On August 11, the uprisings that took place in 1965 are still felt today. The “Watts Rebellion,” marched to a familiar tune of racial injustice. The tip of the iceberg that had a titanic effect on the local community, was fueled by a police act.
When Donald Trump allegedly referred to el-Sisi as his ‘favorite dictator’ that said a great deal about both el-Sisi and Trump. What it said about el-Sisi was to remind the world that his regime is among the favorite of the United States elite in its policies in the Middle East and North Africa.
As we gather to remember and mark the 25th anniversary of the 1992 Los Angeles Revolt and to discuss the course of history after it, it is important to place it in the context of the long history of Black resistance in which revolt is a central and defining feature. Indeed, ours is a history of resistance through which revolts run like a bright red line, stretching from the age of colonialism, imperialism and the Holocaust of enslavement through segregation and the Black Freedom Movement of the 60s to the revolts and other forms of resistance in our time, from Ferguson onward. Such critical remembering is at the heart of the article below, previously published as a 20th anniversary assessment and reveals how history does not exactly repeat itself, but retains features of things and thoughts which remain stubbornly among us and require continuing righteous resistance for their removal and the radical transformation toward which revolts point and push us and history.
A silent march and a day of civil disobedience are among the events being planned for next month in Ferguson to mark the first anniversary of the fatal shooting of a black 18-year-old by a white police officer, an event that galvanized the “Black Lives Matter” movement.