Re: AUT: Black Like Who? - Why African Americans Arn't Supporting Mumia

[Alvaro Reyes <areyes@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Jamal,

	I am interested in knowing what you wanted to get at by posting this
message about Mumia?

	The person who wrote it has little to no understanding of MOVE
or Mumias relation to the black community.  First, MOVE has never been a
"radical black nationalist" organization-it is an organization that
sees the "protection of life" as its main goal and this has no relation
to any nationalistic stance. Although the members of MOVE chose the last
name
Africa as an expression of the situation of exclusion that they
experienced within Philadelphia it is a total misconception that MOVE is an
African American organization-its members are white, latino, and black.
So, although MOVE is far from perfect nationalism is not one of the
cricisms to fairly level at them.


	Second, I find it really funny that activists take one of two
positions toward communities of color: they either idealize them as
inherently revolutionary or they portray them as inherently more
conservative
than the rest of the population.  Both positions signal a radical
disconnect
between those communities and the people making such statements.

	So, I think that whole discussion about why the average black
person does not support MUMIA is off base. As activists (who I am sure
don't recieve much support from our own communities) our
discussion should be focused not on why the african american community as a
whole does
not support Mumia (and everything that he has come to symbolize exactly
because his supporters understand the connection between the case of
Mumia and the larger injustices in our society) but how we can hook up to
the sectors within the African American community that do support Mumia
and the radical causes he has taken up-in order to intensify the
circulation of struggle and build strength for radical causes as a whole.

Alvaro


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