Join Dr. Nika in a discussion with Patrisse Cullors, the co-founder of Black Lives Matter. Cullors' journey will inspire you as she shares how her maternal lineage and ancestral experiences with religion and systemic oppression fuel her art and activism. One standout moment is her collaboration with designer Rita Nazarino on the North Star bag collection, a project that combines traditional hand weaving with potent abolitionist symbolism inspired by Underground Railroad quilt patterns. Enhancing the narrative is a poignant poem by formerly incarcerated Black poet Nisi Berry, making these bags a canvas for abolitionist expression and future.
Our conversation takes you through the transformative power of embracing West African spiritual traditions, particularly Ifa, through the influence of Malidoma Patrice Somé's seminal book, "The Healing Wisdom of Africa." We delve into a moving case study from Malawi, as Ida Puliwa's work in her village to empower girls highlights the synergy between mutual aid and community resilience against patriarchal oppression that makes the African diaspora instructive for building abolitionist futures in the U.S.. Additionally, we examine the intertwined histories of African indigenous religions and political movements, underscoring how practices like Voodoo, Candomblé, and Orishas have historically fortified Black power and resistance. These reflections are deeply personal, drawing connections between abolition and the Cullors' own family encounters with carceral systems.
Our discussion pivots to the critical role of healing justice, particularly in the context of the Los Angeles County jail system. Spearheaded by concepts championed by Cara Page, we emphasize the necessity of healing justice services to support continually traumatized communities. Shifting the focus from individual self-care to collective care, we outline systemic changes vital for addressing the deep scars racism inflicts on Black health and well-being. We also touch on the delicate balance of activism and motherhood, revealing the often overlooked physical and emotional toll borne by those on the front lines. Wrapping up, we discuss the crucial role of artists in the struggle for abolition and reimagining a more just and equitable world.
Sign-up and join a social media platform for abolitionists Enroll to take courses at Abolition Academy Follow us on Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook Subscribe to our YouTube Channel
Join Dr. Nika in a discussion with Patrisse Cullors, the co-founder of Black Lives Matter. Cullors' journey will inspire you as she shares how her maternal lineage and ancestral experiences with religion and systemic oppression fuel her art and activism. One standout moment is her collaboration with designer Rita Nazarino on the North Star bag collection, a project that combines traditional hand weaving with potent abolitionist symbolism inspired by Underground Railroad quilt patterns. Enhancing the narrative is a poignant poem by formerly incarcerated Black poet Nisi Berry, making these bags a canvas for abolitionist expression and future.
Our conversation takes you through the transformative power of embracing West African spiritual traditions, particularly Ifa, through the influence of Malidoma Patrice Somé's seminal book, "The Healing Wisdom of Africa." We delve into a moving case study from Malawi, as Ida Puliwa's work in her village to empower girls highlights the synergy between mutual aid and community resilience against patriarchal oppression that makes the African diaspora instructive for building abolitionist futures in the U.S.. Additionally, we examine the intertwined histories of African indigenous religions and political movements, underscoring how practices like Voodoo, Candomblé, and Orishas have historically fortified Black power and resistance. These reflections are deeply personal, drawing connections between abolition and the Cullors' own family encounters with carceral systems.
Our discussion pivots to the critical role of healing justice, particularly in the context of the Los Angeles County jail system. Spearheaded by concepts championed by Cara Page, we emphasize the necessity of healing justice services to support continually traumatized communities. Shifting the focus from individual self-care to collective care, we outline systemic changes vital for addressing the deep scars racism inflicts on Black health and well-being. We also touch on the delicate balance of activism and motherhood, revealing the often overlooked physical and emotional toll borne by those on the front lines. Wrapping up, we discuss the crucial role of artists in the struggle for abolition and reimagining a more just and equitable world.
Sign-up and join a social media platform for abolitionists Enroll to take courses at Abolition Academy Follow us on Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook Subscribe to our YouTube Channel
Speaker 1:
One, two, three, four. Welcome to the Abolitionist Sanctuary Podcast, where we bring you leading voices confronting issues and interventions at the intersections of faith, abolition and Black motherhood. Our vision is to build a faith-based abolitionist movement and we invite you, our listeners, to support and join our coalition. Abolitionist Sanctuary is a nonprofit organization that provides public education and certified training to faith communities, civic organizations, educational institutions and individuals who aim to organize against the moral crisis of mass incarceration and the criminalization of impoverished Black motherhood. I am your host, reverend Dr Nakia Smith-Robert, the Executive Director of Abolitionist Sanctuary. You can follow me at Nakia S Robert and at Abolitionist Sanctuary on Instagram, facebook and Twitter. You can also sign up for exclusive updates. Donate and support us at wwwabolitionistsanctuaryorg. I am excited to welcome our guest today, patrice Cullors, the co-founder of Black Lives Matter, artist and abolitionist. Hi, patrice, hi, it's so wonderful to have you here. Thanks for having me.
Speaker 1:
Can you tell us your pronouns? Yes, give us a visual of how you're presenting yourself in this space and tell us who are your people.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, my pronouns are she, hers, and I am donning a big Afro. I have a round face, almond shapedshaped eyes, a full nose, full lips and I have a tattoo, a line tattoo down my chin that goes down to my neck and right above my chest.
Speaker 1:
Amazing, and who are your people?
Speaker 2:
Oh, hmm, it's a good question maternal lineage and the people who came from the South to the West thinking like they're going to have a better life. And really, you know, my great grandmother always says that she left her hometown because of the KKK and then coming to the West and experiencing law enforcement and the impact law enforcement had on her life and her children, her grandchildren and her grandchildren's children. So I'm thinking about my maternal lineage right now.
Speaker 1:
It's just horrific how deep and long policing has terrorized Black communities from the earliest of ancestors even to the present day communities from the earliest of ancestors even to the present day and I'm interested in how you are using art as a platform for resistance. So can you tell us a bit about your earliest recollection with art and how these pivotal moments have led to advanced degrees, teaching in the academy and a methodology for your own community organizing?
Speaker 2:
Yes, I've been an artist for as long as I can remember. There isn't a time in my life that art wasn't critical, necessary, an important medium, an important language. And I'd say that it was probably, you know, when I was in middle school, when I realized that I was an artist, that I realized that I was different, that I see the world differently, that I see it through a creative and artistic lens, and it was freeing to feel that and experience that.
Speaker 2:
And then it wouldn't be until high school that I'm'm politicized and, you know, introduced to Audre Lorde and introduced to Zora, neale Hurston and Toni Morrison, and, then, you know, soon after that, introduced to the Panther Party and the organizers you know Black organizing and I think you know I remember feeling a pressure to stop being an artist and only be, you know, an organizer. And I remember thinking, no, that's not possible for me, I can't live my life so compartmentalized. And I remember using my art as a way to communicate my politics and my values, and that felt like an important evolution for me as a younger person.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, yeah, and I feel like that is a tool of empire for us to compartmentalize various categories right and not live the wholeness of your being. Vogue Fashion wrote an article featuring a bag collection between yourself and Rita Nazarino and said that it is, quote unquote, all about freedom and inspired by quilts and poetry. So can you share a bit about your North Star bag collection?
Speaker 2:
Yes, rita Nazarino is an amazing designer out of the Philippines and she is the creative director of a hundred-year-old workshop that she inherited from her grandmother. Um that that her grandmother started uh, that was really making baskets, uh, wicker baskets. And when she took over the workshop, zacharias, um, she said, I don't want to make baskets, I want to make bags.
Speaker 2:
And started making these amazing bags and the bags. I saw these bags on a friend and I said who's this? You know what is this bag Like? I need it. And my friend said, oh, this is, um, you know, my good friend, rita Nazarino, and she's a big fan of yours. You all should hang out. We did, we had dinner and I remember sitting there with her and I said, you know, I said can, can we do something together? Uh, and she was like absolutely. And she was like absolutely. And so you know, this has been such a labor of love, such an important conversation for me. How do we? What's the intersection of art, fashion and abolition, fashion and abolition? And for me this was kind of that first project trying to figure that out. And Rita Nazarino's workshop is called Zacharias 1925, which you know she says it places a contemporary thrust and the traditional craft of hand weaving, so all the bags are hand woven. She comes from an architectural background and a contemporary art background, so you could see that in her work.
Speaker 2:
Look at the use of quilts and quilt making that Black Americans have used, especially during the Underground Railroad. There was a, you know, a, huge quilts were this moment to kind of like when you were part of the Underground Railroad to people where to go, and there were these symbols and signatures that provided a language towards freedom, and so I wanted these bags to do that. And so I looked at the way in which the different stars and symbols on quilts were, and I wanted to put that on these bags. I feel like they're. You know, if you're wearing this bag in the world, you're telling people I'm an abolitionist and we need those. We need that. We need like a new language in which we are communicating an abolitionist presence and future.
Speaker 2:
And so I asked Nisi Berry, who is a formerly incarcerated Black literary, one of my favorite Black poets, to provide a signature poem for these bags.
Speaker 2:
And so on the front of the bag you'll see these gorgeous stars, but on the back of the bag you'll see a leather flap where the bag opens up, and on that leather flap there's a poem that's been lasered and it's called carrying freedom, and the bags are really a conversation around abolition and what it looks like for Black women, and so I really wanted to work with a Black artist a Black formerly incarcerated artist who identifies as an abolitionist, and also show her work, and so that is the project. I was so excited that Vogue Philippines featured it, and there's also some exciting news that I can't share now about the exhibition and the bags. But there was an exhibition that launched at CDM Gallery, which is the commercial gallery of the Crenshaw Dairy Mart, and we had lots of folks visit us, including some really cool museums, and so soon I'll tell you the news so you can share it with your followers of Abolitionist Sanctuary. But there's some really cool news that comes out of this exhibition and these bags.
Speaker 1:
So Patrice is our strategic advisor. She is my strategic advisor to Adolescence Sanctuary, so I'm wondering if we could get an exclusive drop on this amazing news that you're holding over there. Yes, no, not yet.
Speaker 2:
Not yet, I can't, but I will. I'll let y'all know first that you could tell the folks, and then I'll go out wide.
Speaker 1:
Sounds amazing. So I love how you shared with us the aesthetic details, the significance of symbolism and meaning. I saw the bag firsthand during a protest that we were doing together and I mean it's just it's striking Like it is so powerful, and to see it function in that space of resistance right To materially in real life, see art work as resistance as we are protesting, and seeing you leading us with this bag on your back and the symbolism that it carries was just extremely powerful. I'm interested if how the North Star is paying homage to Harriet Tubman right with this North Star concept, but also acting as a bridge intergenerationally to inspire future abolitionists. How do you see that functioning?
Speaker 2:
So, you know, I do think that we need more signs and symbols that help identify who's an abolitionist. I'm thinking a lot about you know, how divided the country is right now. I'm thinking a lot about who is most vulnerable, who's being targeted, who's being hyper-targeted, and like what it means to have symbols that people know, that people know um, okay, this is a safe person, this is a safe place. Um, and you know, I obviously think about Harriet Tubman all the time. She's actually what inspired um. You know some of the my early works in performance art. You know some of the my early works in performance art, and looking at the impact of the county jail system here in Los Angeles and thinking about what is important um for um abolishing, uh, the incarceration system, the carceral system in particular. Um, she's someone who I felt like I just I would talk to, I would ideate with and ask for downloads from her in order to be able to make sense of what I was trying to do up against such a huge, unruly, violent system.
Speaker 1:
You know, ruthie Gilmore, in her book Abolitionist Geography, writes about Harriet Tubman and she quotes she says about a story that Harriet Tubman told and she says I knew of a man who was sent to the state prison for 25 years. All these years he was always thinking of his home and counting the time till he should be free. The years roll on, the time of imprisonment ends over. The man is free, he leaves the prison gates, he makes his way to the old home. But his old home is not there. The house in which he had dwelt in his childhood had been torn down and a new one had been put in its place. His family were gone. Their very name was forgotten. There was no one to take him by the hand, to welcome him back to life. So it is with me.
Speaker 1:
I had crossed the line of which I had so long been dreaming. I was free, but there was no one to welcome me to the land of freedom. I was a stranger in a strange land and my home, after all, was down in the old cabin quarter with the old folks and my brothers and sisters. But to this solemn resolution I came. I was free and they should be free also. I will make a home for them, and Ruthie Gilmore is making this connection of how abolition is a place, and it's interesting as we think of abolition as geography, as place and re-entry, right, our brothers and sisters, our siblings who are coming home, sisters, our siblings who are coming home do we have a place for them where they can be free? Right? And I'm wondering how you see abolition as a definition that we can hold on to as we think about creating spaces and places for people to be free.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, I've been thinking a lot about underground railroad spaces, and because we don't, because we're not free right now and because freedom is, it's unclear when it's coming.
Speaker 2:
But what we can do is create spaces of freedom I like to call them freedom portals and really looking at what kind of institutions, collectives, businesses, physical spaces we're creating that give people those moments of freedom, those moments of breath, people, those moments of freedom, those moments of breath.
Speaker 2:
I imagine our ancestors, you know, leaving plantations, fleeing them and getting to underground railroad homes and businesses and spaces and having that just moment to breathe and what that must have felt like to be able to regulate your nervous system just for a bit of time, before you had to go back out in the world and the unfree places to find the next Underground Railroad space, to finally get to a free state or a free country. That's where we're at right now. If our people are unable to walk down streets without being murdered, if our people are unable to live their lives and then end up being kidnapped by law enforcement and taken off to prison or jail without due process, if a rumor can be made up and spread across right-wing media and create, you know, misinformation and disinformation for community members and leaders and folks are left, you know, with the fallout of that.
Speaker 1:
We're not free, and so freedom right now looks like creating those spaces, those underground railroad spaces gave me an informal guided tour he pastors a church in Kansas City, kansas an informal guided tour to one of the last destinations on the Underground Railroad crossing from, I believe, missouri into Kansas, because I think Missouri is one of the last states to be emancipated and Kansas was free and we stood there overlooking the horizons and seeing in the shadows the open land that the slaves, our African ancestors, traversed to get to freedom right, and one of the key organizations in preserving that ground and I'm not going to say it right, I think it's Quintero, but I'm sure I'm wrong and I'll have to circle back to that name but the AME church was essential in preserving that site and I think about the role of churches as stops along the Underground Railroad, and Harriet Tubman herself belonged to the AME Zion Church right and Mother Bethel in Philly still preserves as a museum artifacts as a stop of the Underground Railroad, and so churches played an instrumental role right within the abolitionist movement.
Speaker 1:
I also worked with another organization in New Jersey and we created a toolkit on police accountability, and what was fascinating about some of the research that they did is that they looked at all of the churches Black churches who were involved in a stop on the Underground Railroad. So that's data that is useful for you. I'm happy to get that to you.
Speaker 2:
I would love that. That's really powerful.
Speaker 1:
Absolutely, so we'll get that to you. I'm happy to get that to you. I would love that. That's really powerful. Absolutely, so we'll get that to you. And that toolkit is available publicly, so we'll be sure to get that to you. But this role of faith and abolition right and the ways in which the church was involved in the Underground Railroad and Ablish's movement, can you tell us about your own faith system, your faith beliefs and how it has evolved from your younger days as a Jehovah's Witness to where you are traveling across the diaspora with African religious traditions? What is the role of faith and how does it inform your sense of freedom as a place?
Speaker 2:
faith and how does it inform your sense of freedom as a place? Faith is critical for me. I grew up Jehovah's Witness and a really you know Jehovah's Witness family. I think probably by my teenage years I was like this isn't the tradition for me and it was really clear that I was looking for indigenous spiritual technology. I felt it inside of me. I felt a deep longing for indigenous spiritual technology and wisdom and did a deep dive, did a search. You know, where is my people? Where is our lineage? What have we done? How do I hold that space?
Speaker 2:
You know Black man who had had his own journey around Western tradition and colonialism's impact on his people from Burkina Faso, and he wrote many books. But the book that transformed my life was the Healing Wisdom of Africa. One of my good friends introduced it to our little community of Black queer women and I read that book and I said, ok, I want to find this tradition and I need to find traditions that really make sense for me. I went and met with Mali Doma a few times. I went and met with Malidoma a few times. I got to get a divination from him before he passed away. That was really powerful.
Speaker 2:
But then I would find Ifa, the tradition of the Yoruba people. And in that experience, in finding Ifa, I found myself. I got to reclaim myself, my lineage, my ancestors, and not just my ancestors here and on Turtle Island, but my ancestors from the western shores of Africa, and so that has been a game changer for me. I've been in the tradition now for 20 years, almost 20 years, and that's wild. I've been initiated for almost 15 years, um, you know, 13 to 15 years, uh and it's been a a very, very, very important part of my identity. That until up until recently I would say, maybe these last several months I have months I have an exhibition right now at a gallery called the Charlie James Gallery that looks at the Odu Ifa in my tradition. It's not until recently where I'm being much more open about my spiritual practice.
Speaker 1:
I love it. You know I'm teaching a course called African Religions and Politics for Abolitionist Futures. That's right. And yeah, it's a fire course, patrice, like it's fire.
Speaker 1:
I love that we're using Malawi as a case study. We're working with a woman named Ida Puliwa in Malawi and she's doing phenomenal abolitionist work through empowering her village to be self-sustaining against the patriarchy of chiefs who told her that she can't do it because she's just a girl. And she is providing literacy programs, agriculture, health, education around cervical cancer and HIV AIDS. And it all started with her asking kind of a mutual aid mechanism, asking her village to give seven cents to volunteer, and they pooled their resources together to become self-sustaining. And they pooled their resources together to become self-sustaining. And it made me think, after hearing her story, what is instructive from the African diaspora for global abolitionist futures? Right, and so we began to look at the role of religion in that. So the role of voodlé and Lukumi and Santaria and the Orishas and the Orishas' connection to Black power movements that we don't really talk about, right, and so what's beautiful about African indigenous religions is that there is no partition between the religious and the political. That's right. Right, it is one system and so there is no partition between the religious and the political. That's right. Right, it is one system and so there is no choice to be a bystander for injustices. Right, and the role of gender, that women in Candomblé are more susceptible to divination than men. Right, and so we're reading.
Speaker 1:
I offer this book to you by Diane Stewart. It's two volumes and I have to get that to you, but she's doing a lot of work with the Orishas and Obeah and Trinidad and its connection to politics and Black power movements. That's phenomenal work. So thank you for sharing the role of your religious systems to abolition and freedom, and so this call for abolition has been deeply personal for you and the ways in which carceral systems have negatively affected family members who are justice impacted, including your dad. Rest in peace. Your cousin Kenan Anderson, rest in peace, and your brother Right. Tell us, how are you finding healing in art to cope and find well-being amidst state-sponsored violence and carceral terror?
Speaker 2:
Oh man, I mean honestly, it's the healing justice work. Of so many people who have called for healing justice Early on. I think a lot about Cara Page, who coined the term healing justice, who just wrote a book called Healing Justice Lineages. But you know, when I started organizing, I remember having to go to these board meetings and tell these board people how awful the conditions were and the impact on my life. And seeing people ignore me and ignore the community that I was with and walk out the door or talk to their staff and the dehumanization that you experience when you're advocating for yourself and your people, um is really painful.
Speaker 2:
And so when I started my organization, the first organization started Dignity and Power. Now, uh, that has now been around for 12 years. Its primary focus is to take on the Los Angeles County jail system and to organize communities who've been directly impacted by share of violence. I was like I don't want to do this in a way that re-traumatizes the community and I want to make sure that we have healing justice services for the people who we are asking to tell their stories every day as an act of courage. It's an act of courage to tell that story every time you go to a board meeting, knowing that these people may or may not listen to you, and so the healing justice work was critical for me to have be a pillar, and so you'll see it as pretty much all the organizations, all the businesses that I have created established been a part of founding healing and healing justice is at the center of it, at the center of them, and then my own personal practice.
Speaker 2:
I'm a deep believer of therapy. You know, in 2018, when my first book was published by Memoir, one of the first things that I said to the media was firstly, black people need reparations, and part of our reparations package should be a competent therapist for every single black person. In perpetuity, we need consistent and perpetual care for the harm that this place has done to us and continues to do to us every single day.
Speaker 2:
You don't undo years and years of violence, racism. Through a couple therapeutic sessions, I think a lot about the impact physical illness has on black people. You can get you know a black person who's the healthiest. You know raw vegan, you know taking care of their bodies, working out. And then you know a white person who is living in middle America not eating well and look at their health status and that white person is going to outlive the black person simply because of racism, simply because of living in a violent system that doesn't take care of our bodies.
Speaker 2:
Think about maternal health care. They say that black wealthy moms have worse maternal outcomes than white poor women because of a racist system, because of all the years of medical neglect. Before you get pregnant and have a child, it doesn't matter that you're wealthy, and so I think about that a lot as we're talking about health and healing, what that will take. It's not a personal responsibility, although the wellness sort of industry will say it's your personal responsibility to take care of yourself. No, I don't believe in self-care, I believe in collective care. I believe in the care of human beings through systems. We need systemic care.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, I was trying to find a reference my student had gave me from his psych courses. There's a formal diagnosis that was given to slaves for their fugivity that they would think a slave wanting to run away from slavery somehow was an act of insanity. And certainly that's not the mental health care that we're calling for A decolonial mental health care that heals and not harm right, yeah, I'm just gonna.
Speaker 2:
I looked it up Drapedomania was a supposed mental illness that an 1851 American physician, samuel A Cartwright, hypothesized as the cause of enslaved Africans fleeing captivity.
Speaker 1:
Yes, that's it. And there was another one too. I can't find my notes from class last week, but yes, that's it. And it's insane to think that we're crazy and losing our mind for wanting to be free and escape slavocracy. And that's how society works, right? That's how the hegemonic imagination works. It's always to construct us as bestial, as animalistic, as non-being, non-human in all the ways psychologically, emotionally, mentally, physically, aesthetically, right To somehow cancel us right in that way. So you mentioned about reproductive justice, and you're also a mother and I'm wondering if you could share a bit. How has it been to midwife a movement while also giving birth to your child? And as a mom right, what can you tell us about midwifing a movement and giving birth to your own child? And and how is your mothering um a way for you yourself to cultivate, to nurture um the next generation of abolitionists?
Speaker 2:
It's a good question. I feel like I'm still processing that question. Okay, I feel like it's, you know, the I think, back being pregnant and the height has been. There'll be many heights and moments in our movements, but, you know, I gave birth to my child in 2016 and that was the you know year of Alton Sterling and Philando Castile, and I see images of me.
Speaker 2:
It was, you know, two months maybe after my pregnancy, I had a. I had an emergency C-section when I was, like in the streets, you know, um, marching, and I literally cannot, I like cannot believe I was, like you know, spending hours and hours in the streets marching, um, given that my body was still trying to heal from major surgery. Um, I talk about activism and organizing a lot as black people, as you know, there's this idea that black people just love to be fighting for our lives on the front lines, right? So it's sort of a romantic idea about that, and I'll say that many of us would rather be making art being with our families cooking, being free, smelling the grass, frolicking, gardening there's all these things in which Making love, making love.
Speaker 2:
All these things in which our life would look different if we didn't have to fight for it all the time Right. So many of us are courageous enough to fight for Black lives and be a part of the lineage that is the fight for Black lives. But I'll also say that I can't wait for a day where we don't have to do it, where we can live full, healthy, thriving lives.
Speaker 1:
We don't have to call another family member and tell them that loved one has been killed and walk them through the process, where we don't have to be the person experiencing our loved one being killed and having to walk our loved ones through the process of healing. I look forward to that day. We deserve that day we do To live long lives and become elders and venerated ancestors in the fullness of life. Right, you have given so much, you have sacrificed so much for this movement and I'm not sure people understand the gravity that comes with that, and so I personally, every time I've seen you and I've known you for more than 10 years now give you my deep appreciation for all that you have given and courageously stood up for our democracy, for our country, for our communities, for us to live, and in your co-leadership role of pioneering one of the most powerful movement in the history of Black struggle. What are some of your reflections, revelations and insights about the importance of validating the Black Lives Matter, but also protecting Black women like yourself?
Speaker 2:
Oh man, that's another one. I'm still processing.
Speaker 1:
Yes.
Speaker 2:
I'll say that none of us were prepared for the level of Black backlash that we'd experience at the hands of white racism, although we all know about it so well, we've read about it, we've heard about it. I think abolition, more deep study and practice with abolitionist values will help this generation and the next generation of organizers, activists in the fight for Black lives. We need to think about the ways to protect Black women more in our work. There is a deep need to re-evaluate all of our relationship to social media, yes, and which we've allowed for social media to become the place where we believe what's on it, especially misinformation, disinformation, especially Black people. When I saw Black people spreading the misinformation and disinformation about me online and it wasn't digital Blackface, because I know what's a bot and what's not that's when I was most disappointed. Also, that's when I was like, oh they, they, they've won. Um, I, I just finished, I.
Speaker 2:
I every now and again go back and watch malcolm spikey's malcolm x stunning film and I remember um, you know all these news articles that he was reading about himself, about the honorable elijah muhammad, and, and there's just this beautiful conversation that he was having and you know he wasn't using the terms misinformation, disinformation. But he was saying, like this is the same newspaper that, um, uh, you know this is a white supremacist newspaper, this is white-led media and you have to be really conscious of that. So, yeah, I think you know some deeper conversations about the role of social media and the role it's played in upending social movements. I think we need to talk about, you know, racist algorithms.
Speaker 2:
Sophia Noble's work has been profound and really having this conversation about racist algorithms, I'm really interested in the new technology, not because I'm interested in using it, necessarily, but I'm interested in what role it's going to play and creating more misinformation and disinformation and how we are really ignorant on how to read that. You know, I've had to tell a lot of my cousins because they are getting trolled because of me, after my cousin's death, after Kenan's death to teach them what's a bot, what's a real person, what's not, what's worth arguing with, what's not. But the point is that social media has created a space for the division of this country to keep being more and more divided. That's on purpose and if we don't understand that and if we are not able to create new pathways to challenge the algorithm, we're going to let this current COINTELPRO moment really create a lot of havoc.
Speaker 1:
Yes, yeah, and I'm happy that there are a lot of scholars, or increasingly more scholars, who are dealing with AI and algorithms from a decolonial lens and perspective. I know there's someone at USC, a guy there that I met, who was doing similar work. But you're right, right, like, information for so long has been used, or misinformation, to sabotage leaders and movements, and the technology has just changed movements, and the technology has just changed, right, but it's all a form of surveillance, right? That's right, yeah, and so it is what Foucault called the panopticon. It is right, these systems of power that are working, and we've seen the rise of it with Trump.
Speaker 1:
Right, even more so this use of fake news and misinformation, and we have to be vigilant. We have to be vigilant, right, and we knew it in the 90s when they said don't believe the hype, right Period. And so I know we had some really difficult questions and many that you are still processing. So thank you for just opening yourself in this space. I want to talk about what do you do to find joy. What do you do to find joy?
Speaker 2:
Yeah, I hang out with my kid a lot. I love being in community with my friends and family. I love cooking, making food.
Speaker 1:
When my name get in that pot.
Speaker 2:
I got you. Sorry for the vegans, but I'm working on an oxtail Oxtail vibes. I know I'm ready, i'm'm ready. I've never made them, but I'm ready to do it what girl I'm gonna have to give you the recipes. Let me tell you, I can throw down too, so we might have to have that's right some potlucking, I'm down, um uh yeah, I love being in nature and I love listening to music really loud and dancing my ass off All those things.
Speaker 1:
I love it. I love it, I love it. Well, and who keeps you accountable to these things that give you joy and make sure that you're not working from a deficit but finding your cup overflowing? Who?
Speaker 2:
holds you accountable or what I got a, I got a crew, I got a crew that holds me accountable and I really appreciate it.
Speaker 1:
Awesome, as we conclude this talk um the what would you call it, but what we did in the name of Kenan Anderson? A performance protest, a performance protest. Tell us about that. Give us the vision and the imagery of that day.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, I worked with Beyonce's choreographer, Jaquel Knight, who choreographed and directed a performance protest to lift up my cousin, Kenan Anderson, who was killed at a traffic stop by.
Speaker 2:
LAPD, but also so many other Black people killed at traffic stops across the country, and it was just a moment to challenge the current art world. There's a huge fair called Freeze that happens here in Los Angeles. It happened in Santa Monica, seven minutes away from where my cousin was killed. Not a single person a part of Freeze connected with me, knowing that I'm a part of the art world, asked me questions, asked me how they could support, and I really wanted to challenge their audience and their base to look at what's happening right next door.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, it was a powerful demonstration. It was picked up by the New York Times. It was a powerful demonstration. Well, sis, thank you so much for being with us today. Is there any way that we could support you? Anything you want to drop handles, URLs? What can we purchase? Where can we buy it?
Speaker 2:
let us know and I'm just focusing on my art, my art practice. It's very humbling. It feels really inspiring. I'm really grateful for it thank you.
Speaker 1:
Where can we buy this stuff? Where can we pick up our north star?
Speaker 2:
you can um contact um info at crenshaw dairy martorg if you want to come check out the bags. They're no longer on exhibition but you can always contact us and we can have a. You can get a studio visit.
Speaker 1:
Fantastic, so thank you so much for joining us. I am your host, reverend Dr Nakia Smith-Robert, and the Executive Director of Abolitionist Sanctuary. You can follow me at Nakia S Robert and at Abolitionist Sanctuary. You can follow me at Nakia S Robert and at Abolitionist Sanctuary on Instagram, facebook and Twitter. You can also sign up for exclusive updates. Donate and support us at wwwabolitionistsanctuaryorg.
Speaker 1:
As we conclude this episode, remember that abolition is not a practice, but it is a religion, and this is what we believe. We believe in a God of the oppressed. We believe that Black women share divinity with God Hagar, harriet, sojourner, carol and countless others who make a way out of no way. We believe in Black women as worthy, a source of salvation and whose moral agency to make a way out of no way demonstrates the cardinal virtues of compassion, care, creativity, courage and community over and against condemnation and criminality. We believe in a brown Palestinian Jew, the black Messiah Jesus, who was profiled, policed and persecuted by the state on trumped up charges. We believe that Jesus died a criminal but did not wake up one. He transcended criminality on the cross, but no one ever needs to die for us to be saved.
Speaker 1:
We believe in spirit as advocate who draws the least of these femme, women, men, girls, boys and gender non-conforming people together in a beloved community. We believe in a resurrection hope that calls us into right relationship and to restore the human dignity of individuals who are criminalized, caged and cashed out. We affirm discipleship as a call to advance a faith-based abolitionist movement to create spiritual, legal and economic sanctuaries, to transform social structures where the last become first and the captives are set free, where the last become first and the captives are set free. We are abolitionist sanctuaries, leading a coalition to repair, restore and rebuild a more just and equitable society of communal thriving. Dr Najuma, thank you so much for being with us. Amen, thank you.
