Stand with the youth of LA! Justice for Trayvon Martin—we will not accept this verdict.
Come Saturday: BA Speaks: REVOLUTION—Nothing Less!
July 16, 2013 | Revolution Newspaper | revcom.us
July 16, 2013: Last night, hundreds of young people were in the streets of South Central Los Angeles expressing their fury. They were outraged about the acquittal of George Zimmerman and defiant in the face of the police who were trying to suppress their protest.
Today, the police and mayor have announced they will not allow marches on Crenshaw Boulevard and Leimert Park (center of the Black cultural scene) where the protesters have gathered, and the LAPD will be out in force, with a "stricter posture" towards the protests. This can only mean more brutality. The LAPD has already shot rubber bullets and bean bags into crowds of protesters in the last days. This is the same LAPD—infamous for their wanton terror and brutality—that has killed or shot almost 30 people in the last several months, mainly Black and Latino.
In addition, the chorus of "responsible negro leaders" has been working overtime—expending their energies not continuing to denounce this criminal verdict, but scolding the protesters for destroying "our" Walmart and calling on parents to keep their children home. They've pledged to have "peacekeepers" at the rallies to cool down the protest.
This is unacceptable. It means containing things in bounds "acceptable" to this system. The same system that we saw working when George Zimmerman was NOT arrested the night he killed Trayvon. The same system that we saw working in the courts with the criminalization of Trayvon and the persecution of Rachel Jeantel. The same system that has now let that killer go scot-free. The same system that is currently torturing over 80,000 prisoners held in solitary confinement and the same system that is enforcing a New Jim Crow. The same damn system that is brutalizing and exploiting humanity all around the globe, destroying the natural environment in the process.
No! This verdict cannot be allowed to stand! And people are right to protest and right to rebel in the ways they see fit.
First, this is not "our" Walmart for fuck's sake.
But second, these are the very same youth on whose backs a target has been placed and now more firmly affixed. Their lives are at stake—and all our futures are at stake. It is right for them to be in the streets, it is right for them to express their anger—and people of all nationalities need to stand with them.
We need also to stand with the thousands of prisoners currently on hunger strike protesting these torturous conditions. Asserting their humanity and refusing to be treated like slaves. Join in the Day of Solidarity with the Prisoners' Hunger Strike THIS Friday.
The fact is, a radically different and far better world is possible! A world where the Trayvon Martins of the world can not just survive, but flourish. A world where the youth who were marching through the streets last night are part of bringing into being that world. As Bob Avakian said in his recent film, BA Speaks: REVOLUTION—Nothing Less! "Those this system has cast off, those it has treated as less than human, can be the backbone and driving force of a fight not only to end their own oppression, but to finally end all oppression, and emancipate all of humanity."
This requires REVOLUTION. THIS Saturday at 12:30 pm, at the Los Angeles Central Library (630 West 5th Street), at this potential turning point in society, get into the deepest answers to the most profound questions facing humanity. Come to a screening of BA Speaks: REVOLUTION—Nothing Less! This is a film of a talk from Bob Avakian, the Chairman of the Revolutionary Communist Party. As one of the filmmakers said, "Yes, this is a film, but that is not its essence. This is a daring, substantive, scientific summoning to revolution. 6+ hours that can change how you see the world and what you do with the rest of your life."
Join us in the streets—Fighting the Power, and Transforming the People, for Revolution! And be there Saturday. Write to revolutionbooksla@gmail.com or call 323.463.3500
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