Black people have a right to
rebel
By Lorenzo Komboa Ervin
A massive anti-cop rebellion has broken out in
Cincinnati over the police shootings of 15 Black men, ranging
in ages from 12-44 years old, all unarmed. The latest case is
of Timothy Thomas, a 19-year old brother, allegedly wanted for
misdemeanor traffic offenses, who was gunned down last week
by a crazed white cop. The Black community has risen up in a
massive protest against this racist occupying army, poverty,
and other forms of mistreatment. Now, we are being told by various
White politicians and their paid Uncle Toms that even more massive
police violence should be trained on us “to keep the peace”
and “stop the violence.” Not the cop violence and murder, which
has gone on for years, but the current rebellion by our people
against police forces.
I have heard this garbage for years. Going back
to the 1965 Watts rebellion, when Black folks rebelled after
years of LAPD racist brutality, it was a line put forth by the
white ruling class and its Negro spokespersons that we were
“torching our own neighborhoods.” Never mind that we didn’t
own a damn thing in the ghetto, that it was the cops themselves
shooting and torching Black homes, and that this was clearly
a struggle with deep roots in historical oppression, the government’s
line was duly picked up by the Negro bourgeoisie, and passed
off as “truth”, along with “the police right to stop looters”
and “we need peace.” Not about justice, not about stopping police
murders of our people, but that we must stop our resistance
against our oppressors. That is their only concern, restoring
“law and order.”
We are an oppressed people, who have the moral
and political right to rebel. We are fighting oppression, and
seeking freedom. We are opposing terrorism by military agents
of the white government. We have been historically enslaved,
and our youth are being imprisoned and killed in massive numbers,
so we must fight back or become an extinct species. There are
those who say that if we will only be “peaceful” those in power
will listen to us. This has never happened, and truthfully none
of the civil rights bills of the 1960s outlawing Southern segregation,
and other concessions of that period, would have been passed
if the white government had not been afraid of Black people
erupting in the streets. So street rebellion is effective.
Neither I nor anyone else can say with complete
accuracy, but I think we can soon expect to see other such rebellions
in various American cities because similar contradictions exist,
and even more murderous police forces guard the white rich of
those places. For example, Detroit is a city which could go
up at any time. It leads the USA in the number of fatal police
shootings of civilians, most of whom are Black. It has a corrupt
government, which allows violence by police, drug-peddling,
robbery, and other offenses by officers. There are Detroit officers,
like Eugene Brown, who have killed several persons, and yet
have never been punished. He is protected by the Mayor and the
police union. Although worse in Detroit, police brutality goes
on all over the country, along with political cover-ups to protect
them. I hear white folks and middle class negroes say that if
we arm ourselves and resist, “even more of us will be killed.”
I don’t propose individual resistance, but rather community
defense, and I believe then we will talk about funerals on both
sides.
Our task, as an oppressed people, is to work to
overthrow white supremacy and capitalist rule. That is the true
nature of this government, not a so-called “democracy” where
we can expect fair treatment. This system is based on and is
maintained by our oppression. This is why I believe that the
task of Black radicals is not to call for new federal legislation,
an FBI investigation, or a citizen review board. We must educate
our people about the truth of this system, and begin to build
a mass resistance movement against racism and internal colonialism.
This resistance should be by any means necessary, and we must
have an armed self-defense policy. I have always rejected pacifism.
We must seek to build dual power bases, and begin to win over
the masses of the people, build a militia to protect it, and
push the police and white government out of the community entirely.
We must begin to govern ourselves, and create a new zone of
Black power. The activists have got to stop looking in from
the outside and doing all their organizing on the comfortable
college campuses or suburbs, and begin to organize in the impoverished
neighborhoods where the action is taking place. As activists,
we have got to stop waiting on crises like the Cincinnati rebellion,
and begin to set up organizing projects to make sure they don’t
happen, and when they do we can effectively retaliate. Yes,
we have a right to rebel in Cincinnati, Los Angeles, New York,
Atlanta, and anywhere else we are oppressed.
We are a class of poor and oppressed peoples who
are fighting capitalism and racism all over the world. We are
not alone, and when we fight we will find that the people of
the world support our struggle.
Source: Lorenzo Ervin: komboa@hotmail.com
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