hi, I'm Ashton and it's been a while
since I posted a YouTube video, I'm sorry,
but obviously a lot of stuff has been
going on. It doesn't feel right for me to
post my, like, quote/unquote normal videos
until I talk about this, as I've been
talking about it everywhere else,
and it feels wrong to not do as much as
I can and address it on my largest
platform, which is this, so hi. As you all
know if you have watched any of my
videos before, I talk about a lot of
social justice issues on this channel,
but for the most part, I talk about
groups that I am a part of because that
is the sort of thing that I have the
most knowledge and insight on. This is
an exception to that. I do my best on
other platforms to consistently lift up
other people's voices, but by its nature
YouTube is not a great platform for that.
Regardless of what YouTube wants, that is
what I'm going to use this video to do. I
am NOT going to go over everything that
is happening in the U.S. right now. If you
want to know more about it, there is so
much information out there. That said,
be careful where you find that
information, and be aware of mass
media's pro-cop bias, just keep that in
mind. Do your research. But that's not
what this video's for, and likelihood is
if you're viewing this you're probably
aware of what's going on, at least at a
base level. So this video is for my white
audience, as you can tell from the title.
From what I know, most of my audience is
white lgbtq+ people, and I want to talk
to you all about this. I am NOT here
to tell black people how to feel or what
to do, that is bullshit. I want to talk to
my fellow white people about resources
that I've used and how you can learn,
what we can do, what essays and resources
are already out there so that you can
stop bothering black people about
resources that have been put out there
over and over again. Also just a note, if
you defend cops in my comment section
it will delete it. Not because I
"don't value discussion" or your "free
speech," but because nobody needs to see
that right now, and the last thing that I
want is your little devil's-advocate
comment to be seen by someone whose
literal livelihood is threatened by the
police every fucking day of their lives.
Thank you. I have seen so many white
people over the past couple weeks asking
like black people directly "what can I do
to help?" and I know it comes from a good
place, but there are so many essays, so
many books, so many videos and resources and reading lists and mutual aid funds
that are already out there and that
people have already put together. You
should not be asking black people to do
that work for you. I am not an authority
on this, you do not need to listen to me.
I want to lead you towards resources
that are already out there so that you
can learn more without bothering black
people. What is happening right now, what
has been happening since the dawn of
colonialism, is despicable. The repeated
murders of black people by police
officers stems from structural racism
and the foundation upon which the police
system was built. This is not a new
issue, this is not the first nor last
time that I will talk about this or
spread resources about this. I want you
all to be aware that I support black
liberation, I support revolutionaries, I
support looters, I support organizers, I
support prison abolition and police
abolition, and because I know a lot of my
audience is white,
I wanna direct you towards resources
that will help you do the same. This
video is not here for me to justify my
position or explain the philosophy
behind ACAB, rather I want to offer you
resources on the necessary discussions
that you need to be having with yourself
and your family members and resources on
reading and avenues of donating and
people that you need to be listening to
that you can look into right now without
even bothering a black person. Isn't that
great? For my black audience, I know there
are plenty of you as well, some of the
resources in the description might be
helpful for you. There's a bunch of like
free reading stuff that I'm gonna be
talking about, and of course you are
more than welcome to add whatever you
see fit in the comments. First and
foremost, please protect yourself right
now. I'm not gonna be showing any like
violent/traumatic videos in this video
or anything, I won't be talking in-depth
about any of that. I know that seeing
videos of police brutality over and over
can be fucking traumatic, and if you
can't deal with that, if you need to step
away, please do so. So hey, white people,
how are you doing?
Are you uncomfortable? 'Cuz you should be.
It's okay to be uncomfortable and it
should be uncomfortable for you to read
about colonialism, murder, mass
incarceration, institutionalized racism;
because those aren't good things, those
aren't things that you should be
comfortable with. Something that all of
us need to realize is that by default, we
don't want to consider ourselves a part
of the problem. But, if you as an
individual aren't part of the problem, then
it shouldn't be an issue for you to
uplift black voices, donate to street
medics, show up physically or online or
emotionally or however you fucking can,
because that's really important right
now. And if you aren't doing the work
within yourself, then it's a great place
to start, and
hopefully this video will help you with
that. I'll talk a bit more like
one-on-one/normally at the end of this
video, but first I want to talk about
some things that you can read and donate
to and people that you should follow
because that is a big gap that I'm
seeing. There are a lot of people that
know police brutality is going on and
know that it's wrong, but don't know
where they can further educate
themselves, don't know where to donate,
don't know the first thing about direct
action, and I'm hoping to bridge that gap
a little bit. And it's okay to not know,
it's alright to not be aware of things,
but what you shouldn't be doing is put
pressure on already overwhelmed black
people to give you resources that are
already accessible and out there. The
very first thing in the video there will
be timestamps, in case you need to skip
around to certain sections, like if you
know you want to read something right
now, or if you're watching this video
real quick and you just want a place to
donate, like you can look at the
timestamps. But below that is all of the
links and all the resources that I'm
going to be providing you with. Before I
tell you about literally anything, let's
talk about donation. If you can donate
even a little bit, I would encourage you
to. The first link below is an article by
Anthony William James we'll talk about
in a little bit that's a really great
read if you're like kind of struggling
to like conceptualize or understand the
idea of reparations and donations and
why they're important. And it's also a
very good resource to send to other
people that you might be trying to
convince of the same. Also before you
donate anywhere, make sure it is not run
by Sean King. The next link is only one
article, but it does a pretty good job
cataloging all of the like sketch things
that he's done. He's done some real
questionable fundraising in the past, and
you know at the end of the day it's
probably just better to donate to other
causes, so read that if you're unsure on
why. Or you can just take my word for it,
don't donate to things organized by Sean
King. But those two things out of the way,
it would take me a very long time to go
through every single place you can donate, I'm gonna be linking a couple
things that I know of and trust. The
first one is a carrd list of a bunch of
mutual aid networks around the U.S. While
this is a pretty impressive list of them,
I would HIGHLY encourage you to seek out
local ones. Like my local one, for when
I'm at school, is not on that list, but I
still support them. So, while it is a good
list of them, I would further encourage
you to get involved in and donate to
your very local mutual aid networks,
which I'll talk about in a little bit.
The second carrd I'll link is a section
about donations that you've probably
seen passed around a lot. It's got them
organized by like ways to help victims,
ways to help protesters, bail funds,
different organizations doing important
work.
So I encourage you to check out that as
well, but I know a lot of you are also
young, and if you can't donate that is
okay. Don't feel guilty about that.
Capitalism fucks us all over, but
remember that it disproportionately
fucks over marginalized groups. If your
family has a bunch of generational
wealth, especially if you live in the
states, it's not unlikely that that money
came from a plantation. If you have the
ability to give that money back, you
should. Now again, I know a lot of you are
younger, and if you can't give directly
monetarily there are still ways that you
can help. There's a pretty long youtube
video that I would highly recommend
watching, I believe it's linked in one of
the carrds, but I'm also going to link it
directly in description since we're
already on YouTube. It features dozens of
black artists and speakers, it's got
ads sprinkled throughout so that all the
Adsense can go to things like funerals
and bail funds and helping the people
that are fighting against this directly.
You can look through the comments on
that video to figure out how your
watching can be the most effective when
it comes to donation, but I'd recommend
watching it anyway because it is a
beautiful and incredibly well-done video.
And yes, if you have YouTube premium, they
will still get revenue from you! Also on
the topic of donations, I would like to
point out that the Minnesota freedom fund
is kind of overwhelmed. They were the
first like you know fund to be shared a
shit-ton, and it's great that they have
gotten so many donations, even from like
very highly prominent people in whatever
celebrity world. There are other places
they could probably use your money a lot
more effectively because currently the
Minnesota freedom fund has a lot of
money. And I'm sure they're using it well,
I trust them to do that, I'm not saying
they aren't, but I'm saying that your money
can also go other places and donations
right now, I think, can be a lot more
effective if you direct them towards
local mutual aid groups or directly to
black people that are struggling right
now. On the topic of donating your time,
there are obviously a lot of ways that
you can do that, but petitions take like
20-30 seconds.
So the next few links in the
description will be threads of petitions
that you may not have already signed,
because I know there's a lot of popular
ones going around, I know you've probably
signed a few, but
does it hurt to sign a couple more? I
wouldn't think so. This should go without
saying, but of course read the petition
first and know what you're signing for, like
just. I just wanted to clarify that. A lot
of the petitions are on change.org, um
and multiple people have brought up that
change.org is like a very very large
business/corporation/entity or whatever,
and after you sign it, it tells you to
donate. Do not donate to change.org. If
you have those three dollars that they
want you to donate, give them directly to
a black trans woman or your local mutual
aid group. change.org does not need those few dollars, they do not go
directly towards the petition that you
have just signed. Next thing I want to
talk about is that local is important.
You don't need to be involved in like
these giant like ACLU-type groups, right?
You don't have to know everything about
super big international efforts. If the
best you can do is connect with your
local community and local groups, that is
amazing and I would highly recommend
that you do so. Get involved with your
local radical and mutual aid groups,
oftentimes they don't even need money,
but if you can volunteer your time that
is incredible.
Depending on what the group focuses on,
you might be cooking meals, you might be
running groceries, you might be waiting
outside of jail for like protesters that
have been arrested to get out. There's a
bunch of different things you can do
just by donating your time and your
energy, and if you can do that, if you're
in a place where you can do that, that's
that's incredible. There are even
organizing and information-collecting
things that you can do online, and once
you're connected to like a couple local
radical organizations, I guarantee you
there will be something that you can
help out with. Food not bombs is great,
it's a relatively widespread, vaguely
anarchist group that focuses on direct
action and mutual aid through
distribution of vegan and vegetarian
food.
I love Food Not Bombs, you can find your
local chapter by searching Food Not
Bombs and then your city, or Food Not
Bombs and your area code, for me it's my
area code. Food Not Bombs also has a page
on their website that's like a map of the
different chapters of the organization,
but it is kind of behind. Like, it's not
that very well updated, mine isn't on
there, so like so take it with a grain of
salt but it might be helpful. If you're
already involved with a local radical
group, they probably would know
about any local Food Not Bombs efforts,
so get in contact with them, follow them
and find out what they need, see if you
can help. I will link the site website
down below. the IWW, Industrial
Workers of the World, is also a great
thing to keep up with, even if you
weren't currently part of a union.
They've got tons of resources on
unionizing, a union directory, a shop if
you're so inclined, and they don't let
police unions join! So honestly, one of
the best things and most effective
things that you can do locally is stay
connected with local organizers, follow
them, figure out what they need, figure
out how you can help them in any way
that you can, even if it's just online
collecting information. Find who's
organizing protests, figure out who's
organizing mutual aid, keep up with
people monitoring police scanners in
your area, and soon enough you will find
yourself in a network of artists,
activists, organizers that you can keep
up with and know what's going on and
know how to help. I know from personal
experience it can be a little bit more
difficult when you're a college student
bouncing between different cities, but I
promise you you can probably keep up
with two different cities at once or
just focus on the one you're at college in,
I mainly do that. It's difficult to
give advice on like local stuff on a
platform that is by its nature like
international, but I try, and I hope that
some of that helped. Okay, so now that
we've been through ways of donating, good
petitions to sign, organizations to
connect with and follow, I would like to
highlight a few black people that I have
learned a lot from. I'm not saying you
have to follow all of these people or
that I endorse every single one of their
opinions, in fact I'm a bit more radical
than a lot of them, but I have still
learned a lot from them about race, and
let's be honest, you are probably not
following enough black people. I know
I've talked about a lot of them before,
and you might already be following a few,
but nothing wrong with following a few
more, and if you don't wanna hear my
recommendations just skip this chapter.
Amplifying black people's voices is
always important, and especially for
white gays, um, some of you all need to do
better. A lot of white gays only follow
other white gays. Listen, you're already
on YouTube watching this video, and I
promise you you can afford a few more
black women in your subscription box.
You've probably already figured this out,
but I don't want to just sit here and
parrot things black people have
already said. I'd much rather direct you
towards resources where you can do that
listening for yourself. So I do have
quite a few recommendations for you all,
but I want you to keep in mind that a
lot of these people do not make content
for you. A lot of them create content for
fellow black people, and that's something
that you should be aware of when you're
following them. The majority of these
people aren't giving you like, 101, 'hey
racism exists' education, a lot of them
are talking about more in-depth things
and more complex things, and I think a
lot of white gays need to listen to more
of that, which is what I'm recommending
them. However, I don't want you to follow
these people for ally points, I don't
want you to go to their comments and ask
for evidence and resources when the
information is already out there. A lot
of them are just trying to talk about their
fucking experiences, just listen. It takes
less energy to not comment. You can just
leave a thumbs up. The first person I
want to talk about is actually
super relevant to this section of the
video, her name is Claire and she goes by
Professor Flowers on her social medias. I
started following her recently after she
was eyeballed in thoughtslime's 'oops all
eyeballs' focus on black creators video.
Her most recent video is, in my eyes, is an
incredible and very insightful look into
how the leftist end of YouTube
oftentimes looks at race, and how it's so
often catered to white people. I would
highly recommend watching it, especially
as a lot of the creators that I'm going
to be talking to you about don't make
content catered to white people, and that
video might be able to help you
understand like why and the context of a
lot of these creators. That video of hers
was put out two months ago, but I would
still highly encourage you to watch it,
and her YouTube and Twitter are both
linked down below. Now I'll mention the rad
person that I linked an article from
earlier, Anthony William James. You should
particularly check out their 'black queer
man's syllabus on whiteness,' it includes
a bunch of really important writing from
them. I will also link their profile on
medium, because it includes a bunch of
just really good writing, and you should
read some. Their work is mostly
shortform, takes like two to five
minutes to read one of their articles. And
I will be linking their Twitter,
because they are constantly talking
about really important things on there
and I have learned so much from
following them. They are also literally
the entire reason that I read pedagogy
of the oppressed, probably like a year
ago now? So thank you Anthony for my
life. next person I'll recommend is Amanda, she describes her youtube as a beauty
entertainment channel and she just sits
there, she does her makeup and goes on
rants. It's wonderful. Her videos feel
like they're a friend talking to you about
something that she's really passionate
about, and I enjoy her videos even when
they're about stuff that I literally
don't give a shit about.
Do I know anything about the
Billboard charts? No, but I will watch a
45-minute video of her ranting about
them, and when she gets political and
opinionated she's really great. um her
Twitter is also rad and I will link
that as well as her YouTube, so check her
out.
Someone that I've been watching for a
while now and highly recommend is Ti. Her
Instagram, YouTube, and Patreon are all
nappyheadedjojoba, and they're all
linked down below. She talks about pop
culture, fashion, hair, she critiques
capitalism, which is right up my alley,
and relevant to this discussion she
talks about activism, allyship, the
realities of being a black woman,
structural racism, copaganda, and wow she
does a lot of good work and I would
highly recommend checking her out.
Another person that I have a lot of
praise for is Gem. Their main platform is
tiktok, and I'm not the biggest fan of
tiktok, but I will use tiktok if it
means I get to see their content. All
their bios are like 'leftist propaganda
machine,' which is just perfect, and their
content is sometimes funny, sometimes
uplifting, and pretty much always very
educational. They go by urdoingreat on all their social media that they
have, and I will link their tiktok,
Twitter, Instagram, and Patreon all down
below. Ericka Hart, let's talk about them! Ericka Hart is a sex educator, her work has
taught me so many things. She's
unapologetic, they're really outspoken
against racism and sexism, and every -ism
that exists. Their work is really
important, and whenever her partner
appears on her social media, his words
are incredibly powerful too. I will link
their main website, Instagram, and Twitter
all down below. My next rec is Imani
Barbarin, she's a black disabled writer
and speaker. She's created a plethora of
hashtags for disability awareness that
you've probably seen before and not
known who created them - it's probably her!
She has written so much rad stuff, I've
learned a lot from her, and I bet you
will too.
She also recently got verified on
Twitter, which is super exciting! um
anyways, her Twitter, Instagram, and
website are all linked in the description.
Next I'll point you towards forHarriet,
it's a channel run by Kim that focuses
on black feminism, politics, pop culture,
and often a mix between all three topics.
She just sits on her floor and talks
about life, she seems super
down-to-earth and her takes are always
real refreshing. As far as I know, she
does work on YouTube and Patreon, both of
which are linked down below. She also
has a news/blog-type website but it
hasn't been updated since 2018, so.
Alright last one I promise, I've
recommended her before but I very much
enjoy Kat Blaque's work.
She has done a wide variety of content
in the past, a lot of which I would
highly recommend, but she's currently
uploading a lot of true tea videos, which
are like very just chatty, mostly
unedited, real calm, down-to-earth videos
where she talks about her life stories
and her opinions on things.
She is a polyamorous, kinky, goth, black
trans woman and an artist, and oh boy an
incredibly wonderful video content
creator. I really adore her editing style
as well as her stories, and we share a
lot of identities and experiences but
we're also different in a lot of ways,
obviously. And her videos just feel like
talking to a friend. Sarasocial
relationship I know, I know we're not
friends, I just think she's cool and I
think you should watch her. So at this
point, you've got places to donate, you've
got petitions to sign, you've got black
creators to follow, and you know you
should get involved with local mutual
aid funds and organizers. What else can
you do? You can fucking educate yourself.
Now I would be honored to point you
towards more in-depth reading
sources. You all know that I love leftist
lit, I read a lot. Not as much as I wish I
did, but a lot. Something that, admittedly,
I've really slacked on is reading more
black leftist authors. Up until, I would
say the beginning of 2020, a lot of
theory I'd read was more like older,
foundational, written by white people. You
know, Marx, Kropotkin, Rudolf Rocker, stuff like that.
And I'm not saying you shouldn't read
that, because I did learn a lot from
reading them, but you should also be
reading black leftists, black
revolutionaries. There is so much theory,
and just and not not even - just not
theory, just there's so much stuff
written by black authors that you are
probably missing out on because of the
way both our education system works and
the way that, you know, white people just
get an advantage on everything that
they're involved in. I just finished
reading Sister Outsider by Audre
Lorde, fucking incredible, would highly
recommend. But that's not my only
recommendation, so let me tell you about
my recommendations! Literally like an
hour after filming this, I read the
entirety of 'Between The World and Me'
by Ta-Nehesi Coates in one sitting. It's so
good, go read it, oh my god. I also really
hope you're enjoying the very obvious
like devolution of how I look as my
editing clips are dispersed through. Also
keep in mind that these aren't all long
books or super long essays,
and even if you aren't a reader, which
first I encourage you to be one, there
are still resources that can help you
out, and it's still worth looking through
all of these masterlists to see if
anything catches your eye. The first
thing is a twitter thread that links to
a bunch of more radically aligned
readings on race, um stuff by James
Baldwin, Malcolm X, Toni Morrison, Angela
Davis, etc. People in their replies to
that thread have linked even more
resources and PDFs and books and
articles that they would recommend, there
is definitely enough reading material in
there to keep you occupied for a long
whil,e and I would recommend reading at
least a few things in that thread! I know I
will, I've already read some of them. I
would also recommend, as a resource for
both you and anyone that you are trying
to teach, stand up against racial justice
or SURJ's resources page. It's easy to
access, easy to navigate, and most of the
language is pretty beginner-friendly. And
while you're there, you can check out the
rest of their website too! Next, I'm gonna
focus for a bit on readings about police
and prison abolition, as that is the main
goal of a shit-ton of the organizers
right now and it's something that you
need to be educated on. That's like the
general 'you,' I'm not attacking you for
not knowing about this, a lot of people
don't know about it, a lot of people do.
It is incredible, you should read about
it, and that's what I'm gonna make you -
not make you, have you, encourage you
to do. So, prison and police abolition are
things that I have supported in theory
for a while now, but not something that
I'd actually READ read about until more
recently. The very first thing is a PDF
to Angela Davis' 'Are Prisons Obsolete?'
It was the first thing I read on prison
abolition, it's only about 120 pages, and
the whole thing is free online! It's
great, you should read it, it's a really
influential text, you can knock it out in
a couple of hours. It provides great
talking points and resources on a bunch
of different things
I think you should learn about if you
want to get involved. I'd say it's pretty
beginner friendly and it's all, it's
all free online, link down below. Also on
prison abolition, there's a site called 8toabolition that's up in response to the
#8cantwait push, the hashtag 8 can't
wait thing is heavily reform-based and
it's been debunked by a bunch of
organizers and activists, so instead the
8 to abolition site is linked down below
and it includes a ton of resources on
prison abolition, how we can get there,
why we should get there, and why reform
doesn't work. I don't want you to support
police and prison abolition because it's
what I support, I want you to do your own
reading, I want you to listen to black
people, and I want you to come to your
own conclusions in concurrence with what
black organizers have been saying for decades. There are two more
books that I would recommend on police
and prison abolition, as they are both
available as free ebooks as of me
recording this, and they're highly
recommended in a lot of abolitionist
circles.
I haven't read either of them yet
because I have like four books checked
out from a digital library and I'm
trying to get through those, but I have
downloaded them and I am so excited. I have so much to read right now. So, 'The End of
Policing" by Alex S. Vitale is, as of this
video being written and recorded, free
through Verso books as an e-book. It is
linked down below. The other book is more
of an antholog,y it is called 'Who Do You
Serve, Who Do You Protect? Police Violence
and Resistance in the United States,' and
it is free as an e-book through
Haymarket books. Also linked down below.
I'm not sure how long either of those
will be free, um so go ahead and download
them now while you can. If you can't read
them for another fucking month, that's
fine
take your time, but you have no excuse
currently! download them, you can read
them on literally any device, you can
download on your phone, it's so easy, it's
very accessible. The next link is a
Google Doc that is a really incredible
organized list of a bunch of
abolitionist resources, including books,
articles, handbooks, podcasts, online
resources, people you can follow for more
information, even essays on the current
virus' impact on incarcerated people. So
that document is linked, as well as the
twitter of the person that compiled that
document. Ok, last note about abolition I
promise, but I think it's a super
important thing to learn about. um if you
think you are beyond the starter
resources, perhaps you would like to
check out the Twitter thread that's in
the next link. The thread is a work of
art, it's got links to other threads with
reading lists, Angela Davis videos,
answers to some of the most common
questions about prison abolition. There's
so much online, so many things you can
access through Twitter or even just
google docs. The things you can access
through the internet is nearly endless.
It's truly beautiful and I highly
encourage you to take advantage of it.
the next document that's linked down below
that I would also highly recommend
looking through is a scaffolded list on
resources regarding antiracism. It helps
you understand where you are in relation
to whiteness and connects you with books,
essays, videos, questions, podcasts that
meet you where you are. Beyond that, it's
got specific resources for teachers, for
younger people, helpful social media
accounts, resources specifically for
Christians, etc. Check it out, I promise
there is something in there that is
good for you. Okay, the next
compilation of resources that I would be
honored to direct you towards is a
Twitter thread with full PDFs and links
to dozens of book recommendations. It's
incredible, you cannot run out of things
to read, go read them, bookmark the tweets, thrive. All of those resources are only
scratching the surface, there is so much
out there for you to learn from, and I
would highly encourage you to do your
own research as well as, you know, reading
all the things that I've provided to you.
The resources are out there. As white
people, it is our responsibility to look
for them, read them, and it is not our
place to bother black people about them
when they've been putting them out for
decades. There is so much for you learn
from, I'm still learning. I'm not saying
I'm like an expert abolitionist, I'm a
student of it, and I think you should be too.
Before I actually move on, um I would
also recommend the app Libby I don't know
if you can see it, but L-i-B-B-Y, it lets you
connect to your local library, which
sometimes you can do through a school if
you're in a public school system, or just
if you have a library card, which you
might be able to get online depending on
your library system. So it does depend on
like where you live, but download Libby,
see what's on ther,e because there are
probably more resources out there than
you think!
I'd recommend it. There's so much that
you have access to through the internet,
use it, and use it well. So I hope that
is enough for a good start,
now I just want to I just want to talk
to you for a bit, white person to white
person, okay? I know oftentimes it feels
like you can never do enough, and in some
senses that's true, but also be mindful
of your own mental health, because if you
are not doing well, you know, you can't
fight for the things you care about as
effectively. Take care of yourself as
well as fighting for everything that you
believe in. A couple things you can do
beyond all of the other things I've ever
talked about, um, talk to your fucking
family. I guarantee you there is racism
in your family, even in my direct family
I have talked to my parents and my
brother about all of this so much.
I've talked like social issues with them
for years. Um talking about race with
your white family is difficult, I will
give you that. It is hard. I'm not saying
it's easy, but it is necessary. It's a
lot easier to
talk to your family about things when
you are educated on them, which is why a
lot of the resources that I've already
provided you with can be really helpful
when you do so. Don't argue with people
that are arguing with you in bad faith,
but a lot of people are willing to
change and are willing to learn. If you
can recognize that, and if you can turn
people on to abolition, on to black lives
matte,r if you can get people on board? Do
so. It is much safer for you, as a white
person, to talk to your white family than
for a black person to have to convince
them their life is fucking worth
something. I know it's difficult, okay,
I've done it too. I am not done, it is an
ever-evolving process, me learning as an
individual is an ever-evolving process,
but if your voice can change the mind of
a few more white people, then that's
really valuable. Talk to your racist
family members, call out the racist jokes,
call out the racist stereotypes, call out
the misinformation that they're giving
to your family. It's important,
please do it. I know it's difficult and
you can't always respond in that way, but
when it is safe, do it. I also want to
talk a little bit about protests. Be careful,
okay? There are different guidelines for
you than there are for black people. A
lot of people have talked about how
there certain chants and certain actions
that white people should probably avoid, for example, the "hands up / don't shoot"
chant is not for you, um the "I can't
breathe" chant is not for you. Chants that
you can participate in are nearly
everything else. If it feels wrong, don't
do it, but like you're allowed to yell
"black lives matter," you're allowed to say
"no justice / no peace," whatever, but a
chant like "I can't breathe," stuff that
is specifically about black bodies and
police brutality, that's not really for
you to say. I've also seen people talking
about how the black power fist shouldn't
be done by white people, I'll link a
couple things on that down below. Those
would be the next links. That type of
thing varies based on protest, if like
black organizers are asking everybody to
participate in a certain chant, then like
I would say that's fine, but listen to
black people. I'm not the authority on
this. Next link down below is a guide put
together by SURJ, who I mentioned
earlier, on white people protesting. You
should read it before you go to one!
Keith of the try guys recently put out a
song called 'white people taco night' and
and like consider, a parody where it's
"white people protest guide." you are
allowed to go to protests, you are
encouraged to go to protests, but know
what you are doing there. Know what you
are there for. Don't go to take photos
for social media or to hashtag BLM, go
to put your body between police and
black people. Go to show physical
support. Keep in mind that there's a
fucking pandemic going on, and hey, masks
serve a dual purpose! protect your
identity, protect yourself from a virus.
Listen to black people, listen to black
leaders, do your part but do it in a
respectful and responsible way.
Do not post protester's faces on social
media, film cops, don't film protesters.
There are so many important things to
understand before you go to a protest if
you can. Now is also a great time to
email your local like, boards, offices and
everything, mayors, about police
abolition. There is a website, defund 12
dot org, that is organized by state and
then city, and you can click on it and it
gives you a template for how to email
your local people! Because I'm, you
know, a college student and I kind of
split my time between where I grew up and
where I go to school, I sent a letter to
both places! Or an email, not a letter, but
you can do the same, alright? If a small
city gets even like a dozen, a hundred
emails calling for defunding the police,
it's going to be something that they
seriously consider that they probably
wouldn't have even thought about. So, I
would highly encourage you to visit
defund12.org, see if your city's on
there. Obviously, this is not an exhaustive
guide. There are more things that you
can do, and hey, how do you find them? Keep yourself educated, read, follow black
creators, follow local community
organizers, I promise you will learn
something! Okay, I'm sorry if this was a
super long video, but I think it was all
really important and I would highly
encourage you to check out all the
resources that I put down below. Do some
reading, do some donations if you can,
send some petitions, um get out there and
be safe! Goodbye comrades, if you haven't
taken any action yet or read anything
yet, please do so, and I will talk to you
later maybe!
