CRT AND PALESTINE

 

                       THE ABSURD TIMES

 

 

 

 When LBJ was asked why he didn't fire Hoover, he replied "AH'D RATHER HAVE HIM INSIDE THE TENT PISSING OUT, THAN OUTSIDE PISSING IN/' That was the best he came up with.

 

 

 

 

 

 

CRT AND PALESTINE

BY

HONEST CHARLIE

 

I have not counted, but I have pointed out that the only person I know of who can present and discuss Critical Race Theory is Angela Davis.  This is because she studied for her Doctorate with Adorno and then finished here with Hibbermas. This is all Critical Theory, once functioning in Frankfurt, Germany and Horkheimer, in his ECLIPSE OF REASON, made world known. Horkheimer did not really like the idea, but it came to be called the Frankfurt School.

 

It is a long known line of thought that left Germany as Hitler was coming to power in Germany. Hitler stared off by killing "Communists," then Marxists, then anyone else he didn't like, especially Jews.

 

Well, Angela was in France when four little girls were burned to death in the U.S. south, probably Alabama. That is why she finished her dissertation with Habermas.

 

J. Edgar Hoover, head of the FBI and sometimes called vacuum cleaner salesman, people say, liked to dress in his mother’s underwear and chase after his male secretary. The one thing he did do, it is established, was put her on the FBI’S MOST WANTED LIST. This was new to me, but the sign is still available online somewhere. She is now Professor Emeritus at the University of California.

 

Essentially, she dismisses CRT, then talks about Palestine, and what needs to come next. Here it is:

 

 

World-renowned author, activist and professor Angela Davis talks about the prison abolition movement from her time as a Black Panther leader to today. In her tireless efforts as an abolitionist and a teacher, Davis continues to be a fierce advocate of education and the interconnected struggles of oppressed peoples. Davis talks about Indigenous genocide, Palestine, critical race theory and the role of independent media. “Democracy Now! helps us to place our own domestic issues and struggles within the context of global battles against fascism,” says Davis.

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Transcript

This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.

AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org. I’m Amy Goodman. Well, this year we’ve been marking Democracy Now!’s 25th anniversary on the air. Earlier this month, Angela Davis, Noam Chomsky, Arundhati Roy, Martín Espada, Winona LaDuke, Danny Glover, Danny DeVito and others joined us for a virtual anniversary celebration. You can watch the whole event at democracynow.org.

Today, we bring you our full conversation with Angela Davis, the world-renowned abolitionist, author, activist and professor at the University of California, Santa Cruz. Democracy Now!’s Juan González and I interviewed her from her home in Oakland, California.

AMY GOODMAN: On this 25th anniversary celebration, Angela, it is such an honor to have you join us, as you’ve done so many times in the last decades.

ANGELA DAVIS: Well, thank you so much, Amy. You know, it seems like it’s been longer than 25 years. It seems like Democracy Now! has always been there. But I think I may also be thinking about I.F. Stone’s newsletter and some other progressive media in your lineage.

AMY GOODMAN: Well, to be counted in that amazing pantheon, someone like I.F. Stone, who said to journalism students, “If you can remember two words, remember 'governments lie.' If you can remember three words, remember 'all governments lie,'” it would be an honor for us to be counted together with I.F. Stone.

ANGELA DAVIS: Well, thank you so much for your work over the years. I was just reflecting on the fact that when no one else would cover Mumia Abu-Jamal, we were able to hear his voice on Democracy Now! And when no one else was thinking about Assata Shakur and the demonization of Assata Shakur, Amy, you and Juan and your colleagues were covering her case. So thank you so much. I don’t know what we would have been able to do in our efforts to push for radical social change if Democracy Now! had not been there.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Well, Angela, I wanted to ask you — when we first spoke on Democracy Now! about abolishing about the prison-industrial complex, that was back in 2010. And you said then that, quote, “Prison abolition is about building a new world.” Here we are more than a decade later. The abolition movement has drawn more attention. What is key to understand about how this movement can continue to grow?

ANGELA DAVIS: Well, you know, let’s remember that the abolition movement has a very long genealogy. We can go back to the 1970s and the Attica brothers uprising. The people in prison there who rose up against the horrendous conditions also called for prison abolition.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: That’s right.

ANGELA DAVIS: This was perhaps the first time that there was this public display of a way to address the prison system that was not couched in the ideology of reform.

I am absolutely surprised that abolition has entered into public discourse during this period. To tell the truth, many of my comrades and I assumed that it would be decades and decades, you know, perhaps 50 years from now, people would finally begin to understand that we cannot keep attempting to reform the police or reform the prisons. Reform is actually the glue that has held these institutions together over the years.

But it’s so exciting now to see young people, especially, talking about building a new world, recognizing that it’s not about punishing this person and that person, it’s about creating a new framework so that we do not have to depend on institutions like the police and prisons for safety and security. We can learn how to depend on education and healthcare and mental healthcare and recreation and all of the things that human beings need in order to flourish. That is true security, true safety.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: I wanted to ask you about another aspect of that movement, as well. You’re the daughter of civil rights activists. You went on to become a prominent member of the Communist Party USA, a leader of the Black Panther Party. And you were targeted by the FBI. At one point, the FBI had you on its list of the 10 most wanted fugitives in America. Yet today, some of the loudest voices within the young radical resurgence in America, especially on the college campuses and in middle-class intellectual circles, are openly dismissive or simply ignorant of the most vital lessons of the Panther Party, the Young Lords and figures like Malcolm X, you and W.E.B. Du Bois, who all urged the need not only to battle systemic racism but also to strive for the solidarity of oppressed people of all races, for unity of workers against imperialism. But this new trend now, it seems to me, is focusing more on racial identity, individual biases and anti-Blackness as the central question for social change. And in doing so, they echo a historical strain of narrow nationalism, what we used to call in the Young Lords back then “pork chop nationalism.” The Panther Party, as well, called it that. Some have even sought on social media to cancel you and the lived experience and the sacrifices of radical socialists and the revolutionary movement within the Black and Brown communities. I’m wondering your thoughts on that? I’ve heard you speak on it, I think, at a forum in Germany recently.

ANGELA DAVIS: Well, yes. Yeah, I’m very disappointed that we don’t have a more capacious public understanding of what it means to stand up against racism, that racism is the very foundation of this country, based on colonialism and slavery. And that means, in the very first place, it is important to recognize the connections between Indigenous people and people of African descent. It is not possible to tell the story of people of African descent in the Americas without also telling the story of Indigenous people.

You know, I think that when we engage in serious conversations with young people who really want to learn, they begin to get it. They begin to recognize that we can’t work with these narrow assumptions about Blackness and who counts as Black and the efforts to dismiss what is often referred to as political Blackness. And, of course, Du Bois taught us so many decades ago that the reason for identifying connections and relationalities among African people and people of African descent has little to do with the biology or genetics of Blackness, but rather has everything to do with struggles against imperialism, everything to do with global struggles for a better world. But, of course, we continue those conversations.

And I’m actually impressed by the fact that increasing numbers of people are recognizing how important it is to have a decolonial or anti-imperialist perspective. If we did not expect to have abolition become a central element of public discourse during the early part of the 21st century — and it has become that — then I think we can be a little more optimistic about the possibility of encouraging people to think more critically about the future struggles against racism.

AMY GOODMAN: Angela, I wanted to ask you about this latest news. North Dakota’s Republican Governor Doug Burgum has signed legislation banning the teaching of critical race theory, so public schools are now barred from teaching students that, quote, “racism is systemically embedded in American society.” Critics say the law could ban the teaching of slavery, redlining and the civil rights movement. Even discussion of the law that was just passed is now prohibited in North Dakota’s schools. And you see this happening across the country. You know, I see Democracy Now! and, overall, independent media, one of its powers, aside from assuring that there’s a forum for people to speak for themselves, is bringing historical context to everything. So, when we talk about you today, in 2021, you constantly go back in time, and you look to the future. You talk about the struggles of the '60s and what's happening now. What about this movement against education in America?

ANGELA DAVIS: Well, Amy, I think that what we are witnessing at this moment is a profound clash between forces of the past and forces of the future. The campaign against teaching critical race theory in schools — now, first of all, critical race theory is not taught in high schools. And I wish more critical race theory were taught at the university level. But critical race theory has become a watchword for any conversations about racism, any effort to engage in the education of students in our schools about the history of this country and of the Americas and of the planet. Any discussions about slavery as the foundational element of this country are being barred, according to the proponents of removing, quote, “critical race theory” from the schools.

But let’s not be misled by the term they are using. What we are witnessing are efforts on the part of the forces of white supremacy to regain a control which they more or less had in the past. So, I think that it is absolutely essential to engage in the kinds of efforts to prevent them from consolidating a victory in the realm of education. And, of course, those of us who are active in the abolitionist movement see education as central to the process of dismantling the prison, as central to the process of imagining new forms of safety and security that can supplant the violence of the police.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Angela, I’m wondering if you could talk about the growing threat of fascism and authoritarianism here in the United States. Clearly, the January 6th events, I think, were a wake-up call to those who hadn’t awakened during the period of the Trump presidency. But the signs, not only in the United States but in much of Western Europe, are that the right-wing, fascist and populist — right-wing populist movements and fascist movements keep growing. Your sense of how progressives and radicals can unite to beat back this tide here in the United States?

ANGELA DAVIS: Well, of course, fortunately, we did manage to evict fascism from the White House. But I think that people are often a little too shortsighted and assume that by evicting the forces of fascism from the White House, that we had consolidated a victory. No, this is simply a skirmish, as Gramsci might point out, that we need to continue the effort to challenge a fascism that, of course, relies on racism in this country and white supremacy as the ways in which it expresses itself. There’s Brazil, of course, and we see continuing efforts to challenge, you know, what the terrible forces of fascism have done in that country.

I would suggest that here in the U.S., if we are serious about being victorious over fascism, that we have to have an internationalist perspective. We can’t simply focus on what is happening in Washington. We can’t simply focus only on our domestic issues. We have to have a greater understanding of what is happening in Brazil, in the Philippines, in South Africa, in Palestine, throughout Europe. And, of course, this is why we need Democracy Now! Democracy Now! helps us to place our own domestic issues and struggles within the context of global battles against fascism, against climate change, especially against climate change, against racism. We’re becoming aware that racism is not primarily a U.S. phenomenon, not primarily a South African phenomenon. It has infected our global atmosphere.

AMY GOODMAN: You know, you mentioned Palestine, Angela. And in 2019, you were very excited when the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute announced that you were going to get the Fred Shuttlesworth Human Rights Award. I mean, you come from Birmingham, and you were returning home, and it was going to be this big celebration. So we ended up following you back to Birmingham, but this was after the institute rescinded the award, reportedly due to your activism around Palestine. I mean, this became a major brouhaha. In the end, thousands of people — and we covered this whole journey you took — came out to the convention center to hear you speak, to show their support. The institute was disgraced. People resigned from the board. Ultimately, they reversed their decision, and you did get the Fred Shuttlesworth award. I mean, it was an amazing series of months, what happened. And I was wondering if you could talk about that and advice you have for others who have come under attack for their support of Palestine.

ANGELA DAVIS: Well, yeah, Amy, that was actually an incredible experience. And I am so excited now about the attention that Palestine has garnered in a place like Birmingham, Alabama. So many of the people who became involved in the effort to contest the decision of the board of the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute were not necessarily familiar with the struggles in Palestine. But in the process of recognizing that everyone deserves the attention of human rights activists, one cannot be in favor of human rights with the exclusion of certain communities or certain struggles or certain countries. And so I am excited to recognize now that people who were not necessarily involved in the campaign for justice in Palestine have joined that movement — Black people, Jewish people.

And as someone who’s been involved virtually all of my life in struggles around Palestine, as difficult as things remain — and we see the evictions continuing to take place. We see efforts to consolidate the rule of the Zionists, both there and — both in the region and throughout the world. But at the same time, there is, I think, more hope than we have experienced ever in the struggle for justice for Palestine, more people who are involved. And so, at first, I was so disappointed when I discovered that they were rescinding that award, but now I think, in many ways, that was a gift, because that generated conversation, and it generated a renewed reflection, collective reflection, on the absolute importance of focusing on justice for Palestine.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Speaking of reflection, you’ve been on Democracy Now! to talk about President Obama, you’ve been on to talk about President Trump, and then the Biden campaign, as well. And you said in 2020, “I do think we have to participate in the election,” but noted that in our electoral system as it exists, neither party represents the future that we need in this country. So, here we are now one year into the Biden presidency, the battles over these various — huge stimulus program concluding now, Build Back Better. The progressives are battling over what they should do if the Build Back Better program is further eviscerated. Your counsel to radicals and progressives about how they should deal with the Biden administration?

ANGELA DAVIS: Well, you know, those of us who voted for Biden and Harris did not do so because we expected to follow them as leaders in our struggle. We could have predicted this moment now. But I think that what we have learned, especially since the mobilizations of the summer of 2020, is that history does not change because a few leaders here and there decide to take particular positions or decide to pass bills. And, of course, I am not at all trying to minimize the importance of electing progressives and radicals both to Congress and to local office. I’m not at all disparaging that. But what I am saying is that in order to make real, lasting change, we have to do the work of building movements.

It is masses of people who are responsible for historical change. It was because of the movement, the Black freedom movement, the midcentury Black freedom movement, that Black people acquired the right to vote — not because someone decided to pass a Voting Rights Act. And we know now that that victory cannot simply be consolidated as a bill passed, because there are continual efforts to suppress the power of Black voters. And we know that the only way to reverse that is by building movements, by involving masses of people in the process of historical change. And that holds true for the current administration.

AMY GOODMAN: Angela, we’re still in the midst of the pandemic, and I’m wondering how it affected you over this past year and a half. As you talk about movements, so often it’s people gathering, whether we’re talking about the Critical Resistance conferences, the mass protests in the streets after George Floyd was murdered by the police. There were mass protests in the streets even during the pandemic, of course. But if you can talk about, just personally, what this meant for you and if you feel like we’ve learned something, everything from respecting science — and that goes not only from talking about vaccines but to climate change — the issue of vaccine inequity in the world, emphasizing those who have and those who don’t have in so many ways, but then also, personally, how you got by?

ANGELA DAVIS: Well, Amy, I am actually very fortunate in that I live in California. I live in Oakland. And I have access to the kind of technology that puts me in touch with people all over the world. So there are some things that I found really exciting about this terrible pandemic that claimed the lives of so many people, particularly Black and Indigenous and people of color and poor people, more broadly. What I might say was a kind of gift that was offered us in the midst of all of this sadness and tragedy was the fact that we can communicate with people all over the world. And so I participated in conversations that never would have happened had I been compelled to travel in order to be involved in these conversations — for example, a conversation in the Amazonas in Brazil that involved Afro-descended Brazilians, Indigenous Brazilians and people who are active in the struggle against police violence. So I think that there are some ways in which we consolidated our internationalism — of course, not consolidated, but we were able to engage in the kinds of practices that allowed us to recognize how important those ties are.

You know, on the other hand, of course we all need human community. We all need the closeness and the touch of human beings. And that has been so difficult.

I would also point out that I don’t know whether we would have achieved this kind of awareness of the nature of structural racism. And I don’t know whether so many people would have gone out into the streets, at their own peril, of course, because in the summer of 2020 we were not really clear about the ways in which the virus is transmitted. But I don’t know whether so many people would have felt compelled to go out and protest, if we had not become aware as a country — and I’m talking about a good majority of the population in the country — of the realities of structural racism. And the impact of the virus taught as about the nature of structural racism, as it had an impact on the healthcare system, as it claimed — as the virus claimed the lives of disproportionate numbers of Indigenous and Black people and people in the Latinx community. And that awareness helped to condition the response to the police lynching of George Floyd.

And so, as tragic as this period has been, as difficult as it has been to live without the closeness of our community, as terrible as that has been, it has also offered us some gifts. And I don’t know whether we would have experienced a situation in which more people than ever before in the history of this country went out in the streets and marched and protested and said no to racism.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Angela, I wanted to ask you — you mentioned earlier on Mumia Abu-Jamal. In our early years on Democracy Now!, we were knocked off the air in a bunch of Pennsylvania stations as a result of airing his commentaries. I knew Mumia personally because we worked together as journalists in Philadelphia in the early 1980s. I’m wondering — he has continued to be in prison, turned 67 in April, is 40 years now in prison. He’s had COVID, heart surgery this year. Could you talk about his importance? He’s one of the most famous political prisoners in the world. He has continued to have amazing commentaries and writings throughout his time in prison. Mumia’s impact on the radical movement in America? And if you could talk about the pressing need to continue to demand his release?

ANGELA DAVIS: Yes. Thank you so much, Juan. I don’t think we would be where we are today without the consistent and dedicated participation of Mumia Abu-Jamal in our struggles. Well, first of all, I would say that Mumia is known all over the world. There are streets named after him in Germany and in France. He became the second person in the history of France, after Pablo Picasso, to receive an honorary citizenship in the city of Paris, and so that his importance is recognized elsewhere in the world. But because of the ways in which the police and the police benevolent order, the Fraternal Order of Police, because of the ways in which they have misrepresented Mumia and mobilized the entire police community all over the country against Mumia, he remains in prison, after having served time for more than 40 years, including much of it on death row.

What I would say now is that precisely because we have succeeded in making public critiques of the police — and, of course, we see them now trying to reconsolidate their power all over the country, but because there are these fissures in the power of the police, we should take advantage of that to intensify the campaign to free Mumia Abu-Jamal. I was just communicating the other day with Julia Wright, the daughter of Richard Wright, who has been so important in France in developing the campaign to free Mumia. And she and people all over the world want to see us bring the case of Mumia to the fore, especially now, considering the fact that David Gilbert, who has been in prison almost a half a century, was released on parole recently, two weeks ago. We have to claim that victory and recognize that this is precisely the moment to demand more releases, to demand the release of Leonard Peltier, who has been in prison even longer than Mumia, and all of the political prisoners who remain behind walls.

AMY GOODMAN: People can go to Democracy Now! and see our interviews with Leonard Peltier. I know we have to wrap up, and it’s very hard for me and Juan to stop this conversation, but — and we’re going to talk to you again on Democracy Now! Your book is coming out again, it’s being reissued, Angela Davis: An Autobiography, which astoundingly was edited by Toni Morrison. We talked to you on Democracy Now! when Toni Morrison died. We talked to you when Aretha Franklin died. We tracked you down, I can’t remember where. And it’s amazing, because while people talk about Aretha’s great artistry, what people didn’t realize is that she was involved with offering to post bail for you when you were in prison, saying, “Black people will be free.” And I’m wondering if you can reflect — we’ll go much more extensively into this when your book comes out — on these relationships you have had and what gives you hope for the next generation of artists, writers, scholars and activists, all of which you are, rolled into one.

ANGELA DAVIS: Well, you know, I think that having — I think that having lived this many decades and having experienced what I have in the context of movements against racism and against heteropatriarchy, against imperialism, I am more committed than ever to using what talents I might have to developing movements for radical change.

And you mentioned Aretha Franklin and the fact that she offered to post bail for me. That was a very moving moment in my life, and I have come to recognize how absolutely essential the role of artists has been and will be for our movements. This is a period during which musicians and visual artists, poets, writers are all using their talents collectively to create more possibilities for the kinds of conversations that will bring people into movements for justice, for freedom, for equality.

And let me say one more thing, which, unfortunately, we haven’t discussed during the course of this wide-ranging conversation, and that is the power of global capitalism. And I still see that we need — I still think that we need artists to show us the way toward a very different organization — economic, political, social organization — of our worlds, and capitalism has to fall.

AMY GOODMAN: Well, Angela Davis, we want to thank you so much for being with us. And I want to ask you, finally, about the issue of independent media, of people shaping their own narratives. I mean, I think that’s the power of the corporate media, is they tell a story, whether it is true or not, brought to you by the weapons manufacturers every five minutes or the drug industry every 10 minutes, you know, the commercials, as you talk about capitalism. If you could talk about a different kind of media in, perhaps, if you want to imagine this, a post-capitalist society and what that would offer, since it’s the way people can communicate with each other all over the world?

ANGELA DAVIS: Well, I think it’s so important now, Amy, to imagine new worlds. We cannot fight for those worlds unless we know how to imagine them. And independent, progressive media, like Democracy Now!, help to inspire us in that project of collective imagination to allow people to tell their own stories. And, of course, you go where the movements are unfolding. I’ll never forget watching your arrest at Standing Rock and how that campaign helped to galvanize a more holistic understanding of what it is we’re struggling for, the freedom that we’re fighting for, that we have to save this planet. And Indigenous people, the stewards of this land for so many millennia, have taught us that the struggle for the environment has to be central to our work. And you present their stories. So I thank you and Juan and all of your colleagues for the work that you continue to do. And I’m sure we’ll be speaking to each other in the near future.

AMY GOODMAN: World-renowned abolitionist, author, activist and professor Angela Davis.

 

 

It is Ridiculous

THE ABSURD TIMES

With everything else going on, this continues unchecked.

Ridiculous Under Trump

By

Czar Donic

Before we get to our discussion, perhaps a few comments: The Confederate flag is a phony.  The real one had a circular corner, much like the original U.S. flag. Also, both Davis and Lee said, paraphrased: "Hey, it's over. We lost. Get over it."  The statues were all erected years after both men had died.  Lincoln had begun a "reconstruction" program to rehabilitate the south, but was assonated and the plan was stopped by his Vice President, Johnson, who was a segregationist and impeached. He was stopped from impeachment by one vote, By a senator featured in JFKs' Profiles in Courage although Kennedy did not know that his vote had been bought with a bribe.  Also, one of the most amusing statements by Obama was on late night television when asked why Donald Trump seemed to dislike him so much: "Well, it goes back to when we attended Junior High together back in Kenya while playing in a football game."

Now to our feature: Angela Davis is a Ph.D. from the University of Critical Theory, usually referred to as the "Frankfurt School".  She began her dissertation with Adorno in Europe, but retured to the United States when she got news of the girls blown up in a church in Alabama and began her civil rights activity. She was able to complete her dissertation with Habermas who was already in the U.S.  She is now a Professor Emeritus.  (She also spent some time in prison as a Black Panther.) Later, Adorno apparently arrived in the U.S. long enough to advise Thomas Mann on the 12-tone theory of music by Arnold Schoenberg, but that is of little consequence in this context.

Here she is as recently interviewed on the program Democracy Now:

Amid a worldwide uprising against police brutality and racism, we discuss the historic moment with legendary scholar and activist Angela Davis. She also responds to the destruction and removal of racist monuments in cities across the United States; President Trump's upcoming rally on Juneteenth in Tulsa, the site of a white mob's massacre of Black people; and the 2020 election, in which two parties "connected to corporate capitalism" will compete for the presidency and people will have to be persuaded to vote "so the current occupant of the White House is forever ousted."

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Transcript

This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.

AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, The War and Peace Report, The Quarantine Report. I'm Amy Goodman. As the nationwide uprising against police brutality and racism continues to roil the nation and the world, bringing down Confederate statues and forcing a reckoning in city halls and on the streets, President Trump defended law enforcement Thursday, dismissing growing calls to defund the police. He spoke at a campaign-style event at a church in Dallas, Texas, announcing a new executive order advising police departments to adopt national standards for use of force. Trump did not invite the top three law enforcement officials in Dallas, who are all African American. The move comes after Trump called protesters "THUGS" and threatened to deploy the U.S. military to end, quote, "riots and lawlessness." This is Trump speaking Thursday.

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: They want to get rid of the police forces. They actually want to get rid of it. And that's what they do, and that's where they'd go. And you know that, because at the top position, there's not going to be much leadership. There's not much leadership left.

Instead, we have to go the opposite way. We must invest more energy and resources in police training and recruiting and community engagement. We have to respect our police. We have to take care of our police. They're protecting us. And if they're allowed to do their job, they'll do a great job. And you always have a bad apple no matter where you go. You have bad apples. And there are not too many of them. And I can tell you there are not too many of them in the police department. We all know a lot of members of the police.

AMY GOODMAN: Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden is also calling for an increase to police funding. In an op-ed in USA Today, he called for police departments to receive an additional $300 million to, quote, "reinvigorate community policing in our country." On Wednesday night, Biden discussed police funding on The Daily Show.

JOE BIDEN: I don't believe police should be defunded, but I think the conditions should be placed upon them where departments are having to take significant reforms relating to that. We should set up a national use-of-force standard.

AMY GOODMAN: But many argue reform will not fix the inherently racist system of policing. Since the global protest movement began, Minneapolis has pledged to dismantle its police department, the mayors of Los Angeles and New York City have promised to slash police department budgets, and calls to "defund the police" are being heard in spaces that would have been unthinkable just a few weeks ago.

Well, for more on this historic moment, we are spending the hour with the legendary activist and scholar Angela Davis, professor emerita at the University of California, Santa Cruz. For half a century, Angela Davis has been one of the most influential activists and intellectuals in the United States, an icon of the Black liberation movement. Angela Davis's work around issues of gender, race, class and prisons has influenced critical thought and social movements across several generations. She's a leading advocate for prison abolition, a position informed by her own experience as a prisoner and a fugitive on the FBI's top 10 wanted list more than 40 years ago. Once caught, she faced the death penalty in California. After being acquitted on all charges, she's spent her life fighting to change the criminal justice system.

Angela Davis, welcome back to Democracy Now! It's great to have you with us today for the hour.

ANGELA DAVIS: Thank you very much, Amy. It's wonderful to be here.

AMY GOODMAN: Well, do you think this moment is a tipping point, a turning point? You, who have been involved in activism for almost half a century, do you see this moment as different, perhaps more different than any period of time you have lived through?

ANGELA DAVIS: Absolutely. This is an extraordinary moment. I have never experienced anything like the conditions we are currently experiencing, the conjuncture created by the COVID-19 pandemic and the recognition of the systemic racism that has been rendered visible under these conditions because of the disproportionate deaths in Black and Latinx communities. And this is a moment I don't know whether I ever expected to experience.

When the protests began, of course, around the murder of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor and Ahmaud Arbery and Tony McDade and many others who have lost their lives to racist state violence and vigilante violence — when these protests erupted, I remembered something that I've said many times to encourage activists, who often feel that the work that they do is not leading to tangible results. I often ask them to consider the very long trajectory of Black struggles. And what has been most important is the forging of legacies, the new arenas of struggle that can be handed down to younger generations.

But I've often said one never knows when conditions may give rise to a conjuncture such as the current one that rapidly shifts popular consciousness and suddenly allows us to move in the direction of radical change. If one does not engage in the ongoing work when such a moment arises, we cannot take advantage of the opportunities to change. And, of course, this moment will pass. The intensity of the current demonstrations cannot be sustained over time, but we will have to be ready to shift gears and address these issues in different arenas, including, of course, the electoral arena.

AMY GOODMAN: Angela Davis, you have long been a leader of the critical resistance movement, the abolition movement. And I'm wondering if you can explain the demand, as you see it, what you feel needs to be done, around defunding the police, and then around prison abolition.

ANGELA DAVIS: Well, the call to defund the police is, I think, an abolitionist demand, but it reflects only one aspect of the process represented by the demand. Defunding the police is not simply about withdrawing funding for law enforcement and doing nothing else. And it appears as if this is the rather superficial understanding that has caused Biden to move in the direction he's moving in.

It's about shifting public funds to new services and new institutions — mental health counselors, who can respond to people who are in crisis without arms. It's about shifting funding to education, to housing, to recreation. All of these things help to create security and safety. It's about learning that safety, safeguarded by violence, is not really safety.

And I would say that abolition is not primarily a negative strategy. It's not primarily about dismantling, getting rid of, but it's about reenvisioning. It's about building anew. And I would argue that abolition is a feminist strategy. And one sees in these abolitionist demands that are emerging the pivotal influence of feminist theories and practices.

AMY GOODMAN: Explain that further.

ANGELA DAVIS: Well, I want us to see feminism not only as addressing issues of gender, but rather as a methodological approach of understanding the intersectionality of struggles and issues. Abolition feminism counters carceral feminism, which has unfortunately assumed that issues such as violence against women can be effectively addressed by using police force, by using imprisonment as a solution. And of course we know that Joseph Biden, in 1994, who claims that the Violence Against Women Act was such an important moment in his career — the Violence Against Women Act was couched within the 1994 Crime Act, the Clinton Crime Act.

And what we're calling for is a process of decriminalization, not — recognizing that threats to safety, threats to security, come not primarily from what is defined as crime, but rather from the failure of institutions in our country to address issues of health, issues of violence, education, etc. So, abolition is really about rethinking the kind of future we want, the social future, the economic future, the political future. It's about revolution, I would argue.

AMY GOODMAN: You write in Freedom Is a Constant Struggle, "Neoliberal ideology drives us to focus on individuals, ourselves, individual victims, individual perpetrators. But how is it possible to solve the massive problem of racist state violence by calling upon individual police officers to bear the burden of that history and to assume that by prosecuting them, by exacting our revenge on them, we would have somehow made progress in eradicating racism?" So, explain what exactly you're demanding.

ANGELA DAVIS: Well, neoliberal logic assumes that the fundamental unit of society is the individual, and I would say the abstract individual. According to that logic, Black people can combat racism by pulling themselves up by their own individual bootstraps. That logic recognizes — or fails, rather, to recognize that there are institutional barriers that cannot be brought down by individual determination. If a Black person is materially unable to attend the university, the solution is not affirmative action, they argue, but rather the person simply needs to work harder, get good grades and do what is necessary in order to acquire the funds to pay for tuition. Neoliberal logic deters us from thinking about the simpler solution, which is free education.

I'm thinking about the fact that we have been aware of the need for these institutional strategies at least since 1935 — but of course before, but I'm choosing 1935 because that was the year when W.E.B. Du Bois published his germinal Black Reconstruction in America. And the question was not what should individual Black people do, but rather how to reorganize and restructure post-slavery society in order to guarantee the incorporation of those who had been formerly enslaved. The society could not remain the same — or should not have remained the same. Neoliberalism resists change at the individual level. It asks the individual to adapt to conditions of capitalism, to conditions of racism.

AMY GOODMAN: I wanted to ask you, Angela Davis, about the monuments to racists, colonizers, Confederates, that are continuing to fall across the United States and around the world. In St. Paul, Minnesota, Wednesday, activists with the American Indian Movement tied a rope around a statue of Christopher Columbus and pulled it from its pedestal on the state Capitol grounds. The AIM members then held a ceremony over the fallen monument. In Massachusetts, officials said they'll remove a Columbus statue from a park in Boston's North End, after it was beheaded by protesters early Wednesday morning. In Richmond, Virginia, protesters toppled a statue of Confederate President Jefferson Davis from Monument Avenue Wednesday night. In the nearby city of Portsmouth, protesters used sledgehammers to destroy a monument to Confederate soldiers. One person sustained a serious injury, was hospitalized after a statue fell on his head. In Washington, D.C., House Speaker Nancy Pelosi joined other lawmakers demanding the removal of 11 Confederate statues from the National Statuary Hall in the Capitol.

Meanwhile, President Trump said he will "not even consider" renaming U.S. Army bases named after Confederate military officers. There are 10 such bases, all of them in Southern states. Trump tweeted Wednesday, "These Monumental and very Powerful Bases have become part of a Great American Heritage, and a history of Winning, Victory, and Freedom," unquote. Trump's tweet contradicted Defense Secretary Mark Esper and Joint Chiefs of Staff Chair General Mark Milley, who suggested they're open to discussion about renaming the bases. And a Republican committee in the Senate just voted to rename these bases, like Benning and Bragg and Hood, that are named for Confederate leaders.

Meanwhile, in your hometown of Birmingham, Alabama, Angela, comedian Jermaine Johnson is pleading not guilty to charges of "inciting a riot" after he urged protesters at May 31st rally to march on a statue of Charles Linn, a former officer in the Confederate Navy.

Did you think you would ever see this? You think about Bree Newsome after the horror at Mother Emanuel Church in Charleston, South Carolina, who shimmied up that flagpole on the grounds of the South Carolina Legislature and took down the Confederate flag, and they put it right on back up. What about what we're seeing today?

ANGELA DAVIS: Well, of course, Bree Newsome was a wonderful pioneer. And I think it's important to link this trend to the campaign in South Africa: "roads must fall." And, of course, I think this reflects the extent to which we are being called upon to deeply reflect on the role of historical racisms that have brought us to the point where we are today.

You know, racism should have been immediately confronted in the aftermath of the end of slavery. This is what Dr. Du Bois's analysis was all about, not so much in terms of, "Well, what we were going to do about these poor people who have been enslaved so many generations?" but, rather, "How can we reorganize our society in order to guarantee the incorporation of previously enslaved people?"

Now attention is being turned towards the symbols of slavery, the symbols of colonialism. And, of course, any campaigns against racism in this country have to address, in the very first place, the conditions of Indigenous people. I think it's important that we're seeing these demonstrations, but I think at the same time we have to recognize that we cannot simply get rid of the history. We have to recognize the devastatingly negative role that that history has played in charting the trajectory of the United States of America. And so, I think that these assaults on statues represent an attempt to begin to think through what we have to do to bring down institutions and reenvision them, reorganize them, create new institutions that can attend to the needs of all people.

AMY GOODMAN: And what do you think should be done with statues, for example, to, oh, slaveholding Founding Fathers, like George Washington and Thomas Jefferson?

ANGELA DAVIS: Well, you know, museums can play an important educational role. And I don't think we should get rid of all of the vestiges of the past, but we need to figure out context within which people can understand the nature of U.S. history and the role that racism and capitalism and heteropatriarchy have played in forging that history.

AMY GOODMAN: Can you talk about racism and capitalism? You often write and speak about how they are intimately connected. And talk about a world that you envision.

ANGELA DAVIS: Yeah, racism is integrally linked to capitalism. And I think it's a mistake to assume that we can combat racism by leaving capitalism in place. As Cedric Robinson pointed out in his book Black Marxism, capitalism is racial capitalism. And, of course, to just say for a moment, that Marx pointed out that what he called primitive accumulation, capital doesn't just appear from nowhere. The original capital was provided by the labor of slaves. The Industrial Revolution, which pivoted around the production of capital, was enabled by slave labor in the U.S. So, I am convinced that the ultimate eradication of racism is going to require us to move toward a more socialist organization of our economies, of our other institutions. I think we have a long way to go before we can begin to talk about an economic system that is not based on exploitation and on the super-exploitation of Black people, Latinx people and other racialized populations.

But I do think that we now have the conceptual means to engage in discussions, popular discussions, about capitalism. Occupy gave us new language. The notion of the prison-industrial complex requires us to understand the globalization of capitalism. Anti-capitalist consciousness helps us to understand the predicament of immigrants, who are barred from the U.S. by the wall that has been created by the current occupant. These conditions have been created by global capitalism. And I think this is a period during which we need to begin that process of popular education, which will allow people to understand the interconnections of racism, heteropatriarchy, capitalism.

AMY GOODMAN: Angela, do you think we need a truth and reconciliation commission here in this country?

ANGELA DAVIS: Well, that might be one way to begin, but I know we're going to need a lot more than truth and reconciliation. But certainly we need truth. I'm not sure how soon reconciliation is going to emerge. But I think that the whole notion of truth and reconciliation allows us to think differently about the criminal legal system. It allows us to imagine a form of justice that is not based on revenge, a form of justice that is not retributive. So I think that those ideas can help us begin to imagine new ways of structuring our institutions, such as — well, not structuring the prison, because the whole point is that we have to abolish that institution in order to begin to envision new ways of addressing the conditions that lead to mass incarceration, that lead to such horrendous tragedies as the murder of George Floyd.

AMY GOODMAN: We're going to come back to this discussion and also talk about President Trump going to Tulsa on Juneteenth. We're speaking with Angela Davis, the world-renowned abolitionist, author, activist and professor emerita at University of California, Santa Cruz, author of many books, including Freedom Is a Constant Struggle. Stay with us.

[break]

AMY GOODMAN: "Shanty Tones" by Filastine. This is Democracy Now! The Quarantine Report. I'm Amy Goodman, as we spend the hour with the legendary activist, scholar, Angela Davis, professor emerita at University of California, Santa Cruz.

President Trump has announced he's holding his first campaign rally since the quarantine, since lockdowns across the country, since the pandemic. He's holding it in Tulsa, Oklahoma, on June 19th — a highly symbolic day. It was June 19, 1865, that enslaved Africans in Texas first learned they were free, two years after Abraham Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation. The day is now celebrated as Juneteenth. California Senator Kamala Harris tweeted in response, "This isn't just a wink to white supremacists — he's throwing them a welcome home party," unquote.

Well, Tulsa recently marked the 99th anniversary of one of the deadliest mass killings of African Americans in U.S. history. In 1921, a white mob killed as many as 300 people, most of them Black, after a Black man was accused of assaulting a white woman. The white mobs destroyed a thriving African American business district known at the time as the Black Wall Street of America.

Well, this all comes as a Tulsa police major is coming under fire after denying systemic racism in the police force there and saying African Americans probably should be shot more. Listen carefully. This is Major Travis Yates in an interview with KFAQ.

MJR. TRAVIS YATES: If a certain group is committing more crimes, more violent crimes, then that number is going to be higher. Who in the world in their right mind would think that our shootings should be right along the U.S. census line? All of the research says we're shooting African Americans about 24% less than we probably ought to be, based on the crimes being committed.

AMY GOODMAN: "We're shooting them less than they probably ought to be"? Tulsa's mayor and police chief have both blasted Yates for the comment, but he remains on the force. And on Friday, President Trump will be there. Angela Davis, your thoughts on the significance of the moment, the place?

ANGELA DAVIS: Well, that's — well, you know, I can't even respond to anything he does anymore. It's just so, so, so, so ridiculous. And it is, however, important to recognize that he represents a sector of the population in this country that wants to return to the past — "Make America great again" — with all of its white supremacy, with all of its misogyny. And I think that at this moment we are recognizing that we cannot be held back by such forces as those represented by the current occupant of the White House. I doubt very seriously whether the people who come out to hear him in Tulsa on this historic day — of course, all over the country, people of African descent will be observing Juneteenth as an emancipatory moment in our history.

But I think that our role is to start to begin to translate some of the energy and passion into transforming institutions. The process has already begun, and it can't be turned back, at least not by the current occupant of the White House. I'm not suggesting that it's easy to create lasting change, but at least now we can see that it is possible. When someone like Roger Goodell says "Black lives matter," even though he did not mention Colin Kaepernick, and even though he may have — he probably did not really mean it, what that means is that the NFL recognizes that it has to begin a new process, that there is a further expansion of popular consciousness.

In New York, of course, you need to ask whether you really want to create new jails in the boroughs in the aftermath of closing Rikers, or whether you need new services. You know, I've been thinking about the case of Jussie Smollett, and I'm wondering why — in Chicago, given the conditions surrounding the murder of Laquan McDonald, the police department should be thoroughly investigated. And we need to ask: How is it that the public could so easily be rallied to the police narrative of what happened in the case of Jussie Smollett?

So, there is so much to be done. And I think that the rallies that the current occupant of the White House is holding will fade into — don't even merit footnotes in history.

AMY GOODMAN: Angela Davis, I wanted to ask you about another event that's taking place on Juneteenth, on June 19th. The Birmingham Civil Rights Institute is finally going to issue you the Fred L. Shuttlesworth Award during a virtual event on Juneteenth. And I wanted to ask you about this, because you returned to your hometown of Birmingham, Alabama, last February after the institute had at first rescinded the award due to your support for BDS — Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement — and your support of Palestinians. After outcry, the institute reversed its decision. More than 3,000 people gathered to see you talk at an alternative event to honor you, which was hosted by the Birmingham Committee for Truth and Reconciliation. This is a clip of your comments that day.

ANGELA DAVIS: It became clear to me that this might actually be a teachable moment.

IMANI PERRY: Yes.

ANGELA DAVIS: … That we might seize this moment to reflect on what it means to live on this planet in the 21st century and our responsibilities not only to people in our immediate community, but to people all over the planet.

AMY GOODMAN: We were there covering this amazing moment, where the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute had rescinded the award to you, the Fred L. Shuttlesworth Award, went through enormous turmoil. The mayor of Birmingham, so many people across the spectrum criticized them for it, but then this process happened, and you are going to be awarded this. Can you talk about the significance of this moment? And what do you plan to say on Juneteenth, the day that President Trump will be in Tulsa?

ANGELA DAVIS: Well, thank you for reminding me that these two events are happening on the same day. And, of course, that was, I think, the last time I actually saw you in person, Amy, in Birmingham. A lot has happened over the last period, including within the context of the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute. They have completely reorganized. They have reorganized their board. They have been involved in conversations with the community. Of course, as you know, the mayor of Birmingham was threatening to withdraw funding from the institute. There was a generalized uprising in the Black community.

And, you know, while at first it was a total shock to me that they offered this award to me, and then they rescinded it, I'm realizing now that that was an important moment, because it encouraged people to think about the meaning of human rights and why is it that Palestinians could be excluded from the process of working toward human rights. Palestinian activists have long supported Black people's struggle against racism. When I was in jail, solidarity coming from Palestine was a major source of courage for me. In Ferguson, Palestinians were the first to express international solidarity. And there has been this very important connection between the two struggles for many decades, so that I'm going to be really happy to receive the award, which now represents a rethinking of the rather backward position that the institute assumed, that Palestinians could be excluded from the circle of those working toward a future of justice, equality and human rights.

AMY GOODMAN: Speaking about what's going on in the West Bank right now and about the whole issue of international solidarity, the global response to the killing of George Floyd. In the occupied West Bank, protesters denounced Floyd's murder and the recent killing of Iyad el-Hallak, a 32-year-old Palestinian special needs student who was shot to death by Israeli forces in occupied East Jerusalem. He was reportedly chanting "Black lives matter" and "Palestinian lives matter," when Israeli police gunned him down, claiming he was armed. These links that you're seeing, not only in Palestine and the United States, but around the world, the kind of global response, the tens of thousands of people who marched in Spain, who marched in England, in Berlin, in Munich, all over the world, as this touches a chord and they make demands in their own countries, not only in solidarity with what's happening in the United States? And then I want to ask you about the U.S. election that's coming up in November.

ANGELA DAVIS: Well, yes, Palestinian activists have long supported Black people's struggle against racism, as I pointed out. And I'm hoping that today's young activists recognize how important Palestinian solidarity has been to the Black cause, and that they recognize that we have a profound responsibility to support Palestinian struggles, as well.

I think it's also important for us to look in the direction of Brazil, whose current political leader competes with our current political leader in many dangerous ways, I would say. Brazil — if we think we have a problem with racist police violence in the United States of America, look at Brazil. Marielle Franco was assassinated because she was challenging the militarization of the police and the racist violence unleashed there. I think 4,000 people were killed last year alone by the police in Brazil. So, I'm saying this because —

AMY GOODMAN: And, of course, the president of Brazil, a close ally of President Trump. We only have two minutes, and I want to get to the election. When I interviewed you in 2016, you said you wouldn't support either main-party candidate at the time. What are your thoughts today for 2020?

ANGELA DAVIS: Well, my position really hasn't changed. I'm not going to actually support either of the major candidates. But I do think we have to participate in the election. I mean, that isn't to say that I won't vote for the Democratic candidate. What I'm saying is that in our electoral system as it exists, neither party represents the future that we need in this country. Both parties remain connected to corporate capitalism. But the election will not so much be about who gets to lead the country to a better future, but rather how we can support ourselves and our own ability to continue to organize and place pressure on those in power. And I don't think there's a question about which candidate would allow that process to unfold.

So I think that we're going to have to translate some of the passion that has characterized these demonstrations into work within the electoral arena, recognizing that the electoral arena is not the best place for the expression of radical politics. But if we want to continue this work, we certainly need a person in office who will be more amenable to our mass pressure. And to me, that is the only thing that someone like a Joe Biden represents. But we have to persuade people to go out and vote to guarantee that the current occupant of the White House is forever ousted.

AMY GOODMAN: Angela Davis, I want to thank you so much for this hour, world-renowned abolitionist, author, activist, professor emerita at the University of California, Santa Cruz, author of many books, including Freedom Is a Constant Struggle: Ferguson, Palestine, and the Foundations of a Movement. I'm Amy Goodman. Thanks so much for joining us. Stay safe.

The original content of this program is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License. Please attribute legal copies of this work to democracynow.org. Some of the work(s) that this program incorporates, however, may be separately licensed. For further information or additional permissions, contact us.

The uprising against police brutality and anti-Black racism continues to sweep across the United States and countries around the world, forcing a reckoning in the halls of power and on the streets. The mass protests following the police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis on May 25 have dramatically shifted public opinion on policing and systemic racism, as "defund the police" becomes a rallying cry of the movement. We discuss the historic moment with legendary scholar and activist Angela Davis. "One never knows when conditions may give rise to a conjuncture such as the current one that rapidly shifts popular consciousness and suddenly allows us to move in the direction of radical change," she says. "The intensity of these current demonstrations cannot be sustained over time, but we will have to be ready to shift gears and address these issues in different arenas."

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Transcript

This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.

AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, The War and Peace Report, The Quarantine Report. I'm Amy Goodman. As the nationwide uprising against police brutality and racism continues to roil the nation and the world, bringing down Confederate statues and forcing a reckoning in city halls and on the streets, President Trump defended law enforcement Thursday, dismissing growing calls to defund the police. He spoke at a campaign-style event at a church in Dallas, Texas, announcing a new executive order advising police departments to adopt national standards for use of force. Trump did not invite the top three law enforcement officials in Dallas, who are all African American. The move comes after Trump called protesters "THUGS" and threatened to deploy the U.S. military to end, quote, "riots and lawlessness." This is Trump speaking Thursday.

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: They want to get rid of the police forces. They actually want to get rid of it. And that's what they do, and that's where they'd go. And you know that, because at the top position, there's not going to be much leadership. There's not much leadership left.

Instead, we have to go the opposite way. We must invest more energy and resources in police training and recruiting and community engagement. We have to respect our police. We have to take care of our police. They're protecting us. And if they're allowed to do their job, they'll do a great job. And you always have a bad apple no matter where you go. You have bad apples. And there are not too many of them. And I can tell you there are not too many of them in the police department. We all know a lot of members of the police.

AMY GOODMAN: Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden is also calling for an increase to police funding. In an op-ed in USA Today, he called for police departments to receive an additional $300 million to, quote, "reinvigorate community policing in our country." On Wednesday night, Biden discussed police funding on The Daily Show.

JOE BIDEN: I don't believe police should be defunded, but I think the conditions should be placed upon them where departments are having to take significant reforms relating to that. We should set up a national use-of-force standard.

AMY GOODMAN: But many argue reform will not fix the inherently racist system of policing. Since the global protest movement began, Minneapolis has pledged to dismantle its police department, the mayors of Los Angeles and New York City have promised to slash police department budgets, and calls to "defund the police" are being heard in spaces that would have been unthinkable just a few weeks ago.

Well, for more on this historic moment, we are spending the hour with the legendary activist and scholar Angela Davis, professor emerita at the University of California, Santa Cruz. For half a century, Angela Davis has been one of the most influential activists and intellectuals in the United States, an icon of the Black liberation movement. Angela Davis's work around issues of gender, race, class and prisons has influenced critical thought and social movements across several generations. She's a leading advocate for prison abolition, a position informed by her own experience as a prisoner and a fugitive on the FBI's top 10 wanted list more than 40 years ago. Once caught, she faced the death penalty in California. After being acquitted on all charges, she's spent her life fighting to change the criminal justice system.

Angela Davis, welcome back to Democracy Now! It's great to have you with us today for the hour.

ANGELA DAVIS: Thank you very much, Amy. It's wonderful to be here.

AMY GOODMAN: Well, do you think this moment is a tipping point, a turning point? You, who have been involved in activism for almost half a century, do you see this moment as different, perhaps more different than any period of time you have lived through?

ANGELA DAVIS: Absolutely. This is an extraordinary moment. I have never experienced anything like the conditions we are currently experiencing, the conjuncture created by the COVID-19 pandemic and the recognition of the systemic racism that has been rendered visible under these conditions because of the disproportionate deaths in Black and Latinx communities. And this is a moment I don't know whether I ever expected to experience.

When the protests began, of course, around the murder of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor and Ahmaud Arbery and Tony McDade and many others who have lost their lives to racist state violence and vigilante violence — when these protests erupted, I remembered something that I've said many times to encourage activists, who often feel that the work that they do is not leading to tangible results. I often ask them to consider the very long trajectory of Black struggles. And what has been most important is the forging of legacies, the new arenas of struggle that can be handed down to younger generations.

But I've often said one never knows when conditions may give rise to a conjuncture such as the current one that rapidly shifts popular consciousness and suddenly allows us to move in the direction of radical change. If one does not engage in the ongoing work when such a moment arises, we cannot take advantage of the opportunities to change. And, of course, this moment will pass. The intensity of the current demonstrations cannot be sustained over time, but we will have to be ready to shift gears and address these issues in different arenas, including, of course, the electoral arena.

AMY GOODMAN: Angela Davis, you have long been a leader of the critical resistance movement, the abolition movement. And I'm wondering if you can explain the demand, as you see it, what you feel needs to be done, around defunding the police, and then around prison abolition.

ANGELA DAVIS: Well, the call to defund the police is, I think, an abolitionist demand, but it reflects only one aspect of the process represented by the demand. Defunding the police is not simply about withdrawing funding for law enforcement and doing nothing else. And it appears as if this is the rather superficial understanding that has caused Biden to move in the direction he's moving in.

It's about shifting public funds to new services and new institutions — mental health counselors, who can respond to people who are in crisis without arms. It's about shifting funding to education, to housing, to recreation. All of these things help to create security and safety. It's about learning that safety, safeguarded by violence, is not really safety.

And I would say that abolition is not primarily a negative strategy. It's not primarily about dismantling, getting rid of, but it's about reenvisioning. It's about building anew. And I would argue that abolition is a feminist strategy. And one sees in these abolitionist demands that are emerging the pivotal influence of feminist theories and practices.

AMY GOODMAN: Explain that further.

ANGELA DAVIS: Well, I want us to see feminism not only as addressing issues of gender, but rather as a methodological approach of understanding the intersectionality of struggles and issues. Abolition feminism counters carceral feminism, which has unfortunately assumed that issues such as violence against women can be effectively addressed by using police force, by using imprisonment as a solution. And of course we know that Joseph Biden, in 1994, who claims that the Violence Against Women Act was such an important moment in his career — the Violence Against Women Act was couched within the 1994 Crime Act, the Clinton Crime Act.

And what we're calling for is a process of decriminalization, not — recognizing that threats to safety, threats to security, come not primarily from what is defined as crime, but rather from the failure of institutions in our country to address issues of health, issues of violence, education, etc. So, abolition is really about rethinking the kind of future we want, the social future, the economic future, the political future. It's about revolution, I would argue.

AMY GOODMAN: You write in Freedom Is a Constant Struggle, "Neoliberal ideology drives us to focus on individuals, ourselves, individual victims, individual perpetrators. But how is it possible to solve the massive problem of racist state violence by calling upon individual police officers to bear the burden of that history and to assume that by prosecuting them, by exacting our revenge on them, we would have somehow made progress in eradicating racism?" So, explain what exactly you're demanding.

ANGELA DAVIS: Well, neoliberal logic assumes that the fundamental unit of society is the individual, and I would say the abstract individual. According to that logic, Black people can combat racism by pulling themselves up by their own individual bootstraps. That logic recognizes — or fails, rather, to recognize that there are institutional barriers that cannot be brought down by individual determination. If a Black person is materially unable to attend the university, the solution is not affirmative action, they argue, but rather the person simply needs to work harder, get good grades and do what is necessary in order to acquire the funds to pay for tuition. Neoliberal logic deters us from thinking about the simpler solution, which is free education.

I'm thinking about the fact that we have been aware of the need for these institutional strategies at least since 1935 — but of course before, but I'm choosing 1935 because that was the year when W.E.B. Du Bois published his germinal Black Reconstruction in America. And the question was not what should individual Black people do, but rather how to reorganize and restructure post-slavery society in order to guarantee the incorporation of those who had been formerly enslaved. The society could not remain the same — or should not have remained the same. Neoliberalism resists change at the individual level. It asks the individual to adapt to conditions of capitalism, to conditions of racism.

The original content of this program is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License. Please attribute legal copies of this work to democracynow.org. Some of the work(s) that this program incorporates, however, may be separately licensed. For further information or additional permissions, contact us.

AMY GOODMAN: I wanted to ask you, Angela Davis, about the monuments to racists, colonizers, Confederates, that are continuing to fall across the United States and around the world. In St. Paul, Minnesota, Wednesday, activists with the American Indian Movement tied a rope around a statue of Christopher Columbus and pulled it from its pedestal on the state Capitol grounds. The AIM members then held a ceremony over the fallen monument. In Massachusetts, officials said they'll remove a Columbus statue from a park in Boston's North End, after it was beheaded by protesters early Wednesday morning. In Richmond, Virginia, protesters toppled a statue of Confederate President Jefferson Davis from Monument Avenue Wednesday night. In the nearby city of Portsmouth, protesters used sledgehammers to destroy a monument to Confederate soldiers. One person sustained a serious injury, was hospitalized after a statue fell on his head. In Washington, D.C., House Speaker Nancy Pelosi joined other lawmakers demanding the removal of 11 Confederate statues from the National Statuary Hall in the Capitol.

Meanwhile, President Trump said he will "not even consider" renaming U.S. Army bases named after Confederate military officers. There are 10 such bases, all of them in Southern states. Trump tweeted Wednesday, "These Monumental and very Powerful Bases have become part of a Great American Heritage, and a history of Winning, Victory, and Freedom," unquote. Trump's tweet contradicted Defense Secretary Mark Esper and Joint Chiefs of Staff Chair General Mark Milley, who suggested they're open to discussion about renaming the bases. And a Republican committee in the Senate just voted to rename these bases, like Benning and Bragg and Hood, that are named for Confederate leaders.

Meanwhile, in your hometown of Birmingham, Alabama, Angela, comedian Jermaine Johnson is pleading not guilty to charges of "inciting a riot" after he urged protesters at May 31st rally to march on a statue of Charles Linn, a former officer in the Confederate Navy.

Did you think you would ever see this? You think about Bree Newsome after the horror at Mother Emanuel Church in Charleston, South Carolina, who shimmied up that flagpole on the grounds of the South Carolina Legislature and took down the Confederate flag, and they put it right on back up. What about what we're seeing today?

ANGELA DAVIS: Well, of course, Bree Newsome was a wonderful pioneer. And I think it's important to link this trend to the campaign in South Africa: "roads must fall." And, of course, I think this reflects the extent to which we are being called upon to deeply reflect on the role of historical racisms that have brought us to the point where we are today.

You know, racism should have been immediately confronted in the aftermath of the end of slavery. This is what Dr. Du Bois's analysis was all about, not so much in terms of, "Well, what we were going to do about these poor people who have been enslaved so many generations?" but, rather, "How can we reorganize our society in order to guarantee the incorporation of previously enslaved people?"

Now attention is being turned towards the symbols of slavery, the symbols of colonialism. And, of course, any campaigns against racism in this country have to address, in the very first place, the conditions of Indigenous people. I think it's important that we're seeing these demonstrations, but I think at the same time we have to recognize that we cannot simply get rid of the history. We have to recognize the devastatingly negative role that that history has played in charting the trajectory of the United States of America. And so, I think that these assaults on statues represent an attempt to begin to think through what we have to do to bring down institutions and reenvision them, reorganize them, create new institutions that can attend to the needs of all people.

AMY GOODMAN: And what do you think should be done with statues, for example, to, oh, slaveholding Founding Fathers, like George Washington and Thomas Jefferson?

ANGELA DAVIS: Well, you know, museums can play an important educational role. And I don't think we should get rid of all of the vestiges of the past, but we need to figure out context within which people can understand the nature of U.S. history and the role that racism and capitalism and heteropatriarchy have played in forging that history.

AMY GOODMAN: Can you talk about racism and capitalism? You often write and speak about how they are intimately connected. And talk about a world that you envision.

ANGELA DAVIS: Yeah, racism is integrally linked to capitalism. And I think it's a mistake to assume that we can combat racism by leaving capitalism in place. As Cedric Robinson pointed out in his book Black Marxism, capitalism is racial capitalism. And, of course, to just say for a moment, that Marx pointed out that what he called primitive accumulation, capital doesn't just appear from nowhere. The original capital was provided by the labor of slaves. The Industrial Revolution, which pivoted around the production of capital, was enabled by slave labor in the U.S. So, I am convinced that the ultimate eradication of racism is going to require us to move toward a more socialist organization of our economies, of our other institutions. I think we have a long way to go before we can begin to talk about an economic system that is not based on exploitation and on the super-exploitation of Black people, Latinx people and other racialized populations.

But I do think that we now have the conceptual means to engage in discussions, popular discussions, about capitalism. Occupy gave us new language. The notion of the prison-industrial complex requires us to understand the globalization of capitalism. Anti-capitalist consciousness helps us to understand the predicament of immigrants, who are barred from the U.S. by the wall that has been created by the current occupant. These conditions have been created by global capitalism. And I think this is a period during which we need to begin that process of popular education, which will allow people to understand the interconnections of racism, heteropatriarchy, capitalism.

AMY GOODMAN: Angela, do you think we need a truth and reconciliation commission here in this country?

ANGELA DAVIS: Well, that might be one way to begin, but I know we're going to need a lot more than truth and reconciliation. But certainly we need truth. I'm not sure how soon reconciliation is going to emerge. But I think that the whole notion of truth and reconciliation allows us to think differently about the criminal legal system. It allows us to imagine a form of justice that is not based on revenge, a form of justice that is not retributive. So I think that those ideas can help us begin to imagine new ways of structuring our institutions, such as — well, not structuring the prison, because the whole point is that we have to abolish that institution in order to begin to envision new ways of addressing the conditions that lead to mass incarceration, that lead to such horrendous tragedies as the murder of George Floyd.

AMY GOODMAN: We're going to come back to this discussion and also talk about President Trump going to Tulsa on Juneteenth. We're speaking with Angela Davis, the world-renowned abolitionist, author, activist and professor emerita at University of California, Santa Cruz, author of many books, including Freedom Is a Constant Struggle. Stay with us.

The original content of this program is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License. Please attribute legal copies of this work to democracynow.org. Some of the work(s) that this program incorporates, however, may be separately licensed. For further information or additional permissions, contact us.

AMY GOODMAN: We only have two minutes, and I want to get to the election. When I interviewed you in 2016, you said you wouldn't support either main-party candidate at the time. What are your thoughts today for 2020?

ANGELA DAVIS: Well, my position really hasn't changed. I'm not going to actually support either of the major candidates. But I do think we have to participate in the election. I mean, that isn't to say that I won't vote for the Democratic candidate. What I'm saying is that in our electoral system as it exists, neither party represents the future that we need in this country. Both parties remain connected to corporate capitalism. But the election will not so much be about who gets to lead the country to a better future, but rather how we can support ourselves and our own ability to continue to organize and place pressure on those in power. And I don't think there's a question about which candidate would allow that process to unfold.

So I think that we're going to have to translate some of the passion that has characterized these demonstrations into work within the electoral arena, recognizing that the electoral arena is not the best place for the expression of radical politics. But if we want to continue this work, we certainly need a person in office who will be more amenable to our mass pressure. And to me, that is the only thing that someone like a Joe Biden represents. But we have to persuade people to go out and vote to guarantee that the current occupant of the White House is forever ousted.

AMY GOODMAN: Angela Davis, I want to thank you so much for this hour, world-renowned abolitionist, author, activist, professor emerita at the University of California, Santa Cruz, author of many books, including Freedom Is a Constant Struggle: Ferguson, Palestine, and the Foundations of a Movement. I'm Amy Goodman. Thanks so much for joining us. Stay safe.

The original content of this program is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License. Please attribute legal copies of this work to democracynow.org. Some of the work(s) that this program incorporates, however, may be separately licensed. For further information or additional permissions, contact us.