Acts of Resistance: Black Lives Matter

Photo by Julian Wan

“When we identify where our privilege intersects with someone else’s oppression, we’ll find our opportunities to make real change.”

-Ijeoma Oluo

Kendra Coupland is a Vancouver-based Black yoga teacher and multidisciplinary artist who identifies primarily as a sādhaka, or person who is on the path to liberation. Her words are woven throughout this roundup.

“What’s most sad is that we rob human beings from having the most beautiful experience on earth that they could possibly have. And that to me is the biggest tragedy. That people will live their entire lives from the day they were born to the day they die knowing nothing but trauma. And what a theft of a human life.”

Meanwhile in Canada…

“The same thing is literally happening here. We want to condemn what is happening in the States and yet we all watched when leaders of the Wet’suwet’en Nation were pulled from their territory earlier this year. They dragged people from their forts and arrested them… An Indigenous woman was killed by police this morning [June 4]… Just Saturday, a man was killed by police in Richmond and Sunday in Delta a man was killed by police or badly injured… On Sunday or Monday, the police saw a man who was intoxicated and they opened a truck door on him to take him down, and these just happened last week. So the level of police brutality is such that I can just name it off the top of my head.”

If you are tempted to think that this is an American problem, think again. Here are some resources on violence and murder from Canadian police.

Protesters in downtown Toronto demand answers in death of Regis Korchinski-Paquet: Regis Korchinski-Paquet fell from her apartment to her death. Her mother stated from the beginning that the police pushed her. This is in Toronto.

Remembering Black, Indigenous, and Other People of Colour killed by Canadian police: There is a long list of BIPOC folks who have been killed by police in Canada. It doesn’t even include the Saskatoon police’s early-2000’s habit of driving Indigenous people into the middle of nowhere in winter to freeze to death.

‘Racism exists in Canada:’ These are the stories from people who have lived it as eyes turn on U.S. after George Floyd death in Minneapolis. Stories from Black Canadians on their experiences of everyday racism.

Reading Lists

“I have been following the transformative justice work, Mia Mingus has a blog called Leaving Evidence and a lot of their work is around violence, sexual violence, and how do you create a justice system which can hold people accountable… So there are a lot of really brilliant activists already starting to lay down some really valuable frameworks to move away from police brutality.”

Anti-racism resources. Ongoing List of Ways to Join the Anti-Racist Fight. A Detailed List of Anti-Racism Resources. 31 children’s books about racism. Anti-Racism resource guide. Scaffolded anti-racism resources. A number of impressive lists of books, podcasts, movies, articles, people to follow, and more.

Action and Understanding for Allyship

“I think of this quote that Toni Morrison said, ‘If you can only feel tall because someone else is on their knees, then you have a very serious problem.’ And I think that white people have a very serious problem and they need to figure out what they are going to do about it. So I’ve been thinking a lot about what she said and it’s recognizing that, like I’m seeing a lot of people doing this George Floyd Challenge [a TikTok challenge where white teens kneel on each others’ throats]… and it makes me think that white supremacy is also trauma for white people. To have to laugh at that kind of suffering means that the pain of keeping that feeling is too intense. They can’t even process it. They have to go to the place of making a joke of it because they can’t really deal with the reality of it. So for white people, you need to really make space for that. Your children are suffering and y’all have to figure out what you’re going to do about that. That’s the first step, is how do we deal with the grief of the pain that we caused.”

For our white friends desiring to be allies.

75 things white people can do for racial justice.

A Compilation of Anti-Racism Resources For White & Non-Black Musicians.

Bystander intervention training for anti-Asian racism. So you know what to do next time you see something.

No More Money for the Police. Minneapolis is the poster city for police reform. They did it all: body cameras, implicit bias training, de-escalation training, social psychological analysis, mindfulness, and everything in between. It didn’t work. Next up: defund and re-allocate those resources.

Timeline to the 2020 fed-up uprising. This timeline goes back a long way, and the context is key.

Places to Donate and Support

Vancouver-Based Black-Owned Businesses. Scroll down to find listings by category of everything from artists to financial services.

National Bailout Fund. Bail is a great tool for keeping poor folks incarcerated.

COVID Black in BC Mutual Aid Fund. Canada hasn’t collected the data on racial disparities in COVID rates, but in every country that has, black and brown people are disproportionately impacted and less able to take time off. We are undoubtedly no different.