starless @starless@pixie.town

Remember: the issue at hand, today, is making a trip to the grocery store (or whatever) as safe for a black teenager as it is for a white teenager. Do I want more than that from the world? Of course. But, right now, things are *bad*. As white people, we don't get to say "we don't want incremental improvements today, we'll wait for perfect justice tomorrow". We don't get to say that because it's not our bodies that pay the price of that idealistic delay. For black people, incremental justice today can change whether or not their sister dies next week, or whether or not a father's PTSD leads to something tragic. For white people, incremental justice today means you still need to think about race, but you tell yourself that in the perfect future, you won't. That's the trade-- you get that perfect future so you can ignore this problem as early as possible. Black people keep dying until your gamble pays off, if it ever does, and you might win the absolution from your guilt.

Fuck that. Get over your guilt and help build something better today. There was a big, bad crime that lasted for many generations. It'll take many generations to heal from it. More than your lifetime, more than mine. And you've got to become at least a little okay with that, because the slow work to build a more just community is the right thing to do. Keep that rebellion in your heart. Cherish that fire. Let it drive you, don't let that fire escape you entirely. Make it power art and dreams and essays. Make it power poetry readings and meetups and community listening. Make radical stuff, but make approachable, friendly stuff, too. Let your fire fuel justice instead of gambling it on destroying a community in the hopes that the ruins aren't paved over by some billionaire.

Yesterday, at Floyd Square, a black woman challenged white supremacists to come down and stand between black people and cops who'd kill them. To help stop the killing and coralling and tragedies borne on black and brown bodies because they are people, even if it's not from a place of total equality. Now, I'm not saying that you should be friends with racists or that you should listen to them or even give them your full name and address. But, if one black woman is willing to reach out to someone who thinks she will never be as smart or as capable or as important-- someone who will never truly value her-- if she can deal with someone who judges her because of who she is, then you can deal politely with a moderate for a couple of days to get some city ordinance or other amended, too. You can organize an outdoor forum. You can talk with your apologist brother-in-law in a way he might actually listen.

Your own politics are unique and always will be. The hope is for a future in which its safe to be non-white, not for a world where we all agree with you. Have faith in yourself that you can have ideals that don't vanish if you talk with someone who believes something else.

Justice will be imperfect for a long time. And that's okay. Never forget it is imperfect, never stop pushing for better, but more importantly, never turn down an opportunity for progress. That's just not a call white people get to make. Get over your guilt, but never let go of that dream. Have faith that your fire, burning for justice, will still be there in a few years and start making some longer term plans for it.

Here's a really nice essay that breaks down some things around "why didn't they just comply". It talks some about the historical precedent for this excuse (it's old) and highlights that police are in control of these situations and actively make it more difficult for civilians to survive them.

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/04/compliance-will-not-save-my-body/618637/

I have a few more thoughts around this:

* When you say "the officer would not have shot that man if that man had only _______", you're just making it up. You don't know that for sure. You're probably saying it because you're confident the officer would not have shot you, and you do ______ . So, you mistake your single data point as the capital-t Truth and completely lose the point of why people are upset.

* Asking people to comply with police, regardless of police conduct, under penalty of death sets up a terrible precedent. If people expect police to kill civilians, it makes it very easy for police to threaten to kill civilians to get what they want (a cop raping a woman who called for help comes to mind).

* Notice how incredibly kind the author is. Notice how generously he talks about cops he likes! Notice how hard this author is working to build bridges. Fellow white people: stop senselessly alienating moderates. Many 'moderates' are way more likely to listen to you than to someone of color.

Your thoughts can be as radical as you like, and probably should be-- cops are killing civilians and some Americans are blaming the civilians! But, if all you do is stew in a rage so radicalized that you can't find a foothold for progress, you're forcing that work off on someone else. Someone who's either already in politics and trying to address issues of race for the first time (and probably not as familiar with this stuff as you are), or someone who's experienced many issues with race and is trying to get conservative folks in politics to listen.

Real change happens in many ways. There needs to be civic pressure and there needs to be folks to help steer legislation. Huge protests and civil unrest can generate pressure, but without community members stepping forward to work more directly with the legal process, the same people who wrote the bad laws in the first place are stuck writing the next set, too. Vote, certainly, but legislative change is achievable outside of only voting, as well.

And, like, hey, let's do more than just hope.

Over the course of Chauvin's trial, we've lost more lives to this dehumanization just in the twin cities metro. We can't keep playing catch up with the criminal justice system. We need to prevent these harms in the first place.

Show up. Elevate the voices of folks impacted in your community. Help each other do better. We can do this, but there's still more work to do.

Chauvin guilty on all accounts. Palpable relif. Let's hope the world continues to change for the better.

Finished up a project an ex and I started a while back. It's a cribbage board!

Last week, I bound the sides of the board together with leather strips. Today, I added brass feet to the underside and gave it an oiling and a light sanding.

I might slide a little brass tube down one side to hold some pegs eventually, but I think it's pretty set for some use!

I'm thinking about putting together a post that introduces the reader to some basic socioeconomic and policing patterns in Minneapolis so that they better understand why we react as vehemently to police brutality as we do. This is aimed at fossbros who wander into spaces and want to be friendly, but don't realize how authoritarian/racist they're being and won't actually read anything if it seems like the author is angry.

They gotta be *super* babied, but if they are, they often respond very well once they realize that they actually don't know much about what's going on and that you're trying to help them understand. Sometimes, I have the energy for this process.

As police continue to get worse, moderates who are okay with police killing 'some' people but not 'many' people (🙄) may be more open to preventing police brutality. I think a little outreach could make them better allies, and it's work I'm willing to put some energy into. The alternative is people who like neither BLM nor cops, and BLM is so easy to like once you know where they're coming from that this situation seems silly.

Here's a list of topics that I'd like to cover, suggestions/input/boosts welcome. I chose these because I think they're the bare minimum of background needed for anti-racist discussions to make sense to someone who has never paid any attention before.
* What is crime?
* Statistical disparities in policing along racial lines
* Fear, dehumanization, and complicity (pyramid of white supremacy, why a civilian might not reflexively go meek and comply when they're threatened)
* Identity biases and mathematical complexity
* Capitalism and looting-as-protest, mutual aid, and impacts to business (Minneapolis specific)

If there's pre-existing resources folks have, I'd appreciate it. I'm particularly interested in help with the following, with a preference for Minneapolis-based data first:
* Stats on police violence relative to the level of offense, differences in sentencing similar crimes
* 'Crime' vs illegal actions/'white-collar crime'
* Info on rioting and political change (introduce them to the idea them that it can be a form of protest and not just random, unrelated lawlessness)
* Historic data on how racist Minneapolis is

I already have a draft to work from, so I'll be okay if you don't have the energy to help right now. I wanted to open this up for feedback in advance, though, because we make better stuff when we work together. 💙

Also, yeah, I know it's wild that someone who was alive last year doesn't already know all this stuff, but like, people change and this isn't about punishing folks for that.

Thanks, everyone! You're lovely and great! ✨

There were protests at the site yesterday and some looting in the area and around town last night. Unicorn riot has been there giving coverage. Protests last night were dispersed with tear gas, one person was badly injured with a baton round.

Dante was detained allegedly because of an outstanding warrant, but the merits of said warrant are unknown, as is whether or not he knew about it, etc. He'd been initially stopped because his vehicle was similar to one that'd been reported as stolen. There was no self-defense situation for the officers involved as he was killed while trying to leave. His body lay in the street for hours after his death, despite his mother's requests that it be moved. There were a number of live video streams, but I'm not sure where the footage is.

His family is very upset and condemned some of the looting yesterday. There's a ton of misinformation floating around on social media that local kids are running into. Unicorn Riot seems like the best place for coverage.

Dante Wright should be alive today and now he isn't. Say his name. This has to change.

Maybe some late news, but cops killed someone yesterday afternoon. Again. Headline should read "police shoot and scare young man, cause car crash, 1 death".

It sounds like Daunte Wright, who was just 20, got scared after the police didn't want him to leave after a 'random traffic stop'. Brooklyn Center police shot and injured him when he fled.

Daunte proceeded to drive away, presumably to get medical attention, but crashed into another vehicle soon after. Five people were injured, including his passenger. He died soon after.