The New Dark Age

27 January 2021 — Black Agenda Report

Democratic Fascists Prepare to Drop the Hammer

Glen Ford, BAR Executive Editor
Democrats are determined to snuff out freedom of speech and assembly to protect the corporate ruling order – while pretending it’s to safeguard Black people.

Black Citizenship Forum: Pan-Africanism and the Pitfalls of National Citizenship 

Editors, The Black Agenda Review
The Review interrogates the thought of academic and activist Layla Brown-Vincent, who says she was “reared and steeped in Pan-Africanist thought and organization” from birth.

Freedom Rider: Pro-Biden Propaganda 

Margaret Kimberley, BAR senior columnist
The Democratic Party and its corporate media have already white-washed Biden, and nothing will be demanded of him except that he not be Trump.

Neither Class Reduction nor Race Reduction: Toward a Revolutionary Left Framework on an Age-Old Debate

Danny Haiphong, BAR Contributing Editor
White supremacy and class struggle must thus be taken together as parts of a whole social system rather than separate categories of oppression.

Ajamu Baraka: We Are Entering a New Totalitarian Era

Ann Garrison, BAR Contributing Editor
In this interview for Pacifica Radio’s Covid, Race and Democracy, Ajamu Baraka warned of a new era of totalitarian neoliberalism.

First 100 Daze: A ‘new’ dance craze

Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
Everybody’s wild ‘bout this ‘new’ dance craze— this lewd, crude dance called “The 1st 100 Daze…”

We Have To Stop Valorizing Black Cops

Mary Retta
The purpose of policing––to jail and kill Black folks––remains the same regardless of the officers’ race.

Letters from Our Readers

Jahan Choudhry BAR Comments Editor
This week our readers talked about the weakness of the U.S. left, the storming of the Capitol, and the crisis of U.S. imperialism.

BAR Book Forum: Maurice Rafael Magaña’s “Cartographies of Youth Resistance”

Roberto Sirvent, BAR Book Forum Editor
Activist youth who weave deep histories of resistance together with anarchist, autonomous, and decolonial politics and urban culture.

BAR Book Forum: Andrea Allen’s “Violence and Desire in Brazilian Lesbian Relationships”

Roberto Sirvent, BAR Book Forum Editor
Even those who are significantly marginalized act in ways that, unfortunately, inflict pain on others.

“Expect Push for Censorship Under Biden

Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley and Glen Ford
Under the new administration, the State will attempt to “constrict political analysis and alternative information, to impose on us an ideological conformity,” said Ajamu Baraka, national organizer of the Black Alliance for Peace, speaking at a Dissenters online event. UCLA history professor, author and activist Robin DG Kelley said the movement must “do a better job of fighting on behalf of our prisoners of war,” some of whom have been incarcerated for three generations. These prisoners defended their actios under international law, “and that’s why judges hate them,” said Kelley.

Haitians Tell President “Get Out by February 7”

Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley and Glen Ford
Protesters gather regularly in cities around the country to demand that Haitian President Jovenel Moise step down by February 7. “Jovenel has been ruling by decree” in the absence of a legally constituted national legislature, said Daoud Andre, an organizer with the Brooklyn, New York-based Committee to Mobilize Against Dictatorship in Haiti. The United States and its allies continue to support Moise, because “he does their bidding.”

Biden Will Resume “Humanitarian” Wars

Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley and Glen Ford
The Biden Administration will “shift back to the ‘humanitarian’ interventionism model of US imperialism,” said Danny Haiphong, contributing editor of Black Agenda Report and co-host of the influential podcast The Left Lens. “Biden’s rhetoric from the beginning has not been encouraging on easing the Cold War against China” and heightened tensions with Russia, said Haiphong.

The Left Lens: Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and American Empire, with Ajamu Baraka

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s birthday is often celebrated without any regard for his radical political legacy. Black Alliance for Peace national organizer Ajamu Baraka joins Danny Haiphong and Margaret Kimberley to assess the ongoing relevance of MLK’s work and worldview.

Where Trumpism Lives

Jacob Whiton
Support for pro-Trump Republicans remains driven by relatively well-off whites in fast-growing, rapidly diversifying suburbs – not by economic despair in rural America.

Martin Luther King Jr. and the Socialist Within 

Stephen Joseph Scott
Each year in January as King is honored in the eyes of the public, there is little mention of the demands of the man and his mission: his fight for economic justice.

Amazon Launches Anti-Union Website to Derail Alabama Union Drive

Lauren Kaori Gurley
The drive at the Amazon warehouse in Bessemer, Alabama marks one of the few times in the company’s history that workers will have the opportunity to vote in a union election.

New Toolkit Tallies Up Victories and Summarizes Strategies to Defund the Police

Andrea J. Ritchie
It is more imperative than ever to reduce the funding, power, weaponry, and reach of law enforcement agencies that are committed to protecting a white supremacist status quo.

Still Can’t Breathe

Topher Sanders and Lucas Waldron
NYPD officers continue to use chokeholds on civilians without any meaningful punishment.

Encoding Anti-Blackness: Castration in the Digital Age

Kahlil Martin Wall-Johnson
El Negro de WhatsApp outgrew the category of prank to become “the biggest meme produced by social media culture in our country.”