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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."
Donald Trump’s anti-Somali rants are not directed solely at members of that group. All Black/African people are seen as suspects, as ungrateful criminals who are deserving of punishment and scorn.…
The genocide in Gaza has torn off the West’s human rights mask. This naked colonial violence demands a new path where rights are won through people's struggle, not granted by the very states that…
“...the point was to come together to stand against the common enemy. And this is the lesson that I hope we learn…”
CODEPINK is collaborating with the International Women’s Network for Democracy and Peace, which works for peace and democracy in Africa, on a webinar on Rwanda, Congo, and the case of Rwandan…
"DUI Hire" is the latest from BAR's Poet-in-Residence.
