| Black Agenda Report

Editors, The Black Agenda Review
The Mother’s Day Massacre: Mumia Abu-Jamal, 1985
12 May 2021
Four years into his own ordeal as a political prisoner, Mumia Abu Jamal charged Philadelphia’s government with premeditated mass murder in the slaughter of MOVE men, women and children. “Abu-Jamal condemned the excessive force used against MOVE and questioned the fairness of the trial, drawing the…
Danny Haiphong, BAR Contributing Editor
Democrats Give an “A” Grade to Joe Biden’s Brand of Corporate Rule. Should the Left?
12 May 2021
Biden’s policies thus far represent the bare minimum response of a social order mired in total decay. “Biden is nothing more than a placeholder presidency for the ruling class.”
Margaret Kimberley, BAR senior columnist
Freedom Rider: The End of Low Wage Work
12 May 2021
The combination of unemployment and additional stimulus support has made staying home a better economic decision than working for peanuts under stressful conditions. “The opportunity to hear why workers make a logical choice is never heard.” The latest popular lament in the United States is not…
Gregory Shupak
Israel/Palestine Coverage Presents False Equivalency Between Occupied and Occupier
19 May 2021
“As an occupying power, Israel does not have a legal right to claim self-defense against the people it occupies.” Media coverage of heightened violence in Israel/Palestine has misrepresented events in the Israeli government’s favor by suggesting that Israel is acting defensively, presenting a false…
New African Institute
Disinformation in Tigray: Manufacturing Consent For a Secessionist War
19 May 2021
Corporate media in the imperial countries have spread disinformation on the real nature of the fighting in Ethiopia’s Tigray state. “Eritrea has served as the primary scapegoat.”
Denise Lynn
Alphaeus Hunton: The Unsung Valiant, by Dorothy Hunton
19 May 2021
Hunton’s devotion to peace and “mutual cooperation” came out of his understanding that “war and militarism were endemic” to capitalism. “Hunton was ‘steadfast’ in his anti-colonialism and anti-imperialism, in his attacks on racism, and in his commitment to a ‘socialist world devoid of the violence…
J. Lester Feder
The Police “Just Launched a War”
19 May 2021
Do some, most or all US police departments have a pattern and practice of racial bias that makes them fundamentally unable to regulate themselves? “It felt like the Columbus Police Department was at war with its citizens in the middle of the day, in the middle of downtown.” Tammy Fournier-Alsaada…
Heather Ann Thompson
Saying Her Name
19 May 2021
Remains that were found to be those of a Black MOVE teen-ager who was killed by Philadelphia police in 1985 were treated as an anthropological specimen. “The bodies of the six Black men and women and five Black children lay under the smoldering embers of the row house.”
Roberto Sirvent, BAR Book Forum Editor
BAR Book Forum: Rosemarie Freeney Harding and Rachel Elizabeth Harding’s “Remnants”
19 May 2021
There is a need and desire among folks in activist communities for resources of ritual and spiritual grounding. “There are roots of both deep compassion and profound critique in the traditions of spiritually-based social justice organizing in our country.”
Roberto Sirvent, BAR Book Forum Editor
BAR Book Forum: Katrinell M. Davis’ “Tainted Tap”
19 May 2021
Activists and community organizers should be inspired by the work of elders engaged in social change. “Flint residents were forced to prove what water regulators already knew.”