Black Lives Matter
By Grace Carballo ‘17
My Social Innovations (PPD 478) professor, La Mikia Castillo (Price Alumna, National Organizing Director, National Foster Youth Institute) moderated the Black Lives Matter panel last Thursday evening with 4 incredible panelists: Lisa Hines (Mother of Wakiesha Wilson), Melina Abdullah, (Professor and Chair, Dept of Pan-African Studies, Cal State LA) Nyallah Noah, (USC Thornton Sophomore, Black Lives Matter LA Member) and Pete White (Founder & Executive Director, Los Angeles Community Action Network).
This USC Sol Price School of Public Policy event was co-sponsored by the Office of the Dean, the Bedrosian Center on Governance, the Sol Price Center for Social Innovation, and the Rawjee Family Conversation Series and was supported by several USC Price Student Organizations: ASPD, GPAC, PELA, the Queer Policy Caucus, Price Women and Allies, and Price Society of Black Students.
Melina Abdullah, a Cal State Los Angeles professor and BLM organizer, explained that Black Lives Matter is a womanist black nationalist movement which was born on 7/13/13 after George Zimmerman was acquitted after the murder of Trayvon Martin. USC sophomore, Nyallah Noah, joined BLM LA this summer, emphasizing, “for once I saw a movement inclusive of all my identities.” Los Angeles was the first chapter of BLM movement and Melina worked alongside the 3 founders, Alicia, Opal, and Patrice. She explains they created BLM in order to:
“…build a movement rather than a moment.”
Lisa Hines, a BLM activist and mother of Wakiesha Wilson, recounted the heartbreaking story of finding out about her daughter’s death in an LAPD detention center, days after the fact and countless phone calls later, concluding:
“My daughter is not resting, and she won’t rest until justice is served.”
The panel was planned weeks prior, but felt increasingly relevant after Tuesday’s election and reports of subsequent hateful comments and incidents directed at women, people of color, and other marginalized peoples. (Shaun King has been reposting these incidents on his Facebook page.)
Each attendee received this harsh reality check upon taking their seat - even in 2016, even on our own campus, such hate and bigotry exists. Two USC students reported being called the N-word on Wednesday, following the election. #NOTMYUSC has been the response to racism on our campus.
What can you do? Melina reminded those in attendance that you don’t have to completely step out of “the system” in order to be a part of the revolution. You don’t have to drop out of school or quit your job to become a full-time activist, but you do have to be willing to take action in whatever capacity you are able to.
Pete White added:
“If you acknowledge an issue exists, you are duty-bound to do something about it. And if you don’t, you are complicit in it.”
Say Her Name, Wakiesha Wilson
I’m ashamed to admit that I did not know the story of Wakiesha Wilson, perhaps because I was not in LA last spring, perhaps because her story has not received the appropriate outcry and publicity from the mass media, or maybe because I am ignorant about the injustices black people face everyday.
Lisa Hines, mother of Wakiesha Wilson, recounted the story of her daughter’s death while in police custody, as well as the insensitive, inefficient way LAPD informed her. On Easter Sunday, Lisa and Wakiesha had planned via phone call to meet in court on Tuesday, but Wakiesha never came. Lisa waited from the time the court room opened until all cases had been heard, finally asking officers where Wakiesha was and why her name wasn’t included on the list of people going before the judge. They told her that they did not know where Wakiesha was; Lisa recalled feeling hopeless.
Authorities say they found Wakiesha hanging in her cell on March 27th, and she died at a hospital an hour later. If that is true, it does not excuse the fact that Lisa was not notified of her daughter’s death until several days later and only after persistent phone calls. She spoke with numerous officials, all of whom she feels knew of her daughter’s death who passed her along to other numbers, other officials, until eventually she was directed to call the coroner.
Wakiesha’s family adamantly denies LAPD’s claim that she committed suicide. She had made concrete plans to meet her mother in court just days later. She was the mother of a 13-year-old son. Melina Abdullah and Lisa Hines together recounted that even the facts do not support this claim- the allegation is that she hung herself from a phone booth which is only 2-3 feet off of the floor. There was a documented conflict between her and a guard shortly before she was found.
Perhaps most suspiciously, this modern LA detention center, which has cameras everywhere, has not released any information or footage to the family, though months have passed of requesting this evidence, and hopefully, this accountability and closure.
Black Lives Matter, Los Angeles
The objectives of BLM LA include firing current police chief, Chief Beck for failing to discipline officers. Additionally, they want to move weekly Police Commission Meetings to make them more inclusive, especially if the goal of the LAPD really is to “to protect and to serve.” Currently, meetings are at 9 AM on Tuesdays, directly conflicting with almost everyone’s work or school day, at 100 W. 1st Street, Los Angeles.
What’s to come? BLM LA is planning to charter its first in-prison chapter. As a police abolitionist group and a prison abolitionist group, it makes sense that those who are within the system should be included, as their input if first-hand and valuable.
In response to a question about what a “police abolitionist” stance means, Melina Abdullah explained, “The vast majority of crime is crime of need. We don’t think we need the police.” With 54% of the Los Angeles city budget allocated to Los Angeles Pete White added, “The police department is the only recession-proof department in Los Angeles. We’re re-imagining what public safety means.”
Every Tuesday at 9 AM you can protest at the LAPD Commissioner’s Office and demand justice for a Wakiesha Wilson and accountability for her death in LAPD custody.
To find out more about BLM meetings and initiatives, like the BLM LA facebook page
The Black Lives Matter panel was of course, informative, but it was, beyond that, a call to action. The public policy students in attendance and those who helped organize it have a responsibility to consider the systems that continue to marginalize people when they create and reform policy.
It’s important to consider the origins of power systems before we blindly accept them as good. The origins of the police force in the United States can be traced to slave-catching. As a white woman, I was raised with “Officer Friendly” coming to my elementary school and reminding us we could always go to the police if we were in trouble or faced “stranger danger.” Many of my black and Latinx peers were instead taught to fear police and be extra cautious in their presence. With this in mind and with all the information I was presented at the BLM panel, I have to question my long-held beliefs and attempt to recognize and correct any implicit bias I may also hold.
I don’t want to live in a world where Wakiesha Wilson can die in police custody and her mother doesn’t find out until 4 days later. I don’t want to live in a world where the video evidence of Wakiesha’s death is withheld and her death is ruled suicide without accountability. I don’t want to live in a world where white children have “Officer Friendly” and POC are taught not to make any sudden movements near that same officer. And I refuse to be complacent when two members of the Trojan Family are called the N-word on our own campus.
Recognizing that #blacklivesmatter means exactly what it says, yet somehow people are offended by it and interpret it to mean that other lives don’t. I believe that black lives matter, I believe that existing power structures need to be evaluated and changed, and I believe that a campus where racial slurs are present is not my USC.
~ Grace Carballo ‘17
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