Black woman tears up Oakland City Council
(in response to May Day repression of Occupy Oakland and a newly proposed law that would make it illegal for revolutionaries to carry shields and barricades during marches)
“You’re asking why we need our shields for self defense? After a grenade went off behind my head at 12 in the afternoon and gave me something [PTSD] that soldiers coming back from Iraq have? …The policy don’t need to be changed. We’ve got reform crammed so far up our ass it’s clouding our judgement. The police need to be held accountable… and I’m not a nihilist, but I wish I could BURN EVERY FUCKING THING DOWN, except for the houses, so that people could begin to understand that we don’t need this system to survive… There are people being arrested for trying to start farms…!
DON’T SILENCE ME, don’t you fucking DARE. I am SO TIRED… and if you cut off this mic, I’ll still have a mouth… what you’re dealing with is more than rage…
As a black woman, I’m telling you… you’re not serving the people! You’re only serving capitalism. And if you take our shields, the only thing we have left is our second amendment rights— SO IF WE SHOOT BACK…!
YOU DON’T HAVE THE RIGHT TO ARREST ME!”
JESSICA JUST WENT TUMBLR VIRAL AND I AM SO FUCKING STOKED
passion and praxis
This is a tumblelog, kinda like a blog but with short-form, mixed-media posts with stuff I like. Scroll down a bit to start reading, or a bit more to read more about me.
I’M A MAAAAAN SO IMA TAKE UP ALL THE SPACE AND BE COMPLETELY UNYIELDING AND UNAPOLOGETIC….CUZ IMA MAAAAAAAAAAAAN.
that awkward moment when you realize who you’re talking to on the interwebz.
Quebec students call for solidarity marches #nycggi
“So this is a call out for solidarity as much as it’s our heartfelt hope that one day you’ll feel this around you as well. This needs to spread past Montréal, past Québec. Bring it to your cities and communities in whatever way you can, using whatever methods and means are at your disposal.
Our hearts and heads are tired, but we’re still smiling.
We want to see the strike spread.
We want to see this social upheaval spread.
When shit is fucked, fuck shit up.”
This is my best friend, Berlina.
Since kindergarten, she’s been bullied over her weight. She’s had health complications because of it. She’s changed schools because of it. And when I met her in year 7, she was still so bubbly, so full of life, you’d never believe that someone this strong was hiding so much pain.She’s always been there for me as a friend. Last year, she sat by my hospital bedside for hours and hours and hours after my overdose. She literally wouldn’t leave until the nurses forced everyone out. And the sacrifices she’s made for not only me but all of my friends amazes me, because she’s taken on everyone else’s pain as well as her own.
Recently, she’s been through a lot. It’s our final year of high school and all our teachers are harassing her for ‘not putting enough effort into her studies’ despite the fact that she’s not going for an ATAR (final exam rank). She cuts the words fat and ugly into her arm. She’s dealt with death threats from one of her ex best friends. She’s had guys treat her like shit and been called a slut and a fat bitch. And so she’s starting to believe it.
Please, please reblog this if you think Berlina is beautiful, inside and out. Reblog if you have a friend who’s amazing who you want to tell all of tumblr about.
Reblog because no one so good should feel so bad that they want to end their own life.
You are gorgeous, Berlina!
another poem:
no poem is the best poem
but every poem is great
just for trying.
we haven’t spoken in a week.
your nonchalant door slamming and mouse clicking
remind me of my invisibility, my indivisibility
in the patriarchy of this house.
if i do not leave, i might soon drown.
the weight of hegemonic cis masculinity surrounds me.
i am in a bubble of breadwinning and negligence.
it is the nonnormative normative, the normative of the nonnormative,
the alternative normative, and there are many,
but this is one. but you deny it.
once, you stood in the doorway of the kitchen.
i needed to pass, so stepped forward and said,
“excuse me”
but just like a man you didn’t budge
you controlled my space and made me shrink before you,
tiny as an ant.
once, you sat in the hallway taking up half the space and
i accidentally bumped you even though I barely had room
and i said i’m sorry i’m sorry i’m sorry i’m sorry
i said i’m sorry but you, you, you didn’t say sorry
because you weren’t taught to say sorry and you weren’t taught
to take up minimal space and you weren’t taught
to make room for passers by and you weren’t taught
you weren’t taught to internalize patriarchal oppression.
i was taught to internalize patriarchal oppression.
when you tell me i’m overreacting:
that is patriarchy.
not even when you screamed at the pig and called him a cracker did one person accuse you of
overreacting.
that is patriarchy.
calm down, woman.
be a lady.
just talk to us civilly, explain to us, baby us,
give us your emotional labor.
meanwhile, let me let out my anger at the state, because when you yell at a
comrade
you are overreacting. he’s on our side, the anti-capitalist side, because for some reason anti-capitalism is our side, and not anti-patriarchy or anti-white-supremacy or even anti-colonial.
this struggle isn’t mine.
if this was my struggle, nine tenths of the folks i talk to would understand why
i get up in arms against patriarchal oppression
instead of telling me to calm down, that’s your comrade.
this struggle isn’t mine.
if this was my struggle, i wouldn’t feel so alone and isolated when
one of the supposed comrades tells me he wants to fuck me
when i try to hand him a flyer.
this struggle isn’t mine.
because, comrade, friend, if it was, you, a part of this struggle, wouldn’t be sitting downstairs
mislabeling my criticism as attack
when i was only talking to you about gendered oppression.
this isn’t my struggle. but i’ll make it mine.
because someday, someday soon, you’ll learn to listen
rather than defend, and we’ll learn to understand
the complexities of our positionalities,
and not only will you speak to me again,
but we’ll also understand
each other.
Queeruption: SOME ZAPATISTA PRINCIPLES & PRACTICES…
The Zapatista indigenous movement in Chiapas, México has summarized many of
their principles into short, accessible sayings that convey big ideas about a
different way of leading and building power, which contrast greatly with
repressive/oppressive methods of holding power and authority.
…
