Bernie Sanders and his supporters again found themselves in the middle of a Black Lives Matter action this past Saturday in Seattle, Washington. And as with past actions, things were not handled well, especially concerning Sanders supporters. Team Blackness sat down with BLM organizer Marissa Johnson, who got up on the stage to speak for the action, in her first interview to explain why the Seattle chapter chose to demonstrate at the Sanders rally and the response and backlash she has received as a result.
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Tree With Water
Johnson targeting Sanders, all the while ignoring the GOP, is akin to a Jew protesting a social democrat in Germany on February 1st, 1933. Here’s to hoping that she lives to see a great light, to best further her strategic goals.
dman
She’s a past Sarah Palin supporter and a Christian fundy
‘Nuff said
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/progressivesecularhumanist/2015/08/blm-activist-who-shut-down-sanders-is-radical-christian-sarah-palin-supporter/
White Trash Liberal
This was an excellent podcast and I am sorry that BLM is the target of such shortsighted attacks by so-called allies. It seems us white progressives have a lot of learning to do. The candidates are learning; let’s hope the supporters follow suit.
Your podcast has been important to my awareness. Keep fighting the good fight.
Black lives matter
Tree With Water
@dman: That, I did not know. Why, then, bother to interview her at all?
Keith G
Once more with feeling?
rikyrah
Thanks for talking to her, Elon.
Nate Dawg
Black Lives *do* matter, and that’s why the organization would do well to to create broad, grassroots support without alienating the movement from potential allies.
The protesters on stage at the Social Security event appeared unhinged, and optics matter a lot. What good exactly did this action accomplish?
Cervantes
@Tree With Water:
There are similarities, yes.
@dman:
When she was in high school, you mean? And you’re going to hold that against her? Is that wise?
Earl
Elon: the direct download link doesn’t work as of 1:52pm pacific.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@dman: and John Cole was an Iraq War supporting Bush man, and he was a bit older
Dick Woodcock
I only have one question: When is the BLM movement going to protest at a Hillary or GOP get together? Why have they only targeted Sen. Sanders?
I ask this question as a black guy, who doesn’t have a horse in the presidential race. I will vote for the eventual Dem nominee. Both Clinton & Sanders have good & bad points. It just seems odd to me that they’ve only interrupted Sanders rallies.
Cervantes
@Dick Woodcock:
Good question.
I have not seen one good answer.
White Trash Liberal
@Cervantes:
Then you haven’t read anything. Or listened to the interview. Or your definition of good is beyond reach.
Cervantes
@White Trash Liberal:
There are other possibilities — but thanks.
Sly
@dman:
She whistled at a white woman! GIT ‘ER!
Kerry Reid
@dman: That’s why I never listen to Elizabeth Warren — she’s a past GOP supporter. Of course, she was registered GOP until her 40s, rather than her teens.
Mike H
@dman: Try listening to the interview.
Jade
I know this not a popular position on Balloon Juice. As a black person I could support them if they were targeting the GOP and Hillary Clinton in addition to Bernie..
My gut tells me that the rumor that George Soros or someone is paying them to disrupt Bernie Sanders is about right. I see Hillary Clinton supporters all over this movement.
I despise the fact that they are losing support for a big important movement with this sideshow. We need all the allies we can get and based on my friend base we do not have the support that we had before their clown show started.
Clintonistas feel that if they get rid of Bernie they will get his votes. I don’t think that is true. I don’t intend to vote for her no matter who she runs against.
I don’t care about her personality or personal life, just her policy positions. Bill and Hill have a long public record and they have done very little that I could support.
Sly
@Dick Woodcock:
From the interview:
1) She lives in Seattle. Sanders came to Seattle. And she has a real problem with white liberals in Seattle, who predominantly support Sanders, papering over the systemic targeting of black Seattleites by city institutions (police, schools, etc). The entire structure of the protest was introducing Sanders to a city that has real problems when it comes to race, mostly because it’s a city in the United States.
2) Hillary is harder to get to, and not just because she hasn’t come to Seattle yet.
3) She thinks every candidate event should be protested, but…
4) Why does she have to protest every candidate?
The fourth is the salient point, really. If people believe that protest is valid, if not necessary, and believe that Sanders rallies aren’t the right venue, why aren’t those same people protesting Clinton events, or Bush events, or Trump events? Those are the right venues, after all, so go protest them. “Go on, ally. Go do it.”
The only credible answer I can come up with is fanboy politics. They don’t care about their fellow citizens being murdered with impunity by the state – at least not enough to do something about beyond liking something on Facebook or shaking their head at a HuffPost article while saying “That’s so sad” before clicking the next link – and just want people who do to shut up and #FEELTHEBERN.
Cervantes
@Jade:
Popular positions, anywhere, are a dime a dozen.
Cervantes
@Sly:
You misread the question. Here it is again:
All your numbered responses miss the point.
Sly
@Cervantes: Because there have only been two protests so far, and they were held at accessible events by people who were already there.
Cervantes
@Sly:
Are you asking that, in order to prove their loyalty to the cause, people who object to certain tactics should use precisely those tactics? I assume you’re not. What, then, is your point?
Cervantes
@Sly:
Assuming you’re right about the facts, are you, perhaps, begging the question just a little?
ShadeTail
@Jade: I feel the same way. Goddammit, black lives *DO* matter, so take it seriously by making a serious movement. As the Black Panthers liked to say, spontaneity is the art of fools. BLM needs to get organized and focused if they want to make a real difference.
eponymous coward
@Tree With Water:
Because the rallies for Republicans in downtown Seattle are all over the place. Why just the other day I saw Donald Trump AND Marco Rubio courting voters at the Starbucks at the Pike Place Market, while Lindsey Graham was throwing fish there.
Geeno
@Cervantes: You can’t object, or you obviously don’t REALLY support the cause.
I just supporting last thread. It was easier.
HumboldtBlue
@Dick Woodcock: There is a simple answer — the event wasn’t a specific Sanders event in either case and they were able to reach the stage and show their collective ass. They can’t pull this shit with Clinton because they can’t get into the hall where she meets or anywhere near the stage where she speaks because of the Secret Service.
But of course the problem is with the people who came to listen and support a man running for an office where he can make a difference and not with the people simply making noise.
Cervantes
@eponymous coward:
While that may be a reasonable explanation of Johnson’s choice — which is the question you addressed, I agree — would you argue that the movement as a whole, if that’s what it is, should be taking the fight elsewhere as well? (And yes, I know, it’s early days yet.)
eponymous coward
@Dick Woodcock:
In case you didn’t notice, Martin O’Malley was at the Netroots Nation event. So in fact your assertion’s outright wrong.
I know, O’Malley is a rounding error in the Democratic primary race right now, and nobody is paying attention to him because Sanders is the Anointed One for the white liberal progressive wing of the Democratic Party, so it’s basically Sanders and Hillary that everyone is actually thinking about at the moment… but BLM has in fact promised they’re not done yet, and if you look at a calendar, they have just around 15 months to make good on that promise.
So chill out a bit? Given that Bernie just drew a crowd close to 30k last night in Los Angeles, maybe you don’t need to go into freakout mode about how everyone in BLM isn’t part of the Sanders Fan Club just quite yet.
Sly
@Cervantes:
That people who say “protesting Clinton and/or GOP rallies would be more effective” should take their own advice, if its so valuable, and go protest Clinton and/or GOP rallies.
eponymous coward
@Cervantes:
No. I would not agree with that argument. BLM has correctly noted that having an actual black man as President of the United States (you might recall him as the guy who talked about his hypothetical son looking like Trayvon) has not exactly stopped the carnage in the streets, and so as a movement they are not particularly well-stocked with fucks about the Democratic presidential primary or white progressive feels on who the best candidate in that race is, and why are you interrupting him, he marched with MLK, etc.
A lot of BLM activists simply do not care about all that while people are dying, and wish to direct our attention to an issue that’s important to them at a convenient opportunity. They are using their direct actions to pressure ALL the candidates to pay attention to the issue, and more importantly as a way to get action.
Mnemosyne (iPhone)
@Dick Woodcock:
Here in Los Angeles, Sanders had local Black Lives Matter representatives open the rally. Not surprisingly, he was not interrupted during his own speech:
http://www.rawstory.com/2015/08/black-lives-matter-activists-open-massive-bernie-sanders-rally-in-los-angeles/
Sanders seems to have realized that ignoring angry allies is a mistake, so instead he’s inviting them to participate. That’s smart as hell. There’s no reason to interrupt when you get to speak first.
Don’t be surprised to see Clinton and O’Malley do the same when they start doing rallies as well.
Cervantes
@Sly:
As you are more familiar with what has been said here than I am, I’ll ask again: the critics you’re talking about, are they advocating the use of the same tactics at those other gatherings, or are they objecting to the use of those tactics no matter where?
Anyhow, thanks. Dinner with visitors — I’m out for the evening.
Mnemosyne (iPhone)
I have to say, Sanders seems to be a lot smarter about politics and campaigning than many of his online supporters. And good for him. I’m starting to think he may actually be able to give Hillary a run for her money, which is a good thing for Democrats.
eponymous coward
@Mnemosyne (iPhone): Damned straight.
It would be funny as hell watching white progressives be busy being more Catholic than the Pope and putting forth various black helicopter ratfucking bullshit theories, were it not for the sheer facepalm of “guys, if you want to keep confirming suspicions of the white progressive movement being…welll… having some people who are at least a little bit invested in white supremacy…keep doing that…”
http://www.buzzfeed.com/evanmcsan/bernie-sanders-campaign-adds-young-black-woman-as-new-public#.kt4X196kE
“Do I think everyone in the movement agrees with the way the protesters commanded the stage today? No. Am I going to condemn the protesters for standing up and expressing themselves? No. Because their voices matter.”
The campaign, fortunately, is smarter than some of the camp followers. Thankfully.
A Ghost to Most
@Mnemosyne (iPhone):
Sanders is a sideshow, building his cred and trying to move the conversation leftward. Which is good. How about we let him speak?
Earl
The interview with one of the women on stage in Seattle was interesting, though I still think that getting up on stage and asking for silence was silly. With the mics pointed at you, come out with a list of concrete demands. But whatevs.
I think the part that resonated with me was at the end — around 1:43 or so — Elon says he’d love to be able to support Bernie. And these actions have pushed Bernie to improve. After Seattle (and I checked that night; this wasn’t there) lo and behold, look what appeared on his website!
https://berniesanders.com/issues/racial-justice/
But as Elon points out, it grates that Bernie hasn’t simply said look — I fucked up and I’m sorry. I understand your frustration. And called out some of his supporters for being dicks.
Infamous Heel-Filcher
I’ve listened to the interview, and it did nothing to sway my conviction that this action was a fucking disasterpiece.
As of yesterday, my main question was whether the two women onstage were lone wolves or had the backing of Seattle’s #BLM activist group. I’ll go ahead and put this in the latter column based on the interview. Which means that it’s not just two lone wolves grabbing a mike and saying loud things that have only tangential connections to anything that I’ve been told the #BLM movement stands for. This young woman wants to fuck the system and burn it all down? Great, wonderful, she can do so under her own banner.
It may be cathartic for her to call everyone in that room a white supremacist — oh wait, my mistake, only those whose first thought when she called them a white supremacist was “am I a white supremacist?” — and it may be cathartic for Imani to live vicariously through that moment, but that’s not what the movement stands for.
Cacti
@Dick Woodcock:
O’Malley and Sanders were both interrupted at Netroots, with O’Malley getting it first.
MomSense
@Mnemosyne (iPhone):
This has been a wild ride. Sanders and his team are making huge strides but some of their supporters are going to fuck this up for him.
I can’t help but notice that there are an awful lot of progressives who are terribly closed minded and unyielding.
Before criticizing Marissa, just give her the benefit of an honest and respectful listen.
Mnemosyne (iPhone)
@A Ghost to Most:
He spoke without interruption here in Los Angeles, because he gave local BLM activists a chance to speak their piece first. Funny how that worked out for everyone, huh?
ETA because of fat fingers on an iPhone keyboard.
kc
@Earl:
I hope he’s got better things to do than read blog comments and tweets left by troll-y types who may or may not actually support him.
Plenty of Obama’s supporters are raging, abusive, d-bags, but I don’t expect Obama to keep track of them, let alone apologize for them or “call them out.”
I assume we’re not talking about people who work in any official capacity for these guys.
kc
@Infamous Heel-Filcher:
It’s an awesome way to get elected though. “Hi, I’m ___________, and you’re all white supremacists. Vote for me!”
A Ghost to Most
@Mnemosyne (iPhone):
And good for him and the other candidates for including them. Their voices are important, especially now.
I just question the methods, and the way other voices are being shouted down. I much prefer that we aim our weapons at the GOP. What if every group did that at every rally?
Seems like politics by temper tantrum.
Peace.
MomSense
@Mnemosyne (iPhone)</
Why let a great outcome spoil our outrage!
A Ghost to Most
@MomSense:
The ends justify the means.
Sorry, couldn’t resist.
Infamous Heel-Filcher
@kc: Heh, indeed.
As stated by Ms Johnson herself in the interview, she’s not interested in working within the electoral system. Fine and good — well others of us have things we’re trying to achieve too, and some of those do involve using existing structures instead of blowing them up. It’s one thing to disrupt a campaign event because you want your issue heard and addressed by the campaign, and I’m glad that the Sanders campaign at least appears to have ridden over that log without losing an axle. But when an activist’s stated goal is to undermine the entire democratic coalition your campaign is courting, you have no obligation to give them the time of day.
W/R/T Mnemosyne’s anecdote of an opening act from the ranks of the local activist community: Any activist who Sanders puts on the playbill is, of course, implicitly endorsing his campaign, and therefore lending some form of movement endorsement. That’s between that activist, the movement, and Sanders (and frankly I can’t see the movement putting up any objection, decentralized as it is).
MomSense
@A Ghost to Most:
Ha!! Sometimes they do. Sometimes they really do.
gwangung
The ghost of Martin Luther King Jr. is sighing and face palming at all the respectability complaints.
A Ghost to Most
@MomSense:
Do you draw a line somewhere, or does the end justify any means?
Is tear-gassing an opponents event across the line? How about creating a power outage so they can’t speak? What do you teach your kids about this sort of thing?
Mnemosyne (iPhone)
@A Ghost to Most:
As I keep pointing out, we are still VERY early in the nominating process. IMO, it’s better to get this kind of stuff sorted out now, before the full spotlight is on our candidates. By the time the debates and townhalls start, BLM should already be incorporated into the conversation by default and all of this mishegas will be behind us.
A Ghost to Most
Hooray. We don’t need to act like Republicans. We are supposed to be better than that. Our tent has many poles, not just one.
BobS
@MomSense: Like the “honest and respectful listen” she afforded Bernie Sanders?
MomSense
@A Ghost to Most:
Slippery slope! Be afraid. Be very afraid.
MomSense
Disclaimer: I haven’t decided which candidate I will support at my caucus. How the candidates deal with criminal Justice and BLM, which I view as an extension of the civil rights movement, is going to be a major factor in my decision.
It seems to me that the candidate Bernie Sanders has taken what happened in Seattle and used it as a way to grow and lead a better and more inclusive campaign.
Is Bernie’s supporters learning? I wish they would take the example his campaign is setting.
BobS
@MomSense: And with a little luck, some of the more animated characters in BLM will also have discovered “a way to grow” and give others the “honest and respectful listen” they seem to feel they’re owed by virtue of …? In other words, maybe they’ll stop acting like a bunch of spoiled adolescents.
mike in dc
I think my major objections to the action were 1) the gratuitous insult to the admittedly hostile crowd(pro tip: even if there are white progressives tacitly supporting a racist establishment in Seattle, almost certainly in that crowd are white progressives who are actually and actively working on the very issues you are demonstrating for–calling them all white supremacist liberals is a major alienation move) and 2) not letting Sanders speak after they had taken the stage for 10 minutes to say their piece, and simultaneously demanding a capitulatory response on the spot from him. If some white activist had shouted at then Sen. Obama to step to them to answer their demand, would anyone really say that was appropriate or respectful?
It's Not The Fall, It's The Landing
Yes, black lives matter, and yes, all the Democratic candidates can do better on issues of racial justice.
But Ms. Johnson comes across as a childish, narcissistic self-promoter, so the less attention given to her as an individual, the better.
Cervantes
@mike in dc:
The (political) problem with your good-faith question, I think you’ll find, is that no “white activist” is coming from the same terrible place in our so-called society as the BLM folk generally are.
smintheus
Did she explain how she intends to hold Sanders accountable for his crimes against humanity, whatever they are? Will it be a show trial broadcast live on CSPAN? Obviously Johnson is going to have to be in charge, and whatever it turns out to be it’ll have to increase her public profile in some way otherwise there’d be no point.
Plantsmantx
@Mnemosyne (iPhone):
No, he didn’t:
http://news.yahoo.com/sanders-lets-civil-rights-activists-043351572.html
Peter
My perspective on this whole thing is a great big shrug. Do I think this was the best or most appropriate tactic to use? Probably not. Do I think it’s sort of weird that this is dogging Bernie specifically? Sure. But do I think this is a big problem, or doing any real damage, or is something worth arguing over? No.
Decentralized movements have their advantages, but they also have downsides, including difficulty in policing membership and behavior. The Seattle protest does seem like me-too yahooism, but these sorts of things are kind of inevitable and mostly harmless. The only way it would really harm any cause is if we used it as an opportunity to assemble the circular firing squad. Let’s leave that one to the Republicans this year, eh?
mclaren
I’m a big Bernie Sanders supporter but I have a lot of sympathy for these BLM protesters. Seriously — how the hell else are they supposed to get national publicity? They should just shut up and let black people get murdered by racist cops without uttering a peep?
Paul in KY
@Cervantes: I would hold that against her. Even if she was 12 when she was a supporter.
Applejinx
@Earl: It’s great that Bernie is adopting #BLM issues, because they are possibly the most important thing happening in America. If anybody is vulnerable to being randomly shot in the street by police and left to lie there as a warning to the others, we ALL are vulnerable to that eventually.
And of course we are not all vulnerable to that. I’m white and male and old(ish). I am so, so very not vulnerable to that. Hell, I probably have enough clout to stop some of those events, like the famous white lady ordering about cops who were harassing a neighborhood gardener.
It is a good thing that these protesters got this ball rolling the only way they could. It is necessary.
I do have one question.
Now that you have your allies, are you going to squander them?
Now that you have your tactical position, are you going to blow it?
You can have Bernie Sanders take up your torch, bring a #BLM activist ONTO his staff specifically to speak first and open events and communicate this stuff in an experienced, technical, professional-politician way that’s designed to get actual results and change. This is not Bernie’s first rodeo trying to get progressive causes converted into law and lived experience. (it is FUCKING OBSCENE that this is a ‘progressive’ cause. I have to be careful because I lose my damn mind over this stuff when I stare into the abyss too much)
You cannot have Bernie apologize. You cannot have him (or his opening act) inform massive audiences that they are racist. Even if it is partly true (and it is true, and it is only partly true and partly false. This is politics and the evolution of the body politic itself)
What you can have, is the ‘black people not getting murdered’ equivalent of lighting the white house up all gay rainbowy.
You can have a solid, across America understanding that racism is fucked and over and we are done with that bullshit, forever. After hundreds and hundreds of years of fuck-all progress, it’s time. It is time.
You are not the only ones pulling on this rope. Settle down and keep pulling and accept help, which will sometimes come in forms you don’t recognize or respect. The end goal is quite literally life and you don’t get to impede that because you demand life AND an apology. That’s politics, and this is the historical moment when we destroy racism.
If we manage that, we can try and teach Europe, which is having its own hell of a time with just such problems.
Cervantes
@Paul in KY:
You must be joking.
Cervantes
@Applejinx:
Nicely done.
You might be interested in The Politics of Official Apologies, by Melissa Nobles.
sharl
Ms. Johnson comports herself quite well here.
This is coming from an aging white dude, so take or leave my opinion for what it’s worth.
I think it would be a positive for her – for whatever that is worth, and maybe just a tiny bit of a positive – if the interview got wider distribution. Kind of a dangerous thing, though, since you don’t know what the media beyond TWiB will do with the interview. I’m guessing it would probably matter* to some of the Sandernistas, and maybe give them pause for thought, that she has a white mom (*though it shouldn’t).
Damned if I know if this will be a net positive for BLM (what would the metrics for determining that even look like?). But the frustration is palpable here, i.e., the frustration of a community that only receives widespread attention when some group wants something from them, only to be ignored the rest of the time. Meanwhile Black folk are still being killed or (along with poor folks in general) having their lives ruined in various ways. Ms. Johnson sure got everyone’s attention! I hope something positive comes of that, beyond the immediate responses of the Sanders campaign.