Thursday, June 11, 2020

Tomorrow is the statewide day of action, general strike and silent march organized by Black Lives Matter Seattle-King County. If you would like to join the march, look for the group from the UW health sciences schools at Judkins Park on Friday, June 12 at 1:00 p.m.

In a letter dated June 10, the School of Social Work leadership stated their support for #ShutDownAcademia on June 10 and the general strike and day of action on June 12.

All marchers are requested to:

  • Please be respectfully silent, though signs are encouraged.
  • Take the pandemic seriously. Keep a six-foot social distance, wear face masks, carry hand sanitizer and do NOT attend if sick or had contact with someone who has been sick.
  • Disperse and return home immediately after closing remarks. 

If you cannot march, you can study, read, listen, educate yourself and contact your elected officials. Here are some timely pieces:

Read: We suggest a powerful piece published yesterday in the New England Journal of Medicine titled “Stolen Breaths.” Dr. Rachel R. Hardeman, PhD, MPH, Dr. Eduardo M. Medina, MD, MPH, and Dr. Rhea W. Boyd, MD, MPH lay their souls bare, share their pain and call on us in the health sciences to engage in these five practices: 

  • Divest from racial health inequities
  • Desegregate the health care workforce
  • Make “mastering the health effects of structural racism” a professional medical competency
  • Mandate and measure equitable outcomes
  • Protect and serve

Listen: Hear what Ruth Wilson Gilmore says about the case for abolition on yesterday’s episode of Intercepted.

Read: Historian Garrett Felber reminds us that The Struggle to Abolish Police Is Not New.

Download: For a limited time, you can download free e-books, including The End of Policing by Alex S. Vitale;  Who Do You Serve, Who Do You Protect?, a collection of reports and essays edited by Joe Macaré, Maya Schenwar, and Alana Yu-lan Price with a foreword by Alicia Garza (co-founder of Black Lives Matter); and Police: A Field Guide by David Correia and Tyler Wall.

View: In honor of Pride Month, Criminal Queers (password: loverevolution), directed by Chris Vargas and Eric A. Stanley, featuring cameos from Angela Davis, Miss Major, and CeCe McDonald, is free to watch through the end of June. More about the film and a trailer can be found here.

Learn: On the site Transformharm.org, created by Mariame Kaba, you can learn about the active envisioning of transformative justice and community accountability.

Browse: #CHAZ on social media to find first hand reports of what is happening in our region.