It’s been a long and exhausting week so far. I haven’t gotten home before 9 p.m for three days straight. There’s a lot happening. I am excited that the “No Selves to Defend: Criminalizing Women of Color for Self Defense” exhibition opens at Art in these Times tomorrow evening.

I spent Tuesday evening into the night with my friends Rachel, Billy, and Ash putting the finishing touches on the exhibition. I am very proud of what we’ve created. The “No Selves to Defend” exhibition is an outgrowth of the anthology by the same name.

Both projects were inspired by Marissa Alexander. More specifically, they are inspired by her consistent and constant admonition to also focus on the cases of other women who have been and are currently criminalized for invoking self-defense against violence. As I thought about her desire to lift up other women’s stories, the idea to create a document that would highlight other cases was born. The exhibition is simply an extension of this idea.

A lot of people are responsible for making both the anthology and exhibition a reality. I look forward to the opportunity to thank them all at Friday’s opening.

For those who visit the “No Selves” exhibition, you’ll see that it opens with the story of Celia.

On June 23 1855, after enduring five years of sexual violence, Celia, a 19 year old Missouri enslaved woman killed her master, Robert Newsom. Newsom was a 60 year old widower who purchased Celia when she was 14. On the day of her purchase, he raped her on the way to his farm.

By the time she killed Newsom, Celia already had two of his children and was pregnant with a third. She had started a relationship with one of Newson’s male slaves named George who became her lover. George insisted that she end her sexual liaison with Newsom if they were going to continue in their relationship.

Celia approached his daughters and implored them to ask their father to end the sexual assaults. No one could or would protect her and so she confronted Newsom herself when he came to force yet another sexual encounter. She clubbed him to death and then burned his body in her fireplace.

Her court-appointed defense lawyers suggested that a Missouri law permitting a woman to use deadly force to defend herself against sexual advances extended to slave as well as to free women. In spite of this vigorous defense, the court disagreed with the argument and Celia was found guilty of murder and sentenced to death by hanging.

After an appeal of the case failed, Celia was hanged on December 21, 1855.

Reading Celia’s story many years ago, I began to crystallize my thoughts about the fact that women of color (black women in particular) have never had “selves” to defend. It is fitting then that Celia would introduce the exhibition.

I asked my friend the supremely talented artist Bianca Diaz to create a visual interpretation of Celia for the exhibition. Since there are no photographs of Celia, Bianca had to rely on her imagination. Below is what she created which will be on display. It is haunting and beautiful.

Celia by Bianca Diaz

So, if you find yourself in town tomorrow at 6 pm, you are invited to the opening of the ‘No Selves to Defend’ exhibition. It will run until mid September at Art in these Times located on the second floor of 2040 N Milwaukee Ave. Chicago, IL 60647. The gallery is unfortunately not wheelchair accessible. Looking forward to seeing some of you on Friday!

Audre Lorde

Separation

The stars dwindle
they will not reward me
even in triumph.

It is possible
to shoot a man
in self defense
and still notice
how his red blood
decorates the snow.

1972

The excellent journalist Sarah Jaffe interviewed formerly incarcerated Occupy activist Cecily McMillan.

image by Molly Crabapple

There’s a lot worth considering in the exchange but I wanted to particularly underscore McMillan’s description of the violence of cell searches at Rikers.

Any particular stories about what it was like there that you’d like to share?

Maybe the best way that I could explain is through describing a search. Our dorm gets randomly searched at least twice a month, more if they want to set an example or if somebody has been smoking in the bathroom or if there have been rumors that somebody had some sort of contraband.

They use this space more or less to haze the new [correctional officers]. Two or three captains, 10 or so officers file into your dorm in full riot gear, the whole Plexiglas panel that’s surrounding their body, the masks and a huge wooden bat. Another set of officers file into the bathroom and stand in a line facing the stalls that don’t have doors. The first time they did the search I was using the restroom and had to finish my business right in front of them. They direct everybody to get down on the beds face down with your hands behind your back, after you put on your uniform and your ID badge. In Rikers you become a number. I’m 3101400431.

A third set of officers file in through sleeping quarters. Sometimes they bring in dogs. They call you row by row into the bathroom to strip down completely naked, do a deep knee bend forward, a deep knee bend backward, then have you open your mouth and shake out your hair and lift up your breasts.

After that the row files into the day room, and they have you face the wall standing throughout what can take up to a three or four hour process. Again you have three or so different captains, yelling “Miss, Miss,” and if you turn around they’re like, “I said turn around and face the wall! You want me to take your good days away?” You don’t know who’s giving orders where. They direct you into the entrance room where they make you sit down on a metal-detecting chair to check your body for any objects that you may be concealing. You have to put your cheek on a similar body metal detector device.

Then they bring out the women row by row again to our beds where they have flipped your bedding over, and you’re made to stand there and hold your mattress off the ground. These old women up to 80 years old having to stand there for hours and then hold their mattresses up like this. They page through everything. They turned to me at one point and said, “McMillan! Why do you have so many books?” I was like, “Because I’m a grad student! Are you looking for cigarettes or are you looking for radical literature?”

If a CO isn’t being humiliating enough, a CO will come over and ravage through your things even more. They can take anything away. These little soap hearts – this inmate would crush down soaps and reform them into hearts and put little pictures from magazines on them. Anything besides two pairs of pajamas – shoes that you got medically cleared, any commissary, if you have more than one shampoo and conditioner, pens. It takes like two weeks to get one of those.

After that you’re all marched back out and whatever doesn’t fit on your bed becomes trash. They will have another set of inmates come in – this is the real dirty part – and sweep up all of your belongings into these big trash bags and when you’re let back into your room, the closest thing I can describe it to is growing up in southeast Texas and coming back home after a hurricane to return with your community to put your life back together again.

All sorts of things can go wrong. My bunkie, the woman next to me, had very serious asthma and they woke her up like this; she had a very severe asthma attack, to the point that she nearly collapsed and they said, “Stand up, why are you sitting down?” I said, “She has asthma,” and they yelled, “shut the fuck up!” and I said, “You’re going to have a lawsuit on your hands unless you get her her inhaler,” and they asked her, “Which bed are you?” and she couldn’t talk. I said, “She lives right next to me, I can get her inhaler,” and they said, “Shut the fuck up!” and then she started wheezing and they’re like, “OK, McMillan, go get her inhaler, quick!” and I trot off, and they yell, “Don’t run, walk!” This woman ended up having to go downstairs to get a steroid shot.

That’s a normal experience at Rikers, something you have to accept. They can come at any time, any day, during any set of services, 3:00 AM, doesn’t matter.

No matter what anyone tells you jail and prison are NOT country clubs. They are violations and violence. Read the full interview here.

Over the next couple of weeks, you are invited to participate in a series of events that are centered on the case of Marissa Alexander.

In 2012, Marissa Alexander, a mother of three, was sentenced to twenty years in the Florida criminal correctional system for defending herself from her abusive estranged husband. Nine days after giving birth to a premature daughter, she fired a single warning shot upwards into a wall to halt her abusive partner during a life-threatening beating. Despite the fact that Marissa caused no injuries and has no previous criminal record, and despite the fact that Florida’s self-defense law includes the right to “Stand Your Ground,” she was arrested, prosecuted, and incarcerated. Her sentence was set at 20 years in part due to the state’s mandatory minimum sentencing laws. Marissa successfully appealed the trial, overturning the guilty verdict on 9/26/13. On 11/26/13, Marissa was finally released on bond and is currently under house arrest. Her new trial is scheduled for 12/8/14. Prosecutor Angela Corey will seek a 60-year sentence if Marissa is found guilty.

The Chicago Alliance to Free Marissa Alexander (CAFMA) and The Free Marissa Now Mobilization Campaign have been working diligently to educate the public about Marissa’s case and also to raise money for her legal defense.  Though her legal team is working pro bono, Marissa faces $250,000 in legal expense, including court fees, expert witnesses and processing evidence to insure an excellent defense for her retrial. Additionally, Marissa pays $500 every two weeks for bond payments and $105 each week for ankle monitoring. She is prohibited from working while under house arrest.

Please join CAFMA for a series of events to raise awareness about Marissa’s case, to learn about the historical context of the case, and to take action.

July 18, 6 to 9 p.m. – Opening Reception for No Selves To Defend Exhibition at Art in These Times, 2nd floor of 2040 N Milwaukee Ave. Chicago, IL 60647 USA. Details are HERE. Facebook event page here.

July 18 through September 21 – at Art in These Times – No Selves To Defend: An Exhibition about the Criminalization of Women of Color

July 19, 1 to 4:30 p.m. Free Screening of Crime After Crime – Join us for a screening and discussion of the film Crime After Crime. Roosevelt University, 425 S. Wabash Ave, Room 418. RSVP to [email protected]. – Facebook event page here.

July 25, 5:30 p.m.: Sticks and Stones and Stories – Storytelling for Self and Survival. Storytelling to fight back. Storytelling in Solidarity
The more we are injured by oppressive institutions and trauma in our lives, the more we are identified by the stories told about us, and not the stories we share about ourselves. This event is about sharing personal experiences of forcible displacement. That can happen through incarceration, deportation, detention, eviction, or other systems that exist to confine us to a single identity: criminal, unfit, illegal, homeless, invisible. We can fight that violence against us. We can share something about our lives and how we see ourselves, and find love and support in the process. That solidarity makes us infinitely more powerful, unstoppable, and ready to fight back! Join us.

What: Story Sharing Event plus Dinner
Where: 114 N Aberdeen, Chicago
When: Friday, July 25, 5:30 pm

This event is co-organized by Chicago Alliance to Free Marissa Alexander, Black on Both Sides, Moms United Against Violence and Incarceration. Contact Holly for more info: 630-258-8552, [email protected]

July 26, 2 p.m.: A Community Gathering and Rally in Support of Marissa in solidarity with Stand Our Ground Week of Action. We invite all community members to join us in song, performance, poetry and more. This is a family-friendly event. More details to come.

Find all upcoming events here.

This was written fast as I am rushed today and buried under a ton of work. I will revise it over time but I wanted to put my thoughts down while they were still fresh. Also, I am officially retired from commenting on this crap after today.

It’s summer in Chicago and our ‘friends’ are once again calling for military occupation of our city from the comfort of their air-conditioned condos in cities that are not our own. These calls are purportedly offered out of deep concern and love because the military is needed to save us from ourselves. In this case, the “us” is black people living (mostly) on the South & West sides of Chicago.

It’s become routine. Every summer, it’s the obligatory WTF!!!!!????? is going on in Chicago??? All of us who live here are familiar with the ritual. The press reports on shootings and homicides with almost no context (historical or otherwise). Faceless and sometimes nameless numbers are tallied like baseball box scores. And this is fitting in its own way. The prurient voyeuristic coverage is its own sport. The politicians periodically call for the National Guard to be deployed and martial law imposed. Everyone shakes their head while thinking ‘Tut, tut, what’s WRONG with those savages killing each other?’ Then folks are off to the beach or to resume watching Netflix.

When 80 people are shot over a long weekend, pointing out that homicides are actually down makes one seem callous and out-of-touch. It engenders ironic social media hashtags like #crimeisdown. It’s understandable why it’s cold comfort to many that homicides are actually at their lowest rate in decades. This means nothing to those who are most impacted by the shooting and the interpersonal violence. These are real people whose lives have been shattered. So these facts are meaningless to those folks and this is of course as it should be. However, these facts should NOT be meaningless to policymakers and to those more removed from the daily interpersonal violence. Because those are unfortunately the people who drive and set the policy responses. So the information and analysis that they use to craft those “solutions” should be accurate. And they should not have the effect of further destroying, criminalizing, and destabilizing impacted communities.

Read more »

The wonderful Jenna Peters Golden contributed to the terrific Radicalphabet poster project.

Image by Jenna Peters-Golden

A classic…

“He basically got on top of her … it’s basically a UFC ground-and-pound move … full force, punching her in the head … in the head,” Diaz said.

I saw the video and wondered who she was. Who was the woman whose head was being pounded, pummeled by a man wearing a uniform that made him THE LAW? She was black, that much I could tell. But WHO was she? Someone’s grandmother, sister, daughter, friend? And where is she? Is she in the hospital? Just what has happened to this woman?

The woman on the ground using her forearms to block the blows is so familiar to me. I know that she is invisible to others but I ‘recognize’ her. I wonder if she will speak and tell of her torment. I hope so. I hope that she will in Audre’s words “forgo the vanities of silence” and speak her pain. Because in the end, as black women, our voices are too often all we have. We are punished for speaking and yet we must.

The Law keeps punching her in the face and head. Eleven times at least in the video. He doesn’t want her to speak. So many people want us to die silently and to be buried in unmarked graves. I feel this acutely and so I raise my voice in public even though I’m actually a private & quiet person. Those who know me best recognize this description, those who don’t cannot, will not. I’ve learned to raise my voice as an act of resistance against the constant attacks and the acts of intentional obliteration. Muriel Rukeseyer asked that question: “What would happen if one woman told the truth about her life?” The answer: “The world would split open.” But what of black women? What would happen if all of us told the truth about our lives? Maybe we would save the world.

The currently anonymous no name black woman whose head was pounded and pummeled by The Law is of course not the first to be so victimized. Assata Shakur has told her story of police torture in her autobiography and in interviews. Below she recounts her brutal treatment at the hand of The Law in 1973:

On the night of May 2, I was shot twice by the New Jersey State Police. I was kept on the floor, kicked, pulled, dragged along by my hair. Finally, I was put into an ambulance, but the police would not let the ambulance leave. They kept asking the ambulance attendant: “Is she dead yet? Is she dead yet?” Finally, when it was clear that I wasn’t going to die in the next five or ten minutes, they took me to the hospital. The police were jumping on me, beating me, choking me, doing everything that they could possibly do as soon as the doctors or the nurses would go outside. I was half dead – hospital authorities had brought in a priest to give me the last rites – but the police would not stop torturing me. That went on until the next morning, when I was taken to the intensive care unit. They had to calm down a little while I was there. Then they moved me to another room, which was the Johnson Suite, and they closed off the exit from the hallway. So they could virtually control all traffic in and out. It was just open season on me for about three or four days. They’d turned up the air conditioning so that I was freezing to death. My lungs were threatening to collapse. They were doing everything so that I would get pneumonia.

It isn’t hard to imagine The Law thinking “Is she dead yet?” as his fists landed consecutive blows across the head and face of the currently anonymous no name black woman lying on the side of the 10 Freeway.

In 1979, Eula Love, a black woman trying to support her 3 daughters on social security payments, let her $22 gas bill lapse. The Southern California Gas Company sent out a meter man to shut off the gas in the dead of January. Eula threw him out of her house. The Gas Company called the LAPD which dispatched two officers to Ms. Love’s home. She had a knife in her hand when they arrived. They clubbed her to the ground and emptied their .38 caliber revolvers into her as she lay on the floor. I’m glad there was no video of that clubbing. What if Ms. Love had been able to tell the truth about her life? Instead The Law killed her dead.

And so it is against this backdrop of constant, consistent, fear-inducing, paralyzing, galvanizing, obliterating violence that we stand our ground. Always exhausted yet unwilling to be destroyed, resisting, we speak our pain and refuse to be silent. We stay for the dead and we fight for the living. We raise our forearms to protect against the blows (even from those who sometimes claim to love us) preparing for the moment when we can strike a collective blow for our freedom and self-determination.

In the meantime, we call the names of our sisters Assata, Eula, Ersula, Rekia, and the currently anonymous no name black woman who was pummeled by The Law on the side of the 10 Freeway… We call your names and make you visible.

We tell our truth to save the world.

Update: An LA Times article published Saturday evening offers more information on the anonymous woman pummeled by the cop in LA. She is a great-grandmother!!

Update #2 (12/3/15) – No criminal charges