General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: Political Awareness Matters: How Black Lives Matter Are Screwing Themselves -- And the Rest of Us [View all]daredtowork
(3,732 posts)The people calling out "white liberal supremacists" were the Seattle #BLM folks - Bravenak was citing them. She was even imitating their speech with all the "y'alls".
I've continued to research this in the Primaries thread. I did misunderstand what Bravenak was referring to, but she still should have been listened to, and it was still wrong to Hide her for trying to explain what a very real thread in the #BLM movement.
The #BLM members in Seattle are also members of a Black Power/Identity movement called Outliers something. They do strongly believe that the root issue is racism and white supremacy, and that Bernie's economic causes are a distraction from that. Whether that group/belief just happens to play into Hilary's hands or can be used by the GOP to place a wedge in the Democratic party is a different story - but that group exists.
There is a similar group in California called By Any Means Necessary that was generally blamed for driving most of the vandalism and violence of the Ferguson-sympathy protests last Falll. They issued very strong rhetoric of violence against the police, coordinated blocking highways, and may have fomented some mobs. However, it was also apparent that police or government provocateurs could infiltrate protests and then easily blame vandalism on this group once they had acquired a bad reputation.
It saddens me that this is happening to #BLM.
Regarding Bravenak, I hope you can separate what she was trying to tell you about from her own beliefs. And even if she did personally call DU out on being a bunch of "white liberal supremacists" (which I didn't see) in the name of #BLM, I still would have been intrigued under the circumstances and would have wanted to know why she felt that way and why she would support the disruption of a Bernie event.