Revolution #278, August 19, 2012
September 13th—Blow the Whistle on Stop-and-Frisk:
A Call for Nationwide Resistance to Racial Profiling, Police Brutality and Murder and the Pipeline Leading to Mass Incarceration
We need much more resistance to the way the cops, courts, prisons—the whole criminal justice system—has been unleashed on people locked onto the bottom of this society. Look at what's happened in just the past few weeks:
- A man in Saginaw, Michigan, was surrounded by police in a parking lot who shot him 46 times!
- Chavis Carter, a young Black man in Arkansas, who was searched twice, handcuffed and placed in the back seat of a cop car, ends up killed by a gunshot to the head, and the cops claim he shot himself!
- Two youth were murdered by police in Anaheim, Ca. a couple of days apart.
- The NYPD reported that the numbers of people stopped and frisked declined in recent months, but still for the first six months of this year, New York cops on average stopped nearly 2,000 people each and every day.
On top of that, there are tens of thousands of people held in solitary confinement in prisons across the U.S. subjected to conditions that fit the international definition of torture. And there are five million former prisoners who have served their sentences but face discrimination when looking for work, are denied government loans, can't live in public housing, and aren't even allowed to vote.
Add in the families and loved ones of all these people and you get tens of millions of people forced to live their lives caught up in the criminal "injustice" system of this country. This is a horrible injustice. It amounts to a slow genocide targeting Black people that could easily become a fast one. It is unacceptable, and it must be stopped. We will make a big leap in stopping it on Thursday, September 13, when we "Blow the Whistle on Stop-and-Frisk." And you have to be part of making this happen!
Stop-and-frisk concentrates the racial profiling police enforce all across the country, racial profiling that serves as a pipeline to mass incarceration—the 2.4 million people warehoused in prisons throughout the US. Mass Incarceration + Silence = Genocide. If we don't meet this with determined, mass resistance, the masses will be ground down so far, they'll never be able to do anything about all they do to us. From the other end, through standing up and coming back at this injustice in a powerful way, we can build our strength and organized capacity to resist and inspire others to join in the resistance. It's time to break the silence! And you must be a part of doing that.
On September 13, we will shatter that silence. Tens of thousands of people in New York City will politically confront police violating people's rights with whistles and cameras—blowing the whistle on all the crap these pigs inflict on the people. The actions in NYC will be the centerpiece of resistance on the 13th, and there must be diverse expressions of resistance to the many ways people are being beaten down—mass incarceration, racial profiling, police brutality and murder in cities across the country. These actions must involve the active participation of thousands and thousands of people.
The word needs to get out everywhere through Facebook and Twitter. Public Service Announcements and videos of people saying why they're going to "Blow the Whistle on Stop-and-Frisk" need to be recorded and played on the media and posted online. Some of these can feature artists and other well-known people. Students need to take whistles into their schools and organize others to come out on the 13th. Organizing has to be going on in neighborhoods, through church groups, unions, etc. People who hear about this have to organize their own actions on September 13! Organizing kits and other materials to use in doing this will be available on the Stop Mass Incarceration website—www.stopmassincarceration.org.
Through all these actions a powerful message will be delivered: WE WILL NO LONGER ACCEPT ALL THIS INJUSTICE IN SILENCE!
From Anaheim to Chicago, from Saginaw, Michigan to Jonesboro, Arkansas, people will be blowing the whistle on brutal murdering pigs. People will be blowing the whistle against torture behind prison walls from California to Red Onion Prison in W. Va. In different cities, people will express in many different ways their determination to end mass incarceration, racial profiling, police brutality and murder. People will mobilize people to go to the prisons, courthouses, police stations or into oppressed neighborhoods with signs, stickers and whistles, declaring their determination to "blow the whistle" on the slow genocide this system is inflicting on the people. At 6 pm EST, everybody, wherever they are, will blow their whistle in solidarity with the developing nationwide movement of resistance to mass incarceration and its consequences.
We will have to raise a lot of money to do all this. Funds are urgently needed in order to realize the vision concentrated in this call for nationwide resistance—money to get tens of thousands of whistles to put into people's hands and cards to spread the word on September 13. Money has to be raised from all sections of the people. Tax-exempt contributions can be made at stopmassincarceration.org. Donations for whistles, buttons and stickers need to be collected every time people are out in the streets organizing people to be ready to Blow the Whistle on Stop-and-Frisk.
On September 13, we will be building on the resistance that has developed over the past year, resistance which must be built as part of building a movement for revolution—the prisoners who went on hunger strike in California, in Georgia, in West Virginia, the neighborhoods that exploded in protest and rebellion in response to police murders in Anaheim, the thousands of people who have taken to the streets calling for an end to stop-and-frisk. And the advances made on September 13 will be the launching pad for leaping further forward in making this battle against mass incarceration a major societal issue, changing the political terrain and contributing to the building of a movement for revolution.
For more information, or to get involved go to www.stopmassincarceration.org.
