News just in (3/3/18): we were told by a member of CPF that this event has been indefinitely postponed. Hopefully it will take place in June of 2018.
NEW ABOLITIONIST MOVEMENT: A Community Summit Block Party
“At the end of this massive collective struggle, we will uncover our New Man/Woman, the unpredictable culmination of the Revolutionary process. He/She will be better equipped to wage the real struggle, the permanent struggle… the one for new relationships between men.”
– George Lester Jackson
Our communities are the foundation of our present and future prosperity. The criminalization which fuels imprisonment is rooted in the underdevelopment and destabilization of our Communities. The response of the state is to turn our Communities into the first cog in the Prison-Industrial Slave Complex (PISC), to criminalize our youth and lock-up as many desperate Black, Brown and poor People as they possibly can; to develop policies which impoverish us, then punish the People for seeking their food in the streets. But the response of the New Abolitionist Movement, of CPF, of Amend the 13th and so many other dedicated organizations and activists, is to transform our communities into foundations of prosperity for us, of us and by us. Selling dope, preying on your own People and engaging in criminal activity is NOT a rational response to poverty – collective work and responsibility – cooperative economics – IS.
We have the capacity to feed, clothe, house, heal and defend ourselves lying readily available within our Unity. We are our own liberators. The Autonomous Infrastructure Mission provides us a blueprint by which to, not only transform our communities into shining lights of prosperity and self-determination, but to also change the relationship between our Communities and the productive system from one of dependence and exploitation, to one of empowerment and independence.
I would like you all to take this opportunity to not only celebrate the UNITY of our Communities, but to review the Initiatives of the A.I.M. and volunteer to implement one or more of them in YOUR community, in conjunction with the A.I.M. Coordinating Committee.
So eat, drink and dance – but do so with the intent to strengthen the bonds of collective life, and wage struggle to transform the very structure of our Communities in such a way that the school, to poverty, to prison pipeline CAN NOT function in OUR Communities. My love and solidarity are with you always.
-Joka Heshima Jinsai
Executive Director
Amend the 13th: Abolish Legal Slavery in Amerika Movement
Amendthe13th.org
Date: March 31st, from 12 noon to 5 PM
Place: outside the California Prison Focus headquarters in Oakland, CA
California Prison Focus
1904 Franklin St #507
Oakland, CA 94612
Email: contact(at)prisons(dot)org
Tel.: (510) 836-7222
Who is organizing: Amend the 13th and CPF in conjunction with the New Abolitionist Movement will be holding a Community Summit Block Party, join us!
