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Mae Jackson is a New York City based writer, poet, dreamer and doer whose record of activism on behalf of her people stretches back to SNCC. A founder of Art Without Walls, an art program for the children of imprisoned women, she is well acquainted with the difference between surface change, and fundamental, revolutionary change.
Here are a few minutes of her address to the crowd at May 31, 2009 event memorializing the early 20th century Harlem activist Hubert Harrison, in which she lays out a clear understanding of whose lips move when our First Black President speaks. Referring to some of Barack Obama's widely acclaimed orations at the Democratic convention, atop Lincoln's tomb, and other places, she tells us
“..those wonderful speeches made by the young man from Chicago were actually crafted, that's written, by three young white men 25, 26 and 31 years old. We got the unfortunate opportunity once again to see the world through their eyes. Obama was the spokesperson. Same as when you buy a painting, that doesn't make you the painter...”
She explains how the establishment turned took the politics out of activism, neutralizing and de-politicizing young political activists by turning them into “community organizers."
Free trade deals, water contracts, and military training programs are quietly binding one Latin American government after another to Tel Aviv.
Recent killings at the hands of federal agents have fueled protests across the US, including a nationwide day of action on July 18.
The human rights groups’ suit came as the Trump administration vowed to destroy the International Criminal Court entirely.
The fight for the ballot has always been tied to a wider war against Black political power, against workers, against the people paying for empire abroad and austerity at home.
In this week’s segment, we discuss the Supreme Court ruling that ends Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for Haitian immigrants. But we begin with South Africa and discuss the origins of xenophobic…
