Thousands of people have reached out over the past week to connect with SURJ and find ways to move into action against police violence and for racial justice. Below is a statement from SURJ’s leadership in light of the 136 murders of Black people by police this year and the shooting in Dallas last night.
When It Comes to People of Color, the Police Make San Francisco “Baghdad by the Bay”.
The transformation of police practices in this country cannot happen without a national reckoning regarding the ways both white supremacy and misogyny have shaped and continue to influence law enforcement practices in the United States.
As Jewish New Yorkers, we firmly believe that no community can ever be safe through the oppression of another. Your advocacy of broken windows policing while in Israel reinforces the Israeli government's ongoing policies of discrimination against Palestinians. The military occupation of Palestinian communities, political and economic exclusion ...and discriminatory and violent policing by the military and police do not increase the safety of the Jewish people.
July 2015 Paul Castaway was shot and killed by Denver police while holding a knife to his own throat. Police initially claimed that Castaway, a mentally ill Indigenous man, had charged them with a knife after stabbing his own mother. Surveillance footage would later contradict those claims and support the accounts of Castaway's family and other witnesses, who have maintained that Castaway menaced no one but himself with the knife in his hand.
Answer: When the child is Black and the shooter is a police officer. You're not likely to find any law enforcement person within a 100-mile radius who would dare speak out and say what we all know: this went down badly (not just "tragically," as one of the experts put it) and the officers should be held accountable. Law enforcement culture doesn't allow for people to break ranks without consequences. So please, let's not call these hired consultants independent.
After the NYPD broke his leg and charged him with resisting arrest, NBA star Thabo Sefolosha cleared his name in court. Here's what we learned. The NYPD has a racism problem that was just proven in open court. One of the least covered aspects in this trial was the surveillance footage of the initial approach by police. They passed Thabo's white teammate Pero Antic and making a beeline for Thabo. He was in their sights. He was their target. His skin was a bull's-eye.
Reader Comments: U.S. Trade Union Support for BDS; Pacific Coast Farm Worker Rebellion; Cornel West - Sanders, Trump and BLM; Selma - Site of National Dumping; North Dakota Legalizes Drone Strikes; Solidarity Confinement Victory in California; Israel, Iran; Sex Trade, Sex Workers and Amnesty International;
Announcements: - New App for Worker Rights; Charleston, Chicago, Brooklyn, Bay Area, New York
Sue Bradford Edwards, local Missouri journalist, and Dr. Duchess Harris, Professor of American Studies at Macalester College, new book, Black Lives Matter, is a comprehensive guidebook introducing without emotionally overwhelming 6-12th graders who are learning about the movement, and its inheritance, for the first time to antiblackness violence in U.S. law and society. Surprisingly, the text also resonates with lower-division university students.
Reader Comments - Obama and the TPP; Stop-and-Frisk; White Americans and Police Accountability; Vietnam and Anti-War History and the Ongoing Debate; Remembering Jackson State Murders; Greece, Organizing New York; Those Who Work in Customer Call Centers;
Announcements - Immigration, Work and Wages - Washington - May 21; Film Showing and Discussion - Blood Fruit - New York - May 22
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