Movement for Black Lives

The Movement for Black Lives is a coalition of groups across the United States representing the interests of black communities. It was created in 2016 as a response to sustained and increasingly visible violence against black communities, with the purpose of creating a united front and establishing a political platform.^[1][2] The collective is made up of more than 50 organizations, with members such as the Black Lives Matter Network, the National Conference of Black Lawyers, and the Ella Baker Center for Human Rights.^[3]

Platform

The organization's platform has six "demands": 1) End the war on black people 2) Reparations 3) Invest-Divest 4) Economic justice 5) Community control, and 6) Political power. Each demand outlines the demands, the problem, the solution, and actions to be taken at local, state, and federal levels.^[4]

Demands

End the war on black people has 10 demands—to end:

1. "the criminalization and dehumanization of Black youth across all areas of society";
2. capital punishment;
3. money bail and court surcharges in court proceedings;
4. "use of past criminal history to determine eligibility for housing, education, licenses, voting, loans, employment, and other services";
5. "the war on Black immigrants including the repeal of the 1996 crime and immigration bills";
6. "the war on Black trans, queer and gender nonconforming people";
7. "the mass surveillance of Black communities";
8. "the demilitarization of law enforcement";
9. "the privatization of police, prisons, jails, probation, parole, food, phone and all other criminal justice related services"; and
10. "public jails, detention centers, youth facilities and prisons" in their present conditions.^[5]

Reparations has five demands—reparations for the:

1. "systemic denial of access to high quality educational opportunities in the form of full and free access for all Black people";
2. "continued divestment from, discrimination toward and exploitation of our communities in the form of a guaranteed minimum livable income for all Black people";
3. "wealth extracted from" the black communities "through environmental racism, slavery, food apartheid, housing discrimination and racialized capitalism in the form of corporate and government reparations";
4. "cultural and educational exploitation, erasure, and extraction" in the form of, among other things, "public school public school curriculums that critically examine the political, economic, and social impacts of colonialism and slavery"; and
5. the demand the state and federal levels require "the United States to acknowledge the lasting impacts of slavery, establish and execute a plan to address those impacts".^[6]

Reception

Some Jewish and "pro-Israel" organizations expressed strong objections to the platform's statements on Israel, particularly its use of the word "genocide" to describe Israel's treatment of the Palestinians.^{[7][8][9][10][11]}

Rabbi Arthur Waskow described the platform as "a remarkable platform for social change toward racial justice in America" and recommended that every American read it. He wrote that although the platform has "thousands of words that address both comprehensively and in great detail what it would take to fully end the legacy of slavery and the constant resurgence of racism", a single paragraph "and especially one word in it—'genocide'" has grabbed the attention of the American Jewish community. Waskow wrote that the specific allegations in the paragraph concerning "the Israeli government's behavior and its effects in the US are largely accurate BUT—factually, it is not true that the State of Israel has committed, is committing, genocide upon the Palestinian people." He added, "Oppression, yes. Genocide, no."^[12]

In addition, David French criticized the platform in the National Review as too radical.^[13]

In August 2016, the Movement for Black Lives coalition received $100 million in pledges from liberal foundations through the newly established Black-Led Movement Fund.^[14]

References