If you don't see the video above, click here.
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."
Preserving the Black Radical Tradition demands struggle not only against white supremacists, but also against the co-opted Black political class who actively support the very evils Dr. King named.
Africans in the U.S. must weaponize their position and sabotage imperial projects from the inside. Black revolutionaries must modify traditional strategy.
Israel's recognition of a breakaway region in Somalia has redrawn the map of the Horn of Africa, pitting two oil-rich Gulf powers against each other and forcing the U.S. to delay its imperial plans…
Harris County, home to a world-renowned medical center, holds the worst maternal death rate for Black women in the entire nation. This staggering statistic represents a systemic failure that subjects…
Venezuela's official stance remains one of principled anti-imperialism. Internal discussions reflect the complex realities of navigating a crisis.
