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Solidarity, Not Charity: Philadelphia Independent Journalist Heads to New Orleans
by
Amy L. Dalton | 10.02.2005
Independent journalist and hip hop artist Walidah Imarisha embarked today for a week of intensive volunteering in hurricane-torn New Orleans. But this is not your run-of-the-mill mission trip. Walidah Imarisha will join forces this week with the Common Ground Collective "My sister was going down," said Imarisha, "but she's a doctor. I was wishing had some useful skills to lend, and then my friend Suncere Shakur contacted me, and said, you gotta come down! We need as many radical folks as possible, and we need as many radical black folks as possible." Shakur, a longtime community organizer for prisoners rights and police accountability, has moved to New Orleans since the hurricane in order to work with the community on relief work. He explains that FEMA and Red Cross workers are "slow to get to these folks [in the Black community]." "If it wasn't for the grassroots people on the ground getting people the supplies and water that they need, they'd probably just perish." Shakur says that this sort of organizing has been able to save about 70% of the community. Shakur says Hurricane Katrina is "the Black 9-11," and that Black people are needed to come down and help at this critical time. "Its time right now - not tomorrow -- but right now, for all those theories to practice -- to get down here and see about your people." Imarisha says she was motivated by Common Ground's philosophy of temporary mutual-aid assistance by and for the impacted community. "These are community members who are doing these things -- black people from that community that are addressing their community's immediate needs with an understanding of the bigger picture." It is vital, says Imarisha, that the volunteers who are coming to help understand the big picture causes of the poverty and neglect of these communities -- realities that long preceded the fury of Katrina. "I think its amazing that them media has even addressed race and class, but its of course done in a very superficial way... its presented as about a mistake being made, or ignorance, or maybe bias -- maybe! -- but not about institutional racism or the effects of capitalism in oppressed communities." Failing to see the larger picture is to fall into the trap of portraying the residents of New Orleans solely as victims, she says. But that's not the whole story: "I really want to put out the stories of the people in those communities, who are doing this work ... who have been there and will continue to be there." Imarisha says that community members and relief teams have experienced harassment from the authorities while trying to do their work. Recently a 16-year-old boy who was volunteering at the health clinic was beaten by police for allegedly trying to steal a cooler. Out-of-town volunteers have also reported trouble. "The cops are harassing them because they are black folks doing this work," Imarisha says. "If they were white folks in a Red Cross t-shirts, they wouldn't have any trouble!" She expects to spend much of her time working at the Freedom Schools, a grassroots school that provides for children's needs as the public schools are all closed. The freedom schools, as well as the more run of the mill relief efforts such as free breakfast programs and a health clinic, harken back to the Black Panther's philosophy of pursuing political goals only in conjunction with organizing community-based efforts to provide basic needs. "People have to eat, they have to have someplace to live," explains Imarisha. "So you do survival programs. But without addressing the larger systemic reasons that people don't have what they need, then you are really just keeping the system going, by feeding people and not attacking why they don't have food to feed themselves... you're a poverty pimp." According to Shakur, Common Ground's work in New Orleans is like "the Black Panther breakfast programs on steroids." Imarisha will also be taking interviews and documenting what she encounters, with the hopes of contesting the stereotypes that have been put out in the mainstream media about the way black people have responded to the catastrophe. "We've been hearing about 'looters' and 'thugs' and 'gang warfare' in the convention center. But those brothers went out and got food; they organized to make sure that the elderly and children lived; these so called gangs and thugs were the ones that made sure that the old folks and the sick got out first." "Its crazy, but at the same time its really clear: They don't want to show young men of color taking initiative to take care of their community." "I would have never known this if it hadn't been for the internet," she added. Imarisha says she relied on first person testimonies that circulated via email and indymedia news sites. "And that's what I want to do, too," she says. "Just write what I see." "I'm not excited, exactly... there's no word to properly say it... but i'm really looking forward to going and seeing people who are taking such devastation and making something hopeful out of it." ------------------ Common Ground's Needs List Walidah's Live Journal Interview with Suncere Ali Shakur Indymedia NOLA People's Hurricane Relief Fund Hurricane Katrina Demand Statement |
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