[charlescearl]

If you fail to understand how so many Indigenous and Black people of this country view it with such contempt, I would recommend a few reads. But first I would ask you to consider that whatever greatness it can claim lies not in it’s continued founding myths, but in the many unheralded acts of sacrifice and resistance that so many of it’s marginalized citizens made and continue to make down to this very minute.

James Baldwin’s “The Fire Next Time”, or his “No Name in the Street” layout both how the country was brought to the reckoning of the Civil Rights movement and then completely capitulated to white supremacy. Frederick Douglass’s “What to the Slave is the 4th of July” [1] still rings true to so many of us. Read David Truer’s “ The Heartbeat of Wounded Knee: Native America from 1890 to the Present” on the meticulousness explicated horror of how this country has and continues to destroy and devalue Indigenous life.

The people protesting Friday in the Black Hills or in the front lines of the Black Lives Matter actions are calling upon us all to view it as it is, and dare to imagine what it could be. I am sad that we don’t embrace the movement to bring about real democracy.

[1] https://nmaahc.si.edu/blog-post/nations-story-what-slave-fou...

[rayiner]

> I would ask you to consider that whatever greatness it can claim lies not in it’s continued founding myths, but in the many unheralded acts of sacrifice and resistance that so many of it’s marginalized citizens made and continue to make down to this very minute.

Did you mean to make this an either or thing? I’m a supporter of BLM and have long been a supporter of criminal justice reform. But I also think a lot of America's “greatness” rests on the founders’ creation of a Republic with limited government, separation of powers, free speech, freedom of religion, freedom of assembly, an armed citizenry, due process, etc.

People shouldn’t take those things for granted, because those were also achievements, not some inevitable, universal principles. I come from a country that has ideas like freedom of religion and due process embedded in its constitution. We lifted these ideas from the US Constitution and the magna carts because they are foreign to us. For example, according to the dominant religion in our country, people of other religions should not enjoy equal status. Likewise, freedom of speech is a totally foreign concept imported from the west.

[wincy]

Who isn’t embracing it? Every person I know on LinkedIn has made some sort of statement, including a few high level managers I went to school with and could call out because they say they’re an “ally” and lived in a “diverse” neighborhood when really they lived in the rich subdivision and went to private school as the neighborhood became “lower class”. But I don’t really know what putting an old classmate on blast on LinkedIn is going to accomplish.

[noworriesnate]

Black lives do matter, but BLM the organization gets a lot of flak because they're unfortunately hijacking the concern of black lives with a Marxist political agenda. Here's one of the founders discussing this in an interview about BLM: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kCghDx5qN4s&t=423s

It's sad to me that we can't have a conversation about police brutality without having Marxists inject themselves into the conversation and harness it for a political agenda that is so violent and manipulative. I care very much about the sanctity of all lives, but I can't discuss black lives without having to explain that I don't support Marxists. That is messed up.

[charlescearl]

If you have come to a point of discomfort in seeing Marxism discussed within the context of Black Lives Matter, then you are where you need to be. Sit with it.

It is a radical movement, the larger goal of which, discussed in [1,2], is the complete dismantling of white supremacy. What would a United States look like in which all life was equally valued? We don’t know, none of us has experienced that world, and that is why (I would contend) there is an urgent need to consider all options. The movement is not just about anti-Black policing, it is about bringing about a United States (a world?) where Black life (or the life of any marginalized person) is as valued and as treasured and held as sacred as any other.

You might also consider that Black radicalism has a long intellectual history [3,4,5].

In sum, I am saying to take a moment to understand the long historical context that birthed this movement. Sit with the discomfort that goes along with the process that will bring that world into being.

[1] “When they call you a terrorist: a black lives matter memoir”, Patrice Khan-Cullors, Asha Bandele

[2] “Stay woke: a People’s Guide to Making All Black Lives Matter”, Tehama Lopez Bunyasi, Candis Watts Smith

[3] “The Black Jacobins”, C.L.R. James

[4] “Black Marxism: The Making of the Black Radical Tradition”, Cedric Robinson

[5] “Black Reconstruction in America: 1860-1880”, W.E.B. DuBois

[dorado3]

The idea that others are to blame for one’s suffering is maybe the most potent and toxic of all political ideas, and it has thrived like a mind-virus for thousands of years. The truth is that people of all races in the USA are _not_ blocked by racism from living a good live, but certain political forces sell this story (the victim identity) in order to control certain groups of voters, and play shallow ego-gratifying mind games in academia.

[nec4b]

I have hardly seen any black or native American viewing its country with contempt. Most of the haters are young native born white leftist without any recent experience with immigration within their families.