“I’ont got time to watch TV, we too busy watching the police,” Travis told me in his native St. Louis tongue. Travis is part of a ten-member youth-led community organization fighting police brutality and systemic racism in Ferguson and the greater St. Louis area. They call themselves the Lost Voices. “It’s important for us to be out here and be a voice for the youth,” they tweeted. While the Lost Voices have received little to no mainstream media attention, they represent the heart of a burgeoning community-based movement primarily organized by youth. The group formed the night of Michael’s murder. And they’ve been camping out in a vacant parking lot ever since. When I asked why the campsite, they responded: “If we don’t fight for ourselves, no one else will.” In addition to the camp out, Lost Voices is involved in a range of actions aimed at transforming the Ferguson Police Department, as well as eradicating the epidemics of police brutality and anti-black violence throughout the country. They’ve hosted voter registration drives. Though several of the members are too young to vote themselves, they insist that “voting is part of the solution.” They’ve met with local leaders, including Mayor James Knowles III and Chief of Police Thomas Jackson, to deliver demands and demand justice. Yet, like many black youth across the country, Lost Voices recognizes the limits of electoral politics. So they meet every night at 7pm on the corner of W. Florisant and Canfield to march. (Several members have literally marched holes in their shoes, and two have been arrested for acts of civil disobedience). They educate the community, especially local youth, about their civil rights and our political history. In the tradition of the Black Panther Party, they watch—or “police”—the police. And they do it all in khakis and white Ts: the same outfit Michael wore the day he was killed. They consider it their “uniform” and “wear it in remembrance of him.” But what’s most notable to me, amid all their courageous work, is the spirit by which they organize. These young men and women (two members are female) are radically redefining what it means to be “about that life” for a hip-hop generation disillusioned by the American dream and its colorblind discourse. They are infusing new political life into old order politics, remixing traditional organizing tactics with new visions of building beloved community. - See more at: urbancusp/2014/09/lost-voices-ferguson/?utm_content=buffer171e5&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook&utm_campaign=buffer
Posted on: Tue, 30 Sep 2014 00:07:56 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015