#BLACKLIVESMATTER | Thank you for your time. You are more helpful outside.
Thank you for informing yourself. Thank you for taking the time to repost the nicely designed graphics of black inventors, unbelievable historical facts that weren’t taught in history books and favoriting all the black businesses you should be supporting instead of corporations. That was nice of you. It’s great to know you are learning, but we need to have a conversation on how helpful you are really being.
Protesters at Los Angeles’s Solidarity March in Hollywood/ Asha Moné
Protesters outside of Victorville’s City Hall demanding answer for the death of Malcolm Harsch / Asha Moné
On June 12th, social media was buzzing about a young man named Robert Fuller who was found hanging outside of the Palmdale City Hall, across from the Palmdale fire station at 3am Wednesday morning. On June 13th, social media became aware of another black man named Malcolm Harsch, found 2 weeks earlier, “hanging from a tree” in Victorville. In this same week, 3 more black bodies were confirmed to be founded hanging from trees across the country. At the same time, an alternative group, All Black Lives Matter LA, announced that they would be holding a Los Angeles PRIDE in conjunction with council member Mitch O’Farrell. This year’s PRIDE was changed into a “solidarity march” to combine the LGBTQ+ community with the Black community. This was scheduled for that coming Sunday, June 14th. An estimated 10,000 people were said to attend.
I bring up these events because there is some hypocrisy in the ally and solidarity movement. I would like to believe people mean well, but the amount of people that came out to the “solidarity march” did not equate to half the people I have seen come out to Palmdale and Victorville for the last weeks nor any other marches. There were more people at the solidarity march than at the “Jackie Lacey Must Go” protest in the last 2 weeks combined. Most of these attendees haven’t even attended another protest.
In the last week I have seen more photographers and publication post beautiful photos of camaraderie at the PRIDE march, but have not seen the same level of enthusiasm being held keeping the names of the black trans lives that have been lost, Tony McDade, Riah Milton, and Dominique “Rem’mie” Fells, circulating in the media. What is meaningful to you? Why are you actually outside?
I want you to re-read my next statement as many times as you need to so that it sticks in you head.
BLACK LIVES MATTER. Black cis-women, Black trans-women, black men and black disabled people, afro-latinx people, black lgbtq+ people, black children. Anyone that identifies as apart of the black diaspora, matters. We are one. Do not try to separate us.
Now let’s be real about some things in regards to this solidarity march.
Painting ‘ALL BLACK LIVES MATTER’ on the street in Hollywood is counterproductive, tone deaf and a pacification tactic and here's why.
Counterproductive: There are no official LA County offices on Hollywood Blvd. If your goal is to make LAPD, the city council, Mayor Eric Garcetti, LA District Attorney, Jackie Lacey, or anyone else that has been under pressure believe “Black Lives Matter,” you would have put that mural in front of their office, in Downtown Los Angeles. No exceptions..
Tone Deaf: Black Trans Lives are under-represented in the media and social outcry for justice. This statement does not give you a foundation to “All Black Lives Matter" the movement. It gives off he same energy as “All Lives Matter.” It creates room for division in a community that is already marginalized and also gives a stage for LA's whitewashed LGBTQ+ scene to use this moment as a way to get out the house from COVID-19, grab some selfies with celebrities that haven't been to any protest, profit off of Black Lives Matter without any affiliation with the organization and still have their LA Pride without the name attached. You could have just painted “Black Trans Lives Matter.” The march wasn't actually meant to be about solidarity. If it was, the press release would not have grouped LGBTQ+ and Black Lives as separate entities.
Pacification: I don’t know of any Black person who has asked for these Black Lives Matter street paintings across the country. Did you know that the All Black Lives Matter, do not get them confused with Black Lives Matter, organizers partnered with multi- million dollar marketing agency, Trailer Park Group, and controversial Council member, Mitch O’Farrell, to create that street mural? Council member O’Farrell is known to be anti-homeless, pro-police, anti-tenant, pro-policies that criminalize black and brown people and all around just happy to waste the city’s budget on unnecessary things. The mural was scheduled to be scrubbed off the street by city workers no less than 24hrs after the march, but O’Farrell order the stop of the cleaning after coming under scrutiny. It has not been disclosed how much money was allocated from the LA City budget to create the mural or the cleaning. It was a great distraction and a beautiful, volunteer created, media push.
Protestors outside of the “Jackie Lacey Must Go” rally in Los Angeles. / Asha Moné
Do not get me wrong, I am happy that Black Trans Women were given the opportunity to express themselves in a large scale. They deserve safety, compassion, visibility and love just as everyone else. I am extremely frustrating though. Not only as a reporter, but as a human being with common sense seeing people be unaware of how the system plays off our weaknesses. We can see where reform is happening because of our active presence. I have no idea why PRIDE was done in Hollywood if it was meant to bring attention to Black Lives Matter. If all the policies are created at City Hall, why not do it there. While the immense amount of capitalism shown at the march was comical, even that would have been better used at City Hall.
But this is the current problem with intersectionality and allyship. People only come when they think it suits them best.
Intersectionality and being an ally does not start and stop when things do not affect you specifically. You can spend two hours of your time to drive to a ‘solidarity pride’ in Hollywood, but can’t do the same drive to go to Palmdale, Victorville or downtown Los Angeles to City Hall? Is this because you are busy or is this because those places aren’t convenient for you? Could it be you are subconsciously prioritizing one community based off of your own bias’s or are you only available to be outside showing support where you feel “safe” and surrounded by people just like you? Do you believe one Black Life is more important than another?
The solidarity march showed me that some allies are only available when it’s in their community. They are only available when they are able to show off for social media or able to capitalize off of the movement for their own gain. Those lessons you are learning from book, articles and history only work when you partner it with learned experiences. While I haven’t spoke in depth about my time in Palmdale or Victorville, those protest showed me how allyship depends on connivence, not justice. If major photo opportunities are not found, some allies will not come out.
The media has shown us what happens when we do not show grave “public interest” in these cases. For example, in the case of Tete Gulley, a queer Trans woman found hanging from a tree in Portland, Oregon in 2019, the case was initially just ruled a suicide and swept under the rug because there was no public outcry. Now that the public has founded out about Gulley’s death a full year later, the Portland PD has been forced to open the case up again. Just recently in Palmdale, the Palmdale Sheriff's department had to take back their initial ruling of “suicide” because of the large presence in the first two days of protest.
We are the change. Check your person bias’s.
Officers outside of the Palmdale Sheriffs’s Station/ Asha Moné
Officers outside of the Palmdale Sheriffs’s Station/ Asha Moné
Gil Scott Heron said “the revolution will not be televised.” The alternative is not to stay at home behind your computer screen or stay in areas that are comfortable to you. We need you to be just as vocal about the communities that you are familiar with as the communities you aren’t.
Must I remind you again. Black Lives Matter. There is not separation.
Do us all a favor, go outside and use your privilege to protest, but be aware of what is happening around you and behind the scenes. Be active where these injustices are happening. There is power in numbers. You are more helpful standing in front of city hall for an hour than you are just signing petitions or partying in the Hills. Implement all that information you are learning about by standing up for the people in real life. Information isn’t helpful bottled up. Learned experiences are extremely important. Put your boots on the ground and help out.
Protestors outside of the Palmdale Sheriffs’s Station demanding answer for the death of Robert Fuller / Asha Moné