896500/bernie-sanders-vermont-campaign-radical/
VOTE for Bernie in the Primaries! So Hillary does not win the Presidential Nomination! ... Cornel West supports "Brother Bernie" https://youtu.be/nHsHhj329T4
time.com/3896500/bernie-sanders-vermont-campaign-radical/ Bernie Sanders has been fighting for the rights of Blacks since the 60's ! He had attended MLK's "I have a dream" speech in Washington, DC ... know who your allies are!
Maureen: I love Bernie, support him totally and will do my best to get him elected President of the United States. But neither his support for SNCC nor Martin Luther King and all he fought for has much to do with the battle being waged by BLM to save the lives and the very living of people of color in the USA against structural racism that is destroying lives and communities in our country. Trust Bernie. He listened and acted. We all should do the same.
please check out links to time magazine articles above - there are 2 of them. Bernie Sanders was PROTESTING segregation of Blacks & Whites 1962 ... he is your friend .... KNOW YOUR ALLIES
time.com/3896500/bernie-sanders-vermont-campaign-radical/
QUOTE FROM TIME: "Tuesday afternoon in January, 1962 the 20-year-old from Brooklyn [BERNIE SANDERS] stood on the steps of University of Chicago administration building and railed in the wind against the college’s housing segregation policy. “We feel it is an intolerable situation, when Negro and white students of the university cannot live together in university owned apartments,” the young bespectacled student told the few-dozen classmates gathered there. Then he led them into the building in protest, and camped the night outside the president’s office. It was Chicago’s first civil rights sit-in."
Be proud that you have chosen a candidate who listened to the complaints, anxieties, oppression and demands of the people of color in the 60s and 70s. Be just as proud that you have chosen a candidate who is listening to the complaints, anxieties, opression and demands of people of color in this new century.
The racism that Bernie spoke out about and attacked in those earlier years that so many want to talk about, is and has been structurally built into our white dominated and dominating culture for generations. It seems ok to me for BLM to remind bernie and to remind us that hanging a black person from a tree or from the back of a moving truck is no different but maybe more acceptable and institutionalized when the black person is pulled from a car, choked, tasered, beaten or shot to death by a policeman or member of the "citizen's watch" just because of her race or her color...
DID YOU KNOW?
Bernie Sanders has been a genuine champion of civil rights of African Americans since the 60's.
A True Civil Rights Maverick; At the age of 20, he organized a protest in Chicago against student segregation & was arrested January 1962 - a civil rights protestor [when most protestors were Black] ---- K-N-O-W-------Y-O-U-R-------A-L-L-I-E-S!!!!
Thom Hartmann shares a piece by Time Magazine that lays out U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders' efforts to promote civil rights in the 1960's. (Published on Jun 29, 2015) Martin Luther King, Jr is rolling over in his grave with all this misdirected anger! you are not helping matters!
https://youtu.be/JDzbUpwgLCs
The Seattle BLM action was derivative and ego/agenda driven for more anti-Democratic party and basic political elements than justice for people of color. That said, the BLM action at NetRoots Nation was both well thought out, strategic and effective. The progressives of BLM turned to the one candidate who might, rather than attacking and rejecting, listen and understand their concerns and help to address those concerns.
It worked. Everyone benefitted. Sanders who had been actively engaged in civil right movements in the 60s and 70s had moved to more attention on the broad multi-class, multi-racial impacts of the corporate, oligarchial control of the US through our congress and administration(s). Those were long term battles for him. When the BLM leaders spoke and insisted that he and his allies listen, he did. He acted. That is why he will be a great president starting in 2017.
I live in Olympia as a Haitian Priest, Ayida Wedo. The people here call me "the snake (of satan)" because they believe Haitian voodoo is satanism. They practice satanism here, and have practiced it against me, after finding out I was a Haitian voodoo Priest. They've been calling me nigger ever since, and have tried to kill me leaving my body for dead in the streets of Olympia, which I recovered from miraculously, they thought they had killed me...Later someone attacks me with brass knuckles and they lock ME up for 180 days, most of it in the hole, and racially harass me over my practices, treating me like I had black skin and calling me an animal, telling me to suck their dick, that I was big dicked and stupid for being a "nigger," and made a number of sexual insults with food to the point I tried to hang myself in prison, and it was over a misdemeanor probation violation of missing a probation appointment due to surgery where I had confirmed missing the probation appt with my White probation officer. I had a black probation officer before in Greensboro for some weed matters, and he was super cool, even did some haitian dream travel one time with him surprisingly. Black Lives Matter. The injustice done to me here was done with the sole purpose of hurting an innocent Haitian. Please help and send info to: bengwebb@gmail.com or call me at 919-740-7864. It is vitally important right now for black people to stand up and protest this imposition of white power from the new Presidential Candidates, especially Hilary Clinton, who is the face for white power. And probably our next incumbent. She has ties with the KKK. But yes, the capitol of Washington has chosen me, a Haitian Priest for their Ritual Satanism that previously has been tried & prosecuted: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thurston_County_ritual_abuse_case, and its to hurt Black Power in this world. Please do something...this slight against me is not something done personally, but to hurt Black people's spiritual Power. And much of this torture was designed by Evergreen State College, that propounds it's an "ally" or whatever when they're parasites, just like the rest of Olympia that protested hatred towards blacks just to scream at me for days & nights long that I'm a "nigger" for the following two days after the protest until I became so aggravated I said some words back and they beat me up trying to murder me. I'm nearly dead right now. This is 3 direct attacks on my life from white people and all over Haitian Voodoo, which they believe is going to manipulate them for my personal purposes, but has absolutely NOTHING to do with them, except for naming them monsters and deceivers, much like Maureen Schilder above, who believes corrupting the message of Black Lives Matter as a white person (like Olympia has done) makes her a stronger black leader than a black man protesting, or a Haitian speaking for his rights. Thank you for your work. This is amazing. I've written a movie script about the KKK and satanism going on here in Olympia that works specifically against American Indians and blacks and children. Best to you. May we have a brighter future ahead! These plans sound great, and a huge step above the white student organizations that attempt to subvert and usurp this operation called Black Lives Matter and speak for their white privilege being marred by blacks in secret and behind posters of "Black Lives Matter." Literally every satanist owned business in town here has that poster up, and it sickens me. Something has to be done about this. Thank you again! And may God keep the angels working for this struggle empowered and clear minded out of the hands and words of the deceivers speaking for white power against this movement! Thank you!
The BLM folks are idiots if they are attacking Bernie.
Dummazz doesn't begin to cover it. He's been working for you for decades.
This is old news, but it has taken this long for me to come up with a comment. I need more information. Did these interrupters contact the Sanders campaign to address racial inequality beforehand? Did they have reasonable belief that no action would have been done to address the issues they were bringing up had they not stormed the stage in the fashion they did?
It may be my innate bias, but I suspect that they made assumptions about the white man on stage as being a progressive-for-whites-only type without really giving that person the chance to be human first. I want to know that these girls contacted his campaign and did everything they could in the way that anyone is expected to get their message across to another person before they did something as drastic as storming a stage and basically creating a fight at an event that other people are really excited about. It's just disrespectful to everyone there otherwise, and I can't support them until I find out what they did to address him in a more civil way.
I don't even think it's fully allowable to hijack an event only if one sends them a letter, and nothing more either. First, not all letters or emails can be responded to: that's just a problem of numbers. Second, you can communicate your message to a politician and just not have them agree with you. Perhaps they will agree that police brutality is a heavy issue, but don't want to take a moment of silence for a person they may feel bad for, but never met and wasn't known by anyone at the rally. If one takes a moment of silence for every victim of police brutality, one will literally never be able to speak. They could circumvent this by asking instead for a moment of silence for all the people who died by the use of excessive force that year, but again this kind of communication implies a sense of imploring on the one hand, and listening on the other. This communication is vital to any conversation between individuals or groups, and must precede a shouting match. It implies humility, and giving each other the benefit of the doubt, coming into a dialogue on equal terms.
If they did all this, and still the campaign was silent; if they made what can reasonably estimated to be all possible effort to contact that person's campaign and still were met with silence, only then can I say that yes, this was a good move, and it was time to force Sanders to address this question. But did anyone ever ask him? Did it come at the conversational level first? No one is asking that question, yet that is the question that underlies this whole affair. If they did, or someone they know did, then I will remember Sanders as another electability-first type who backslides on principles, and won't get that excited about him in the election. Then I'll probably vote for the "not Donald Trump" or "not Ted Cruz" option. But that doesn't seem like him, based on what i've seen of his past, fighting years as an independent to become mayor. I don't know the guy - too many people feel like they do. But I say that no one deserves bad treatment, and what I saw from those girls looked like bad treatment to me. I am willing to be proven wrong with their records though: that would bring me closer to the BLM movement as a whole.
I hope that we can all resolve this and criticize bad actions for what they are, whoever may be the culprit. We can even come together to celebrate the effect afterward for drawing that conversation into the fore. But first, the relationship between black activists and white progressives and working class folks, and their respective sympathizers must be repaired. Too many people were shocked and angered by what they saw from that moment. Now it's up to those two girls to come out and expose Sanders as a fraud, or else go back to that moment and apologize to the man and his fans and Black Lives Matter as a whole for representing them in such an improper and temperamental way. And should they refuse to do so, the movement itself must decide: is this the organization for rights? Or is it simply an organization for black rights? For minority rights? For non-white rights? Will it come out and disown those actions finally for what they were - upsetting to some and harmful for all? Or will it be disappointingly unable to criticize itself, falling back on its base and make the same kind of division between people, by insisting that some be held above - or below - others?
Let them show me that Sanders brushed them off as if their concerns didn't matter, or stayed quiet out of fear of not being electable, I welcome it. But if they don't have that, and jumped straight to hijacking someone's campaign rally, in true shoot-first, ask-questions-later form, then I have to say that this story was an example of bad BLM, and that unless some reconciliation is attempted on the part of those who contributed to the event as representatives of BLM, or by the BLM community itself, I will see that movement as one where disrespect and impropriety against white people is tolerated. And that would make it one where I no longer have a place, nor much in the way of sympathy. To be fair, I will always have sympathy towards those who are oppressed, I will simply no longer see BLM nor its respective leaders as capable of bringing true equality about. Equality is about respect just as much as anything else. That’s never been up for debate.
Thank you for reading my comment,
Tyler
I am very supportive of the disruption because Bernie failed to speak their names himself and I saw the disruption as necessary. If interruptions get results, great. Use pretty much whatever tactics you choose. Except, calling all whites racist like they did and calling it #BowDownBernie proves that she failed in her primary goal, which she lays out above:
"I sincerely hope that doesn’t happen [Blacks running for office]. The system was not built for us: it was built on the enslavement and genocide of our black and Native ancestors. Shuffling movement leaders into government positions, academia and the non-profit industrial complex is one of the major ways that the state will try to repress and kill this movement. With all the black femme power of this movement we have the potential to bring about real revolution – we need to keep it pushing and take it there."
She really does not want to make Bernie "better", as she writes in her blog and links to Glen Ford to support, she wants division and a breakdown of the Democratic Party and Black Femme Rulers. While Progressives do need to be interrupted, telling them to "BOW Down" makes her a wannabe Master who hopes to be Queen power tripper in a Black Racist System if she could.
Bernie and White Progressives, as well as smarter Black voices will not fall for her ruse. Bernie will take the Democratic Party into the future in spite of her, not because of her.
I, as a vocal White Progressive who speaks up in White company about White Privilege, can not defend "Bow Down Bernie", so I have gone nearly silent there because I can not defend that sick and demeaning phrase which everyone heard, and is disgusted to hear. Why are almost no Black Voices willing to be honest about what that hashtag really was intended to do; split the movement and the Party? Black Femmes like her in Revolutionary Leadership so she can make Whitey Bow Down will never happen, she is a fool who did some good in spite of failing at her primary goal. She can sit in her circle of back slappers plugging her ears forever for all I care.
Still, I am with you all the way, in spite of her intentions. Live and learn.
Here's a new meme I am creating for my White Moderate and ignorant Progressive contacts: "I'm not racist, why should I have to give up my White Privilege?"
And, when my now ex-girlfriend complained that those cop-on Black shooting videos I watch are annoying, I reminded her that it is White Privilege that Whites can ignore it, unlike the families of the victims and every POC in America, etc.
Peace and Justice.
BLM-RACIST-
They want to be treated equally yet are racist against whites. The mission statement wrought with racism ie; black lives matter "all whites are racist" chants , attacking whites, looting, riots, mob violence, disregard for daily activities ie; blocking roads. BLM. Is a hate group nothing else.
What are their goals? Ask. It's irradiation.
BLM. Members will be behind bars for the terrorists threat against civil people, rest assured.
The penalties and federal crimes have accumulated against the founders and followers.
ITS ONLY A MATTER OF TIME NOW
James Spitzer: Thank you for an excellent comment. I have difficulties with some of the Sanders supporters who do not seem to understand that BLM conducted their action during Sanders' NRN speech because they could, because they are progressives, because they needed to demand that those who are the most rationally supportive of them and their issues, were called out. It worked. The tactics there were traditional, effective and productive. Sanders and his team met with the BLM leaders, began developing a program to address institutionalized racism, deaths of the lives of black people by police in outrageous percentages and the failure of the criminal "justice" system to exercise real justice when the murders occurred.
Any observer who has watched as Clinton and Bush were pushed aside and not even allowed close to the candidates can see that they and the BLM movement have nothing in common. Nothing would come from even attempting to interrupt them and their closed meetings and carefully vetted "rallies" of preselected supporters. All of us who support Bernie Sanders should be proud that he is the person, the candidate, that people whose families, friends, associates and fellow people of color are all being killed without any response, would choose Sanders as their best, if not only, route of access into justice.
I did not like the Seattle action of interrupting the Social Security and Medicare meeting that many people of many colors had worked hard for months to establish and create. The disgusting anarchistic hashtag of the group that BLM people used, associated with and endorsed was demeaning and destructive.
Finally, BLM is not racist. The people who have organized and are organizing BLM are doing their best to represent the unrepresented, to bring attention to the ignored and to stop the stopping, abusing, frightening, injuring and killing of people of color simply because they are different from the white people who are and have for generations been, immune from such irrational and deadly conduct. I marched in the 60s, led a civil rights march with Jesse Jackson and Andrew Brown in the 70s. So...Freaking...What...is a fair response to me if I do not yet grasp the reality of the damage of structural racism in my country and work just as hard to stop that now as I did then.
Bernie Sanders is my populist, progressive hero and I believe he can be the next president of the United States. One of the reasons that I believe that is that he listens when people express anger and frustration as much as or more than when people cheer and express support and love for him. He is a better candidate today than he was when he first rose to speak at NetRoots Nation. He will be a better candidate tomorrow after he has listened to the people of Iowa about the things they are angry and upset about. His attention and concern for the necessity to overcome the structural racism of America has made him a better candidate and my understanding of all of that has made me a better progressive and a better person.
Yes, David, there is a hidden contradiction at the root of all the fuss, mostly due to what seems like old school Dialectical Materialism which says that it is wise to create division with reformist moderates, even those who call themselves, and are, Progressives. Been there, done it.
Instead I am glad if it moved the conversation vastly forward and results in deeper transformative evolutionary shift by simply overwhelming The System with 99% voter turnout in a national to local networked mass action instead. I actually predict this, right here to you. OK, maybe not 99, but overwhelming unity with Progressives, Moderates, Dems, Reps,Indys, etc. It will make clear sense to nearly everyone. It already does to people of all stripes who take the time to look. Who is not going to jump at the chance to get this not-so-slow train wreck back on track in a way that clear headed unified yet diverse adults can do if given a chance. Let's Roll!
This is old news, but it has taken this long for me to come up with a comment. I need more information. Did these interrupters contact the Sanders campaign to address racial inequality beforehand? Did they have reasonable belief that no action would have been done to address the issues they were bringing up had they not stormed the stage in the fashion they did?
It may be my innate bias, but I suspect that they made assumptions about the white man on stage as being a progressive-for-whites-only type without really giving that person the chance to be human first. I want to know that these girls contacted his campaign and did everything they could in the way that anyone is expected to get their message across to another person before they did something as drastic as storming a stage and basically creating a fight at an event that other people are really excited about. It's just disrespectful to everyone there otherwise, and I can't support them until I find out what they did to address him in a more civil way.
I don't even think it's fully allowable to hijack an event only if one sends them a letter, and nothing more either. First, not all letters or emails can be responded to: that's just a problem of numbers. Second, you can communicate your message to a politician and just not have them agree with you. Perhaps they will agree that police brutality is a heavy issue, but don't want to take a moment of silence for a person they may feel bad for, but never met and wasn't known by anyone at the rally. If one takes a moment of silence for every victim of police brutality, one will literally never be able to speak. They could circumvent this by asking instead for a moment of silence for all the people who died by the use of excessive force that year, but again this kind of communication implies a sense of imploring on the one hand, and listening on the other. This communication is vital to any conversation between individuals or groups, and must precede a shouting match. It implies humility, and giving each other the benefit of the doubt, coming into a dialogue on equal terms.
If they did all this, and still the campaign was silent; if they made what can reasonably estimated to be all possible effort to contact that person's campaign and still were met with silence, only then can I say that yes, this was a good move, and it was time to force Sanders to address this question. But did anyone ever ask him? Did it come at the conversational level first? No one is asking that question, yet that is the question that underlies this whole affair. If they did, or someone they know did, then I will remember Sanders as another electability-first type who backslides on principles, and won't get that excited about him in the election. Then I'll probably vote for the "not Donald Trump" or "not Ted Cruz" option. But that doesn't seem like him, based on what i've seen of his past, fighting years as an independent to become mayor. I don't know the guy - too many people feel like they do. But I say that no one deserves bad treatment, and what I saw from those girls looked like bad treatment to me. I am willing to be proven wrong with their records though: that would bring me closer to the BLM movement as a whole.
I hope that we can all resolve this and criticize bad actions for what they are, whoever may be the culprit. We can even come together to celebrate the effect afterward for drawing that conversation into the fore. But first, the relationship between black activists and white progressives and working class folks, and their respective sympathizers must be repaired. Too many people were shocked and angered by what they saw from that moment. Now it's up to those two girls to come out and expose Sanders as a fraud, or else go back to that moment and apologize to the man and his fans and Black Lives Matter as a whole for representing them in such an improper and temperamental way. And should they refuse to do so, the movement itself must decide: is this the organization for rights? Or is it simply an organization for black rights? For minority rights? For non-white rights? Will it come out and disown those actions finally for what they were - upsetting to some and harmful for all? Or will it be disappointingly unable to criticize itself, falling back on its base and make the same kind of division between people, by insisting that some be held above - or below - others?
Let them show me that Sanders brushed them off as if their concerns didn't matter, or stayed quiet out of fear of not being electable, I welcome it. But if they don't have that, and jumped straight to hijacking someone's campaign rally, in true shoot-first, ask-questions-later form, then I have to say that this story was an example of bad BLM, and that unless some reconciliation is attempted on the part of those who contributed to the event as representatives of BLM, or by the BLM community itself, I will see that movement as one where disrespect and impropriety against white people is tolerated. And that would make it one where I no longer have a place, nor much in the way of sympathy. To be fair, I will always have sympathy towards those who are oppressed, I will simply no longer see BLM nor its respective leaders as capable of bringing true equality about. Equality is about respect just as much as anything else. That’s never been up for debate.
Thank you for reading my comment,
Tyler