Once again, in the words of Angela Davis, legitimacy is dictated by privilege. A look into the current practice of incarceration highlights how law enforcement protects the private sphere of middle class white women. People of color are opposing this “carceral feminism” with new solutions involving restorative and transformative justice that don't involve violence solving problems of violence.6 Instead she calls for “Abolition feminism” which “recognizes the relationship between different types of violence... How can violent institutions solve problems of violence?” She believes this kind of decarceration, that recognizes gender violence, racism, classism, and other forms of discrimination, may have the ability to create change, to realign our sense of justice that is equitable, and palatable. To drive her message home, Davis recites the words of Dr. King: “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.”
Before she left the stage, Angela Davis had time to answer a few questions from the crowd. COM students, Karissa Rajagopal, COM ’22 and Jenna Wozer, COM ‘21 of White Coats for Black Lives (WC4BL) asked her advice on how physicians going out into the world can address the overwhelmingly high health disparities for black women. Dr. Davis interpreted the question more broadly, stating that “racism and forms of oppression insinuates itself in all our institutions… You can always create an arena of struggle.” No matter your profession, you have the ability to influence the world around you; everyone has the ability to do the work and create change, and no particular platform or title is necessary to do so.
Students, faculty, staff and the greater community walked away from the talk with the confidence that activism does not look like one particular thing, but each of us has the ability to be an agent of change. Dr. Davis cautioned the limited pitfalls of the terms "diversity" and "inclusion," and instead proposed to put energy into the subversive and transformative power of justice.
References:
1. Maine Voices: Just another echo chamber? Higher education’s identity crisis. 11 Feb. 2018. Retrieved from https://www.pressherald.com/2018/02/11/maine-voices-are-we-just-another-echo-chamber/
2. Angela Davis speaks out on Palestine, BDS & more after civil rights award is revoked. 11 Jan. 2019. Nederlands Palestina Komitee. Retrieved from https://palestina-komitee.nl/?p=6665.
3. FBI Wanted poster for Angela Davis. National Museum of African American History & Culture. Smithsonian. 18 Aug. 1970. Retrieved from https://nmaahc.si.edu/object/nmaahc_2012.60.8.
4. King, M. L. (1968). The trumpet of conscience. New York: Harper & Row.
5. Garcia, Sandra E. The woman who created #MeToo long before hashtags. The New York Times. 20 Oct 2017. Retrieved from https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/20/us/me-too-movement-tarana-burke.html.
6. Kim, Mimi E. From carceral feminism to transformative justice: Women-of-color feminism and alternatives to incarceration. Journal of Ethnic & Cultural Diversity in Social Work, 2018, Vol. 27, No. 3, 2019-233. https://doi.org/10.1080/15313204.2018.1474827
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Watch the speech Angela Davis, PhD delivered at UNE