In May of this year, I wrote about the death of a young man known to his friends as Damo at the hands of the Chicago police. To this day, none of us knows the actual circumstances of his tasing death. Answers are not forthcoming.

I wrote back then: “Understand that Damo is part of a long legacy of death at the hands of police. The Chicago police shoot black people. In 2012, CPD shot 57 people and 50 were black. They also tase, target, torture, and kill people of color.”

After Damo’s death, I saw the pain and rage that some of his friends were experiencing. I was at a loss about how best to support them. But I knew that there was a need for an outlet to transform pain into something else that might eventually catalyze some positive action.

In late May, I e-mailed a small group of friends, comrades and co-strugglers with an idea. I followed up in early June with a note on Facebook to others who might be interested. The idea was a simple one – to create a modern petition/report to the United Nations about police violence against young people modeled after the 1951 We Charge Genocide petition.

The first meeting was on June 11 and over 45 people packed the Chicago Freedom School to hear about the idea and most importantly to offer their own. From the start, I made it clear that what mattered most was that we act collectively on something. Any and all ideas about what that something could be were welcome. After a couple of hours, we left with a plan of action and several ideas to pursue:

1. Everyone assembled agreed that we should create a Chicago version of a “We Charge Genocide” petition/report to be presented to the United Nations.
2. Everyone agreed that we would organize at least one youth hearing to gather relevant testimony for the petition/report by the end of the summer.
3. A suggestion was made that the group revive the Young Women’s Empowerment Project’s Bad Encounter Line and focus it specifically on collecting reports of police encounters.
4. Some people wanted to revive community monitoring of police through a Copwatch model.
5. Everyone agreed that the city would benefit from a social media campaign to raise awareness about and report negative police encounters.

After the June meeting, We Charge Genocide (WCG) was born. Since then, dozens of people have worked diligently to achieve all of the goals set in our first meeting. Importantly, the work is owned by every person involved in the group. Subcommittees meet on their own to plan activities and move the work forward. Everyone is invested and has devoted countless hours. WCG is not contingent on one person but is truly a collective and collaborative effort.

Today, we kick off a fundraising drive to send a delegation of 6 people to Geneva to present WCG’s report/petition to the Committee Against Torture in November. While WCG is an inter-generational effort, it’s an initiative driven by and focused on young people. Five of the WCG UN delegation are under 30 years old and four are 25 and under. I will not be traveling to Geneva or it would have skewed the numbers dramatically :).

I am incredibly proud of the work that has already been done in just the past three months. I continue to be in awe of my comrades who have carried the work. They are in school, work full time jobs, organize in other settings, have lives and families and yet they have shown 100% commitment to meeting our collective goals. It’s been an inspiration.

I hope that everyone reading this will consider contributing to WCG’s Geneva fundraising effort. The trip will provide a foundation for even more organizing moving forward. Already, WCG members are thinking about how to organize around the issue of police militarization and planning an action for the National Day of Protest Against Police Brutality on October 22. There is more to come… Please contribute to sending these wonderful young people to Geneva. You can hear the pitch from some of them in the video below:

Regular readers of this blog know that history matters a great deal to me. I think that it isn’t past and informs all present actions. This post is an attempt, in my own way, to provide some of the history of this current iteration of We Charge Genocide in Chicago in 2014. It is also a call for support. Please make a contribution in any amount today and help spread the word about the fundraising campaign to others. Thank you.

The following is an image made by Meredith Stern which is available for purchase at Just Seeds Cooperative for $10. Stern explains why she created the image:

This is a redo of an image I made over ten years ago when the incarceration rate had already skyrocketed and the trend has tragically continued as a direct result of harsh and disproportionate racial profiling, targeting and sentencing of communities of color for non-violent drug related behavior. For starters, we must end mass incarceration, the criminalization of undocumented migrants, and the war on drugs. It is incredibly damaging for families, for communities, and our entire society to be putting such a large portion of our population in detention centers for non-violent behavior.

The Sentencing Project has incredibly eye opening data on the current state of affairs.

For anyone interested in learning more about the current state of affairs:
“This House I Live In” is a documentary about the “War on Drugs” in the US which I highly recommend.

For book readers I recommend “Race to Incarcerate” and “The New Jim Crow.”

I purchased a couple of the prints.

by Meredith Stern

A monthly forum on Chicago-based cultural projects that confront, agitate, and work to dismantle the prison nation.

In the last decade, a growing number of artists, organizations and activists in the Chicago area have created artwork and developed responses to what is now termed a prison nation The U.S. locks up more people than any other nation in the world and exhausts more resources on confinement and punishment each year. One in 99 adults in the US is incarcerated; the financial and social costs to tax payers and communities is staggering. Conservatives, liberals and members of the left have all called for policy changes, yet when violence and poverty rage in Chicago neighborhoods, the common response is a call to lock more people away for longer prison terms.

Creative culture has been at the forefront of changing the public perception about the realities of social segregation, poverty, violence, and incarceration. Chicago-area artists have staged performances and exhibitions, created organizations and developed long-term projects to alter entrenched thinking and unsettle business-as-usual.

What kinds of projects are happening that create a culture of change? Can art decarcerate? Change the law? Liberate communities from violence? Envision and enact new futures?

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William C. Anderson wrote a short essay about CeCe McDonald for the No Selves to Defend anthology which I share below.

by Micah Bazant

Chrishaun “CeCe” McDonald is a trans woman whose bravery in the face of injustice has changed lives and perceptions in the United States. On the night of June 5, 2011, CeCe was out with friends when she was attacked. Three people began harassing her and her friends outside a bar by deriding them with racist and transphobic slurs, before attacking them physically.

CeCe fought for her life; when the dust settled one of her attackers lay dead. CeCe survived the attack, but was arrested by the police. After receiving 11 stitches to her cheek, she was interrogated without counsel and placed in solitary confinement. CeCe was charged with second-degree murder for defending herself. Rather than face trial by a jury that would not likely sympathize with her, she accepted a plea deal to the lesser charge of second-degree manslaughter.

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This is a good video by the Black Alliance For Just Immigration. It makes the case that mass criminalization (incarceration and deportation) negatively impacts people of color. It’s worth watching.

I am thrilled to have this post by my friend Lewis on the blog this morning. The piece was written in response to this.

I learned that there would be another protest yesterday for Roshad McIntosh, a 19 year old young black man, who was killed by a Chicago Police officer on August 24. Neighbors say that the young man had his hands up and was in the process of surrendering when he was shot and killed.

I had missed (because of illness) the previous protests demanding that the killer cop be named and that the police report be released to the public. I had, however, been closely following information about the incident on social media. Yesterday, I finally felt well enough to attend the latest protest. I grabbed a ride with my friends Sarah, Zach and Megan and we headed to North Lawndale for the 5 o’clock protest/march.

We marched from the site of Roshad’s killing to the 11th police district.

photo by Sarah Jane Rhee (Chicago, 9/1/14)

When we arrived at the police station, Roshad’s mother, Cynthia Lane, entered the building to ask for more information about her son’s killing.

photo by Minku Sharma (Chicago, 9/1/14)

She returned a short time later to say that the police didn’t tell her any more details about her son’s death. She vowed to come back every day until she got answers.

photo by Danielle Villarreal (Chicago, 9/1/14)

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by Molly Crabapple (2014)

Regular readers of this blog know that I think, write, and organize a lot around policing and violence. It’s back to school season and many of my educator friends have either already started teaching or will be soon. Police violence is very much in the news lately and many young people want to address the issue (they always do). I and several of my comrades have created several resources that can assist in those conversations. I share them below.

General Questions To Ask About Policing

Who benefits?
Who suffers?
Whose interests are advanced?
Who pays the costs?
Who/What is protected and served?
Who is bullied and brutalized?
How has policing evolved over the years?
Can you envision a world without police?
What might be some alternatives to policing?

Introductory Activities

#1 – 6 Words about Policing and Violence
I have found 6 word stories to be good opening activities (especially if you are limited in terms of time). You can figure out what young people/students already know & think about various issues and can effectively engage a group. I have created an activity that includes watching a video, discussing it, and then facilitating a 6 word story activity. This was created for an event I co-organized last year. Download the instructions HERE (PDF).

If time is an issue, you can substitute the video suggested in the curriculum template with this 2 minute one produced by Buzzfeed using Shirin-Banou Barghi’s powerful series of graphics depicting the last words of unarmed black men killed by police. I shared her graphics here.

Some examples of 6 word stories are:
Walked outside. Did nothing. Cop Harassed. [by me]
Cops said my bruises would fade. [by me]

You can also switch it up by asking students/youth to write a 6 word story for the families of the murdered men featured in Barghi’s graphics as well as others.

#2 – Activity Guide
A couple of years ago, I created an activity guide to help youth workers and educators discuss police violence with young people. You can find some introductory activities there too.

Historical Timelines of Policing

#1 – Interactive Timeline
We focus on political education at Project NIA. As such, we create many resources and tools that can help with that work. A couple of years ago, Lewis Wallace, Jessie Lee Jackson and Megan Milks (3 of our volunteers) created an interactive timeline that covers the history of policing in the U.S. from pre-colonial times to the present. You can find that timeline here.

#2 — Interactive Activity
In addition, Lewis developed an interactive activity about the history of policing and violence that can be downloaded HERE.

#3 — History Zines
In late 2011, I decided to develop a series of pamphlets to inform and educate community members about the longstanding tradition of oppressive policing toward marginalized populations (including some activists and organizers).

This series titled “Historical Moments of Policing, Violence & Resistance” features pamphlets on various topics including: The Mississippi Black Papers, the 1968 Democratic Convention, Resistance to Police Violence in Harlem, the 1937 Memorial Day Massacre, Oscar Grant, the Danziger Bridge Shootings, among others. The pamphlets are available for free downloading here. They are youth-friendly and each publication includes a set of discussion questions.

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This is adapted from a previous post in light of recent and current events in Ferguson…

who anointeth the city with napalm? (i say)
who giveth this city in holy infanticide?
– “Elegy” by Sonia Sanchez

That justice is a blind goddess
Is a thing to which we black are wise
Her bandage hides two festering sores
That once perhaps were eyes.
– “Justice” by Langston Hughes

[Are you raging still?]
– “Untitled” by Mariame Kaba

For too many people it probably felt like a movie. We are used to seeing paramilitary troops riding down city streets on the big screen. Most of us, however, would be surprised to witness such a scene in our neighborhoods. But starting on August 10, 2014 and lasting several days, many watched in horror as Ferguson, Missouri police launched repeated tear gas attacks against civilians followed by piercing LRAD sounds and rubber bullets. The victims of these police attacks were mostly peaceful protesters with a very small number accused of ‘looting’ local businesses.

by Corina Dross (http://corinadross.com/2014/08/19/ferguson-fundraising/)

For those of us who pay attention to policing in the U.S., these images were awful but unsurprising and certainly not new. It was infuriating and painful to watch the police assault from afar without recourse. I wasn’t sure if I was a witness or a voyeur as time passed. Maybe there isn’t a clear delineation between the two. I was glued to social media; it made me feel less lonely and alienated. Others were seemingly as angry and disgusted by what they were seeing as I was and that gave strange comfort.

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