The Contours Of Resistance Beyond The Election

November 5th, 2020

Awake Goy

Take Action: Black People’s March on the White House. Saturday, November 7, 2020. Starts with a rally from 11:30 am to 2:00 pm at Malcolm X Park near 16th and W Streets, NW.

No matter which party wins the White House on November 3, one thing is certain:

The objective crisis of the system will force the winning political party to be guided by a logic that concludes domestic repression and warmongering abroad are necessary.

From occupied Philadelphia to occupied Palestine, the people in the colonized spaces of empire will find it hard to discern a difference between how Democratic and Republican oppressors treat them. In Philadelphia, Trump’s Department of Justice (DOJ) prosecutors borrowed a page from the Obama administration’s DOJ playbook. If folks recall, after the Baltimore uprisings in 2015, Obama’s DOJ slapped federal charges on the resisters Obama had referred to as “thugs and criminals.” Just last week, the Trump DOJ swept into Philly and nationalized a local law enforcement by arresting and slapping federal felony charges against four African activists.

So, while the Black Alliance for Peace (BAP) takes no official position on the election or on its outcome, we have been consistent as an alliance: We are clear the fight for our people will continue. We do not have the luxury of believing any illusions to the contrary.

That is why the demands we raised as part of our Candidate Accountability Campaign will continue and will anchor our umbrella campaign, No Compromise, No Retreat: Defeat the War Against African/Black People in the U.S. and Abroad.

Those demands include:

Opposing the militarization of U.S. police through the Department of Defense’s 1033 program
Stopping Israeli training of U.S. police forces
Working for the closure of the U.S. Africa Command (AFRICOM)
Advocating for the closure of 800+ U.S. foreign military bases
Opposing Trump’s “Operation Relentless Pursuit” and all federal anti-crime measures
Opposing all military, economic (including sanctions and blockades) and political interventions
Demanding an end to U.S. participation in the white supremacist NATO structure
Calling for at least 50% cuts to the U.S. military budget
Requiring the U.S. Department of Justice document and investigate the use of lethal force by domestic police officers
Demanding the passage of Congressional resolutions that commit the United States to uphold international law and the U.N. Charter
Calling on the U.S. Congress to pass legislation and/or resolutions to support the global abolition of nuclear weapons, such as seen with the U.N. Treaty to Prohibit Nuclear Weapons

BAP is clear: It is only through the construction of alternative, independent popular power that the suffering caused by the irreversible crisis of the system can be mitigated. We must move to create a new system in which war, militarism and repression are permanently eliminated from the realm of human concerns.

For the exploited, colonized and oppressed, our fate will not be determined on November 3. The U.S. duopoly is incapable of addressing our human needs because the interests of the people and the planet—and the goal of peace—are contrary to the narrow interests both the Democratic and Republican parties are committed to upholding.

Therefore, there will be No Compromise and No Retreat in the face of evil—lesser or otherwise.