Revolution #98, August 13, 2007
voice of the revolutionary communist party,usa
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“The politics of the ‘possible’ is the politics of monstrosity. To adhere to, or acquiesce in, the politics of the ‘possible’ is to support, and actually to facilitate, monstrosity.”
Bob Avakian, Chairman of the Revolutionary Communist Party,USA
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- Nooses and White Supremacy in the USA Today
Louisiana Goddamn! Free the Jena 6!
- Bringing Forward Another Way, Part 15, by Bob Avakian, Chairman of the Revolutionary Communist Party, USA
- The Firing of Ward Churchill and the Dangerous Trajectory of Repression in Academia
- World Can’t Wait Launches New Campaign, Declare It Now: Wear Orange! Drive Out the Bush Regime!
- Outrage and Protest in Chicago’s West Side, 18-Year-Old Black Youth Shot in the Back - Killed by Cops
- Who’s Afraid of Antioch College…and Why Are They Trying to Shut It Down?
- “Just in case you don’t get it yet…” Proposed Ohio Abortion Law Would Give Veto Power to the Male, by T. Redtree
- From A World to Win News Service, Hiroshima, Nagasaki…and Tehran?
- The Generals and the Christian Embassy
- Who’s Putting the Heat on Barry Bonds… and Why
- Online Video: REVOLUTION Comes to L.A.
- Next Week: Special Issue on Katrina Anniversary Plus Campus Supplement
Permalink: http://revcom.us/a/098/jena-six-en.html
Revolution #98, August 13, 2007
Hundreds March Against “Legal Lynching”
Free the Jena 6!
By Li Onesto and Alice Woodward
The “Jena 6” are six Black students who face the possibility
of going to prison for many, many years because of a schoolyard fight.
This story began on September 1, 2006 in the small town of Jena, Louisiana.
A group of Black students sat under a “whites-only” tree in
the schoolyard. Racist students responded immediately and the next day
nooses were hanging from the tree for all to see.
Tina Jones, the mother of Bryant Purvis who is one of the Jena 6, told Revolution what it was like hearing about the nooses hanging on the tree:
“I was like, what? [My son], myself and a lot of family members
were really upset about that because to Black people that is offensive
because you know over the years Black people were hung in trees. So I
mean we felt like the white people were saying, ‘Well if you sit
under this tree, we’re going to hang you.’ That’s how
us as Black people felt, even though the white people said it was a prank.
How could it be a prank when something like that was done to Black people
over the years? And then they walk under this tree and then you hang nooses.
And you know what that represents and that means to us -- if you go under
this [tree] we’re going to hang you. I mean there’s no other
way to look at that, and there’s nothing funny about that.”
Soon after the nooses were hung, most of the 93 Black students (out of
a total student enrollment of 546) at Jena High School stood together under the tree, in a
courageous act of protest. After this, a school assembly was called where
a white district attorney told the Black students to keep their mouths
shut about the nooses. He told them if he heard anything else about it,
he “can make their lives go away with the stroke of his pen.”
When racist white students jumped a Black student, one white student
got probation. But when a fight broke out that sent a white student to
the hospital for an hour, the law came down on Mychal Bell, Robert Bailey,
Theo Shaw, Carwin Jones, Bryant Purvis, and an unnamed minor--arresting
these youth, who are now known as the Jena 6, and initially charging them
with attempted murder. (see “Free
the Jena Six! Jim Crow Injustice in Jena Louisiana,” Revolution
#96).
Mychal Bell has already been convicted of second degree battery and conspiracy
to commit second degree battery and could be sentenced to up to 22 years
in prison. And the system is trying to make good on the threat to ruin
the lives of the other five youth who still face serious charges. Many
people still do not know about this tremendous outrage. But a nationwide
struggle to free the Jena 6 is beginning to grow--and MUST get much bigger.
The next court hearings for Mychal Bell and the rest of the Jena Six are scheduled to begin on September 4. Bell’s sentencing is scheduled for September 20.
“We Want the Entire World to Hear”
On July 31, some 300 people rallied in support of the Jena 6 at the courthouse
where Mychal Bell was scheduled to be sentenced. People came from all
over the country, including people from New Orleans fighting for justice
in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. And a massive stack of petitions, which
organizers said contained 43,000 signatures, was delivered to the Assistant
District Attorney of Jena. On August 5, Al Sharpton spoke at a church
in Jena. And while the story of the Jena 6 has been way downplayed in
the mainstream media, these events helped get more national and international
coverage.
Mychal Bell has now been sitting in jail since December 4 and was not
able to graduate. His trial was a complete outrage, with the court-appointed
lawyer not even calling any witnesses! Now, a group of lawyers from Monroe,
Louisiana have come forward to take up Bell’s case. Bell’s
new legal team says their goal is to overturn Bell’s conviction.
Bob Noel, one of the lawyers now on the case, said they got involved not
only because Bell came to them, but because it was the right thing to
do. "The interest of justice cried out [for us] to get involved,"
Noel said.
The weekend before the July 31 scheduled sentencing of Mychal Bell, the
“whites-only” tree in front of the high school was cut down.
NPR reported that “Jena High School had the big shade tree in the
courtyard chopped into firewood.” But the tree disappearing hasn’t
in any way lessened people’s anger and their determination to spread
the word about this case and build the struggle to free the Jena 6.
Talking about the significance of the July 31 rally, Caseptla Bailey,
mother of one of the defendants, Robert Bailey, Jr., said, "This
is a beautiful thing that I’m seeing here today—
all types of browns, seeing all types of blacks, all types of whites.
We love that, people coming together." And Khadijah Rashad, representing
Lafayette’s Community Defender television show, said, "We
must remember that the entire world is watching… When there is going
to be sentencing again, we need to flood this area with as much people
as we possibly can. We want the entire world to know” (thetowntalk.com).
Bell’s father, Marcus Jones, agreed: “Justice, that’s
the main thing we want. He’s still in jail, and we want justice
for him and the other boys. And now the whole world sees the wrong done
to these boys.”
Bell’s mother, Melissa Bell, told The Town Talk (a paper
in Alexandria, Louisiana) that the actions on July 31 should send a message
to the community: “We are serious, and everyone is serious about
freeing these kids.”
Confronting Reality in Jena and Beyond
School starts on August 17 and the school board is already setting a
repressive tone and atmosphere. A “Resource Officer” from the La Salle Parish Sheriff's Department will be at Jena High School this year.
Meanwhile, an editorial in the local Jena Times, attacked the
“outside” and “liberal” media for supposedly distorting
the situation in Jena, saying, “The ‘racial unrest’
that has continually been reported simply does not exist here.”
(“Outside Media has transformed Jena” 8-8-07) Things in Jena
are very polarized—right now, there are very few, if any, white
people who are even speaking out against the nooses on the trees or the
unjust way the Jena 6 are being treated--let alone, taking a clear stand
against white supremacy. And this reactionary editorial gave voice to
those backward whites in Jena who continue to claim, “We’re
good people. This is a good town”--which really amounts to defending
the racist status quo.
In contrast to what anyone might declare about how nice a place Jena is, we’ve heard stories which show how the hanging of nooses on the tree at Jena High School and the violent enforcement of white supremacy afterwards is not an exception but is consistent with day-to-day reality in Jena. Black people say they cannot get their hair cut at the barber shop in Jena. Someone showed us photos of nooses that had been put on an offshore oil rig, laying about, and hung up in a bathroom--meant to intimidate Black workers. One parent told us that she overheard white people talking about how the “n*ggers“ who were relocated to Jena from New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina “are worse than the n*ggers here in Jena.” This is the ugly history--and present reality--of not just Jena, Louisiana, but the USA.
At the same the whole struggle around the Jena 6 is shaking things up, forcing a lot of white people to think about the reality of relations between Black and white people in not only Jena, but this whole country. We walked in on a discussion going on among four Jena residents who were taking a break at the office where they work. One Black person was openly talking about how what was happening to the Jena 6 was outrageous—and bringing out the history of resistance and rebellion against racism and injustice, like the 1992 L.A. Rebellion. The white people were listening—one somewhat reluctantly, another with some interest nodded his head in agreement. A third said, “I don't think Jena's racist, it's not racist is it, do you think it is?” This shows how people fighting back and sharply polarizing things creates the basis for a realignment in society.
The significance and stakes of this struggle go far beyond Jena. Alan
Bean, an attorney who works with the group Friends of Justice, recently
wrote: “You probably won’t find 'white trees'
and nooses in New York and Los Angeles—that’s a Southern thing.
But you will find the same kind of racial profiling regime that insures
that young black males are disproportionately watched, hassled and arrested
by the police; and you will discover that the over-prosecution of young
black males is just as rife in our coastal paradise as it is in our southern
purgatory. That’s what Friends of Justice calls ‘the New Jim
Crow’; and it ain’t just a Southern thing. Jena is America.”
Spreading Resistance
People need to seriously ask: Why are the school and local authorities,
courts, and federal officials all working together to ruin the lives of
these six Black youth? Is it because they got into a schoolyard brawl
where another kid was (not very seriously) injured? Or is it because these
youth and nearly every other Black student at the school went and stood
under the “white only” tree in defiance of the openly racist
threat of the nooses on the tree? In the eyes of the system of white supremacy,
these students crossed the line, they “forgot their place,”
and must be punished.
Black students at Jena High have been talking about what to do on August
17, when school begins. One idea they have been thinking about is all wearing
“Free the Jena 6” t-shirts on that day. And as people across
the country learn about what’s happening in Jena, many are outraged
and feel compelled to act, to stand with the Jena 6. In Cambridge, Massachusetts
the City Council passed a resolution, going “on record in support
of the young men and their families in Jena in their pursuit of justice”
and stating that “This frightening example of racism calls to mind
an earlier time in the United States in which segregation and the ‘lynching’
of African-Americans was common practice.” Some people in New York
City who have heard about the case have put a call out to others to help
organize support for the Jena 6. On August 14, Al Sharpton is scheduled to return to Jena, along with Martin Luther King Jr. III, to voice support for the Jena 6 with a service at Antioch Baptist Church and a town hall meeting.
*****
People of conscience who know about the case of the Jena 6 cannot stand
on the sidelines, which would amount to a form of complicity in this great
injustice.
The struggle to free the Jena 6 must be spread far and wide. And a lot
more people need to learn from the Black students at Jena High School
who stood stood beneath the “whites only” tree and through
their defiant action, said “NO MORE.”
Right away, and especially when Mychal Bell is scheduled to be sentenced
on September 20, many, many more people should come to Jena and help build
the movement to free the Jena 6. And there should be rallies in many other
places as well. In small towns, cities and suburbs, in colleges and high
schools, people of ALL nationalities should make it clear that we will
NOT tolerate white supremacy in any form and demand that ALL the charges
be dropped on the Jena 6.
Everyone must take a stand. Are you for or against everything represented
by those nooses hanging on the tree?
Send us your comments.
Permalink: http://revcom.us/a/098/Jena-comments-en.html
Revolution #98, August 13, 2007
Readers Write on Jena Coverage in Revolution
From the editors: We have received an exceptionally large
number of responses from readers to our coverage of the battle to free
the Jena Six. The following selection of comments and letters gives a
sense of the breadth of those responses, followed by a few thoughts from
us in response.
I am appalled that in this day and age such racism is allowed to exist
and grow in my America. I have already signed the Jena Six petition. What
more can I do? Where can I contribute to the defense fund? Who can I write
to protest this obvious injustice? Shame on the town of Jena for turning
a blind eye to this situation. Has this been on national news yet, like
MSNBC, Fox or CNN? Maybe some big bad publicity will get the wheels of
justice rolling again in the South.
*****
I cannot believe the misjustice being done to these six young men. I
was a member of the Black Panther party when I was young and we were seen
as violent people that wanted to bring America to its knees. But what
I wanted back then and desire today is for people to realize that racism
is still alive today just like then. Where are our outspoken black leaders,
where is Rev. Jackson? I know we should choose our battles carefully,
and this is one everyone, no matter what color they are, should be hollering
from the roof top. Of course Bush must believe that racism is gone. Wake
up people, it has not gone away and as long as we keep our heads in the
sand it never will....
*****
I am ashamed to be from Louisiana. I'm an African-American female and
I'm sick to my stomach. I just heard about this case this morning on the
radio and I cried in disbelief. I wish I had money to get these kids an
attorney. I will keep all of them in my prayers.
*****
Sounds like the brothas down there can use some help from their brothers
who don't play that shit. A message to the inbred red neck. I'd like to
extend an invitation to Oakland CA. I dare you try that shit out west
buddy!
*****
Until we can unteach the hate and misunderstanding that one race of people
have for another certain race of people that has been taught to these
children for generations this will continue. It starts with understanding
and accepting the differences in cultures. We are ALL from the human race
and until we accept the diversities from culture to culture, ignorance
will prevail. These people claim to be the moral majority and God-fearing
Christians but they don’t understand the true meaning of being Christ
like.
*****
I am just now hearing about this story. WHY? What are our BLACK LEADERS
doing about this situation? I know that racism is alive and well, but
to be this blatant is overwhelming for me. I am not sure how the Governor
of Louisiana can sit back and think that this is okay or even how these
people sleep well at night. Everyone has their day in front of the Lord.
I just hope that he has mercy on the (publicly elected) officials of Louisiana
and overlooks the fact that they are not following his word. I will uplift
these families in my prayers.
*****
Not only should the town be exposed, but hordes of people just need to
swarm there and become extremely nosy, bringing to light everything that
is going on. As long as people turn a blind eye, pretend that it is not
going on and simply ignore this kind of behavior it will continue. Yes,
sir expose them for the racist town they are. Let the world know that
racism exists here, strongly. Make an example of them. Let people point
their fingers and condemn them for their acts. Yep... let the world know
that Jena is a disgrace and a pity and shame. This kind of thing should
not be tolerated any longer...any longer.
*****
I am a white male 21 years of age in Indiana. Now in the Midwest we have
our own small issues with racism here and there and our fair share of
red necks and hicks as well as black citizens. So I'm not from a high
class family in some white dominated liberalist area who speaks out for
every and any cause. But I find this story appalling in every sense of
the word…
This case makes me almost upset enough to get into fights with the white
people there. I honestly don't know why we even call people white or black
anymore. A "United" country we are not in any form. But I do believe that
black people sometimes encourage stereotypes and exasperate racism by
their own behavior. You mentioned the Imus incident. I think he was too
severely punished and I think the black community is to blame for his
behavior. I don't excuse it, but there are black people who use much more
derogatory terms much more often than he does and no one bats an eye.
The rap industry is also a huge proponent in what created that situation.
But that’s all small stuff compared to this Jena case. Imus didn't
die or get sent to jail for 20 years. These boys in Jena are being so
abused and mistreated, it’s just beyond words. Anyways, I could
ramble and fume in either direction for many more pages but I just wanted
to write to let you know that I support anything in favor of the Jena
boys.... But I did interject the points about Imus because I want you
to know I'm balanced in my opinions. I don't blindly support whites or
blacks in any case, and I think both can be responsible depending on the
situation. Take my comments for what they're worth, and let me know if
there’s anything petition I can sign, or somewhere I can support
this atrocity.
*****
I am disgusted in the treatment of these black students!! How can I help
to raise media awareness of this injustice ? I live in UK and we seem
to know more about it than the USA. How can I help?
*****
I will never support america in anything. Everything is still being controlled
by white racists. This country is full of innocent blood. I often wonder
why are so many white people racist. What are they scared of. I have a
lot of white friends and family but they are different. Full of hate and
ignorance are the ones running this country. You wouldn’t want your
children or people to be targets of racism but people are often made target
by you racists. You are truly full of hate ignorance and fear.
*****
…I am the first to admit that poverty, racism, & ignorance still
exist in Jena, as it does in most areas of the world.
However, as much as the news media, among others, have tried to make
this case as simple as "black and white", it is much more complicated
than this, as most situations are. …
The truth is that education, enlightenment, tolerance & courage are the
only solutions for ignorance, poverty, hatred & racism. I have seen none
of these characteristics exhibited by any of the media, including yourself.
…
*****
In the words of the most honorable Elijah Muhammad, "separation, (not
integration) is the only solution to the black mans (womans) 452 year
old problem"; with the former slave master and his children!!
This case, is a real and true picture of the hearts of that grafted being.
(shaitan).
My heart goes out to the brothers accused in this matter. I pray, the
creator will guide each and every one of them and give them strength,
to persevere!!
*****
I was deeply touched by this incredible story, I’d like to know
if there is any means to protest against this awful decision and give
my support. Thanks.
*****
This is the first I have heard of this. Are any of the Human Rights groups
involved? Anyone been in contact with 20/20, Dateline, Oprah for mass
media alert? How about Amnesty or the ACLU? I have sent this out to all
my contacts and hope many will involve themselves. My big question is
where was the NAACP during all of this, they could have gotten this kid
a decent attorney. I have asked the Jericho Movement to place this article
on their website. If I can help please contact me.
*****
Comments from the Editors
This sampling of comments sent to Revolution gives a feel for how deeply
the story of the Jena Six is striking a nerve with people. A number of
letters alerted us to other similar outrages, and we will do our best
to write about these cases or put these letters at our web site. Many
readers are asking—demanding—to know what this is all about,
and what we can do to stop this. Here we are in 2007. Lynching ropes hang
from a tree in a schoolyard. A district attorney tells Black students
that if they do anything about it, he can ruin their lives. And now six
Black youth face decades in jail.
For many people who have experienced, or are aware of how widespread
racism is in this society, the story of the Jena Six resonates deeply.
Many feel compelled to do something to stop what is going on there. People
should get the articles in the current issue of Revolution on Jena distributed
online and in print, far and wide. People should organize protests around
the country—there are protests planned in several cities on September
20 when Mychal Bell is scheduled to be sentenced. People should go to
Jena to work for justice there.
We also got letters from white people who were very disturbed by our
coverage, and are in some cases refusing to come to grips with what this
is all about. Or, in other cases, beginning to come to grips with what
this is all about but still being played by the system into thinking that
Black people are to blame for societal prejudice. There’s a need
for everyone, including white people in Jena and other places, to come
forward in support of the Jena Six, in the face of the status quo. If
you disagree with what’s happening you can’t just say you
feel bad about it, you have to actively protest and resist this.
And we are confident that as you do this you will feel compelled to get
deeper into the actual root causes of outrages like Jena and begin to
learn how Black people have been systematically oppressed.
Many people who wrote to us said that they are turning to god for help
though prayer. But if there really was an all powerful, all knowing, and
loving god, why would he allow this horrible thing to happen—where
six young Black men are facing decades in jail like this? Or, if there
was a god listening to all these prayers, and still allowing what is happening,
in Jena, then he would be a very unjust, and oppressive god who was backing
up those who strung up lynching ropes (and don’t forget that the
Bible condones slavery). So there is no god who will free the Jena Six,
or do anything else. And it is a good thing that there is no god. The
problem is with an oppressive system here in the real world. And to get
free, we have to confront and struggle to change this real world.
This whole case has been a glaring example of white supremacy, violently
imposed on Black youth, and Black people generally, from the nooses, to
the beatings and gunplay, down to the government itself putting these
youth on trial, and then trying to sentence these youth to prison for
decades. This whole thing is one more reminder of why we need a revolution.
And now that people have dared to resist this, that resistance must be
supported and spread, as part of building a revolutionary movement.
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Send us your comments.
Permalink: http://revcom.us/a/098/Jena-doj-en.html
Revolution #98, August 13, 2007
U.S. Department of Justice: Nothing “Irregular” or Wrong
with Jim Crow “Justice”
Jena is a small town where racism and segregation is the status quo—enforced
in official and unofficial ways as well. A young Black man told Revolution
newspaper, “Well you walk a sharp line and you cross the line and
you face the consequences.”
But the forceful imposition of white supremacy is not simply or even
fundamentally a case of “good ole boys” going wild. The case
of the Jena 6 is happening at a time when the U.S. Supreme Court, the
highest judicial body in the land, has overturned Brown vs. Board
of Education— officially fortifying segregation and savage
inequalities in the schools. And from the school officials to the police
to the courts— authorities and government officials
have been and are a part of the completely unjust and racist treatment
of the Jena 6.
For anyone who doubts this, officials from the highest levels of the
U.S. government recently descended on Jena to make this crystal clear.
On July 26, more than 165 people packed into the Good Pine Middle School
auditorium. The crowd was almost all Black. The event was billed as a
“community forum” to discuss issues arising out of the Jena
6 case. But this was definitely a case of the fox guarding the chicken
coop.
The four-hour forum hosted by the U.S. Department of Justice featured
Lewis Chapman, assistant special agent in charge of the New Orleans FBI
office; U.S. Attorney Donald Washington from the Justice Department; and
Carmelita Freeman, regional director of the Department of Justice’s
Community Relations Service.
The struggle to free the Jena 6 is about justice and stopping and reversing
a terrible outrage that is now going on. So what kind of “justice”
was Washington (who is Black) talking about when he told the crowd that
he empathized “very publicly with all the families involved in this
dispute…white, black, purple and green.” What does it mean
when someone from the U.S. Justice Department says he supports all
sides in this conflict? The lynching nooses, as well as the Black
students who sat under a “whites-only” tree? You can’t
support all sides. The question is—which side are you on?
What Washington said means support for the status quo of racism and
segregation and all the rights this gives to racist whites. What
Washington said means supporting the racist white students who hung nooses
and attacked Black students. What Washington said means NOT taking a stand
against the injustice of what is being done to the Jena 6.
During the Q&A period at the end, someone in the audience asked whether
the hanging of the nooses on the tree was a “hate crime.”
Chapman, from the FBI, responded, first of all, by revealing that the
FBI had agents in Jena a week or so after the incident. Then Washington
claimed that there were all the elements of a “hate crime”—except
for the threat of use of force. In fact, force was used—
by the government — to back up those nooses.
The arrest of the Jena 6, who are facing decades in jail, is all about
enforcing those nooses with the force of the state.
The U.S. Department of Justice serves as an enforcer for a system that
has enslaved, worked to death on plantations, lynched, enforced Jim Crow
against, segregated against, and turned fire hoses and KKKers (often organized
by the FBI) on Black people and those who joined in the struggle for equality.
This is part of the same “justice” system that sent a DA to
the school assembly to threaten Black students who protested the nooses.
Washington and the FBI are no friends of the people.
History tells us, no question about it— when white
people hang nooses on trees, this is nothing but a murderous, racist threat
against Black people. And Washington and Chapman, as representatives of
the FBI and U.S. Justice Department, have only underscored how this kind
of lynch mob “justice” is bolstered and supported by the government
institutions of this system.
The most revealing moment in the so-called “community forum”
was when Washington (discussing the high school’s handling of the
noose incident and the fight for which the Jena 6 are on trial) said:
“We have examined all of their actions and I'm not saying I agree
with what they've done but I can say that we could find no violation in
the way they handled each event. All of their procedures were ‘regular’
and not ‘irregular.’” (quoted in The Jena Times
)
“All their procedures were regular and not irregular.”
Well, this was the one statement in the meeting by Washington we have
to agree with.
No punishment for white students who hang lynch nooses on a schoolyard
tree: REGULAR. Threatening Black students who protest this racist threat:
REGULAR. Giving a slap on the hand to white students who attack Black
students: REGULAR. Black students facing decades of prison time for fighting
with white students: REGULAR.
On this, Washington is right: This is the “regular” workings
of a white supremacist system.
And we would add another “regular.” Officials from the highest
offices of the system, holding a “community meeting,” wolves
in sheep’s clothing— to try and cool things
out and at the same time justify and bolster the enforcement of segregation
and white supremacy: REGULAR.
Send us your comments.
Permalink: http://revcom.us/a/098/Jena-ice-en.html
Revolution #98, August 13, 2007
A short, brutal, and ugly history of imprisonment in Jena, Louisiana…
and plans for more of the same in the future
Jena, Louisiana: While white students hang nooses on trees and 6 Black
students face years of prison for a schoolyard fight (see “Hundreds March Against “Legal Lynching”: Free the Jena 6!”), another outrage is in the works: A
new prison is scheduled to open, run by U.S. immigration and Customs Enforcement
(ICE), to incarcerate up to 1,160 immigrants.
Because of the very workings of this capitalist system, thousands of
immigrants have no way to live in their own countries and risk their lives,
and often leave their families to come to the U.S. to try and find a way
to survive. They are hunted down, rounded up, brutalized, and deported—many
times cruelly separated from their children. Now, many of them will be
locked up in Jena, Louisiana.
Louisiana has the highest rate of incarceration in the country--816 sentenced
prisoners per 100,000 state residents. Although Black people make up 32
percent of Louisiana's population, they constitute 72 percent of the state's
prison population.
The new ICE prison will be housed in what used to be the Jena Juvenile
Correctional Center that was opened in the mid 90s and owned by Wackenhut
Corrections Corporation. This prison, and others owned by Wackenhut, was
investigated and found guilty of widespread abuses, including the rape
of young women prisoners, widespread sexual abuse, and excessive use of
force. When CBS 60 Minutes did a program in May 2000, exposing
abuses in prisons nationwide, they focused on the one in Jena.
After a lawsuit was filed by the Juvenile Justice Project for Louisiana,
the U.S. Justice Department was forced to investigate the Jena Juvenile
Correctional Center and concluded, "Jena's environment is unsafe,
violent and inhumane for the juveniles incarcerated there.” Louisiana's
Department of Corrections took control of the prison and in 2005, after
Hurricane Katrina, the prison was used to house prisoners evacuated from
New Orleans. This was after these prisoners had been left, locked
up in their cells as floodwaters rose inside the prison
(see “Doing ‘Katrina Time’—Torture in New Orleans
Prisons” by Li Onesto, Revolution #64 (Part
1)
and #66 (Part 3),
December 8
and 22, 2006 and “They
Left Us There To Die,” Revolution #16, October 2, 2005).
A press release written by Human Rights Watch stated: “Inmates
at Jena claim that correctional officers have beaten, kicked and hit them
while they were shackled. In addition, they claim that officers have forced
inmates to stay kneeling for several hours at a stretch, and then hit
them if they fell. They also say that officers sprayed the walls with
chemical spray that inmates believed was mace and forced inmates to hold
their faces against the sprayed walls. When some inmates became ill and
vomited, officers wiped their faces and hair in the vomit, they said.”
The prison was closed down again. But now it’s reopening again.
And the ugly history of this place will continue—this time, with
immigrants brutalized behind prison walls. Posters have gone up around
town for a prison job fair, and the Jena Times ran a full-page
ad for jobs at the new prison. This is yet another intolerable outrage:
That they are counting on people in Jena, including Black youth who face
a future of nothing but unemployment, being cannon fodder in the military
or prison, to be part of the persecution and unjust imprisonment of immigrants.
Send us your comments.
Permalink: http://revcom.us/a/098/martinsville7-en.html
Revolution #98, August 13, 2007
Correspondence:
The Martinsville Seven
Revolution received this correspondence:
In light of the Jena Six, the group of black Louisiana students charged
with second-degree murder after beating up a fellow white student, please
allow me to share with your many readers another American story of injustice.
It is a little known story about the Martinsville Seven, the largest mass
execution for rape in U.S. history.
In 1949, in Martinsville, VA, seven black men were arrested for the rape
of Ruby Stroud Floyd, a 32-year-old married white woman. Within 30 hours
of this crime, all seven men had signed written confessions. Within 7
days, all seven were tried, convicted and sentenced to death by all-white,
all-male juries. (Two were tried at the same time.) At the time of his
arrest, the youngest was only 17 years old and the oldest, a 37-year-old
WWII vet with a wife and five beautiful, young children, could have passed
for white.
During appeals, Thurgood Marshall, later to become the first black Supreme
Court judge and then head of the NAACP's Legal Defense Fund, helped represent
them. (Three times the Supreme Court refused to hear their case.) Ossie
Davis and Paul Robeson rallied Hollywood in their defense but to no avail.
Communist Russia and China sent telegrams to the White House asking the
U.S. to spare their lives but then President Truman, an alleged Klansman,
refused to grant clemency. Around the world, they became known as the
Martinsville Seven.
Just two years later in Richmond, VA, eight black men were executed,
seven for the rape of one white woman. On Friday, February 2, 1951, at
about 10:00 a.m., one man was taken to the electric chair. Ten minutes
later, another died. 10 minutes after that, another died. It's been said
that the chair was too hot to touch.
The following Monday, the remaining four black men were executed, or
should I say boys because five of them were teenagers. Right before the
youngest was executed, he said: "God knows I didn't touch that woman,
and I'll see ya'll on the other side."
In the entire history of the United States, no white man has ever been
executed for the rape of a black woman. During this time, no white man
in Virginia had ever been executed for any rape of any woman. In 1977,
over 25 years later, the Supreme Court ruled that rape could not be punishable
by death. The Martinsville Seven case was instrumental in helping change
the rape laws of this great nation. (The Seven case was the first time
ever in a court of law where lawyers used statistics showing that black
men were executed more than white men for similar crimes, especially rape.)
Every black person I have ever interviewed in Martinsville, young and
old alike, said that the victim was having an affair with one of the Seven,
the WWII vet, who could have passed for white. Elderly people who knew
Rudy said she was a flirtatious lady, always "on the colored side
of town," always "up in colored men's faces." Others said
she was a devout Jehovah Witness, relentlessly passing out her religious
pamphlets in Cherrytown, the colored side of town.
The true story of the Seven has never been told. There is one book published
about the Seven and the author once told me that when he was researching
his book, not one black person in Martinsville would be interviewed. For
the record, I was born and raised in Martinsville, and three of the Seven
executed were Hairstons.
If this is news to you, please share this American history with your
readers and if not your readers, your friends and colleagues. Thanks for
listening and KEEP HOPE ALIVE!
Pamela A. Hairston
Information Research Specialist and freelance writer
Washington, DC
Send us your comments.
Permalink: http://www.revcom.us/avakian/anotherway/anotherway15-en.html
Revolution #98, August 13, 2007
Part 15
Editors' Note: The following are excerpts from an edited version of a talk by Bob Avakian, Chairman of the Revolutionary Communist Party, USA, to a group of Party supporters, in the fall of last year (2006). This is the 15th in a series of excerpts we will be running in Revolution. Subheads and footnotes have been added for publication here. The entire talk is available online at
revcom.us/avakian/anotherway.
Never Underestimate the Great Importance of Ideology
In the context of what I have been discussing here, and as a point of basic and overarching importance, I want to emphasize something we could capture with the phrase: "Never underestimate the great importance of ideology."
We have a very negative example of this with the Islamic fundamentalists. The way in which they are proceeding to do what they're doing has a very powerful ideological component to it.
How do people respond to the conditions that they find themselves in? What course or road do they take, and what do they respond to, in the face of those conditions? This is not predetermined. There is not just one way that people respond, automatically and regardless of influences on them. And even the level on which people sacrifice depends on their ideological orientation to a very significant degree.
Lenin pointed out, for example, in What Is To Be Done?, that, in the course of the Russian revolutionary movement, Iskra, the newspaper of the Bolsheviks, trained a whole generation in how to live and how to die. And that's what these Islamic fundamentalists are doing, from a very different and fundamentally reactionary standpoint. We can see the very negative effects of this. And, yes, in the short run they have certain things going for them because they can promote metaphysics and idealism, with the notion of another world and how you'll get your reward there. And, of course, it's too late, once you're dead, to find out there's nothing there—including you! But are there things worth living and dying for? This is a profound ideological question. Besides things like these Islamic fundamentalist movements, look at what many people are living and dying for these days, especially the youth, being drawn to crime and gangs, and so on. Where is that going to lead? And what is that going to contribute to and reinforce? But, with all this, it would be a very serious error to underestimate the great importance of ideology, of one kind or another, and how it leads people to act, and be willing to sacrifice—how it trains them, in short, to know how to live and how to die.
And from another angle—talking about the other "historically outmoded"1
—we shouldn't underestimate the degree to which Bush and company are also attaching great importance to ideology. Bush, in his recent speeches, and others, like Rumsfeld, have continually emphasized that the battle against what they call "Islamic extremist totalitarianism" is not only a major military battle but also the great ideological battle of our time. This is how they're presenting it. And, yes, we can make our jokes about "W," who doesn't know how to pronounce "nuke-u-lar," and so on and so forth, but there are people surrounding him and there is a core there that thinks, that is very deeply ideologically committed and understands the importance of the battle in the ideological realm. That's why they're bringing forward all these World War 2 analogies and all their talk about totalitarianism and extremism, and so on. In other words, they are bringing forward their solid core—with very little elasticity and a lot of absolutism, these days especially. And what can stand up to and really oppose that? In the final analysis, and in fundamental terms, only our solid core— with a lot of elasticity, on the correct basis of the necessary solid core.
The relativism and ideological flabbiness so common among the liberals—both those within the ruling class, but also more broadly in society, including the liberals and progressives among the middle strata—this is not capable of and is not going to stand up to the reactionary solid core in the ruling class—nor, for that matter, to the reactionary solid core of the Islamic fundamentalist phenomenon.
And here I want to return to Michelle Goldberg. Despite, or in some ways actually because of, her own worldview, including the influence of Hannah Arendt's notions of totalitarianism, the following from "our old friend" Michelle Goldberg provides a valuable window into the thinking of many liberals and progressives these days. She says: "Ideologies that answer deep existential needs are hugely powerful." That's a profoundly important point.2
Then, after making this very crucial basic point—"Ideologies that answer deep existential needs are hugely powerful"—Goldberg goes on:
"The Christian nationalists [or what we would call Christian fascists—BA] have one. And their opponents largely do not. Today's liberalism has many ideas and policy prescriptions, but given the carnage born of utopian dreams in the 20th century, it is understandably distrustful of radical, all-encompassing political theories. It is cautious and skeptical. Liberals don't want to remake the world; they just want to make it a little better." (Michelle Goldberg, Kingdom Coming, pp. 191-92)
Well, there's a lot packed into that statement. This is why it's worth reading people like this, even after they've slandered us (which Goldberg did a few years ago, in connection with the original "Not In Our Name" statement and the political movement which that statement helped to inspire). Here is a classic example of someone who is highly disturbed by developments in U.S. society, in particular the growing influence of Christian fascism. From reading this book it is clear that she would like to keep things, including opposition to this fascist trend, within certain bounds, but she has a sense that this may not be possible. This is very profound in its implications, in a number of ways. So, in a certain sense, "there you have it" in those few sentences—a lot is actually captured there—including a window into the highly distorted way that people like Goldberg are viewing the experience of communist-led revolution and socialist society in the 20th century (a major part, if not the heart, of what she is referring to with the phrase: "the carnage born of utopian dreams in the 20th century"). And this is why, in a general and overall sense, it is worth it and necessary to investigate what people from all different strata are thinking, both when they systematize it like this and through broader investigation to find out about, and make a synthesis from, more scattered and unsystematic ideas and sentiments among people in different parts of society.
But, with all this, it is extremely important to keep in mind a profound point from Marx. To paraphrase (and somewhat expand upon) what he says: what matters fundamentally is not what anyone or any group of people might want subjectively, or might be thinking at any given point, but what the underlying and driving contradictions and dynamics will confront people with. Among other things, this underscores the great importance of our solid core, ideologically as well as politically—a solid core which is dialectically related to, and in an essential way encompasses, elasticity and which can lead the way to in fact radically remaking the world to bring into being something far better.
Footnotes
Send us your comments.
Permalink: http://revcom.us/a/098/churchill-firing-en.html
Revolution #98, August 13, 2007
The Firing of Ward Churchill and the Dangerous Trajectory
of Repression in Academia
7 Talks by BOB
AVAKIAN, Chairman of the Revolutionary
Communist Party, USA
#7 "Balance" Is The
Wrong Criterion – And A Cover for a
Witch-hunt – What We Need is the Search
for the Truth: Education, Real Academic
Freedom, Critical Thinking and Dissent
Download audio
files online at bobavakian.net and revcom.us
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On July 24th, the Regents of the University of Colorado (CU) fired tenured
Ethnic Studies Professor Ward Churchill. The vote came after a vicious
campaign spearheaded by David Horowitz, self-described “battering
ram” for the assault on critical thinking in academia, along with
the right-wing American Council of Trustees and Alumni (ACTA). Horowitz
is a highly connected political operative, with close ties to and support
from Karl Rove and top national Republican leaders. ACTA is a powerful
academic “watch-dog” group founded by Lynne Cheney, the wife
of the vice president.
This is much worse than, as the Pink Floyd song goes, just another brick
in the wall. And it has nothing to do with the story being told of an
"academic fraud" uncovered by a thorough investigation. The
investigatory process was a fraud, and the charges brought against Churchill
were either false or grotesque exaggerations (for more on this, see Revolution
#92, June 17, 2007, “New
Assault on Dissent and Critical Thinking: University of Colorado President
Calls for Firing of Professor Ward Churchill”). Together with
the denial of tenure to Norman Finkelstein by DePaul University (see Revolution
#95, July 15, 2007, “Denial of Tenure for Norman Finkelstein: Rising Outrage, and Raising Big Questions”), it represents a major move to recast universities
into a more fully controlled machine for indoctrination.
Building a Foundation for Indoctrination
Churchill was actually targeted for firing not because of any supposed
academic conduct issues, but because of an essay he wrote that included
his sharply worded post-9/11 critique of the U.S. role in the world. In
it, he made a very provocative formulation about how not all the people,
but those people who worked particularly as functionaries for the large
corporations with offices in the World Trade Center were “Little
Eichmanns,”—comparing them to the functionaries of the Nazi
regime.
When Churchill was invited to speak at a small college in New York, the
reactionary “noise machine” cranked up a huge attack on him
for this essay. The governors of New York and Colorado called for his
firing, and CU Chancellor DiStefano launched an investigation into “everything
he had ever written” to see if he could be fired--or jailed - because
of the content of his writings. Horowitz publicly advised that it would
be better to go after Churchill for “fraud” instead. And in
fact, the pretense for firing Churchill was not the essay, but
instead a shamefully disingenuous investigation supposedly of Churchill’s
academic scholarship. And while reactionaries fanned all kinds of hysteria
about Churchill, the response of the Democratic Party establishment was
stone silence in the face of this attack.
Reactionary opponents of critical thinking and dissent on campuses have
explicitly said that the firing of Churchill should open the gates to
wholesale attacks on other professors. A blurb for Horowitz’ book
The Professors: The 101 Most Dangerous Academics in America says,
"American universities are full of radical academics like Ward Churchill—and
worse." ACTA’s report, “How Many Ward Churchills?”
also called for expanded witch-hunts, saying, "Is there really only
one Ward Churchill? Or are there many Ward Churchills…Ward Churchill
is not alone…Ward Churchill is everywhere."
In the wake of the firing, these same forces (along with some new ones)
are demanding further attacks. These include targeting not just other
dissident scholars, but the tenure system and whole fields of study, such
as ethnic studies, women/gender studies, an anti-imperialist current within
area studies, and numerous courses in law and other fields where “social
justice” is discussed.
Setting an Intolerable Precedent
Churchill was fired even though he had tenure at the University of Colorado--a
status that supposedly protects professors from being fired for their
political views. The firing makes it very clear to scholars that tenure
no longer provides any such protection. Furthermore, most professors are
not tenured. They have always had even less security.
Speaking on Michael Slate's radio show, “Beneath the Surface,”
DePaul professor Matthew Abraham, commenting on a colleague’s comparison
of the Churchill and Finkelstein cases to public executions, said: "You
don't need to do ten or twenty of them. You just need to do four or five
just to keep people in line and to have them remember what can happen
if you get carried away with your speech. Ward and Norman, these are top-flight
scholars, and if they can take them out, believe me they wouldn't hesitate
to take out people of much lesser stature.”
From the beginning, the attack on Ward Churchill has been approached
as a test case, a proving ground for tactics and strategies, and as a
foundation for broader attacks on academia. As an example, this past March,
the CU Regents voted to tremendously speed up the process of firing tenured
professors. Whereas before the process could take years and involve appeals
from the professor, it is now designed to take a little over three months.
These guidelines, which drastically depart from standard practice at universities,
were established by the Regents with the Churchill case in mind, as a
fast-track for future punishment and repression. They were also explicitly
put forward as a model for other universities to follow.
The Stakes Involved
Speaking on Michael
Slate's radio show Beneath the Surface,
DePaul professor Matthew Abraham, commenting
on a colleague’s comparison of the Churchill
and Finkelstein cases to public executions,
said: "You don't need to do ten or twenty
of them. You just need to do four or
five just to keep people in line and
to have them remember what can happen
if you get carried away with your speech.
Ward and Norman, these are top-flight
scholars, and if they can take them
out, believe me they wouldn't hesitate
to take out people of much lesser stature.”
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The firing of Churchill makes clear the dangerous trajectory of U.S.
society. The stakes involved need to be grasped, not just by students
and academics, but by everyone who hates the current direction of society
and who longs for something different, and everyone who thinks that academia
should be a place where people are free to pursue the truth.
What makes it so important is the relation between the overall direction
those in power are taking the world--going for a qualitative leap in consolidating
and expanding their global empire--and their need to chill, suppress,
discredit, and drive out dissent and critical thinking in academia, and
making “indoctrination,” rather than critical thinking, the
watchword. Their agenda requires lies, torture, violations of international
and domestic law, and the unleashing of horrors against millions. It cannot
stand up to critical thinking, and requires closed, intimidated, and uncritical
minds. They need to restrict any public debate to tactical discussions
based on shared aims and assumptions. At a time when powerful forces in
the U.S. have unleashed a cauldron of contradictions, which they do not
control, accomplishing this is essential to ensuring their continued rule.
Radical and critical-minded intellectuals who challenge established truths
and create the intellectual space for debate and discussion play a disproportionate
and crucial role in society. When they are silenced, it has tremendous
ramifications throughout society.
Many people, especially but not only from the middle strata, are first
introduced to "inconvenient truths" of U.S. history and imperialism
in college. There is still much more space for critical thinking in academia
than elsewhere in society. And in the past few decades, people coming
out of the 1960s have become professors, received tenure, and gained influence
in some academic sectors, and have brought forward new scholarship that
sheds light on and refutes the official narratives about America’s
history and role in the world. To Horowitz, ACTA, and the system they
represent, that is a terrible plague.
The Need to Resist: Rehire Churchill and Finkelstein!
Many scholars and intellectuals have defended Churchill and condemned
the witch-hunt against him. They have seen through the lies surrounding
this case, understood the tremendous threat to critical thinking hidden
behind them and have defended Churchill as an expression of principle.
Unfortunately, many others have stood on the sidelines. Others have joined
in on the attacks, or have blamed Churchill for his problems, and for
putting others in danger. Some have even advocated throwing Churchill
to the dogs in order to protect themselves--which amounts to sawing off
the branch you're sitting on.
Scholars and others need to step back and look at the big picture. Any
pragmatic or uninformed response to the firing of Ward Churchill will
only compound the disaster and speed the already very negative motion
and development in the universities. John K. Wilson, author of Patriotic
Correctness: Academic Freedom and Its Enemies, noted on his blog:
"Back during the McCarthy Era, colleges thought that they could
protect themselves from outside intrusion by sacrificing a few radical
professors to the witchhunt. Ultimately, they simply fed the bloodlust.
It’s not hard to see a parallel to Churchill’s case, and the
glee of conservatives who hope this will be the beginning of mass firings
and the abolition of entire departments."
Academics have a special responsibility--to “sound the alarm”
as broadly as possible, enlist the broad masses in the defense of dissenting
scholars and critical thinking in academia, and contribute to the greatest
degree possible to the awakening of society in fundamental opposition
to this whole regime.
It would be disastrous to adopt the view that the firing of Churchill
(and the denial of tenure to Norman Finkelstein) is unjust but irreversible.
Churchill's firing must not be allowed to stand. The demand for the reversal
of this decision needs to be massively raised, in academia and in broader
society. What is called for now is actually stepping up the full opposition
to these attacks on the basis of demanding that the injustices against
Churchill and Finkelstein be reversed.
In so doing, our sights should be set on bringing into being their worst
nightmare--an aroused and awakened academia, increasingly rejecting the
present dynamic in society and the vision of the future it threatens;
a situation where prominent intellectuals and scholars are publicly calling
into question and challenging the whole direction those in power are rushing
to take the world. And more, are engaging and encouraging discussion and
debate over the question of the kind of world we would want to live in,
and making major contributions to strengthening the theoretical as well
as the practical underpinnings of that world, and what it’s going
to take to get there.
Send us your comments.
Permalink: http://revcom.us/a/098/wcw-campaign-en.html
Revolution #98, August 13, 2007
World Can’t Wait Launches New Campaign
Declare It Now: Wear Orange! Drive Out the Bush Regime!
The following was gathered from reports on the World Can’t
Wait web site:
Launching a new campaign on Friday, July 27, World Can’t Wait put
out a challenge to all those who are against the Bush program: “If
you want the war to end, if you want the Bush regime driven out, if you’ve
had enough of the torture and police-state laws: Declare It Now: Wear
Orange!”
At Orange Friday actions around the country, tens of thousands of orange
buttons, ribbons, armbands, bandanas, and shirts went out to people. In
Houston and San Francisco banners were hung over freeways; in Bakersfield,
San Diego, and Louisville, “honk for impeachment” street corner
actions turned orange. At San Francisco’s Fisherman’s Wharf,
tourists found “Bush” in a portable jail cell under a sign
saying “international war criminal.” A dentist in Florida
ordered orange scrubs for himself and his staff for the day.
In New York City, about 1,000 people gathered over several hours at Union
Square, and hundreds of orange bandanas were distributed. Speaking at
the rally was Cindy Sheehan, who was at the end of her “Journey
for Humanity” which started weeks before at Camp Casey in Texas,
and included a sit-in at Rep. Conyers’ office demanding impeachment
of Bush and Cheney. Chilean activist Victor Toro, wearing bright orange,
said, “We are doing this in solidarity with those detained without
rights in Guantánamo.” World Can’t Wait had published
full-page ads in five weekly newspapers in the city to announce the launch
of Orange Fridays.
At the new National Impeachment Center in Los Angeles, a press conference
began with a dramatic reading of the Call to Drive Out the Bush Regime
by actor René Auberjonois, currently appearing in the network TV
show Boston Legal. He was joined by three people who were hooded
and wearing orange jumpsuits like the prisoners in the U.S. torture center
at Guantánamo. The event was prominently featured in La Opinión,
the largest Spanish newspaper in the country. Also speaking were West
Hollywood Mayor John Duran, who recently led the City Council’s
passing of a resolution calling for impeachment of Bush and Cheney, and
attorneys Peter Thottam and Steven Rohde. Wayne Kramer (formerly of the
band MC5 and co-founder of the White Panther Party) performed a song.
World Can’t Wait activists are going out widely to reach millions
to join the Declare It Now campaign. They are raising funds for internet
and print ads and organizing public service announcements by well-known
people. Outreach crews are going to conferences of sociologists and psychologists,
churches, concerts, and elsewhere to call on people to take responsibility
to act and challenge others to act. World Can’t Wait will provide
60 ushers dressed in orange at the Rock the Bells hiphop show in San Francisco.
Dennis Loo, of the World Can’t Wait Steering Committee, wrote after
the campaign’s launch: “People taking up orange and wearing
it DAILY is designed to be both a statement against all of the horrid
things that this regime is responsible for AND a statement to the rest
of the people. It’s designed to provide people a vehicle to express
their too long suppressed sentiments and to bring to life the people’s
political potential. It’s designed to bring home to people the fact
that we are the majority and it will be you and I and the rest of us in
our millions who will make history, not the criminal president and vice-president,
not the culpable and complicit Congress and the Democratic Party leadership,
and not the corporate media who are largely merely the scribes to power.
“The choice all of the people now face is whether we are going
to go along with torture and war crimes and so on, or are we going to
condemn it, speak out against it, and fight it. Taking the moral high
ground is itself a form of asserting leadership. To the extent that
the people make the conscious choice to declare themselves against the
horrid things that this regime is responsible for and represents, they
are becoming part of that competing legitimate authority.”
(From “Shifting the Center”)
For more info and updates about the Declare It Now campaign, go online
to declareitnow.com and worldcantwait.org.
Send us your comments.
Permalink: http://revcom.us/a/098/chicago-police-en.html
Revolution #98, August 13, 2007
Outrage and Protest in Chicago’s West Side
18-Year-Old Black Youth Shot in the Back—Killed by Cops
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Aaron Harrison. [Photo: Courtesy of Aaron Harrison's family]
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Protest against police killing of Aaron Harrison. [Photo: Special for Revolution]
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On the evening of August 6, sometime around 8, the life of 18-year-old
Aaron Harrison ended in an alley on Chicago’s west side. Shot by
a police officer. Sandra Shannon, Aaron Harrison's aunt, told Revolution,
“He was home for five days. He was on two years probation. He was
scared. He was running for his life. Kids shouldn't have to fear for their
life."
Shocked, stunned, outraged—hundreds of mostly young people from
the North Lawndale neighborhood took to the streets. Dozens of squad cars
blocked off streets around the area. Chicago authorites say that rocks
and bottles were thrown at police. Chanting “no justice, no peace, no
racist police,” people marched to the nearby police station. The police
arrested five people and used mace. A photographer from the Chicago Tribune
had two cameras broken by a cop.
Police officials claim that cops saw Aaron doing something suspicious
with his waistband before they chased him. They insisted that Aaron was
NOT shot in the back but in the shoulder, and that he was armed and pointing
a gun at them. The police insisted on this even after the initial report
from the medical examiner said that Aaron was shot in the back. The police
claim that they recovered a 9mm weapon near Aaron's body. But "finding"
a gun doesn't answer the more important question of its origins. A number
of witnesses insist that they saw police officers take a bag from the
trunk of a police car and leave a gun by Aaron's body.
The August 11 Chicago Sun-Times reported that Cook County Chief
Medical Examiner Nancy Jones "confirmed" that Aaron Harrison
was shot in his left shoulder, offering the explanation that their initial
story that he was shot in the back actually referred to being shot in
the top of the left shoulder, which is considered a part of the back.
According to the article, Jones claimed that "the wound is consistent
with what the officers are saying about the body being turned to them."
Ashunda Harris, an aunt of Aaron Harrison, viewed Aaron's body in the
morgue. She told Revolution that she saw the location of the
bullet hole. It was in the upper left part of Aaron's back —not
his front —and she disputes the medical examiner’s
conclusions. And she told Revolution that numerous witnesses
close to the shooting saw that Aaron was shot in the back, and they never
saw any gun in Aaron's hand.
Chicago's Mayor Daley tried to deflect criticism of the police by saying
that "everyone blames the police" and telling people to "withhold"
their judgment. In other words, as Sandra Shannon put it, "shut up."
Aaron Harrison’s shooting is the third death linked to the hands
of Chicago police in less than a month. On July 22, Lester "Roni"
Struill was found dead in a police station lockup. According to witnesses,
cops severely beat him before he was brought to the police station. On
August 4, Gefery Johnson was pronounced dead at St. Bernard Hospital after
police used pepper spray and two shots from a taser (which can deliver
50,000 volts of electric shock) on him. His family had called 911 when
Gefery, who had a history of mental and substance abuse problems, had
locked himself in a room. "They actually executed my child,"
said Gefery's mother, Lula Johnson. "They executed him."
In the days following the Aug. 6 shooting, Black community activists,
some pastors, family members, neighborhood residents, and a growing number
of supporters from around Chicago have protested and denounced the police
killing of Aaron Harrison. There have been marches to the police station,
rallies, press conferences, and a town hall meeting to defend witnesses.
At a protest on Aug. 7, Ashunda Harris, spoke powerfully about what the
youth face, and the need to stop police brutality and murder: “I'm
here about killer cops. I'm here because this has gone too far. [Aaron]
is dead but it could have been anyone. There is a national epidemic of
police brutality and WE have to stop it. It's not about 15 minutes of
fighting. This is about the way we live everyday… You can't take
people to jail and beat them up. You can't beat a confession out of people
today and expect them to respect you tomorrow. What is going on out here
is a violation of our youth. An attack, a rape of our young people. What
they do EVERY DAY. This is a national epidemic.”
A woman who came to three days of protests of Aaron Harrison’s
shooting said, “You can't keep seeing these things day after day.
I came all the way from the south side. I don't even live out west, but
I see police doing this every day. Throwing them up against the cars.
Making them get on the ground. Look at all the love they scattered when
they killed that boy. Look at all the people that are hurting because
they scattered that love when they killed him.”
The shooting of Aaron Harrison, and the outbreak of protest that erupted
in its wake, took place as the Chicago “city fathers” are
trying to clean up the image of the Chicago police while contending to
host the 2016 Olympics. After the widely publicized brutal beating of
a Polish-immigrant bartender by an off-duty Chicago cop, the Chicago
Sun-Times warned, “Chicago, be clear. The whole world is watching.
From Mexico to Moscow, CNN has shown the international community the shameful
videotape of off-duty Chicago Police Officer Anthony Abbate trying to
beat the living daylights out of a female bartender less than half his
size….” (Mar 28, 2007).
And Chicago’s bid for the Olympics has the specter of Jon Burge
hanging over its head. For decades Burge ran a Chicago police
torture chamber where electrodes were applied to the testicles of suspects,
people were repeatedly suffocated with plastic bags and covers, and subjected
to cattle prods. The city officially admitted that "an astounding
pattern of torture" existed, and continue to defend Burge. Mayor
Daley was the county state's attorney for many of the years when Burge
and the Chicago PD were torturing people.
The city of Chicago sits on top of hundreds and hundreds of thousands
of desperate people with no prospects for decent jobs, education, health
care, or a life – a situation that is enforced daily and hourly
by the police. Scandals or not, the Chicago police lashed out in the aftermath
of the protests. Since the murder of Aaron Harrison, 13 young men have
been arrested. According to Sandra Shannon, some were arrested as people
were gathering for one of the protests. "Right now, they're trying
to intimidate the community," said Ashunda Harris. She said that
police are arresting "young men that can possibly identify or testify
on some of the things taking place in the neighborhood. I think they're
trying to discredit their character. If they're constantly locking them
up, their credibility becomes less."
On Friday, Aug. 10, there was a protest rally and then 100 to 200 people,
including some white and Latino youth, marched again to the police station
behind a “Stolen Lives” banner listing the names of 400 people
killed by police around the country.
Sandra Shannon spoke about the protests against the police killing of
Aaron Harrison: "They thought it was just going to be another person
gone and ain't nothing going to be done about it… If it don't stop,
who's gonna be the next victim?" There is a need for people from
all walks of life to join these protests, and demand an end to
police brutality, repression, and the criminalization of a generation.
On October 22: No More Stolen Lives—Wear
Black to Protest Police Brutality
From
the Call for Oct. 22, 2007, National Day
of Protest to Stop Police Brutality, Repression,
and Criminalization of a Generation:
“October
22nd has come to be recognized as a concentrated
day of resistance—a national day
when people all over the country, in different
cities and through different means of
expression, come together to STOP police
violence, repression, and the criminalization
of a generation…”
Nicholas
Heyward, Sr. (father of Nicholas Heyward,
Jr., killed by NYC housing police in 1994)
says:
“Police brutality has always existed
in poor and oppressed neighborhoods. But
since September 11, 2001, it has gotten
much worse. In order for any justice to
be done, it takes a mass number of people
coming together for a common cause. Police
brutality affects everyone and has to
stop. We need as many people as possible
to come out this year on October 22nd
to support the families of victims of
police brutality.”
Juanita
Young (mother of Malcolm Ferguson, killed
by NYPD in 2000) adds that resistance
is critical:
“You can’t give in. They will
try to make an example out of you, try
to break your spirit. If you don’t
resist and keep on fighting, they will
be able to get away with what they’re
trying to do to us.”
To
contact the October 22nd Coalition to
Stop Police Brutality, Repression, and
Criminalization of a Generation:
www.october22.org/
info@october22.org 1-888-NOBRUTALITY October
22nd Coalition, P.O. Box 2627, New York,
N.Y. 10009 |
|
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Send us your comments.
Permalink: http://revcom.us/a/098/antioch-en.html
Revolution #98, August 13, 2007
Who’s Afraid of Antioch College…and Why Are They Trying
to Shut It Down?
By a former Antioch student who attended the college during the late
1960s and early 1970s
In late June, Antioch College’s Board of Trustees announced their
decision to close the college in 2008. Antioch is well known—and,
in the halls of power, hated—for a progressive, open-minded approach
to education. Its academic program combines classroom learning with work
experience and community involvement. Founded by progressive Christians
as a secular college in 1852 in Yellow Springs, Ohio, Antioch from the
beginning sought to include Black people and women among students and
faculty. A saying by founder Horace Mann became the school’s watchword:
“Be ashamed to die until you have won some victory for humanity.”
I was outraged to hear about the attempt to shut down Antioch. The move
to close Antioch is part of the assault on the rebellious legacy of the
1960s—and part of attempts to shut down critical thinking and dissent
on campuses today.
Antioch’s influence and significance far outweigh its small size.
Among its well-known graduates are scientist Stephen Jay Gould and Coretta
Scott King. From its radical anti-slavery roots in the 1850s until today,
Antioch has been a school where the emphasis is not on individual career
advancement in the corporate world but on service to society.
Antioch’s liberal and critical atmosphere led the House Un-American Activities
Committee to scrutinize the school’s faculty during the anti-communist
witch-hunt of the early 1950s. In the early- and mid-1960s many Antioch
students became involved in the growing civil rights movement. And Antioch
students organized campus protests against the Vietnam war. In the late
’60s, radical critiques of capitalist society, including a revolutionary
trend, had a big impact among students and teachers at Antioch, and in
turn what was going on at Antioch helped spread intellectual and activist
ferment in society. In 1970, Antioch students shut down the campus in
a strike that was part of a national wave of protest in response to the
U.S. invasion of Cambodia and the murder of student protesters at Kent
State University in Ohio and Jackson State College in Mississippi.
A campus strike at Antioch in 1973 is often pointed to by critics as
“the beginning of the end” of the college. So it is important to set the
record straight on what that strike was about. In the spring of 1973,
Antioch administrators used government cutbacks in education aid in an
attempt to drop the New Directions program that enabled working class
and Black students to attend Antioch, along with the grants and loans
needed to pay their tuition. Students struck to win back the tuition aid
for New Directions students, and they were supported by many faculty and
campus workers. The college administration called in state police and
sheriff’s deputies to attack the strikers and to forcibly open buildings.
Twenty students were expelled and 7 teachers fired. Those students and
teachers were eventually reinstated.
Even as the ’60s ebbed, the commitment to social responsibility
and critical thinking continued among the faculty, and the school continued
to attract students looking for the combination of theory and practical
work experience historically associated with Antioch. In 2000 Antioch’s
graduating class invited political prisoner Mumia Abu-Jamal to give the
commencement speech (via a pre-recorded tape). This gave rise to a national
mobilization of reactionaries who protested at the commencement, calling
for Mumia’s execution. In that case, the administration did not
back down in the face of reactionary attacks. However, when students chose
University of Colorado professor Ward Churchill as the commencement speaker
in 2005, then-College president Rick Jurasek intervened to disinvite him.
The campaign to go after Churchill had begun earlier that year, led by
arch-reactionary David Horowitz. Not only did Jurasek wipe out the Antioch
graduates’ choice for speaker, he set a political precedent of “avoiding
controversy” and contributed to the witch-hunt against Churchill.
In 1993, the Antioch community adopted a Sexual Offense Prevention Policy.
This was a result of campus-wide discussion about “date rape”
and how to best handle situations that could lead to date rape. The policy
was an attempt by the Antioch community to publicly promote standards
that included verbal consent among sexual partners at each stage of intimacy.
While date rape is widespread on college campuses, this attempt by students
at Antioch to stop it became the subject of ridicule by reactionaries.
Who Is Trying to Close Antioch?
Last year Steve Lawry was appointed as Antioch’s
new president. Lawry’s immediate actions were opposed to the historic
practice and philosophy of the school. The Yellow Springs News
reported last year that Lawry described the student culture on campus
as “toxic” (“Lawry challenges campus culture; students
troubled,” 9/28/06). He began cracking down on drugs and alcohol,
directed the censoring of the student newspaper for the first time in
Antioch’s history, and oversaw the suspension of a student for using
profanity against an administrator on an Internet forum.
The Board of Trustees couched its closure decision in terms of lack of
financial resources and low numbers of student admissions, while Lawry
pointed his finger at the students themselves as the cause of the college’s
lack of funding. He was quoted in a June 23 New York Times article
as saying that the college “became less about intellectual rigor,
than a political and social experience… The boot camp of the revolution
became the model.”
Recent research into enrollment figures provided to me by an Antioch
faculty member shows that Antioch had the highest student enrollment precisely
during the most radical years of the late ’60s and early ’70s.
And there was a stable and steady enrollment of between 500 and 600 students
every year between 1983 and 2003. In 2003 the College announced a “Renewal”
plan that imposed changes in the curriculum and work-study programs. And
that, in fact, is when the real decline in enrollment began.
The Yellow Springs News reported that in making its decision,
the Board of Trustees hired a consulting firm to evaluate the viability
of the school. The report by Gateway Consultants Group said the Trustees
wanted to suspend school operations in order to give time for a “cleansing
of the ghosts that have plagued Antioch’s recruitment efforts since
the 1970s.”
Why is it that Antioch cannot be allowed to exist any longer? The spontaneous
workings of capitalism do in fact act against institutions like Antioch.
The school is not a magnet for programs like the Energy Biosciences Institute
at UC Berkeley sponsored by the global oil monopoly BP. That, in itself,
is an indictment of this society. And there are now “facts on the
ground” that indeed do pose great challenges to keeping Antioch
alive. The Trustees say that some $21 million is needed to maintain the
existence of the college.
But there are more fundamental reasons why the powers-that-be want Antioch
shut down or drastically redirected. The talk about “toxic culture”
and “cleansing of the ghosts” shows that this is about a lot
more than the financial bottom line. One question that bears further investigation
is the connections of some members of the Antioch Board of Trustees to
the U.S. military and intelligence agencies (see sidebar, “Antioch
Trustees and the Military-Intelligence Connection”).
In an opinion piece in the New York Times,
Antioch alumnus Michael Goldfarb took aim at virtually all the supposed
excesses and misdeeds of the radical ’60s (“Where the Arts
Were Too Liberal,” June 17). Goldfarb attacked (while greatly exaggerating
the scope of) affirmative action programs at Antioch that recruited Black
and other oppressed nationality students from inner-city schools and ridiculed
a roommate who was agonizing over his sexual orientation. He complained
that “For the increasingly vocal radical members of the community,
change wasn’t going far enough or fast enough.” He went on
to blast the 1973 strike by Antioch students and faculty and the anti-date
rape policy adopted in the 1990s.
In a commentary widely published on July 16, including in the Washington
Post and the Wall Street Journal, reactionary columnist
George Will zeroed in on the 1973 strike that, he says, ruined the school.
And he also attacked the Sexual Offense Prevention Policy.
I was inspired to become one of the “increasingly
vocal radical members of the community” at Antioch in the late ’60s
and early ’70s because the world needed radical change.
A restless spirit of rebellion against all that was outmoded was combining
with rich and ongoing debate and contention over what a different society
should be like, bubbling into one of the most invigorating and innovative
periods in the whole 20th century. That whole orientation of taking on
what is reactionary with a method that merges a spirit of irreverent inquiry
and concrete action actually was allowed some breathing room at Antioch
in the 1960s and early ’70s. Antioch has been vilified and slandered
by the powers-that-be because of that history, and because that history
is still upheld by many alumni and current students and faculty.
But it is not just the history of Antioch that is being threatened with
extinction. The fate and social significance of Antioch College have suddenly
become big issues in the current “culture wars.” The ridicule
and slander against Antioch and its students are taking place at a time
when critical thinking and dissent on campuses are under broad and serious
attack from those like David Horowitz, a right-wing ideologue with close
ties to ruling class forces around Bush, and the American Council of Trustees
and Alumni, co-founded by Lynne Cheney, wife of Dick Cheney. Using the
banner of “academic freedom,” Horowitz has initiated witch-hunts
against professors like Ward Churchill, who was recently fired by the
University of Colorado. Similarly, Prof. Norman Finkelstein was recently
denied tenure at DePaul University in Chicago because of his opposition
to Israel. In recent years, Horowitz has targeted Antioch on his web site.
These are not disconnected or random events. I urge everyone to read
“Warning:
The Nazification of the American University” in Revolution
#81 (available online at revcom.us), which describes a systematic offensive
to cleanse campuses of dissident thinkers, curricula, faculty, and students.
The aim is to place severe limits on permissible discourse and to squelch
thinking, inquiry, and debate that would challenge and refute the official
narratives and explanations of U.S. history and present-day inequality
and global lopsidedness. As “Warning…” points out: “If
this reactionary program wins out, the university will be turning out
students who will have had little, if any, opportunity to think critically,
into a society qualitatively more severely repressive than anything seen
in this country’s history.”
Antioch’s tradition of turning out students with a commitment to
the betterment of humanity, as opposed to a “me first and screw
everyone else” outlook, has always been viewed as subversive by
those with the reins of power in America. And in the post-9/11 “you’re
either with us or with the terrorists” climate, the rulers consider
the kind of outlook represented by Antioch a threat to their “homeland”
and global empire.
The Fight to Save Antioch
|
Oppose the Closing of Antioch!
|
The Antioch Board of Trustees recently announced it would hold
an open public meeting in Cincinnati
on August 25 to further explain their
decision to “suspend” operation of Antioch
College. In this same announcement,
Board Chair Art Zucker restated that
the decision would not be reversed.
Alumni groups around the country are
making plans to attend this meeting
to voice their opposition to the “suspension”
plan. Alumni chapters in various cities
are also organizing events during national
“Support Antioch College Weekend” on
Aug. 17-19 (info at http://chapters.antiochians.org/).
| | | |
There has been a passionate outcry from alumni, students,
and faculty against the plans to close Antioch. At an annual reunion at
the end of June, some 500 alumni flocked to the campus to begin a challenge
to the threatened closure. Board of Trustee members and top administrators
were grilled over the plans. Alumni resolved to create a College Revival
Fund and to demand that the Board reverse its decision. Almost half a
million dollars was raised in pledges and donations on the spot.
Antioch professor and past Antioch president Bob Devine and another faculty
member wrote to Lawry last year: “It is incomprehensible to us to
think of our students as comprising a ‘toxic culture.’ The
students we have taught, advised, and worked with on various committees,
are some of the most caring, committed, conscientious, compassionate,
and community-oriented individuals we have ever known.” Devine noted
that “The most ‘toxic culture’ I have experienced in
my recent years at the College has been the administrative culture of
the College.” (Lawry announced in late July that he will resign
as president at the end of 2007. It is not clear as of this writing what
his reasons are.)
The Board of Trustees says it wants to reopen Antioch College in 2012
with a new financial base and curriculum. But there is great disbelief
among alumni, students, and faculty that a “new” Antioch would
continue its mission. Alumni are forming committees across the country
to mobilize public opinion and financial resources to enable Antioch to
stay open with its values intact. At the same time, the Board of Trustees
has reiterated that its decision to “suspend” Antioch College
operations is “irreversible.”
It would be a huge setback for the people if an institution of higher
learning like Antioch College were allowed to be shut down. On the other
hand, a vigorous counter-offensive by Antioch alumni, faculty, students,
staff and supporters could not only stop the closing but draw greater
numbers of people into the crucial society-wide battle to defend critical
thinking and the very ability to dissent on campuses and beyond.
For more information, go to www.antiochians.org/,
the alumni website that is focused on preventing Antioch’s closure.
Send us your comments.
Permalink: http://revcom.us/a/098/antioch-military-en.html
Revolution #98, August 13, 2007
Antioch Trustees and the Military-Intelligence Connection
In an article titled “Did U.S. Intelligence Assets Kill Antioch
College?” Bob Fitrakis, publisher and editor of The Free Press,
points out that at the time of the closure decision, the Board of Trustees
had two members with ties to the U.S. military and security agencies.
One is Bruce P. Bedford, who is also on the board of GlobeSecNine, a company
described by a representative of investment corporation Bear Sterns as
having “a unique set of experiences in special forces, classified
operations, transportation security and military operations.” Another
member of the Board at the time of the closure decision was Michael Alexander
(since resigned), who founded a company called AverStar that later became
part of a large military technology company, L3 Communications. The L3
Communications website says that its customers include “the Department
of Defense, Department of Homeland Security, selected U.S. Government
intelligence agencies and aerospace prime contractors.”
Fitrakis writes, “The role of these trustees must be heavily scrutinized.
Antioch alumni should be ashamed to allow their college to die until they
get to the bottom of this spooky mystery.” (Fritakis’ article
is available online at http://freepress.org/columns/display/3/2007/1568)
Another current trustee, Laurence Stone, runs Metron, Inc., whose brochure
details its activities: “Objective: Support our DoD [Department
of Defense] and Intelligence clients with advanced, mathematics-based
products for dynamic target tracking, threat activity and event detection
and large-scale warfighting simulation and analysis.” Metron works
with the U.S. military and intelligence in the targeting and directing
of submarine-launched missiles as well as electronic tracking of human
“targets.”
The Dayton Daily News reported on July 26 that Congress recently
voted $50 million in funding for high-tech military industries located
in the area around Antioch. The Dayton/Yellow Springs region is home to
Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, which has spawned a large number of companies
doing military research and manufacturing.
In addition, it is quite curious that the Antioch Board of Trustees hired
the “marketing, branding and public relations” firm of SimpsonScarborough
in relation to the decision to close the school. The chief executive officer
of SimpsonScarborough, Christopher Simpson, formerly worked as a writer
and editor for the Washington Times, a newspaper associated with
Rev. Sun Myung Moon, a rabidly right-wing Christian fundamentalist with
political connections to U.S. ruling circles. Before working for the Washington
Times, Simpson was the press secretary for the notorious racist Senator
Strom Thurmond.
SimpsonScarborough specializes in “reorienting” the curricula
and funding bases of universities and colleges. In an article about Antioch
on the firm’s website, SimpsonScarborough Vice President Tom Hayes
wrote, “No college or university can ignore market realities. There
is simply too much competition to keep a blind eye to institutional drift…Maybe
running a college like a business is too radical of an idea for many in
higher education. But, it is an idea you can live with.”
Send us your comments.
