Come Strike with Me!
I've been impressed and inspired by the professional sports strikes to protest racial injustice and racialized police violence, and I'm not alone. Dr. Anthea Butler, Associate Professor of Religious Studies at the University of Pennsylvania tweeted about it saying "I would be down as a professor to follow the NBA and Strike for a few days to protest police violence in America." Her tweet was so well received that she began organizing a walk-out event for students and educators to take a stand against these atrocities. This is different from strikes I typically think of in that the protest isn't about workers' rights or conditions at our institutions, but rather a wide-scale, national protest against police violence and racial injustice.
ScholarStrike is taking place on September 8th and 9th nationally and in Canada. Organizers are posting resources at scholarstrike.com, and there is a Town Hall on Wednesday, the 9th through SSU’s Center for Community Engagement on COVID, Health Disparities, & Information Literacy Town Hall. You may register for this event at https://sonomastate.zoom.us/meeting/register/tJYkcOqspjsvGNMdbrXAjsJGRrQqUFZpzPBG
I won't be picketing around campus, or anywhere else, but using the opportunity provided by laying down my teaching and administrative duties for two days to attend workshops, talks, and other events about racial inequalities and learning how to better leverage my own privilege and position to support BIPOC who are not provided with the same privileges I am.
Because we are working in an online environment currently, we can't stage a visible walk-out or hold a rally in front of the Student Center the way we did after the Parkland massacre. Instead, I'm going to post information about talks and webinars on my Canvas pages and encourage my students and colleagues to do whatever they can to fight against systemic racism in their communities.