Close the life expectancy gap.

Happy Friday and welcome back to the Anti-Racism Daily. A year ago yesterday, the World Health Organization declared coronavirus as a global pandemic (NPR). Since then, so much of our lives have forever changed. Its impact in the U.S. didn't just exacerbate the existing disparities in our country, but create new and distinct issues that directly affected our wellbeing. And it's evident in the latest data on life expectancy. Hannah shares more in today's newsletter.

And just a quick personal note – grief is not linear. Give yourself grace with any feelings or sensations that might be arriving with the one-year marker of an event that turned our lives around. There's no right way to heal from this, only the way that is right for you. I'm sending you all the love for what's been lost this year, and all that there is to discover in the days ahead.

This newsletter is a free resource made possible by our paying subscribers. Consider giving $7/month on Patreon. Or you can give one-time on our website, PayPal, or Venmo (@nicoleacardoza). You can also support us by joining our curated digital community. Thank you to all those that have contributed!

Nicole

TAKE ACTION

Explore the Kaiser Family Foundation to advocate for health reform; push for medicaid expansion and learn about the causes of the life expectancy gap and what is needed to reverse it in your state through the Health Resources & Services Administration and the Office of Minority Health at the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.
Use resources from the Equal Justice Initiative website to dissect America’s racist roots and learn how to be engaged in the current fight for equal rights.
Support the People’s Institute for Survival and Beyond with a charitable contribution, and attend one of their community workshops—whether in person or virtually. The Institute seeks to organize diverse networks of people in order to understand and undo racism on a personal and global level.
Watch The Essentials documentary that addresses health equity and immigrant health at the Center for Health Progress website.

GET EDUCATED

By Hannah Edmondson (she/her)

In the United States, great expectations within the healthcare sector are not endowed to everyone. Black and Brown populations have continued to fall behind the average life expectancy of white populations—a chasm that has widened considerably in the wake of COVID-19. Though recent years saw a shrink in the gap between Black and white lifespans in the U.S., the pandemic brought the difference to its widest breadth since 1998 (Intelligencer). In 2020, the average life expectancy for white Americans decreased by 0.8 years, but Latino and Black populations dipped more notably, losing 1.9 years and 2.7 years, respectively (NPR). This shocking statistic does not boil down to genetics or biological fitness, but rather economics.

The pandemic has killed one in every 645 Black Americans, but as of March 1, only seven percent of COVID-19 vaccine recipients have been Black (Now This News). This goes to show that access to medical care is not dictated by actual need; instead, it is a matter of privilege, leaving Black and Brown Americans to scramble for resources that should be readily available. There are several factors behind the burgeoning lifespan disparity throughout the pandemic, but they each share a common denominator: racism. Insufficient access to healthcare in the United States is bemoaned by working-class citizens across the board, but the brunt of its effects are absorbed by Black and Brown families.

Sickle cell disease sheds a light on the deeply entrenched prejudice that plagues the U.S. healthcare system. The disease predominantly affects Black individuals; on average, one in thirteen Black children are born with the sickle cell trait (CDC). The disease is inherited and requires intensive, regular care in order to be treated properly. In this way, it is similar to cystic fibrosis, a disease which occurs most commonly among white Americans. However, cystic fibrosis receives significantly more funding and national attention, with new treatments being approved regularly over the past decade. The issue at hand is proven to be a matter of access rather than intel as a majority of sickle cell patients are forced to go without even the earliest sickle cell treatments (KHN).

According to a study conducted in 2009, the average life expectancy of Black men and women was seventy-five years of age, mirroring the average life expectancy of white populations in 1979 (Business Insider). The fact that Black American lives are set back nearly thirty years when compared to the well-being of white counterparts is telling. The gap in life expectancy cannot be chalked up to violence or mere coincidence, though, as this lag in Black survival is largely a product of the U.S. healthcare system. The evidence shows a marked swell in the gap between Black and white life expectancy during the 1980s, demonstrating the dramatic impact of the AIDS crisis on communities of color. The latest national health crisis—the COVID-19 pandemic—has similarly ravaged BIPOC while leaving white populations with significantly fewer fatalities.

While the difference in life expectancy between ethnic groups has gradually grown less severe, the underlying cause remains. Black and Brown communities are too often barred from receiving quality care on account of financial setbacks and discriminatory legislation. Residential segregation leaves Black and Hispanic neighborhoods without conveniently-located hospitals and healthcare facilities (TCF). Most U.S. cities and suburbs reflect the racist tactics of city planners throughout the twentieth century. Nonetheless, these geographic barriers stand strong to this day, effectively keeping white communities comfortably within their privilege.

The economic inequality that has plagued BIPOC since America’s origination ultimately leads to health inequality, perpetuating the lower life expectancy among non-white persons (Intelligencer). Adequate healthcare requires ample funding, and Medicaid patients are rarely prioritized over wealthy clients able to fully cover their medical expenses. The United States continually shirks the possibility of socialized healthcare in favor of maintaining privatized, for-profit institutions, making it exceedingly difficult for low-income patients to receive proper care. On average, Black families devote twenty percent of their annual household income to medical expenses; that portion is only half as much for most white families (TCF). Systemic racism in the U.S. works to ensure that the nation’s lowest-income communities are disproportionately Black and Brown. Until this economic inequality is dissolved, non-white citizens seeking decent healthcare will be consigned to the bottom of the waitlist.

The economic challenges facing BIPOC undoubtedly heighten the risk of health issues, as proper nutrition and safe housing are simply not affordable. The dog-eat-dog ideology that has come to undergird the American Dream serves only those who are currently in power—namely, affluent white people. Furthermore, unemployment insurance rates are significantly lower in Southern states with high concentrations of Black inhabitants. This practice of state-controlled unemployment benefits dates back to the New Deal; Southern politicians rallied to keep Black workers within their home states oppressed, crafting their unemployment rates to withhold vital government funds from non-white laborers (RAND). This long-standing power imbalance leaves people of color with little upward mobility. Proper healthcare, then, is a luxury reserved for those at the top. This discrepancy is why Black women are three times more likely to die of pregnancy-related causes than white women (TCF). Non-white lives are treated with less reverence because the racist foundation of the United States insists upon the preservation of one population at the expense of all others.

Statistics continue to prove that this antiquated, bigoted ideology is not yet weeded out of the healthcare system; moreover, it steals Black and Brown lives in staggering numbers. In spite of the grim reality, the Affordable Care Act has made a noteworthy stride towards equality. The ACA extended coverage to over twenty million Americans, 2.8 million of whom are Black (AJPH). While this shows a step toward improved medical access regardless of race or class, it is only one minor victory amid a war that will likely drag on for decades to come. Major changes are required in order for society to represent and protect all of its members equally. Privilege should not determine one’s right to survival, but in America it certainly seems to be the case.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

COVID-19 has brought attention to the inequality of U.S. healthcare–a system which has never adequately served minority populations.
The life expectancy gap between BIPOC and white Americans is a result of the social and economic policies that have oppressed non-white citizens for centuries. This gap, contrary to popular belief, cannot be shrunk by the determination of working class individuals alone.
In order to wage a social contract that protects people of every race and economic standing, the existing institutions that govern American society should be deconstructed and purged of their racist tactics.
A healthcare system that benefits all people equally will not be implemented without major political action.

PLEDGE YOUR SUPPORT

Thank you for all your financial contributions! If you haven't already, consider making a monthly donation to this work. These funds will help me operationalize this work for greatest impact.

Subscribe on Patreon | Give one-time on PayPal | Venmo @nicoleacardoza

Nicole Cardoza 3/11/21 Nicole Cardoza 3/11/21

Support musicians of color.

Late last year, I had a conversation on the difference between tokenism and inclusion in the music industry with fellow Americana artist Lizzie No that was published on Talkhouse.com. We chatted about how festivals, conferences, concerts, and events often believe they are practicing inclusion when really they are exhibiting harmful tokenism. “We have to talk about the differences between actually including people and bringing them to a seat at the table, versus using them to promote what’s already there.” - Lizzie No.

Happy Thursday and welcome back! Our latest podcast episode seemed to truly resonate with our listeners, prompting more curiosity of what a more and inclusive music industry would look like. Raye joins us today on the newsletter side to share more about her experience. If you missed it, find the latest Anti-Racism Daily podcast episode wherever you listen to podcasts.

This newsletter is a free resource made possible by our paying subscribers. Consider giving $7/month on Patreon. Or you can give one-time on our website, PayPal, or Venmo (@nicoleacardoza). You can also support us by joining our curated digital community. Thank you to all those that have contributed!

Nicole

TAKE ACTION

Raise awareness and learn more about the long-standing issue of racism in the music industry by following the hashtag #TheShowMustBePaused
Diversify your music & lift up BIPOC artists. Check out this playlist of BIPOC folk artists!
Support BIPOC led diversity initiatives such as The Black Independent Music Accelerator and Color of Music Collective.

GET EDUCATED

By Raye Zaragoza (she/her)

Tokenism: the practice of making only a perfunctory or symbolic effort to do a particular thing, especially by recruiting a small number of people from underrepresented groups in order to give the appearance of sexual or racial equality within a workforce.

Inclusion: the action or state of including or of being included within a group or structure.

(dictonary.com)

As a New York City-born, Folk/Americana music artist and Brown woman of Mexican, Native American, Japanese, and Taiwanese ancestry, I have experienced firsthand the line between inclusion and tokenism. I have realized that this line is oftentimes one that I can see but one that the white folks in power can not see. To me, inclusion when you’re being invited to speak for yourself, as your whole self, and have an equal share of the mic to your white counterparts. Tokenism is when you’re being propped up by the pieces of you they want to exploit, a cosmetic cover-up for previous years of failing to bring in diversity, and one’s racial identity being centered and advertised more than the work itself.

According to data collected by the Census Bureau in 2017, 73.6% of singers, musicians, and related workers are white, only 13% are black, and less than 1% are Indigenous. It is easy to see how this lack of representation has led to a hunger for diversity in the music industry. It’s time that we insist on effective inclusion rather than harmful tokenism within the music industry and beyond.

While folk music is predominantly populated by white artists, it is heavily influenced by the work of Black artists. “In fact, without the spirituals sung by enslaved people, the railroad songs of the Reconstruction era, and the ragtime hits of the early twentieth century, modern folk music would not exist” (library.org). It is important to acknowledge that inclusion in the music industry, and specifically within folk music, is not about bringing underrepresented groups to the table, but about acknowledging that the table itself was inspired by the music of the underrepresented groups themselves — a credit that is long forgotten.

In our conversation on Talkhouse.com, Lizzie elaborates on her experience of feeling tokenized throughout her music career: “When I’m on a bill, sometimes bookers will be fast and loose about labeling my music — like ‘African-American folk,’ or like ‘Black folk.’ And, sure, I’m a Black artist as a person, but I wouldn’t describe my music as Black music any more than any other Black artist’s music is Black music. So, yes, I find that to be a really good way for people to pat themselves on the back for booking me, and to let me know that they’re not as familiar with my music.”

Like Lizzie, I have experienced times where the line between inclusion and tokenism felt like it lit up like a Christmas tree in my mind. For example, there was the time I was on a panel that was questioned about whether the project encompassed indigenous issues and they pointed to me as their coverage of the “indigenous issue.” And the time I was on a call with folks who wanted to use my music for a promotional video and they had never actually listened to my songs but were interested in my mixed racial identity. And the countless times concert promoters told me that they booked me cause they really needed a “diversity factor.” Tokenism is incredibly harmful because it leaves the artist questioning whether anyone is even listening to the work itself.

Inclusion, when done right, can be incredibly productive and can open doors for diverse folks. Folk Alliance International brought in the Indigenous Music Summit, a satellite conference led by and for Indigenous people in the folk music community (folkconference.org). Jonathan Azu started the Diversity in Music Employment database, a talent database of BIPOC and female music professionals looking for jobs in the industry (www.musically.com). The American Association of Independent Music (A2IM) created The Black Independent Music Accelerator (BIMA) to amplify independent, Black-owned music businesses (a2im.org). With inclusion, it is important that the mic is being passed not only to speak, but also to lead. I applaud these organizations and conferences for doing just that, and I hope we will continue to see more.

As live events and national tours have been put on hold, it is time to reevaluate our inclusion practices in the music industry and take action by empowering those fighting for their voices and music to be heard. I am incredibly grateful for organizations and artists that fight for empowering and effective inclusion practices and bring more BiPoc folks into positions of power in the music industry. I hope you will consider lifting these voices and acknowledge the change that is needed.

Raye Zaragoza (she/her) is an award-winning singer-songwriter who NPR Music called “one of the most fresh and compelling voices in folk music today." Her sophomore album Woman In Color offers an intimate exploration of coming into her own, in a country where for many, simply existing is political.

Lizzie No (she/her) is a New York based singer-songwriter, harpist and guitarist who released her second full-length album, "Vanity," on August 2, 2019. Rolling Stone Magazine called the first single, Narcissus," a "crisp alt-rock gem" and a "Song You Need To Know." The album was a "Now Hear This" pick in No Depression Magazine. Lizzie is currently working on her third studio album and creating content through her subscription service on ampeld.com/artist/lizzieno

KEY TAKEAWAYS

It is important that the mic is being passed not only to speak, but also to lead.
Musicians of color deserve to be recognized as their full selves.
Though most recognized folk musicians are white, the genre owes its existence to the work of black artists.

PLEDGE YOUR SUPPORT

Nicole Cardoza 3/10/21 Nicole Cardoza 3/10/21

Believe Black women.

Last Sunday, March 7, Prince Harry and Meghan Markle sat down with Oprah Winfrey for a tell-all interview on stepping down as senior members of the royal family. In that interview, Meghan Markle named that the stress and anxiety from the defamatory press led her to suicidal ideation, but she received no mental health support from the palace. She also details the racism that she and her child, Archie, experienced directly, including that the Crown would not provide her son titles or protections and that someone in the family questioned how dark his skin would be (Vulture).

Happy Wednesday and welcome back to the Anti-Racism Daily. I'm still sitting with the "Harry and Meghan" interview with Oprah. Two of the most powerful Black women on Earth sat and discussed racism, oppression and mental health live on television. But you don't need to be in positions of power to experience the harm and rejection that Meghan Markle named. Today's newsletter unpacks some of this, along with links to great content to dive deeper.

This newsletter is a free resource made possible by our paying subscribers. Consider giving $7/month on Patreon. Or you can give one-time on our website, PayPal, or Venmo (@nicoleacardoza). You can also support us by joining our curated digital community. Thank you to all those that have contributed!

Nicole

TAKE ACTION

Donate to the Loveland Foundation, a nonprofit organization founded by Rachel Cargle that provides therapy resources to Black women and girls (which is supported by Meghan Markle’s foundation). Black women: apply for support here.
One way to prioritize racism allegations is to de-prioritize those that gaslight or diminish those that speak out. Actively seek to use your privilege to address those like Piers Morgan who aim to discredit serious claims.
Believe Black women when they say they have been harmed.

GET EDUCATED

By Nicole Cardoza (she/her)

This post references suicidal ideation. If you are in need of support, call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-8255.

This interview only reaffirmed what became quickly apparent after Meghan Markle and Prince Harry began dating in 2016: that the tabloids, and perhaps even members of the royal family themselves, treated Markle differently because of her racial identity. There are countless examples of the disparities of headlines for Markle vs. Kate Middleton and headlines making unfair accusations based on her race, referencing her (false) “gang-scarred” upbringing and “exotic DNA.”

These only escalated after the couple announced their departure in early 2020. The tabloids blasted their departure as a “Megexit,” using a term that was already a popular hashtag online where users would post racist and sexist comments about Meghan Markle (Vanity Fair). As the couple said in their interview, they decided to move to the U.S. to escape the abuse they experienced in the U.K.

Because Meghan is Black, she experienced a particular form of misogyny: misogynoir. Coined by queer black feminist Moya Bailey, this term explains the misogyny directed towards black women where both race and gender influence the bias and discrimination that one may experience.

But we didn’t need to wait for Meghan Markle to analyze the anti-Blackness of the British monarchy. Since its start, it’s been deeply invested in the enslavement and control of Black people. By investing in English trade with West Africa, the Crown hoped to find financial independence from Parliament. Between 1690 and 1807, European enslavers brought over 6 million enslaved African people to the Americas. Half of that trafficking was protected and funded by the Crown and Parliament (Slate). Although the Crown first publicly supported anti-slavery efforts in 1838, they have still yet to address their contributions to the system or the harm they’ve created, even after the past year’s racial reckoning. We can also look to the impact of British colonial rule on the destruction and disparagement of African culture, community, and heritage, an effect that persists to this day (Quartz).

There’s a lot of criticism against Meghan Markle for participating in this system. If she knew about colonialism and anti-Blackness in the institution, why would she even marry into it, to begin with? Why didn’t she expect to deal with racism all along? And quite frankly, that’s no one’s business but hers. We need to continue to question why these systems continue to perpetuate violence instead of chastizing how marginalized folks choose to navigate through them. What do we gain from punishing the victim? What do we lose when we fail to hold our institutions accountable? Why is it up to one woman to protect herself from a legacy of harm?

We also need to emphasize the light skin privilege on display here. Meghan Markle is a very light-skinned Black woman with a Black mother and white father. Colorism is the reason why Meghan Markle was likely even able to marry Prince Harry and be considered a part of the family to begin with. She experienced this violence because she was “white enough” to be included and still “too Black” to be loved, respected, and protected. Darker-skinned Black women experience more misogynoir than their lighter-skinned peers (Change Cadet). But light-skinned women are often more privileged to have a platform to share their experiences. So as you follow stories of misogynoir, always look for what you don’t see, too. Colorism is especially insidious in British culture. Learn more in this comprehensive article by Seun Matiluko (Glamour UK).

We don’t have to wait for breaking news to find examples of racism against Black women, though. Meghan Markle bravely named the same kind of fear, guilt, and shame that many Black people have experienced at their offices or dinner parties or while buying groceries or meeting their significant other’s family. 17.1 million people tuned in to this conversation last night on CBS, but how many of us are listening when we have a front-row seat to this violence happening in real life? Her statements came as no surprise to many Black Britons who have experienced the same racism and discrimination themselves (AP News).

Many people have reflected on how damaging the interview is to the monarchy. But how much has the monarchy hurt us? And this goes beyond its legacy of colonialism and oppression. We have to recognize its complicity of normalizing and perpetuating misogynoir on a global platform through its treatment of Meghan Markle. We must recognize the harm inflicted on Meghan Markle, her son Archie, and her daughter.

And most urgently, we must recognize how it harms the Black women in our community. Listen to what we say. Believe us. Platform our voices, not those of white men committed to disparaging us (Washington Post). Ensure we have the tools we need for our well-being. And, for all of this, prioritize the safety and wellbeing of dark-skinned Black women.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

The "Harry and Meghan" interview with Oprah was the first time the couple publicly addressed why they stepped down as senior members of the royal family and named the racism and harm they experienced from the tabloids and members of the royal family.
Meghan Markle is subject to misogynoir, a specific form of misogyny where race and gender both play a part.
Meghan is a light-skinned Black woman, which gives her a particular set of privileges that also fail to protect her from harm.

PLEDGE YOUR SUPPORT

Nicole Cardoza 3/9/21 Nicole Cardoza 3/9/21

Respect the Chicago hunger strike.

Though Chicago is home to some of the most vibrant urban forests, prairies, and wetlands, in 2020 it set the record for having the worst, unhealthy air quality streak in ten years, ranking even higher than busy cities like Los Angeles. Coupled with COVID-19, experts and advocates predicted the damage would hit Black and Brown communities the hardest (abc 7 chicago). In addition to the many contributing factors that make this city environmentally unsafe such as daily emissions stemming from rail, road, and air traffic, Little Village—a Black and predominantly Latinx neighborhood—soon will have to endure the harsh effects of a metal-shredding operation on top of the pandemic and daily exhaustion.

Happy Tuesday and welcome back to the Anti-Racism Daily. The hunger strike for environmental justice led by organizers in Chicago over the past month has inspired the heck out of me. Sometimes the injustices the world faces may feel insurmountable, and that we alone can't make an impact. But that should never stop us from trying. Three people started a hunger strike – and with that, a youth-driven movement that is likely to transform their community. Learn more in today's newsletter.

This newsletter is a free resource made possible by our paying subscribers. Consider giving $7/month on Patreon. Or you can give one-time on our website, PayPal, or Venmo (@nicoleacardoza). You can also support us by joining our curated digital community. Thank you to all those that have contributed!

Nicole

TAKE ACTION

Follow the efforts of the strike on Twitter at @CHIhungerstrike.
Research environmental organizations like weact.org to learn about the many ways to support environmental justice.
Consider: how does environmental conditions differ in your own city, town or neighborhood? Who are the leader(s) advocating for change?

GET EDUCATED

By Kashea McCowan (she/her)

Without the metal-shredder, Black and brown citizens residing on the southeast side of Chicago already are having to overcome a “moderate” air quality index (AQI) of 52. The United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) defines “moderate” as air potentially unhealthy to sensitive groups including children, the elderly, and people with pre-existing cardiovascular or respiratory health conditions (IQAir). In order to protect themselves from air pollution, these groups have no access to fresh air as it is recommended for them to keep their windows closed to avoid dirty outdoor air and reduce outdoor exercise. According to the EPA, the neighborhood surrounding the new scrap yard site is in the 95th percentile for diesel emissions, 90th for hazardous waste, and 80th for air pollution (grist).

“Many of our residents already have problems with respiratory issues because of the ongoing industry that is operating in our neighborhood. We’re just adding a lot more stress to our public health,” says Edith Tovar in July 2020, Little Village Environmental Justice Organization community organizer. (abc 7 Chicago).

With awareness of these health constraints, Mayor Lori Lightfoot gave Stephen Joseph, chief executive of Reserve Management Group, the go ahead in late 2020 to acquire General Iron, a metal-shredding company rebranded as Southside Recycling. Expressed in a detailed two-page agreement is a timeline of when Joseph could expect to undergo the move of the decades-old business from the north side, a predominantly white neighborhood, to the south side where people of color mostly reside beginning in early 2021. The car and metal-shredding operation was often cited for violations of air pollution in the white part of town. This prompted its relocation, instead, to the Black and Brown part of the city. Despite protests from residents about the environmentally racist move, Lightfoot signed the agreement and all but sealed the deal with Joseph and General Iron (Chicago Sun Times).

Beginning on February 4, 2021, the relocation of the metal-shredder did not sit well with the Latinx community who it would affect the most and thus, began a month-long hunger strike. Among those leading the strike was Oscar Sanchez, Breanna Bertacchi, and Chuck Stark with Sanchez and many other protestors willing to go without food for however long it takes.

“It is immoral, it is discriminatory, and we cannot allow [this plant to operate] in a pandemic when we can prevent it,” says Byron Sigcho-Lopez, a 25th ward alderman who joined the hunger strike (EcoWatch).

The EPA suspended its environmental justice investigation into whether Illinois discriminated against the predominantly Black and Latinx southeast side community after the initiation of discussions about an informal resolution agreement. According to the Chicago Tribune, Mayor Lori Lightfoot is looking for Biden and his administration to make the call of whether or not the scrap yard can be moved to the southeast side (EcoWatch).

Lightfoot finally reached out in response to the strikers via a letter on February 23 acknowledging the hunger strike and the environmental racism the neighborhood faces, but has yet to deny General Iron’s permit and has failed to commit to the hunger strikers demands. Last Thursday, more than two hundred protesters gathered on the streets of Chicago with signs that read “Stop General Iron” and face masks with the words “We deserve clean air!” and “Ecological devastation is immoral”. The scrap yard violated EPA’s standards in 2018, 2012, and 2006 and was regarded by white neighbors as a nuisance. Many of the speakers at the rally including students who attend George Washington high school stated that they should not have to starve themselves just to get their Mayor’s attention (The Guardian).

According to Dr. Susan Buchanan, public health professor at the University of Illinois-Chicago noted that the particular matter that often escapes these types of businesses can lead to severe heart and lung conditions. Joseph says that the pollution controls at the new site will be enough to keep residents safe as he feels like he and his company are not the enemy (The Guardian).

Kudos to those neighbors like Oscar Sanchez who are willing to sacrifice their physical and mental health for what they believe in. Sanchez lost about twenty pounds from participating in the hunger strike for thirty days, and though the hunger strike ended yesterday, he says that the fight is far from over.

“Think about somebody pulling into your home and wanting to kill or hurt those around you. You’re gonna put yourself in line, right? We’re risking our lives just by living here, of course we’re going to fight,” says Sanchez. “This fight for the southeast side is a fight for Chicago and a fight for Chicago is a fight for Illinois and the nation because no one else should suffer at the hands of pollution.” (Grist)

KEY TAKEAWAYS

In 2020, Chicago set the record for having the worst, unhealthy air quality streak in ten years, ranking even higher than busy cities like Los Angeles.
Little Village, a Black and predominantly Latinx neighborhood, soon will have to endure the harsh effects of a metal-shredding operation on top of the pandemic and daily exhaustion.
Mayor Lori Lightfoot gave Stephen Joseph the go ahead to acquire General Iron and move decades-old business from the north side, a predominantly white neighborhood, to the south side where people of color mostly reside.
Though the hunger strike ended yesterday, the fight for environmental justice is far from over.

PLEDGE YOUR SUPPORT

Nicole Cardoza 3/8/21 Nicole Cardoza 3/8/21

Demand accountability during the Derek Chauvin trial.

Today, March 8, marks the beginning of the murder trial of former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin, one of the four police officers responsible for the death of George Floyd in May of 2020. Chauvin is the officer depicted in cellphone and bodycam footage kneeling on Floyd's neck for nearly nine minutes.

Happy Monday and welcome back to the Anti-Racism Daily. I started this newsletter days after the death of George Floyd; my way to hold us all accountable for the violence and devastation that racism causes. Today I'm amplifying the work of The George Floyd Memorial Foundation to demand a fair trial, and sharing local reporting from the ground. Please do what you can to support their efforts.

This newsletter is a free resource made possible by our paying subscribers. Consider giving $7/month on Patreon. Or you can give one-time on our website, PayPal, or Venmo (@nicoleacardoza). You can also support us by joining our curated digital community. Thank you to all those that have contributed!

Nicole

TAKE ACTION

Sign the petition urging Governor Tim Walz, Keith Ellison, of Minnesota Attorney General, and Judge Peter Cahill to ensure a fair trial.
Send an automated postcard to members of city and state government advocating for a fair trial. Their goal is to send 10,000 cards by March 31, 2021, and I know we can help them get there. A portion of proceeds supports the George Floyd Memorial Foundation.
The Minnesota Star Tribune will be making all reporting on this case free to the public. Consider subscribing to support local journalism during this time.
Remember, this is not the “George Floyd” trial. George Floyd is NOT on trial. As the NAACP states, “George Floyd was taken from us viciously, inexplicably, and inhumanely. Derek Chauvin is on trial to tell his side of the story. A luxury that was not afforded to George Floyd and countless other men and women within the Black community”.

GET EDUCATED

By Nicole Cardoza (she/her)

Chauvin is charged with second-degree murder and second-degree manslaughter. Prosecutors were initially denied the chance to add a third-degree murder charge in the case, but the Minnesota Court of Appeals overturned that decision on Friday, March 5. This could potentially delay the trial proceedings (Star Tribune). Three other former police officers involved in the death of George Floyd will face trial together in August 2021.

If he’s found guilty, Chauvin would be the first former police officer to be convicted of murdering a Black man in Minnesota. He will also be one of the few police officers charged and convicted to this extent. Our current justice system makes it incredibly difficult to hold police officers accountable (NYTimes). Read more about qualified immunity in a previous newsletter. This was made quite evident last September when a grand jury decided not to charge any police officer with a crime for killing Breonna Taylor (NYMag).

And justice is rarely seen for victims of police violence in Minnesota. In the past 20 years, at least 195 people have died in law enforcement incidents in Minnesota. But only one officer has been convicted of an on-duty killing. That officer was a Somali American man, and the victim was a white woman (Star Tribune). Last Friday, families of over a dozen of those victims gathered to advocate for a murder conviction in this trial – not just for the family of George Floyd, but everyone that’s failed to see accountability in these kinds of cases (Star Tribune). In each of the families' cases, facts were disputed, credibility was questioned, and police escaped liabilities when juries decline to indict or refuse to convict. Read more about Families Supporting Families against Police Violence in this excellent long-form story from the Star Tribune.

Although courtroom seating is limited due to COVID-19, video, and audio of the trial will be streamed live online, which is also significant. A fair and equitable trial unfolding in real-time may help to shape accountability for future cases. This will be the first time a high-profile trial in a Minnesota state court will be broadcast live, and the second trial in August will be, too (Star Tribune). The Star Tribune will offer a live stream each day on StarTribune.com.

If the city’s preparations for the upcoming trial are any indication, they give a pessimistic outlook on the case’s perceived outcomes. The city plans to spend $1M on security measures, and over half of that budget will go towards fortifying its five police precinct stations (NBC News). They’ve also called in thousands of additional law enforcement, including police officers and members of the National Guard. Although the city says that they have been working in partnership with local activists, reporting Tasneem Nashrulla at BuzzFeed News says otherwise. She reports that many activists did not hear from city leaders until Thursday — just days before the trial — and were not involved in the public safety plan. After criticism, the city also reversed plans to hire local social media “influencers” to spread messages of civility and unity in advance of the trial (USA Today).

Demonstrations have been held all weekend in Minneapolis and across the U.S. They are expected to continue today and throughout the trial (Star Tribune). And although only some may participate in person, it’s clear that the world is watching. George Floyd and his family deserve a fair and just trial, but so do all the families impacted by police violence, and all of us still processing the trauma of police brutality in our communities. The verdict in this trial will symbolize how far we’ve truly come over the past year – and only emphasize how much we’ve fallen short historically.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

Today is the start of the Derek Chauvin trial, one of the four police officers responsible for the death of George Floyd in May 2020.
The trial will be livestreamed to the public, and Minneapolis is bracing for tension by hiring law enforcement and building barricades.
Police officers are rarely tried or convicted, particularly in Minnesota, and families of victims are advocating for a fair and just trial.
The outcomes of this trial hold particular cultural significance and will symbolize how the U.S. is responding to the racial reckoning of the past year.

RELATED ISSUES

3/2/2021 | Demand more than reform.

9/24/2020 | Demand justice for Breonna Taylor.

7/6/2020 | Abolish qualified immunity.

PLEDGE YOUR SUPPORT

Nicole Cardoza 3/4/21 Nicole Cardoza 3/4/21

Reject appropriation in fashion.

Until its end in 2019, the Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show reigned supreme in not only pageantry and glittery wings but also cultural appropriation. Leaked photos from the 2012 live show revealed that supermodel Karlie Kloss donned a large feathered Native American headdress paired with a fringed suede bikini accessorized with turquoise jewelry. Though the immediate backlash caused the look to be cut from the broadcast, it wouldn’t stop the lingerie conglomerate from finding itself guilty for the same crime again in 2016 and 2017 (CRFashionbook).

Happy Friday! And thanks for being here once again. We often get questions on what the line is between cultural appropriation and appreciation when it comes to clothing. It's not a straightforward line, but it's necessary to understand who benefits – and who is harmed – when the fashion industry celebrates cultural and ethnic markers at the expense of the communities it represents. Here to share more is Isiah.

This newsletter is a free resource made possible by our paying subscribers. Consider giving $7/month on Patreon. Or you can give one-time on our website, PayPal, or Venmo (@nicoleacardoza). You can also support us by joining our curated digital community. Thank you to all those that have contributed!

Nicole

TAKE ACTION

Boycott labels that continue to appropriate cultural aesthetics without proper accreditation. Ask yourself: Have they collaborated with an artist, designer, musician that identifies with the culture they’re trying to emulate?
Hold brands accountable by sharing issues publicly, contacting corporate PR and design teams, and refusing to buy products from these companies.
Stay informed about racism and diversity in fashion by following accounts such as The Fashion Law and Black in Fashion Council.

GET EDUCATED

By Isiah Magsino (he/him)

But these aren’t the only places where appropriation happens. Fast-fashion retailer Zara is no stranger to cultural appropriation. The brand came under fire in 2018 after knocking off the traditional baati style from Somali by calling it a Tie-Dye Maxi Dress (Allure). Some brand insiders argue that the outfits are meant to celebrate cultures from around the world, but this misunderstanding of what’s appreciation and what’s appropriation is another flaw the fashion industry must fix (BBC). (To learn more about the problems with the fast-fashion industry, check out our previous newsletter.)

By definition, appropriation is when a person from one culture adopts the fashion, iconography, or traditions from another culture (Very Well Mind). While the act might not sound that bad, the issue lies when the borrower (who often belongs to the oppressive or dominant culture) profits off of, falsely represent or exploits whatever is being borrowed (Reach Out). As cultural appropriation remains widespread amongst the white elite, the issue isn’t necessarily that they take inspiration from other cultures. It’s that those in power take from and profit off of Black and Brown creators, while such creators are excluded from recognition and oftentimes reprimanded for the same styles that are being stolen (Vox ATL). For example, singer Billie Eilish was accused of appropriating Black, hip-hop fashion styles from the 90s. When her “style” is written about, the media often doesn’t credit the Black icons like Aaliyah and Dapper Dan whom her style ultimately emulates (Buzzfeed). Similarly, in 2020, Kim Kardashian was accused of appropriating Black culture after posting pictures of herself wearing Fulani Braids (Independent UK).

On a larger scale, cultural appropriation in fashion points to a racist system of power. Borrowed styles are often glamourized on white bodies, but looked down upon on the Black and Brown bodies where the styles originated. Fashion designer Marc Jacobs immediately faced backlash after featuring dreadlocks in a show with mostly white models in 2017 (Dazed). Using dreadlocks as a costume for a fifteen-minute show ignores the reality of the Black people who experience discrimination and harassment for their hairstyles. Black women continue to have career opportunities taken away from them simply because of their natural hair (Shape). Coils, afros, and dreads have long been considered “unprofessional” due to Western beauty standards which forces Black women in the workplace to abide in order to gain or retain employment (Shape). For more about cultural appropriation and Black hair, check out our previous newsletter.

Similarly, the “fox-eye” trend is a make-up look that uses eyeliner to make the eyes appear more slanted. The irony is that the Asian American community continues to be discriminated against for these same features (Teen Vogue). Not only are the designs and beadwork of Indigenous people exploited by non-Indigenous retailers, but around the world, Indigenous people—themselves—are as well (Unreasonable). White people who appropriate cultures are able to move seamlessly in and out and borrow styles without suffering the consequences put in place by them.

While white fashion designers and retailers profit off of these stolen styles from Black and Brown people, designers of color often are struggling and in need of financial support. In 2017, four percent of women-owned fashion businesses and only thirteen percent minority-owned businesses received venture capital funding (Fast Company). As COVID-19 continues, an estimated ninety percent of small businesses owned by people of color are excluded from the Small Business Administration’s Paycheck Protection Program (Fashionista).

Unsurprisingly, cultural appropriation in fashion isn’t new. Its origins can be traced through textiles and materials made of interlacing fibers that often are used in clothing and upholstery. For example, the nineteenth-century European court dress, a style that was popular for formal occasions, borrowed fashion and Asiatic themes that resembled the Indian Kashmir shawl (WWD). The textile moved into vogue among the masses as it was donned by Emperor Bonaparte’s wife, Josephine (WWD). At the same time that India was controlled by the British Empire and its citizens were subjugated to colonial rule, their styles were being stolen and worn.

The modern-day issue of cultural appropriation is a continuation of a history where people of color and their cultures are colonized and oppressed—at the same time—as what they wear is stolen and used. Today, social media enables consumers to more fully understand where styles are borrowed from (BBC). Consumers and inherent participants in the fashion industry should remain aware of where their money is being spent, as well as, who is benefitting from it. Conducting thorough research is vital in the support of Black and Brown artisans while, on the other hand, brands prone to appropriation instead of appreciation must be held accountable.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

Cultural appropriation in fashion is rampant, and signifies the power differential between who can take and who is being taken from.
Appropriated styles are often glamourized on white bodies, but denigrated on the Black and Brown bodies where the styles originated.
Cultural appropriation in fashion has a long history. At the same time that India was controlled and subjugated by the British Empire, Indian styles became fashionable in European courts.
While white designers profit off of appropriated styles, Black and Brown designers often lack financial support. An estimated 90% of small businesses owned by people of color are excluded from the Paycheck Protection Program (Fashionista).

PLEDGE YOUR SUPPORT

Nicole Cardoza 3/3/21 Nicole Cardoza 3/3/21

Know the difference between canceled and accountability.

Water is a necessary natural resource needed to live a sustainable life. Humans are made up of about sixty percent of water and, in addition to it being essential for the body, it is the most important substance for cleaning, bathing, washing, and many other things. When it comes to cities that are mostly comprised of Black and Brown citizens, proper maintenance and availability to the basic necessities—such as water, in this case—are sometimes overlooked or deemed as unimportant or not as urgent as those living in predominantly white neighborhoods. Blatant disregard for these Black and Brown populations shows up more often than not but mostly during some sort of environmental crisis or natural disaster.

Happy Thursday, and welcome back to the Anti-Racism Daily! I was disappointed to see this news get convoluted into something more than what it is. Not only does it add noise to a time where fast and accurate information is critical for our wellbeing, but it also detracts from the rare instances where organizations hold themselves responsible for change. I think this is a good case study in media literacy and looking past sensationalized headlines.

This newsletter is a free resource made possible by our paying subscribers. Consider giving $7/month on Patreon. Or you can give one-time on our website, PayPal, or Venmo (@nicoleacardoza). You can also support us by joining our curated digital community. Thank you to all those that support it!

Nicole

Ps – yes, I know that MI is for Michigan and MS is for Mississippi. That was a typo.

TAKE ACTION

If you are reading books with a child that depicts harmful racist stereotypes, have an honest discussion with them about it. More resources from Learning for Justice.

Explore the diverse books recommended for 2021 by the National Education Association.
Pay attention to how “canceled” is used in conversations about race. Who is on the defensive? What were the actions taken? Where did the conversation originate from?

GET EDUCATED

By Nicole Cardoza (she/her)

March 2 was Read Across America Day, an initiative launched in 1998 to celebrate reading across the U.S. The day was started to commemorate the birthday of Theodor Seuss Geisel who wrote iconic children’s books under the pen name Dr. Seuss. But this year, the news was lit up with shocking allegations that Dr. Seuss was officially canceled for promoting racial tropes in his work. A school in Virginia banned his books. President Biden slighted him in a speech. And on Tuesday, the organization that manages Dr. Seuss’ anthology was forced to stop publishing his works. Altogether, these read as serious developments at first glance but, is the controversy valid?

One thing for certain is that there are definitely racist tropes in Dr. Seuss’s work. This conversation is not new, in fact, Dr. Seuss himself acknowledged and apologized for the harm (Dr. Seuss Art). In a study from 2019 titled Research on Diversity in Youth Literature, researchers Katie Ishizuka and Ramon Stephens analyzed all the published children’s work of Dr. Suess and found that only two percent of the human characters were people of color. All of those characters were depicted using harmful racial caricatures that are unacceptable today (St. Catherine University).

Consequently, organizations have acted accordingly. In 2017, the National Education Association rebranded Read Across America which is held on March 2 each year in honor of Dr. Seuss’ birthday to focus only on the celebration of reading and, specifically, the need to read diverse books (Edweek). These changes are reflected by others celebrating the day including school districts. Loudoun County Public Schools, the school district in question, had to publish an update on their website explaining just that (lcps.org). And although President Biden is the first president not to name Dr. Seuss in his public acknowledgment, it’s likely more to stay aligned with the NEA’s talking points than a direct attack on the Dr. Seuss’ legacy.

It’s also true that some of Dr. Seuss’ books are “canceled”, but not because of public outrage. Dr. Seuss Enterprises, the organization that manages Dr. Seuss’ anthology, announced that they made the decision to cease publication and licensing of only the books that depict racist tropes. The announcement indicated that this decision was made sometime last year after an external review. None of these books are the popular ones Dr. Seuss is known for. Think That I Saw It on Mulberry Street, If I Ran the Zoo, McElligot’s Pool, On Beyond Zebra!, Scrambled Eggs Super!, and The Cat’s Quizzer are the six books that have been removed. (Suessville).

The controversy this year is less about the issue itself, but more on how it’s being spun by conservative media which is blaming the “woke mob” and “cancel culture” for “destroying” the institution of Dr. Seuss’ whimsical rhyming children’s books. Nothing here is destroyed; the majority of Dr. Seuss’ books will still be sold, organizations will celebrate the importance of reading, and we’ll continue to acknowledge the harm of promoting racist tropes in kids’ books. This wasn’t brought about by a mob of protestors but instead were decisions made by a national organization and the company that represents Dr. Seuss’ legacy. These clear and straightforward calls for accountability have been weaponized to insinuate that they’ve caused more harm than they actually have.

The controversy around Dr. Seuss is one of many recent examples of the conservative uproar over change, particularly expressed in the media. According to conservatives, The Muppets were canceled after Disney added content warnings to some of the old episodes that showcased harmful stereotypes (Vulture). Mr. Potato Head fell victim to the woke mob when Hasbro—sort of—dropped the Mr. and Mrs. from the brand name and logo to make the characters more gender-inclusive (AP).

These misinformation initiatives detract from the necessary efforts of both individuals and organizations to promote diversity and inclusion. They also attempt to discredit efforts to address sexism, racism, homophobia, etc. By disparaging those that seek change, conservatives believe they can reshape the narrative to act in their favor, often completely ignoring the facts most central to the issue; in this case, that some of Dr. Seuss’ work can be harmful for youth.

There’s a wide berth between accountability and cancelation, and we should applaud those taking steps to move forward instead of defending the outdated norms that exist. Although the actions of Dr. Seuss aren't forgiven, the most we can do is take accountability and do our part to move forward.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

After conversations around racist stereotypes found in Dr. Seuss' work rose again alongside Read Across America Day, the organization that represents his work announced they are ceasing the sale and publication of the books in question.
Critics decried the move as an attack by the "woke mob" and their attempts to "cancel" Dr. Seuss entirely, misrepresenting recent actions by the President, a Virginia school district, and the official Dr. Seuss organization.
This is one of many examples on how conservative media and leaders wield "cancel culture" and "wokeness" against those taking accountability and working towards change.

RELATED ISSUES

2/5/2021 | Stop white centering.

12/13/2020 | Acknowledge whiteness in classical art.

12/8/2020 | Learn how to apologize.

PLEDGE YOUR SUPPORT

Nicole Cardoza 3/2/21 Nicole Cardoza 3/2/21

Advocate for clean water.

Happy Wednesday and welcome back to the Anti-Racism Daily! Today we're focusing our attention on the water crisis in Jackson, MS, which hasn't received adequate coverage for the scope of the issue. But water crises throughout the U.S. are certainly not new. But the lack of infrastructure to support clean water is often concentrated in Black and brown communities, and, when combined with a global pandemic, only exacerbates the health and safety issues it causes. Kashea breaks down what's happening in Jackson and offers action items we can replicate in any community in crisis.

This newsletter is a free resource and that's made possible by our paying subscribers. Consider giving $7/month on Patreon. Or you can give one-time on our website, PayPal, or Venmo (@nicoleacardoza). You can also support us by joining our curated digital community. Thank you to all those that support!

Nicole

TAKE ACTION

Donate to organizations supporting those without water, including Shower Power and the Immigrant Alliance for Justice and Equity MS (Venmo @IAJEofMS). ,
Stay up-to-date with current news and live city council meetings concerning the water outages on the City of Jackson, Mississippi Facebook page.
Help local Jackson residents push for long-term local and federal support by reporting the damages they have undergone. A cumulative threshold of $4.5 million in reported damages must be reached for the city to declare a federal emergency (Mississippi Today).
Consider: are their neighborhoods in your town with critical infrastructure needs? How can you advocate for them in your local government, and in support of organizers advocating for change?

GET EDUCATED

By Andrew Lee (he/him)

In 2014, Flint, Michigan was hit with a water crisis that left more than a hundred thousand people with unclean, lead-infused water. The problem wasn’t fixed until five years later in 2019. And today, people of color who reside in the South are being affected by a water crisis that has left tens of thousands of Black and Brown people without clean water for weeks due to the winter storm that swept across nearly every state in mid-February. Among those hit the hardest were Texas and Jackson, Mississippi. Residents from both states still are feeling the effects while Jackson residents are left to fend for themselves as most of them still are left without water. What these disasters have in common is that government officials do not act with a sense of urgency when it comes to these groups of people.

It’s been nearly three weeks since the residents of Jackson, Mississippi have had access to clean, running water. The city of Jackson issued a boil water notice on February 18 in response to the water main breaks on the City of Jackson’s Well Water System which caused an inability to maintain system pressure resulting in some areas experiencing low to no water pressure (The City of Jackson, Mississippi). Residents still are having to scrounge for this essential natural resource. In addition to having to boil it, they are now being asked to limit their use of it. According to one of the city’s representatives, it is unclear how many people are without water as the system which services approximately forty-three thousand people is old (CBS News).

“The challenges of aging infrastructure are not new to Jackson, but this is different. This was an act of God that sent old systems into havoc resulting in severe water outages and trauma for our residents,” says Mayor Chokwe Lumumba. “Our systems were never meant to endure days of ice storms and sub-zero temperatures coupled by road conditions that prevented the delivery of critical supplies” (The Daily Beast).

Mississippi Governor Tate Reeves agrees and says that fifty years of deferred maintenance is not something that can be fixed within hours. Mayor Lumumba is asking for people to have patience as it is clear that there is no definitive timeline as to when the water will be restored in the tanks (The Daily Beast). There are several sites in place for distribution of non-potable or flushing water, and Reeves activated the National Guard to help with water distribution efforts in the area. But many locals, including professional chef Enrika Williams and her family, are having to spend excessive amounts of money on bottled water to cook and clean with. Jackson’s total population is approximately 160,000 people with a 26.9 percent poverty rate. That means that most of the people don’t have the resources to go out and buy additional water for their homes.

“Part of the problem is that it’s everywhere. Usually when we have an outage it’s in one neighborhood . . . ,” says Laurie Bertram Roberts, manager of the Mississippi Reproductive Freedom Fund. “But when it’s the whole damn city, where are the Black people supposed to go? It’s not like this is everywhere; it’s where the mostly Black population in Jackson lives. (The Daily Beast).

Not only has routine maintenance for these tanks and water lines been neglected, but it seems that communication between Governor Reeves and Mayor Lumumba about the issue also has fallen by the wayside as Lumumba is being accused of reaching out to Reeves too slowly, and Reeves’ camp retorting saying that he had no missed calls from the Mayor.

As of Monday, Jackson Public Works Director Charles Williams says that the city’s water system is still in the process of stabilizing itself. It is unclear how many people are still without water but Williams stresses that crews are working as hard as they can to get water flowing to those areas as there still is no definitive timeline on when services will be fully restored (Clarion Ledger).

For fifty years, maintenance for Jackson’s water system has been put off. Even after the city approved a one percent tax increase six years ago, the goal of updating all of its aging infrastructures has yet to be retained. Lumumba says that the annual fifteen million dollars the city generates are only a fraction of the two billion dollars the city will need to fix the problem. This is an issue that city officials have neglected to put at the top of their to-do lists and as a result, people are suffering—specifically, the Black population. More than a few residents have noted that the crisis has hit South and West Jackson while Northeast Jackson, the one predominantly white corner of this eighty percent Black capital city, is left relatively unscathed (The Daily Beast).

KEY TAKEAWAYS

When it comes to cities that are mostly comprised of Black and Brown citizens, proper maintenance and availability to the basic necessities are sometimes overlooked or deemed as unimportant compared to those living in predominantly white neighborhoods.
It’s been nearly three weeks since the residents of Jackson, Mississippi has had access to clean, running water.
Mississippi Governor Tate Reeves says that fifty years of deferred maintenance is not something that can be fixed within hours.
There still is no definitive timeline on when services will be fully restored.

PLEDGE YOUR SUPPORT

Nicole Cardoza 3/2/21 Nicole Cardoza 3/2/21

Demand more than reform.

The murders of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor this past summer sparked militant uprisings and massive protests nationwide. Combined with the ongoing pandemic and recession, the upheavals sparked tension and frayed nerves as the National Guard roamed American streets and police stations burned. None of this was helped by Trump’s hostility towards protestors, leaving many to look towards the incoming administration for a breath of fresh air.

We once again have a Democrat in the White House, one who has said we must “root out systemic racism across our laws and institutions” (USA Today). Biden is proposing $300 million for “community policing”: buying body cameras, diversifying and retraining police departments. Reform seems to be coming. You might think all is well.

Happy Tuesday and welcome back to the Anti-Racism Daily! Cities across the U.S. have pledged to hold local law enforcement accountable for the racial disparities in policing. But are efforts of reform sufficient to create comprehensive change? Andrew joins us today to emphasize the importance of advocating for abolition, in time for the launch of defundpolice.org, a comprehensive platform with education and action items for those that want to drive this work home in their communities.

This newsletter is a free resource and that's made possible by our paying subscribers. Consider giving $7/month on Patreon. Or you can give one-time on our website, PayPal, or Venmo (@nicoleacardoza). You can also support us by joining our curated digital community. Thank you to all those that support!

Nicole

TAKE ACTION

Visit DefundPolice.org, a new, comprehensive web resource where organizers can find everything they need for their campaign to defund police in one place.
Read “How I Became a Police Abolitionist” by Derecka Purnell to learn how someone who grew up calling the police decided that they never should have existed.
Support police and prison abolitionist groups like Critical Resistance (@C_Resistance), Survived and Punished (@survivepunish), the Incarcerated Workers Organizing Committee (@IWW_IWOC), Study Abolition, and Jailhouse Lawyers Speak (@JailLawSpeak).
Donate to the National Bail Fund Network to free those behind bars solely because of a lack of financial resources.
Read about the white supremacist origins of policing and consider the role one’s privilege might play in opposing abolition.

GET EDUCATED

By Andrew Lee (he/him)

The problem is that depending on reforms is dangerous. First of all, it takes power away from protestors and communities and puts it in the hands of detached politicians. If politicians had the inclination and competence to fix unjust systems of their own accord, they presumably would have done so long ago.

The second problem is that community policing is just the last in a list of “silver bullets” supposed to truly end police brutality. First, it was civilian review boards (Minneapolis Star Tribune). Then, dashboard cameras (CNN). Now we’re told sensitivity training and body cameras are the missing piece. But if we look at the history, we find reason to be skeptical of these quick fixes.

A number of major American cities now have some form of police review board where citizens submit complaints about police misconduct. New York City implemented civilian oversight in the mid-1960s (Civilian Complaint Review Board) after the police murder of a Black teenager sparked the Harlem race riot (Britannica). A few years after a massive uprising following the assassination of Dr. King, Chicago started a police review board as well (Better Government Association). For many, it stood to reason that police misconduct would cease with civilian oversight.

Similarly, increasing attention to racism in law enforcement in the 1990s caused a number of states to mandate that police have in-car cameras (“dash cams”) to record traffic stops (Department of Justice). Surely if every police stop were recorded, the thinking went, racial bias in law enforcement would end.

And in the wake of the murder of Mike Brown and the Ferguson uprising, civil rights advocates joined with politicians (including President Obama) to support body-worn cameras for police (The Guardian). How could police racism ever persist, advocates declared, with video evidence of each and every encounter?

We now know that each of these silver bullets failed repeatedly in the most abysmal, tragic ways. A police review board didn’t stop Officer Jason Van Dyke from murdering teenager Laquan McDonald (New York Times). Officer Derek Chauvin’s body camera didn’t give him second thought as he knelt on George Floyd’s neck for eight long minutes (ABC News). And the Louisville Metro Police Department’s body cams didn’t stop them from executing Breonna Taylor in her own home (VICE News).

This should be no surprise: studies have found review boards (PBS) are often woefully unprepared to actually investigate police and a study commissioned by Washington, DC found that body-worn cameras actually have no measurable impact on police use of force (The Lab @ DC). We’ve seen cops get all of the shiny new tools they keep promising will finally bring accountability and justice, and we’ve seen nothing change. There has been so little improvement in American policing as a result that two panels looking at Chicago police misconduct found virtually the same problems some 43 years apart (Chicago Reader).

All of these much-lauded police reforms have actual effects—but not the ones advocates hope for. The announcement of reforms can pacify protests following highly-publicized police misconduct. And those dashboard-mounted and body-worn cameras for cops? Police departments were already interested in those, not for the purpose of protecting civil rights, but rather to help police evidence collection (Department of Justice). Nine out of ten state prosecutors’ offices who use body-worn camera footage as evidence in court use it to prosecute not the police but rather the civilians being filmed (Body-Worn Camera Training & Technical Assistance).

These reforms not only do not work, but they also increase the scale and the funding of policing. What abolitionist organizations like Critical Resistance identify is that the problem isn’t that the right tweaks haven’t been made, or the correct diversity seminar hasn’t been presented. The problem, in a deeply unequal and white supremacist society, is policing itself. Instead of directing more resources towards police departments, whether in the guise of reform or not, we should move resources away from them and into oppressed communities. For more on the difference between reform and abolition, check out our previous newsletter.

As an East Asian man with a college degree and housing, I don’t face the brunt of police brutality in my day-to-day life. But I’ve seen them unleash incredible amounts of violence at political demonstrations, and I’ve heard real horror stories from people in my life. It’s relatively painless for allies to support easy fixes to police brutality. Imagining a world without policing and its flip side, incarceration, can be scary for the privileged since police and prisons function in many ways to protect that very same privilege.

But if we want to be true allies for racial justice and collective liberation, we don’t have the luxury of taking the easy way out. We can’t be satisfied with simplistic reforms, especially ones that not only fail to limit police abuses but actually increase police power.

Removing resources from the police to build the kind of fully-resourced, safe and thriving communities that make policing obsolete won’t be easy. But at a time of inspiring mass mobilizations and incredible political danger, we need to look honestly at what decades of much-lauded reforms have actually done and what they haven’t. It’s time to demand more than reform.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

Police reform has been tried before. There is compelling evidence that a variety of reforms do not reduce police misconduct.
In fact, reforms can actually strengthen law enforcement’s power by increasing surveillance or diffusing anger at police abuses.
We should directly redistribute resources currently invested in law enforcement to under-resourced communities.

PLEDGE YOUR SUPPORT

Nicole Cardoza 3/1/21 Nicole Cardoza 3/1/21

Support unaccompanied minors.

One category of immigrants that is often overlooked in the larger conversation about immigration is unaccompanied minors. The term refers to youth who are under eighteen years old, undocumented, and have no parents or legal guardians in the United States (National Immigrant Justice Center). They also are the students who don’t get to join the high school soccer team because they have to work a full-time job. They are the hard workers who have to choose between earning a diploma and paying their rent. Every day, they are faced with making decisions about whether to go to school and reach their academic potential or go to work to provide for themselves and their families back in their home countries.

Happy Monday and welcome back to the Anti-Racism Daily. It's a new month and I'm excited for the possibilities it holds. Today, Sergio joins us with his personal narrative, urging us all to do more to support unaccompanied minors in our communities.

This newsletter is a free resource and that's made possible by our paying subscribers. Consider giving $7/month on Patreon. Or you can give one-time on our website, PayPal, or Venmo (@nicoleacardoza). You can also support us by joining our curated digital community. Thank you to all those that support!

Nicole

TAKE ACTION

Volunteer at your local high school to mentor unaccompanied minors through high school and into college.
Donate to organizations that provide free legal assistance to unaccompanied minors like Kids in Need of Defense.
Write letters to your local representatives to provide more funding and resources at majority Latino high schools.

GET EDUCATED

By Sergio Rodriguez (he/him/el)

Most unaccompanied minors are from Central America, particularly El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras. In 2018, 49,100 unaccompanied minors arrived in the United States. In May 2019, 11,500 more crossed the U.S.-Mexico border (Migration Policy Institute). Most of them leave their home countries to escape political violence, gang violence, and extreme poverty. Because of U.S.-driven instability in Central America, it can be hard to disentangle one of these reasons from another. For me, it was a mixture of all three.

I came to the United States from El Salvador at the age of seventeen. The decision to leave my home country was incredibly difficult and complex. In El Salvador, my parents supported five children on poverty-level wages. When I was five, I spent early morning hours under that never-ending blue sky farming volcanic soil with my dad for five dollars a day. That money went right to my mom to try and satisfy our always hungry stomachs.

As I got older, it became more and more difficult for my parents to support us all. In El Salvador, due to a compounding mix of violence, unemployment, and job scarcity, it is increasingly difficult for young people to stay motivated to get through school and into the workforce (OECD). I knew that if I wanted a better future for myself, one where I could realize my full potential and meet my most basic needs, I would have to leave my country.

I decided to come to the United States alone. I left with nothing more than my wallet, three shirts, a pair of jeans, a pair of shoes, and a water bottle. The wallet contained my high school ID card, my passport, letters from friends and family, and memories; no money.

I traveled through Guatemala with a small group of people. We hitched rides and took buses to get to Mexico. We crossed the U.S.-Mexico border and immediately got arrested and put into a youth detention center. After being released and connecting with my long-distant aunt, I got my first job. My first paycheck was a hundred dollars. I had never had so much money in my entire life; I was excited. Then the bills started piling up.

To pursue my right to stay in this country, I found and paid for a lawyer. Because I am an unaccompanied minor, I had no parental support. My aunt was living her own life, and while I was able to rent a bedroom from her, that was the extent of our relationship. I paid for my legal fees, rent, food, and sent money back to feed my family by working more than fifty hours a week at a restaurant all through high school. This often meant sacrificing things for myself. I ate a lot of fruit because it was cheaper than buying meat, bread, or beans. I spent my first Boston winter sloshing through snow and ice each night after my shift ended at midnight without a winter coat or boots shivering the whole way home.

My high school grades were far from exemplary. I struggled to pay attention in class because I was always tired, my stomach always rumbling, my thoughts easily drifting to the next impending crisis. It would have been so easy to drop out, to disappear into the background. If you are undocumented, you probably have an immigration story just as harrowing and difficult as mine. Some of it I talk about, more of it, I don’t.

Approximately 125,000 undocumented immigrant students like myself reach high school graduation age each year. However, only ninety-eight thousand actually graduate. The other twenty-seven thousand students exit early from high school and, in my experience, these students are most likely unaccompanied (Migration Policy Institute). (Accurate data about unaccompanied minors is nearly impossible to come by because of our often under-the-radar existence.)

Without the support of mentors, I would be one of those twenty-seven thousand young people who leave high school only to drift into the shadows and operate on the edge of legality to try and chase my dreams. Unaccompanied minors are kids. They deserve everything any child deserves, especially a full-time education where they are not pressured to choose between school and survival.

An unaccompanied student in high school has the same responsibilities as an adult except that the adult doesn’t have to attend school while working full time, paying bills, buying food and clothes, and paying for legal representation. Immigration court is the only court system in the United States where you are not guaranteed a lawyer, even as a minor. Maybe you remember hearing those horror stories about kids going to court alone (The Atlantic). It’s all true; we all do. Being unaccompanied is a full-time adult and adolescent existence that constantly forces children to make hard, grown-up decisions.

We need to overhaul our system to support unaccompanied minors both in the legal system and in the community. We need to reform our immigration court structure to guarantee all defendants a lawyer. We need mental health support in schools, especially bilingual and bicultural counselors who can help students process the trauma of independent migration. We need a social safety net that includes unaccompanied minors to ensure they have safe housing, food, and clothes whether or not they have an income. Finally, we need adults who support us—people who can mentor, tutor, and believe in our capabilities—so that we get the chance to be kids before becoming adults.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

Unaccompanied minors are children seeking education, safety, and a future in the U.S.
Unaccompanied minors are not guaranteed legal representation and have to find lawyers and pay legal fees
Unaccompanied minors are often left out of immigration conversations and deserve the same opportunities and paths toward citizenship as DACA and DREAMers

PLEDGE YOUR SUPPORT

Nicole Cardoza 2/28/21 Nicole Cardoza 2/28/21

Learn from public syllabi.

As an educator who teaches courses on histories of race in the United States, I am all too aware of the deep need to address how current events impact the things we talk about in the classroom. A week before the quarter began this year, for instance, I emailed my students in order to address the January 6 insurrection. I touched on how it would likely impact the way in which we engaged with our course, as well as why learning about histories of racial formation and activism were so critical to moving forward. As writer and professor Rebecca Schuman puts it, “college, with its structured reading environment and safe discussion spaces, can give an entire generation the tools not just to begin to understand our violent, incomprehensible world—but to make it a little bit less violent, and a lot more comprehensible” (Slate). I see my courses as giving students those tools to take with them as they move beyond the university.

Happy Sunday! Today is Ida's third publication of a three-part series on how to diversify our education. I really appreciate this one; this newsletter has acted as my own public syllabi, in a way. I get to dive deep into diverse topics and constantly get introduced to new sources and inspiring people. But the sources that mean most are the *actual* syllabi that educators share online. I'd love to hear where else you're learning from and what this email inspires.

This newsletter is a free resource and that's made possible by our paying subscribers. Consider giving $7/month on Patreon. Or you can give one-time on our website, PayPal, or Venmo (@nicoleacardoza). You can also support us by joining our curated digital community. Thank you to all those that support!

Nicole

TAKE ACTION

Explore curriculum guides & public syllabi curated by academics, such as the #StandingRockSyllabus, #ImmigrationSyllabus and #IslamophobiaIsRacism syllabus, among many others.
Read or view at least one of the syllabus items that intrigue you.
Create a regular reading group with friends or colleagues to go through some of the syllabus items and have collective discussions about the texts.

GET EDUCATED

By Ida Yalzadeh (she/her)

Unfortunately, most do not have access to these kinds of spaces that allow us to collectively process and work through the historical underpinnings of what’s going on right now. Most don’t know where to turn in order to figure out, “What got us to where we are today?”

In previous issues, I’ve written about the importance of new media & zine culture as two different yet converging mediums that allow for information and knowledge to be more easily distributed among those advocating for structural change. Today, I wanted to talk about online & crowd-sourced syllabi as a source that puts a new spin on the traditional college course. By using current events as framing sites for deep dives into histories of the United States, scholars, researchers and activists are curating online syllabi to distribute foundational texts and accessible content that help others process what’s going on and how we got to these moments.

The first real instance of an online syllabus going viral was in 2014, with the instigation and organization of the #FergusonSyllabus on Twitter by Marcia Chatelain, an African American Studies and history professor at Georgetown University. The Ferguson unrest was prompted in the wake of the shooting of Michael Brown, and had many, including Chatelain, wondering what they could do. She began the hashtag as a way of crowd-sourcing texts that could speak to the reasons for the unrest and its historical context (The Atlantic). While Chatelain curated a list of books, essays, images and videos that lives on The Atlantic, searching the twitter hashtag yields thousands of results.

Since then, many other historians and scholars of the United States have collectively developed syllabi in order to help other communities make sense of the historical and political underpinnings that frame our current circumstances. Syllabi have been written to further contextualize the horrific Charleston church shooting, anti-Muslim racism, immigration, Standing Rock and the rise of Trump. These syllabi have the common goal of serving as a tool for those interested in social justice to educate themselves on the deeper contexts that underlie our most pressing issues of the current day.

One point I’d like to emphasize, though, has less to do with the content itself and more with those who are organizing it. Most all of the syllabi I listed here are curated by scholars of color. Back in November, I wrote about the importance of creating a more diverse professoriate in academia, as with their research comes asking a “more diverse set of questions—questions that are critical of using whiteness and capitalism as the norm by which all other subjects and ideas are measured.” That scholars of color are leading the way in these initiatives to digitally distribute knowledge across communities should come as no surprise. Community-based projects are central to the practice of collective liberation as we work to move our research beyond the Ivory Tower.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

By using current events as framing sites for deep dives into histories of the United States, scholars, researchers and activists are using online syllabi to distribute foundational texts and accessible content that help others process what’s going on and how we got to these moments.
The first real instance of an online syllabus going viral was in 2014, with the instigation and organization of the #FergusonSyllabus by Marcia Chatelain, an African American Studies and history professor at Georgetown University.
Syllabi written to contextualize the Charleston church shooting, anti-Muslim racism, immigration, Standing Rock and the rise of Trump have the common goal of serving as a tool for those interested in social justice to educate themselves on the deeper contexts that underlie our most pressing issues of the current day.

RELATED ISSUES

2/10/2021 | Celebrate zines.

1/21/2021 | Invest in new media.

11/8/2020 | Rethink what a professor looks like.

PLEDGE YOUR SUPPORT

Nicole Cardoza 2/26/21 Nicole Cardoza 2/26/21

Honor the legacy of Malcolm X.

Sunday, February 21 marked the 56th anniversary of the assassination of Malcolm X, a muslim minister and prominent human rights activist during the civil rights movement in the 1960s. As his family and the world prepared for the remembrance of his life on this tragic day in history, new evidence of devastating but also long-time speculated news came to light through the form of a written letter. Written by a former NYPD policeman, the letter serves as somewhat of a confession of his alleged helping hand in the murder of controversial leader Malcolm X, also known as el-Hajj Malik el-Shabazz. The case was put to rest more than fifty years ago when three members of the Nation of Islam were charged for the heinous crimes, but the evidence presented by the Shabazz family has prompted them to revisit the case with government groups like the New York Police Department and Federal Bureau of Investigation in the line of fire.

Happy Friday and welcome back to the Anti-Racism Daily. I've been reflecting on how so many of our great Civil Rights leaders – Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr, Fred Hampton, Malcolm X – knew that their lives would be cut short because of the work they did. And in many of these cases, law enforcement played a part. This week, on the anniversary of the assassination of Malcolm X, new information suggests that the NYPD were involved. Today, Kashea shares more – and urges us to understand the impact Malcolm X had on the civil rights movement of today.

This newsletter is a free resource and that's made possible by our paying subscribers. Consider giving $7/month on Patreon. Or you can give one-time on our website, PayPal, or Venmo (@nicoleacardoza). You can also support us by joining our curated digital community. Thank you to all those that support!

Nicole

TAKE ACTION

Watch the documentary “The Lost Tapes: Malcolm X” to learn about the legacy and impact of Malcolm X.
Donate to The Shabazz Center, which honors the memory of Malcolm X and Dr. Betty Shabazz with events & programs that promote cultural engagement and public discourse.
Consider your perspective on the legacy of Malcolm X, how the media portrayed him, and how it may differ from his true teachings.

GET EDUCATED

By Kashea McCowan (she/her)

It is said that everything that is hidden must come to light and nearly sixty years after his death, there’s still apprehension and suspicion about who killed Malcolm X, one of the civil rights most prominent players. On February 20, the day before the 56th anniversary of their father’s assassination, the Shabazz sisters—Qubiliah, Ilyasah, and Gamilah—and attorney Ben Crump stood in the Malcolm X and Dr. Betty Shabazz Memorial and Educational Center—formerly known as the Audubon Ballroom where Malcolm X was assassinated—and presented the letter given to them by Reggie Wood, the brother of Raymond A. Wood. At Raymond’s request, the letter he wrote in 2011 was not to be released until after his death by Reggie who serves as the administrator over his estate. Raymond died in November 2020 and Reggie delivered the letter to Malcolm X’s family.

In the letter, Raymond A. Wood addresses the alleged events leading up to Malcolm X’s assassination. Wood states that he was approached by his supervisors at the New York Police Department to coax two members of Malcolm X’s security team into committing crimes that led to their arrests just a few days before the assassination (The Washington Post). As a result, the men were unable to perform their duties in securing the doors of the Audubon ballroom where Malcolm X was speaking the day he was killed. The letter began with a tone of disappointment, embarrassment, and regret.

“I was a black New York City undercover police officer between May of 1964 through May of 1971. I participated in actions that in hindsight were deplorable and detrimental to my own black people,” Wood writes. “. . . Under the direction of my handlers, I was told to encourage leaders and members of the civil rights groups to commit felonious acts” (The Washington Post).

The letter says that the NYPD and the FBI covered up details of the assassination and that they were actually the ones who set in motion and conspired a plan to murder Malcolm X in Harlem. Because Malcolm X’s popularity with the Nation of Islam began to dwindle and he decided to leave the Black Separatist group to start his own organization called The Muslim Mosque, it was the perfect cover-up for these groups to proceed with their evil plans.

“Ray Wood, an undercover police officer at the time, confessed in a deathbed declaration letter that the NYPD and the FBI conspired to undermine the legitimacy of the civil rights movement and its leader. Without any training, Wood’s job was to infiltrate civil rights organizations and encourage leaders and members to commit felonious attacks,” says Crump (Atlanta Daily World).

Wood had several roles as an undercover police officer for the Bureau of Special Services and Investigation (BOSSI). He reportedly earned his reputation for infiltrating the Bronx Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) chapter under the name Ray Woodall in 1964. In 1965, he was reassigned to infiltrate a group calling itself the Black Liberation Movement (BLM) and received credit for defusing a plot to bomb the Statue of Liberty (Atlanta Daily World).

“Who more personified the Black Liberation Movement in America in 1965 than civil rights icon Malcolm X? [The FBI] was trying to stop another Black messiah from uniting African Americans. This was orchestrated, and the only way we get to justice . . . restorative justice or otherwise, is with truth,” says Crump (The Washington Post).

Though Wood committed wrongful acts against his own Black people, it is important to note and highlight the major roles that law enforcement played in the attempts to extinguish Black movements and individuals, especially civil rights activists and prominent Black leaders of the 1960s such as Martin Luther King Jr., Fred Hampton, the chairman of the Illinois Black Panther Party, Angela Davis, Billie Holiday—for the messages she sang about in many of her Jazz records such as “Strange Fruit”—and many others. Still today, this brutality ignited by the involvement of law enforcement rears its ugly head as violence took over the nation during the Black Lives Matter movement in 2020. The brutal murders of innocent Black men and women including Ahmaud Arbery, Eric Garner, and many others, demonstrates that the resentment that law enforcement has towards Black and Brown populations have yet to cease. But, it is necessary—no matter how long it takes—to fight for the truth whether it is seeking justice for Breonna Taylor or radical figures such as Malcolm X.

“Any evidence that provides greater insight into the truth behind that terrible tragedy should be thoroughly investigated,” says Ilyasah Shabazz (BBC).

The FBI has so far made no public comment on the issue and the NYPD has provided all available records relevant to that case to the district attorney. The department is committed to assist with that review in any way (BBC).

It is unfathomable to think that at least two of the men arrested could have served time in prison at the hands of the NYPD and FBI. In addition to this, justice—as it were—has not yet been served for the famed Black Leader who we know as Malcolm X. The 2020 Netflix TV series, Who Killed Malcolm X?, is evidence that there is somewhat of a “dis-ease” surrounding this case. Although, digging up the past is no fun, when trash rises to the surface, you have no choice but to go through it. The family is pushing for the case to be reopened. Like Ilyasah Shabazz says, the investigation should undergo a thorough review, and hopefully this new evidence will shine a light on the hidden truth behind Malcolm X’s tragic death.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

Sunday, February 21 marked the 56th anniversary of the assassination of Malcolm X.
On February 20, the day before the 56th anniversary of their father’s assassination, the Shabazz sisters—Qubiliah, Ilyasah, and Gamilah—and attorney Ben Crump presented the declaration letter written by Raymond A. Wood
Wood was an undercover policeman who helped coax members of Malcolm’s security to felonious crimes preventing them the ability to guard the doors at the Audubon Ballroom the day of Malcolm X’s death.
The letter says that the NYPD and the FBI covered up details of the assassination and that they were actually the ones who set in motion and conspired a plan to murder Malcolm X in Harlem.

PLEDGE YOUR SUPPORT

Nicole Cardoza 2/25/21 Nicole Cardoza 2/25/21

Reject racial fetishization.

Of all the hospice patients in the United States, only 14% of enrollees are people of color (The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine). While communities of color and low-income communities face the brunt of COVID-19, they also face a myriad of hurdles when navigating and accessing end-of-life care. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, people of color are up to 2.8 times more likely to die from the virus, underscoring the importance of end-of-life and hospice care for this population (CDC).

Happy Thursday and welcome back to the Anti-Racism Daily. Today, Sayaka outlines how racial fetishization often increases violence against people of color, particularly those in the LGBTQ+ community.

This newsletter is a free resource and that's made possible by our paying subscribers. Consider giving $7/month on Patreon. Or you can give one-time on our website, PayPal, or Venmo (@nicoleacardoza). You can also support us by joining our curated digital community. Thank you to all those that support!

Nicole

TAKE ACTION

Work to bring awareness to the sexual violence perpetrated against people of color, particularly trans women of color by supporting the Trans Agenda for Liberation.
Express your support for the Survivors’ Access to Supportive Care Act, which will increase access to forensic nurses who provide comprehensive care to victims of sexual assault, by sending an email to your representatives. The act also increases support for tribal communities. RAINN (Rape, Abuse and Incest National Network) has a good template here to do so.
Reflect on your own current and past relationships and ask yourself why you are attracted to a person. Do misconceptions about race or ethnicity play a role?

GET EDUCATED

By Sayaka Matsuoka (she/her)

For as long as white supremacy has existed in the world, so too has the exotification and fetishization of people of color, particularly those who identify as women and femmes. Racial fetishization is the seeking out of a person or culture belonging to a specific race or ethnic group for sexual gratification. While some individuals may explain their attraction as a personal preference, historical research and context shows that choosing sexual partners specifically based on their race is problematic and rooted in white supremacy (Wear Your Voice Mag).

The fetishization and exotification of women of color dehumanizes the individuals that are targeted and denigrates them to objects that exist solely to fulfill the male gaze and appetite. It’s about taking a fully fledged, well rounded human and limiting them to one aspect of their being that they don't even have control over says Kevin Patterson, a polyamory activist and author. (Willamette Week).

In the United States, racial fetishization dates back to a time before the slave trade. White women often were seen as pure, innocent entities to be protected, while Black women were depicted as lustful and sinful (Thirteen). After migrating to African countries, white settlers objectified Black women and saw them as sexually promiscuous beings because of their attire or physical features (Jim Crow Museum). White owners often raped Black enslaved females referring to the women as their hypersexual property (Earlham Historical Journal).

During the early 1800s, women of color were displayed in carnival freak shows to showcase their “exotic” features. One such example was Sarah Bartmaan, a South African Khoikhoi woman who was exhibited while scantily clad. Wealthy white people were given the opportunity to prod and touch her if they paid extra (BBC). The mistreatment of Black women continued long after slavery was abolished. These days, the ramifications of this type of behavior can be seen in the criticism of Black female artists like Nicki Minaj, Cardi B, and Megan Thee Stallion who own their sexuality and use it in their work.

“We never address how cisheterosexual men’s sexuality facilitates some unhealthy practices that we’ve normalized and accepted,” writes Melissa Brown (Blackfeminisms.com). “Negative reactions to Cardi B result from how, historically, strippers were the objects rather than the subjects of the songs written from the vantage point of a male rapper’s voyeuristic and pornagraphic gaze.”

Racist fetishization permeates other aspects of society and extends across all women of color. Indigenous women are depicted as sexual beings to conquer. Statistics show that they are most likely to be sexually assaulted (End Rape on Campus). Latina women have also historically been hypersexualized in American media, which often makes heavy use of the actress’ accent—real or forced—to create a sense of the exotic.

“If I played a Latina, I always had to be too sexy and too easy. I hated that," explained actress Rita Morena (Latina.com).

A study found that of the hundred top-grossing films of 2016, only 3% of roles were occupied by Latinx people—and of that, one-fourth of the women cast either appeared nude or in sexy attire (USC Annenberg).

Like Black and Latina women, Asian women are hypersexualized as well, but in a different way. Historically, the media often portray East Asian women as being submissive and childlike. Examples can be seen in the novel and movie Memoirs of a Geisha and the Broadway show Madame Butterfly. Lately, the stereotype is further perpetuated by members of the alt-right who see East Asian women as the perfect partners because of their perceived submissiveness (NY Times). The idea stems from other harmful stereotypes about Asians like the model minority myth which pits Asians against Black and Brown individuals. Read our past article about the Model Minority Myth.

“Asian women are seen as naturally inclined to serve men sexually and are also thought of as slim, light-skinned and small, in adherence to Western norms of femininity,” Audrea Lim says in her article, “The Alt-Right’s Asian Fetish.”.

Such ideas follow in the footsteps of nineteenth century European male fixations on geishas and China dolls. The subjugation of East Asian women continued well into the twentieth century when American GIs visited countries like Japan, Korea and Vietnam where the local women and sex workers often were raped (Institute for Policy Studies).

The issues of fetishization are even more complicated for members of the LGBTQ+ community, particularly transgender individuals because it is directly correlated with a person’s curiosity of the other. The hypersexualization of trans people of color is compounded by the fact that they are part of another marginalized community. This can lead cisgender individuals who are curious about transgender bodies to objectify and perpetuate violence against them. A 2015 national survey of transgender people in the United States found that 47% of them are sexually assaulted at some point in their lifetime. Of those who were people of color responded with higher rates of assault (National Center for Transgender Equality).

Because the fetishization and exotification of women of color, including transgender women, is a dehumanizing mechanism that often leads to violence and acts of sexual assault, it is up to us all to fight these stereotypes when we see them. It is important to remind each other that women of color are not for consumption. They deserve respect on all levels, from the mind and soul to the body.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

The fetishization of people of color has existed in the United States for centuries and works to dehumanize individuals as objects for consumption by others.
Fetishization can harm individuals and lead to sexual violence.
Members of the LGBTQ+ community, particularly trans individuals, face higher rates of sexual violence and can also face additional layers of fetishization.

RELATED ISSUES

8/21/2020 | Let Black girls be girls.

11/24/2020 | Stop violence against Native women.

9/25/2020 | Decriminalize sex work.

PLEDGE YOUR SUPPORT

Nicole Cardoza 2/24/21 Nicole Cardoza 2/24/21

Advocate for end-of-life care.

Happy Wednesday, and welcome back to the Anti-Racism Daily. With over 500,000 lives lost to COVID-19 in less than a year, along with the compounding impact of natural disasters and economic woes that threaten our wellbeing, end-of-life care should be prioritized and centered for all. However, there are clear disparities in the opportunities granted for ourselves to care for one another. Today, Kayla shares more on what we can do to change that.

This newsletter is a free resource and that's made possible by our paying subscribers. Consider giving $7/month on Patreon. Or you can give one-time on our website, PayPal, or Venmo (@nicoleacardoza). You can also support us by joining our curated digital community. Thank you to all those that support!

Nicole

TAKE ACTION

Advocate for hospice care using the advocacy resources provided by the National Hospice and Palliative Care Organization.
Encourage your elected officials to address disparities in end-of-life-care in Medicare and Medicaid.
Read Atul Gawande’s Being Mortal to learn more about the unnecessary suffering in America’s hospitals, hospice, nursing home systems.

GET EDUCATED

By Kayla Hui (she/her)

Hospice care is a service that provides professional caregiving and the coordination of care for people who have chosen to discontinue disease-fighting treatments (Mayo Clinic). Having access to hospice care, especially that which meets the cultural, physical, and social needs of the patient, can be all the difference between a painful versus dignified death. Unfortunately, humane hospice care is often inaccessible to low-income and BIPOC patients (The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine).

In the United States, there are two main public systems responsible for funding hospice care: Medicare and Medicaid. Medicare is a government insurance program that serves people over sixty-five years of age and younger individuals with disabilities. Two million Medicare beneficiaries die every year representing roughly 80 percent of deaths in the U.S. (Kaiser Family Foundation). Meanwhile, Medicaid provides government insurance to low-income people, no matter their age (U.S. Department of Health & Human Services). Approximately 70,588,000 individuals were enrolled in the Medicaid program in 2020 and 44 million beneficiaries enrolled in Medicare, making these systems some of the largest payers for hospice services (Medicaid, AARP).

But when public hospice care is underfunded, it disproportionately impacts BIPOC communities who are more likely to face greater disparities in end-of-life care (Journal of Palliative Medicine). That’s why some state’s stringent laws on eligibility are problematic. In Texas and Kentucky, only those with a life expectancy of six months or less are eligible for hospice care, and in New York, hospice patients only will be admitted if they have a life expectancy of one year (U.S. News). Other states, like Oklahoma and Louisiana, have excluded hospice coverage from their plans completely (Oklahoma Human Services, 4WWL).

Medicaid also is likely to be underfunded in facilities where Black patients are enrolled (JAMA Health Forum). Studies show that there are higher rates of disenrollment of hospice programs and more concerns about the quality of care and communication among Black patients (Journal of Palliative Medicine).

Other communities of color also face barriers when navigating end-of-life care. Over eleven million undocumented immigrants are not covered by the Medicare Hospice Benefit, and one in three hospice programs refuses to treat this population (JAMA Internal Medicine). This leaves undocumented people reliant on the exorbitant costs of emergency services which can drive up their costs for end-of-life care. These people are more likely to have fewer private insurance options due to nationality status (JAMA Health Forum).

Hospice and palliative care are inaccessible for Native people. Today, there are only fourteen tribal nursing homes still in operation that allow visitors and cultural practices such as greeting the sun every morning,a Navajo tradition, in end-of-life care (Indian Health Services). But in order for Native communities to provide hospice services under Medicaid, tribal health organizations have to meet a great number of logistical and bureaucratic requirements, which can serve as a deterrent.

When tribal health organizations are not able to meet these requirements, it leaves Native patients reliant on private or outside hospice programs that often are culturally insensitive to tribal end-of-life practices (JAMA Health Forum). Medicare and Medicaid need to make hospice certification accessible for such facilities. If the certification process was streamlined for Native-run hospice care organizations, it would allow these clinics to incorporate tribal practices into the fold of their work.

Hospice coverage under Medicare and Medicaid is systematically flawed and requires policy-level changes. If these programs made a concentrated effort to increase enrollment, not only would Medicare save $6,430 for each patient enrolled in hospice care, but increase the quality of life of patients, especially those who are vulnerable to COVID-19 (Indian Journal of Palliative Care, National Library of Medicine).

A successful end-of-life is one that delivers care at the right time and according to the patient's preferences. It is a system that values life and quality of life over money and profit. The folks nearing end-of-life deserve healthcare. The underfunding of Medicare and Medicaid disproportionately impacts BIPOC communities leaving them without health insurance, hospice care coverage, and access to culturally sensitive hospice programs. We need to push for investment in Medicare and Medicaid programs to better support marginalized people until the very end of their lives.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

Medicare beneficiaries represent 80 percent of deaths in the U.S., underscoring the need to include hospice coverage within the Medicare and Medicaid programs.
While some states have made efforts to include hospice care under Medicaid and Medicare coverage, others have excluded it from funding, leaving low-income populations without care to navigate end-of-life.
The underfunding of Medicaid disproportionately impacts BIPOC communities leaving them without health insurance, hospice care coverage, and access to culturally sensitive hospice programs.

1/19/2021 | Advocate for universal healthcare.

11/4/2020 | Understand intergenerational trauma.

PLEDGE YOUR SUPPORT

Nicole Cardoza 2/23/21 Nicole Cardoza 2/23/21

Rally against anti-trans legislation.

Right now, there are over 50 pieces of anti-trans legislation under consideration in states across the U.S. All are designed to strip away the limited rights and protections that currently exist for transgender people (LGBTQ+ Nation). Seventeen states are all considering bills that would ban transgender girls and women from school sports this year, and some of the bills also ban transgender boys and men. These states are Arizona, Connecticut, Iowa, Georgia, Hawaii, Kentucky, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, New Hampshire, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, and Texas.

Happy Tuesday and welcome back to the Anti-Racism Daily. This week, hearings are scheduled in South Dakota, Kansas, Tennessee, and South Carolina to act on anti-trans legislation that will disproportionately impact trans women and girls. Amplify the work of state and federal organizers fighting for their rights.

This newsletter is a free resource and that's made possible by our paying subscribers. Consider giving $7/month on Patreon. Or you can give one-time on our website or PayPal. You can also support us by joining our curated digital community. Thank you to all those that support!

Nicole

TAKE ACTION

Sign up to phone bank with NEAT, the National Equality Action Team, to defend trans youth in key states.
Review the anti-trans legislation by state on the ACLU’s tracker. Then, contact your local legislators and urge them to block anti-trans bills from passing. Find your state representatives here.

Donate to trans-led organizations in your community. To make a donation that will be distributed to local orgs, donate to the Trans Justice Funding Project.

Action items inspired by the work of Chase Strangio, deputy director of transgender justice for the ACLU.

GET EDUCATED

By Nicole Cardoza (she/her)

In addition, 15 pieces of legislation designed to prevent transgender youth from receiving gender-affirming healthcare. Like HB 1/SB 10 in Alabama, these bills seek to impose criminal penalties on medical professionals and parents that offer transgender youth medical care. Arizona’s SB1511 wants to make it a Class 2 felony – punishable with up to 12 years in prison (Human Rights Watch).

Together, this legislation drafted in 2021 is a coordinated attack against trans rights, which activists feared after the Trump administration’s continued attacks on the trans community and growing anti-trans sentiment. Although President Biden signed an executive order to protect LGTBQ+ people in federally funded spaces, including education, it’s insufficient to ban state legislation on this topic (them).

These bills don’t necessarily reflect the sentiment of each state’s voter base. The Human Rights Campaign and Hart Research Group conducted a study across ten swing states on LGBTQ+ rights. They found that 87% of total respondents believe transgender people should have equal access to medical care, with many states breaking 90% support. They were also asked to prioritize banning transgender people from participating in sports against other policy issues. This issue came in dead last, and only 1-3% of respondents prioritized the issue (Los Angeles Blade).

In fact, much of this legislation has been drafted not by legislators, but Alliance Defending Freedom, a conservative Christian nonprofit organization that aims to protect "religious freedom, sanctity of life, and marriage and family" (Southern Poverty Law Center). As Nico Lang reports for them, the ADF has been fighting against equal rights for queer and transgender people for years. The organization has lobbied in favor of anti-LGBTQ+ legislation in Colorado, Idaho, and South Carolina and advocated for the use of “religious freedoms” to justify discrimination against LGBTQ+ people (them).

This is also happening in a time of rampant violence against the trans community, particularly the Black trans community. And many of these deaths were directly caused by police brutality; the criminal justice system disproportionately impacts the Black trans community (Vox). This is exacerbated by the systemic injustices that the Black trans community experiences, including unprecedented unemployment rates, high levels of houselessness, and low household incomes (Harvard Civil Rights). The Human Rights Watch noted a 43% increase in the formation of anti-LGBTQ hate groups in 2019.

This legislation is yet another form of policing the health and safety of trans youth, particularly trans women, for it’s important to emphasize how gender influences these harmful narratives. A common refrain from proponents of this legislation is that it’s necessary to protect women in sport because people assigned male at birth are “inherently” better at sports, purporting the notion that “women are weak and in need of protection.” It also insinuates that trans women athletes have an unfair advantage (this has been proven untrue). Throughout history, women’s protection, particularly white women, has been used to justify unnecessary harm against other marginalized communities (Washington Post). And more generally, the government continuously tries to control women’s bodies (Institute for Women’s Policy Research).

"
These bills cloak transmisogyny in inflammatory language and scare tactics that distract from the policies’ discriminatory intent. Notably, many do not lay out restrictions for transgender boys and men, focusing solely on regulating women’s bodies.
Excerpt from Fair Play: The Importance of Sports Participation for Transgender Youth by the Center for American Progress (CAP), via them.

As hearings unfold this week, I urge you to take direct action on this legislation right now, even if it doesn’t affect your state. And, more broadly, continue to amplify and advocate for the needs of the trans community, particularly trans youth.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

A series of anti-trans legislation is being discussed in state legislators across the U.S. this week.
This legislation is a part of the violence and discrimination that trans communities experience on behalf of our government, particularly trans communities of color and the Black trans community.
This is especially harmful for trans women and girls, who experience added discrimination because of stereotypes about the role of gender in society

RELATED ISSUES

11/20/2020 | Honor Transgender Day of Remembrance.

6/13/2020 | Center Black trans lives.

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Nicole Cardoza 2/22/21 Nicole Cardoza 2/22/21

Advocate for reparations.

Last Wednesday, February 17, Congress held a hearing on “H.R. 40: Exploring the Path to Reparative Justice in America.” The bill, referred to as H.R. 40, calls for Congress to create a commission to study the history of slavery in the U.S. from 1619 to 1865, and develop actionable steps to pay reparations. You can watch a recording of the entire hearing on PBS.

Happy Monday and welcome back to the Anti-Racism Daily. I was hoping to cover this issue last week on the day of the hearing, but I totally missed my own deadline with everything happening in Texas. It aligns well with Andrew’s article yesterday, which analyzed our relationship to reconciliation through history.

This newsletter is a free resource and that's made possible by our paying subscribers. Consider giving $7/month on Patreon. Or you can give one-time on our website or PayPal. You can also support us by joining our curated digital community. Thank you to all those that support!

Nicole

TAKE ACTION

Send a message to your members of Congress urging them to support H.R. 40.
Download and review the reparations toolkit from the Movement for Black Lives.
Research efforts for reparations in your state and local community. See how you can support, amplifying, or advocate as needed.

GET EDUCATED

By Nicole Cardoza (she/her)

This is a marked point of progress on the long road to receiving federal reparations for Black people. In 1898, The National Ex-Slave Mutual Relief Bounty and Pension Association had 600,000 members – all of who organized to obtain compensation for slavery from federal agencies. During the 1920s, Marcus Garvey organized hundreds of thousands of Black people to demand reparations. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr advocated for reparations as part of his book “Why We Can’t Wait” in 1964. The Black Panther Party called for reparations as part of their ten-point program.

In fact, in her 2019 public lecture at Columbia Journal of Race and Law, activist, attorney, and scholar Nkechi Taifa emphasizes that, since the end of slavery, “there's been no substantial period of time where the call for redress has been neglected.” Read her full speech via Columbia and more examples of reparations through history via ACLU.

But in 1988, Congress passed legislation paying reparations to Japanese Americans that were descendants of those held in detention camps, along with funding dedicated to educating the history of Japanese internment and a pardon for all those convicted of resisting arrest. This action created a framework for approaching reparations for Black people in the political sphere. As a result, the H.R. 40 bill was introduced a year later, led by the late Representative John Conyers (MI). It’s named after “40 acres and a mule,” referencing the broken promise of 1845 to redistribute land to formerly enslaved people (learn more in a previous newsletter).

The House and the Senate issued apologies to Black Americans for the impact of slavery and Jim Crow back in 2008 and 2009 (NPR), a hollow gesture without joint accountability or reparations for the harm. (They also apologized for the harm that happened “to Native Peoples” during this time). But otherwise, there’s been no significant progress on behalf of the federal government.

Despite this, public perception of reparations is rapidly shifting. Ta-Nehisi Coates’ article, The Case for Reparations, brought reparations to the front-page in 2014 (The Atlantic). And racial reckoning of this year alone has swiftly shifted sentiment in favor of passing reparations. Reparations have been a persistent demand from major Black-led organizing groups. And last summer, the Human Rights Watch, along with dozens of other organizations, sent a letter to Congress urging the review and passing of H.R. 40 (Human Rights Watch).

Representative Shelia Jackson Lee (TX) took on this work after the passing of Rep. Conyers. She reintroduced the latest version of H.R. 40 on January 4, 2021. This pivotal step got buried in the news; two days later, white supremacists stormed the Capitol building – resulting in another slew of calls for accountability. It’s difficult to imagine what more is needed to make this case a national priority.

“
Reparations is repairing or restoring. It’s a formal acknowledgment and apology, recognition that the injury continues, commitment to redress and actual compensation.”

Nkechi Taifa, told to Donna M. Owens for NBC News

Proponents of the bill believe that this year, H.R. 40 has a chance. It’s likely the bill will pass the House but may falter in the Senate. But they hope that President Biden will step in, enacting this work as an executive order if Congress votes against it. The press secretary at the White House confirmed that Biden supports a study on reparations but didn’t explicitly note how he’d respond to the bill (Newsweek).

In the interim, we can also turn to state and local governments to pursue reparations in their communities. Over the past two years, in particular, states and cities have increased efforts to pay reparations for Black people and other people of color (Pew Trust). For example, Maryland has launched its own commission to consider financial commitments like free college tuition at Maryland schools, low home mortgages, and business loans without collateral (NBC).

It’s important to remember that conditions only worsen each day the government fails to act on reparations. A recent study found that reparation payments could have reduced the transmission and fatality of COVID-19 across the U.S. Researchers from Harvard Medical School and the Lancet Commission on Reparations and Redistributive Justice analyzed data in Lousiana and found that payments could have reduced between 31% to 68% of coronavirus transmissions (Social Science and Medicine). As of this past weekend, over 500,000 people in the U.S. have died from COVID-19 in less than a year. This is more than the number of U.S. soldiers that died in both WWI and WWII (NBC News).

The best time to demand reparations was yesterday. The second-best time is right now. We must hold our leaders accountable for a legacy of harm to protect our communities today.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

Last week there was a Congressional heraing on H.R. 40, a bill that calls for the government to create a commission to study the history of slavery in the U.S. and pay reparations.
Social sentiment on reparations is changing swiftly, particularly due to the racial reckoning of the past year
The work to federally recognize reparations for Black people has been happening for decades by politicians and organizers alike

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Nicole Cardoza 2/19/21 Nicole Cardoza 2/19/21

Learn about Harriet Tubman on the $20.

From wading in the water to following the drinking gourd towards the North Star, Harriet Tubman, an abolitionist, scout and spy for union soldiers in South Carolina, and conductor of the Underground Railroad, was “Bound for the Promised Land.” She fought for her own emancipation and led many enslaved people to freedom. More than a century later, Tubman still is making her mark and is set to grace the face of the twenty dollar bill, an Obama-era initiative, as soon as 2028. But fans of the renowned political activist have differing views about the banknote’s new design. While some people are excited to see this freedom fighter acknowledged on the front of the bill, others say that it goes against the very thing she fought for—liberation from the capitalistic system that slavery was built on. The fact that Andrew Jackson, an oppressor of enslaved people, still will be placed on the back of the $20 bill—some say—is utterly disrespectful (Time). But, what would Tubman think?

Happy Friday and welcome back to the Anti-Racism Daily. This week we've written frequently about issues related to the economy. I feel that the conversation about Harriet Tubman being featured on the $20 bill is an interesting lens to the role of money in our lives.

Thank you all for your contributions! This newsletter is made possible by our subscribers. Consider giving $7/month on Patreon. Or you can give one-time on our website or PayPal. You can also support us by joining our curated digital community.

Nicole

TAKE ACTION

Learn more about the legacy of Harriet Tubman through books and documentaries (Smithsonian).
Get educated about how slavery helped build a world economy (National Geographic).
Get involved in the conversation and state your opinion about the redesign of the twenty dollar bill that is set to be released as soon as 2028.

GET EDUCATED

By Kashea McCowan (she/her)

We will never know Tubman’s thoughts on the matter, but those stemming from her family tree—her descendants—are looking forward to seeing their Aunt Harriet printed on the front of the bill. As efforts for the release of the banknote accelerates, Rita Daniels, Tubman’s great-great-great niece and her ninety-three-year-old aunt, Pauline Copes Johnson, Tubman’s oldest surviving relative, are proposing to build a learning center in her name in Bridgeport. The Connecticut city is significant because it was one of the main stopping points for Tubman on the Underground Railroad (Cheddar). Family members like Ernestine “Tina” Martin Wyatt, Tubman’s great-great-great grandniece and her daughter, Lauren Jillian Wyatt, honor their Aunt Harriet’s past and retell stories told to them about the great warrior and steadfast, freedom fighter. The Wyatts believe that new efforts to remember Tubman’s legacy are vital.

“She was a leader who has earned the right to be on the bill,” says Tina. “We have to remember when this country was formed, it was done so within a racially segregated, male-dominated society. Women were not allowed any titled or lead roles or consideration; black women were not even thought of.” (Glamour)

Though Tubman’s family is grateful for the recognition of their beloved relative, many historians are diving deeper into the history of Tubman’s past, what she fought for, and the irony of it all.

Harriet Tubman, also known as Araminta Ross, was born in Dorchester, Maryland around the early 1820s in a capitalistic system that profited off of free human labor. It is this same system that prompted her rebellion in 1849, as she was beaten, whipped, and abused to the point that caused her to suffer from a traumatic brain injury that resulted in dizzying spells, seizures, severe headaches, and unconscious episodes.

Like grain and wheat or gold and silver, enslaved people were seen as a commodity and were bought and sold like home goods. Their price tags were determined by their age, strength, ability to work, and health. If there were any injuries or handicaps determined to lower their value, they immediately were sold or traded to the highest bidder. Tubman’s injuries—although caused by her kidnapper—put her at a major risk of being sold off away from her family, and the thought of someone having that much power over her life sparked a rebellion in her.

Along with her two brothers, Ben and Henry, Tubman ran away on September 17, 1849. Their overseer at the time issued a runaway notice in the Cambridge Democrat, a Maryland newspaper, offering a reward of a mere hundred dollars for each returned enslaved person. After being a part of the population revered as a common good, Tubman decided to have faith in her hunches, and she built up the courage to escape from the slave auction blocks that constantly traded its currency for her liberty.

“Harriet Tubman did not fight for capitalism, free trade, or competitive markets. She repeatedly put herself in the line of fire to free people who were treated as currency themselves. She risked her life to ensure that enslaved Black people would know they were worth more than the blood money that exchanged hands to buy and sell them. I do not believe Tubman, who died impoverished in 1913, would accept the “honor,” writer Feminista Jones wrote in the essay “Keep Harriet Tubman—and all women—off the $20 bill.”

Zoe Samudzi, a feminist writer in Oakland, told The Post that she is mulling over the irony that a Black woman who was bought and sold is being commemorated on the $20 bill without [The Treasury] also taking steps for economic recompense for Black folks who are descendants of enslaved peoples. Though there are many others who anger at the blatant irony of the new design idea, there also are people like Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham, a professor of history and African American studies at Harvard University, and Clara Small, a retired history professor at Salisbury University, who are in full support of the $20 bill initiative (The Washington Post). Small says she hopes the addition of Tubman to the $20 bill is a sign of progress, something the freedom fighter likely would approve. This gives hope that maybe women will be accepted as equals; as a president she says.

“Money is a powerful means of communication. It is a part of our national identity and can help to remind us of our common purpose. Our money should not only reflect our country’s origins, but also who we have become over the past 250 years—as well as who we aspire to be,” says Ellen Fiengold, writer of the article “A Harriet Tubman $20? That’s just the Beginning.”

If the legacy of people such as George Washington, who enslaved more than a hundred people when he died, and Andrew Jackson deserve a place on our currency, then surely activists such as Harriet Tubman who represents freedom, fearlessness, and heart deserve the same honor and much more.

The United States is supposed to be the land of the free. And today, we still see the restlessness of the differences in race creep up in our daily lives. Some may see it as disrespectful to paint Tubman’s face on the twenty dollar bill, but it is more disrespectful not to acknowledge her efforts at all—a woman who fought so hard for the liberty of enslaved Black people. And though capitalism is a foul system, her face will be a daily reminder of where we came from and where we are going. Her legacy, literally, will be passed along hand to hand for generations to come. And it is in honoring and looking up to revolutionaries and risk-takers like her that perhaps will help us paint the world in vivid color rather than the blacks and whites of old.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

Harriet Tubman fought for her own emancipation and led more than seventy people to freedom.
Fans of the renowned political activist have differing views about the banknote’s new design. Some people are excited to see this freedom fighter acknowledged on the front of the bill while others say that it is utterly disrespectful.
Our money should not only reflect our country’s origins, but also who we have become over the past 250 years—as well as who we aspire to be.
Her face will be a daily reminder of where we came from and where we are going.

PLEDGE YOUR SUPPORT

Nicole Cardoza 2/18/21 Nicole Cardoza 2/18/21

Address the jobs lost by women of color.

Earlier this year, the Bureau of Labor Statistics released a solemn report: between November and December of 2020, the U.S. lost over 140,000 jobs (U.S Department of Labor). Many of these jobs had been held by women, who have been pushed out of the workforce in startling numbers. Since February 2020, women have lost 5.4 million jobs (Fortune). They are leaving the workforce at four times the rate of men (NPR). “Even in more stable times, jobs typically held by women were among the lowest-status and worst-paid work,” explains Diane Coyle, a professor of public policy (NY Times). For example, women account for about three-quarters of workers in education and a majority of those in food services (sectors that have been hit hard by the pandemic).

Happy Thursday and welcome back to the Anti-Racism Daily. Thank you for all the well-wishes as I navigate the storm, and your donations to those in need. The most damaging part of this nasty weather is its compounded impact on a nation already struggling to survive. Natalie's reflection on the jobs lost by women of color over the past few months is an example of this.

Thank you all for your contributions! This newsletter is made possible by our subscribers. Consider giving $7/month on Patreon. Or you can give one-time on our website or PayPal. You can also support us by joining our curated digital community.

Nicole

TAKE ACTION

Sign the National Domestic Workers Alliance Petition that urges Congress to provide more cash assistance to caregivers and domestic workers regardless of citizenship status.
Research local organizations within your community that can directly help BIPOC women, such as Chicago’s Women of Color United Giving Council.
Contact your local legislators to push for tangible changes in employment laws that support women of color.

GET EDUCATED

By Natalie Baddour (she/her)

Additionally, between schools shutting down and a lack of childcare, many working mothers have no choice but to stay home for their kids. Sometimes the decision comes down to finances: because women still earn 82 cents for every dollar a man makes and typically earn less, it might seem to make more sense for a male partner to keep his job (NPR). But even when that’s not the case, our society often perpetuates the harmful notion that women are best suited for caregiving duties and should sacrifice their careers for their kids.

While it is important to note that women in general have disproportionately left the workforce during the pandemic, the news reports that overlook the intersections between race and gender are missing a pivotal point: that women of color have been significantly affected (NY Times).

Over the last year, employment has been down nearly 7% for Hispanic women, 5.6% for Black women, and 3% for white women (Reuters). By August, only 34% of Black women who’d lost their jobs due to the pandemic regained employment, compared to 61% of white women (Catalyst).

There is a multitude of factors that contribute to these job losses. Systematic racism often prevents women of color from securing the same opportunities as their white counterparts; thus, white women are more likely to hold jobs that offer the flexibility to work from home (Eater). Overall, only 19.7% of Black workers and 16.4% of Hispanic workers can telework, compared to 29.9% of white workers (Economic Policy Institute).

Women of color also disproportionately hold jobs considered essential and most vulnerable to the pandemic, accounting for 53% of workers in the food service industry and 80% of workers in the health and social assistance field (Center for American Progress). When it comes to firing, women of color are often the ones at the top of companies’ layoff lists; they tend to hold the most marginal, low-authority roles, therefore losing their jobs at excessively high rates (Harvard Business Review).

Women of color also were disproportionately excluded from the benefits of last year’s federal Families First Coronavirus Response Act (FFCRA), which exempted many essential workers in grocery and retail environments (Washington Post). Employers were also allowed to exclude health care providers, and emergency responders from the act’s mandated paid sick days and child care leave. The U.S. Department of Labor defines “health care workers” so vaguely that it can include anyone employed in a healthcare facility, from cafeteria workers to maintenance staff and janitors. (Center for American Progress). Workers of color are overrepresented in these industries that offered little government support; Black employees comprise one-sixth of frontline workers (Axios). Given the lack of support, many women of color were forced to quit their jobs. In December 2020, the FFCRA ended, severing a crucial lifeline to those few able to receive benefits (U.S. Department of Labor).

However, Biden proposed a new coronavirus bill that includes a $1,400 stimulus check, one that he hopes can now go to eligible adult dependents and families with mixed-status citizenship (CNET). Biden also plans to extend the child tax credit to families with lower incomes. If approved, families will be able to claim up to $3,600 per young child and $3,000 per older child every year (USA Today). The bill will also add a temporary expansion of the childcare tax credit and expand access to childcare (Vox).

But while measures may temporarily ease some of the burdens on BIPOC women and mothers, they do not fully address the structural inequities that are the foundation of such job loss disparities. Even before coronavirus, people of color were far more likely to receive poverty-level wages than white workers; in 2017, 19.2% of Hispanic workers and 14.3% of Black workers were paid poverty-level wages, compared to 8.6% of white employees (Economic Policy Institute).

Based on all these statistics, it’s easy to see why women of color have suffered the most job loss during this time. The pandemic has erased years of gradual economic progress, and the effects are still going to be felt even after it is over. While Biden’s new coronavirus bill provides a brief glimmer of hope, America needs more direct, long-term policies to give these women ongoing support. Paid sick and family leave are crucial, and new measures should be taken to provide low-income workers with full-wage replacement no matter how big or small the business is. Our country is in a crisis, and women of color need to be at the forefront of our most important conversations. To see change for those most in need, we must demand it now.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

The U.S. has failed at providing adequate paid family leave for distressed Americans, leaving millions of essential BIPOC workers without support.
Women of color disproportionately hold low-paying essential jobs (accounting for 53% of workers in the food service industry and 80% of workers in the health and social assistance field), therefore being ineligible for benefits and more susceptible to layoffs. (Center for American Progress)
During the pandemic, employment has decreased nearly 7% for Hispanic women, 5.6% for Black women, and 3% for white women. (Reuters)

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Nicole Cardoza 2/17/21 Nicole Cardoza 2/17/21

Support those most vulnerable in the winter storms.

Millions of people across the country are without power after a series of intense winter storms. From Nashville to Chicago, North Carolina to Oregon, states are grappling with power outages, car crashes, and destruction from wind, snow, tornadoes, or hail.

The situation is especially dire in Texas, where over 2 million people are without power throughout the state. Heavy snowfall and freezing temperatures have overwhelmed the state’s power grid, causing widespread outages that have left many communities without power for days on end.

Happy Wednesday, and welcome back to the Anti-Racism Daily. This is a rougher email than usual. I’m writing at 3am after driving to a friend’s home. My neighborhood hasn’t had power for the past two days with no end in sight, a situation many in Texas are experiencing right now. The call to action below is specific to Texas, but as this storm spreads across the U.S., I encourage you to pursue more local action wherever possible.

Thank you all for your contributions! This newsletter is made possible by our subscribers. Consider giving $7/month on Patreon. Or you can give one-time on our website or PayPal. You can also support us by joining our curated digital community.

Nicole

TAKE ACTION

Donate or volunteer with mutual aid funds supporting vulnerable communities.
- Feed The People Dallas | Website or Venmo @feedthepeopledallas
- Mutual Aid Houston | Website or Venmo @mutualaidhou
- Austin Mutual Aid | GoFundMe or Venmo @austinmutualaidhotels
- Para Mi Gente Mutual Aid (San Antonio) | Venmo @pmgmutualaid, IG @para.mi_gente
Donate to commissary funds for those incarcerated in Texas jails receiving inadequate care (via Texas Jail Project).
Local news is critical for many people to stay informed in turbulent times, and can use your support now more than ever. Make a monthly or annual subscription to your local news site if you can. If you can't, be sure to like, follow and share their articles!

GET EDUCATED

By Nicole Cardoza (she/her)

Texas once prided itself on its energy independence. Unlike the rest of the country, the state has its own power grid, managed by the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT), which acts independently from neighboring states. This means that the state needs to produce enough energy to support its residents. But the grid entered this upcoming storm with a lower reserve than usual, and the weather halted or reduced power generation effort by freezing refineries and wind turbines. It’s not impossible to generate power in cold weather; cold states do it all the time. But Texas chose not to winterize their equipment (Washington Post). This, paired with the increased demand from residents, put the grid at a deficit. And the shortfall can’t be fixed overnight. It will take improved weather conditions and increased production to generate enough power to reach more residents. And in the meantime, there is no timeline for power to be restored.

Power scarcity isn’t a unique issue to Texas; Oklahoma and Louisiana have similar problems (WDSU). On a much smaller scale, California experienced a similar situation during the heatwave last summer (Bloomberg). But the scale and severity of the power outage in Texas is a grave reminder to the rest of the country of what happens when we don’t plan for unprecedented weather amid global warming.

As we often see when analyzing the impact of climate change, black and brown communities are disproportionately impacted by the latest winter storm. Across Texas, there are clear racial disparities in power outages. In Austin, for example, the communities experiencing ongoing outages are predominantly Black and brown, while downtown Austin and other pricier, mostly white neighborhoods have yet to lose power (Statesman).

The storm is also gravely impacting houseless communities across the U.S., who are already vulnerable to the pandemic. With freezing temperatures expected to continue through the weekend, shelters quickly became overwhelmed. Cities are opening more warming centers to provide temporary relief. Mutual aid networks were booking hotels for those unhoused to get a night of reprieve. In Tulsa, a record $1.5M was raised to support those unhoused (Tulsa World). However, as many of the housed community experience ongoing power outages at their own homes, they’re quickly filling up hotels, decreasing available supply.

Those incarcerated in Texas are also struggling during this time. The Texas Jail Project noted that, since losing power, those incarcerated in Harris County Jail hadn’t received hot meals or extra blankets. At another Texas jail, heaters aren’t working, and correction officers have resorted to using table salt on the walkways to mitigate ice (Keri Blakinger on Twitter). The cold and lack of power exacerbate existing inequitable conditions that already threaten their livelihood (Twitter).

The storm also conflicts with the Biden administration’s efforts to increase the vaccine distribution to communities of color – both in Texas and throughout the U.S. Appointments were postponed or canceled altogether because of the severe weather, and additional shipments are delayed. In California, though, two new FEMA sites in Los Angeles and Oakland began mass vaccinations (AP).

Haphazard weather is unavoidable. But it’s our local and federal government’s response to it that influences its severity. With so many marginalized communities in need, it’s important to remember that some of our greatest threats are man-made.

PLEDGE YOUR SUPPORT

Nicole Cardoza 2/16/21 Nicole Cardoza 2/16/21

Raise the minimum wage.

The minimum wage has stayed the same, while the cost of living has increased significantly. Advocates for a minimum wage of $15 an hour have been lobbying lawmakers for several years now. The federal minimum wage has not increased since 2009 when it was raised to $7.25. Since 2009, the cost of living in the United States has increased by 20%, and the cost of essentials like housing and healthcare have grown at higher rates (CNN). Currently, the median living wage in the United States is $67,690 (Insider). For reference, if the minimum wage were to be increased to $15 an hour, the annual wage would add up to $30,000. Employers are also permitted to pay subminimum wages to employees who have disabilities (DOL).

Happy Tuesday, and welcome back to the Anti-Racism Daily. I'm writing from Austin, TX, with no power or heat. If you're in the parts of the U.S. affected by the snowstorm, I hope you're safe and warm!

Today, fast-food workers across the country will walk out in protest, hoping to push through a minimum-wage raise to benefit tens of millions. The #Fightfor15 is critical; a recent study indicated that 7M Americans would be affected by the increase, and that 900,000 would be lifted out of poverty at a time when low-wage workers – and especially people of color – have suffered most during the pandemic. Let's help rally for Congress to pass an increased minimum wage, and for corporations to make the same decision.

Thank you all for your contributions! This newsletter is made possible by our subscribers. Consider giving $7/month on Patreon. Or you can give one-time on our website or PayPal. You can also support us by joining our curated digital community.

Nicole

TAKE ACTION

Sign the petition to urge Congress to increase the minimum wage to $15.
Sign the petition urging Mcdonald’s to increase the minimum wage.
Advocate for fair wages at your place of employment.

GET EDUCATED

By Nia Norris (she/her)

On January 26th, Democrats in the House of Representatives introduced a bill to raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour nationwide by 2025. They attempted to pass the same legislation in 2019, but the Republican-controlled Senate blocked it. (CNBC). Advocates of this bill cited a report from the Economic Policy Institute and the University of California Berkeley, which found that an increased minimum wage would not only lower government spending on public assistance but would also increase tax revenue (Politico). Currently, raising the minimum wage to $15 an hour has been bundled into the new coronavirus relief package (NY Times).

Workers with disabilities have it harder, often working for programs called “sheltered workshops” that pay workers who have disabilities a subminimum wage, many earning only $3.34 an hour (NPR). The U.S. Commission on Civil Rights released a report recommending that the subminimum wage be abolished entirely (USCCR). There have also been multiple federal bills attempting to abolish the subminimum wage for workers who have disabilities, but all have failed to pass. At a state level, Vermont, Alaska, Maine, Maryland, Nevada, New Hampshire, and Oregon have abolished the subminimum wage (NPR).

People of color disproportionately earn poverty wages as compared to white people. Black workers are 1.5 times as likely to make poverty wages as white workers, and Hispanic workers are 2.2 times as likely (EPI). Increasing the minimum wage to $15 an hour would increase the wages of 38.1%of Black people as compared to 23.2%of white people. Black and Hispanic workers are also significantly more likely to experience minimum wage violations (Equitable Growth). Black Americans are also overrepresented in the tipped employee workforce, where the federal minimum wage has remained stagnant at $2.13 an hour for over 25 years (Georgetown Poverty). A study has shown that consumers discriminate against people of color while eating out, tipping them at a lower rate (Wiley Online Library).

Raising the minimum wage is also key to increasing housing affordability. The National Low Income Housing Coalition published a report in 2020 called Out of Reach, documenting the gap between wages and housing. On average, a full-time worker needs to earn an hourly rate of $23.96 to afford the cost of a modest two-bedroom rental. In 11 states, this rate is more than $25 an hour (NIHC).

As a result, there are racial disparities in renting and ownership. In the U.S., 73.3% of White, non-Hispanic people own homes, but only 42.1% of Black people do (USA Facts). Black people who do own their homes also pay more for their mortgages. Black borrowers have an average mortgage rate of 4.62%compared to a mortgage rate of 4.3%for white borrowers (BankRate).

Since Black people have the highest rate of disability, the subminimum wage also has a disproportionate impact (National Disability Institute). Large employers, such as Goodwill Industries, use the subminimum wage to pay workers with disabilities significantly less. The Raise the Wage Act in Congress would also raise the minimum wage for workers who have disabilities (Vox).

Raising the minimum wage would reduce poverty among Americans, particularly people of color and workers who have disabilities. It would increase accessibility to housing and other necessities. It would also prohibit employers from paying substandard wages to people with disabilities and combat racism toward Black employees that rely on tips. The fight for equity must begin with combating economic racism in the United States.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

The minimum wage has not increased with the cost of living. The federal minimum wage has remained stagnant at $7.25 an hour since 2009, while the cost of living has risen by 20%.
Black workers are overrepresented in the tipped employee workforce, which has a federal minimum wage of only $2.13 an hour. Tipped employees are more likely to live in poverty, and there have been studies indicating racial discrimination in tipping practices by consumers.
Black people are less likely to be homeowners, and Black borrowers who do own homes pay more for their mortgages than white borrowers.
Employers of disabled workers, such as sheltered workshops, are not required to pay a minimum wage at all, and Black people experience disability at a higher rate than white people.

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