HistoryPoliticsRace and EthnicityFREEDOM OF SPEECH? The Surveillance, Criminalization & Blacklisting of Black Voices

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Can black voices protest and speak freely without being surveilled, criminalized, and blacklisted?

On March 13, 2019, the NAACP sent letters to the chairmen of the House Judiciary and Homeland Security committees of the U.S. House of Representatives with the following concerns:

“As the nation’s foremost civil rights organization, we are concerned about the safety and well-being of the people, the families, the neighborhoods, and the communities we serve and represent…. [W]e are also concerned about reports of people and organizations being singled out for investigation and surveillance because of their activism.”

Concerns echoed (and substantiated) by a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit by Color of Change and the Center for Constitutional Rights. A lawsuit confirming the surveillance—by tactics typically reserved for counter-terrorism and national security threats—of Black activists involved in high-profile demonstrations like those in Ferguson, Missouri (Michael Brown protests) and Baltimore, Maryland (Freddie Gray protests). Concerns reminiscent of the FBI’s Counter Intelligence Program (COINTELPRO) that targeted activist groups and individuals like the SCLC (Southern Christian Leadership Conference) and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Concerns that continue to give rise to the ever persistent, decades-old question: Can black voices protest and speak freely without being surveilled, criminalized, and blacklisted?

THE ANSWER?

The answer may lie buried deep within America’s forgotten history. A history of more-common-than-not, similar experiences like those of olympians Tommie Smith and John Carlos for speaking out about the marginalization of black lives: “I will never forget, either,” Tommie Smith said in his autobiography, Silent Gesture, as he described the backlash he and teammate John Carlos received for calling attention to America’s inequalities, “the way no one in San Jose would hire me or John when we began to get involved in the Olympic Project for Human Rights back in 1967, or when we came back from [the 1968 Olympic Games in] Mexico City—how I struggled to feed my family, the lengths I went to, after taking my stand.”

Or the experiences of the 21-teachers of the Elloree, South Carolina School District who quit their jobs rather than deny membership in the NAACP: “We took a position and stood by it not thinking about the consequences,” Rosa Haigler Stroman recalled in a T&D article. “As to locating another job, it took me four years to find another teaching position. Everywhere I went, I was told that I was a troublemaker and could not be hired.”

Or the experience of American film and screen legend Eartha Kitt following a White House luncheon hosted by First Lady, Lady Bird Johnson: “… President Johnson decided that you should not be seen anywhere and that’s why you’re having a hard time getting work,” Kitt recalled in an interview discussing the blacklisting of her career. “[A]nd when they ask the question about what is the basic problem—and you tell them—you find they don’t want to hear that. . . . You get punished for telling the truth.”

Or the experiences of Marc Lamont Hill, fired from CNN for a United Nations speech where the phrase “from the river to the sea” was considered irresponsible and anti-Semitic. Or Jamele Hill’s suspension and eventual separation from cable network ESPN for tweeting her opinion about President Trump being a “white supremacist.” Or Colin Kaepernick’s shutout of the NFL for kneeling during the national anthem to protest (and call attention to) police brutality.

Their experiences now a part of a long history of life-altering consequences for black outspokenness, activism and protest—even when the voices and actions point to, speak of, or shine a light on an injustice, reality, or simple truth.

Read the full article (FREE!) in the below issue of C2Change Magazine.

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