A wake up call
March against racism to honor Dr. King's legacy
Published Dec 20, 2007 6:46 PM
The International Action Center and the Fight Imperialism, Stand
Together (FIST) youth group are initiating an important call to action around
the U.S. for Jan. 21, 2008, the official Martin Luther King Jr. birthday
holiday. The call motivates people for solidarity and unity in the struggle
against racism and all forms of injustice at home and abroad. It also calls for
a national march in New York City along with other mobilizations around the country on this day focusing support for the
Black community and immigrant rights. The following are excerpts from the
call. There will be more articles on this important initiative in future WW
issues. Go to www.iacenter.org to read the
entire call.
There is a time for celebrations and there’s a time for fighting.
Now is a time that we need to fight. On this King Holiday we must organize and march against the forces of racism, reaction and war, not just the war abroad but the war raging here at home.
The racism is not just coming from the fringes; it’s been deemed respectable and popular and it’s
being pushed by the mainstream corporate media.
What’s more, the storm is gaining strength at a time when the economy is
heading into a crisis that is bound to make economic survival for those who are
already impoverished more difficult, while tossing millions more, who thought
they were getting along okay, out of their homes and jobs.
The system is setting up its scapegoats for the hard times by gearing up for
racist hate. Lou Dobbs has suddenly become very important. Why? Because in
times like these, the system’s biggest worry is that poor and working
people will come together and demand social and economic justice. If we fail to
unite and fight racism we should only expect much more of the same.
Reports of nooses hanging in locker rooms across the country are up 1,000
percent.
Mychal Bell, one of the Jena 6, will have to stay in prison for almost another
year, but “shock jock” Don Imus is back on the air, with
presidential candidates and VIPs tripping over each other to get on his
show.
Immigrants have been turned into the “Willie Hortons” of the 2008
presidential elections as candidates compete with each other over who can sound
the toughest against undocumented workers.
From New Orleans to Harlem and in every other part of the country, Black people
are being pushed out of their homes as the drive by the wealthy to gentrify,
helped by hurricanes and mortgage foreclosures, is barreling full steam ahead.
The wholesale incarceration of a generation of young Black people is not
slowing down; it’s accelerating. The police war against Black youth is
not easing; it’s growing.
More immigrant workers have been arrested in raids, denied housing and health
care, locked up in concentration camp-type detention centers, deported,
harassed, beaten up or murdered, than at any time since the infamous
anti-immigrant Palmer raids 90 years ago. And just like 90 years ago,
anti-immigrant bigotry and repression are being used to derail labor union
organizing.
Bush’s endless war is not only against people thousands of miles away, it
has made Muslims and people of Arab, African or South Asian origin fair game
for harassment, persecution and torture.
Lest we forget, from the Supreme Court to bigoted cops, jailers, judges and
anti-gay thugs, the rights of women are under attack, and there is war against
lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people.
Along with anti-immigrant bashing and attacking Mexico and China, Dobbs has
lately begun to call on union members who are “American citizens”
to rise up against “treacherous” labor union leaders who dare to
organize undocumented workers.
Combating the divide-and-conquer strategy is going to take work, time, courage
and commitment. One of the most obvious ways to fight it is to work to make
sure that the thousands of white people who will get on buses to go to a
protest against the war in Iraq will also get on the buses going to support a
Jena 6 rally or an immigrant-rights rally. When that happens it makes
demagogues like Dobbs weaker and all of us stronger.
Articles copyright 1995-2012 Workers World.
Verbatim copying and distribution of this entire article is permitted in any medium without royalty provided this notice is preserved.
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