We live in a society of an imposed forgetfulness, a society that depends on public amnesia.
Angela DavisRead
What I think is different today is the lack of political connection between the black middle class and the increasing numbers of black people who are more impoverished than ever before.
Interpretation
The quote highlights the disconnect between the black middle class and those in poverty within the black community.
Angela Davis points out a concerning trend where the political interests and connections of the black middle class diverge from the dire realities faced by a growing number of impoverished black individuals. This disconnection can hinder collective progress and the pursuit of social justice, indicating a need for solidarity and shared political engagement within the community.
In practice
This quote can be used to initiate discussions at social justice seminars.
We live in a society of an imposed forgetfulness, a society that depends on public amnesia.
Well, we see an increasingly weaker labor movement as a result of the overall assault on the labor movement and as a result of the globalization of capital.
Racism is a much more clandestine, much more hidden kind of phenomenon, but at the same time it's perhaps far more terrible than it's ever been.
Imprisonment has become the response of first resort to far too many of our social problems.
It's true that it's within the realm of cultural politics that young people tend to work through political issues, which I think is good, although it's not going to solve the problems
Radical simply means 'grasping things at the root.'
Racism has its boot squarely wedged on the neck of black communities, and we don't want to be told that hard work and responsibility are the answer.
Their suffering is intense, widespread, expanding, systematic and socially sanctioned. And the victims are unable to organize in defence of their own interests.
The basis for sustainable progress is legal protections grounded in an awareness of how identity has been used to deny opportunity.
When money, instead of man, is at the center of the system, when money becomes an idol, men and women are reduced to simple instruments of a social and economic system, which is characterized, better yet dominated, by profound inequalities. So we discard whatever is not useful to this logic; it is this attitude that discards children and older people, and is now affecting the young.
I believe this system of mass incarceration would have Dr. King turning in his grave. There's no doubt in my mind that Dr. King would be doing everything in his power to build a movement to end mass incarceration in the United States; a movement for education, not incarceration.
The same crime element that white people are scared of black people are scared of. While they waiting for legislation to pass, we next door to the killer. All them killers they let out, they're in that building. Just because we black, we get along with the killers? What is that?
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