🇵🇸 Next Up: Criminalizing Pro-Palestinian Thoughts too 🇵🇸

it really is so hard finding a work-witnessing genocide balance.

Azul loved ones:

I don’t really feel like writing this month. From where I stand:

Israel is still on the genocidal war path, no one is allowed to use the word ‘apartheid’ outside of the South African context, and the world goes on…

I do want to share an index of cultural institutions and their stance on the liberation of Palestine, because speaking truth to power is our only recourse at this point.

bravenewfilms

A post shared by @bravenewfilms

….the quiet part out loud.

I also want to take a moment and reiterate that solidarity with Palestinians is not hate speech, whatever would-be censors say. The past couple of weeks we’ve seen:

• France bans all pro-Palestinian demonstrations.

• Michael Eisen is sacked as editor of the biomedical journal eLife for retweeting a post from the satirical website the Onion headlined “Dying Gazans criticised for not using last words to condemn Hamas”.

• David Velasco, editor of Artforum, a leading art magazine, is fired for signing an open letter calling for “Palestinian liberation and… an end to the killing and harming of all civilians [and] an immediate ceasefire”.

• Columbia University suspends two student groups, Students for Justice in Palestine and Jewish Voice for Peace.

• An award ceremony for the Palestine-born novelist and essayist Adania Shibli is cancelled by the Frankfurt book fair because of “the war started by Hamas”

Just a sample of cases over the past two months in which individuals and organisations, including many who are Jewish, have found themselves cancelled, banned or sacked for expressing solidarity with Palestinians. There has been much debate in recent years about “cancel culture”. Even so, the current pushback against speech deemed unacceptably supportive of Palestinians is startling in its intensity. Yet many of those who have made the greatest noise about cancel culture have been relatively quiet in recent weeks, while many on the left who previously welcomed censorship of ideas that they despised have become vocal about the curtailment of free speech.

🤨🤨🤨🤨🤨🤨super super sus. 🤨🤨🤨🤨🤨🤨🤨🤨

Also in weird but wonderful news Gaza ceasefire protest brings Palestinian cause to Cop28, weird because we didn’t expect any kind of protests; wonderful because your girl is always here for political dissent when it comes to causes working on making this world safe and equitable for all humans.

I don’t have much to say this time around, but I leave you with spoken-word artist Suheir Hammad, who preformed this poem in 2011 and yet this poem feels more important now than ever.

I lowkey like spoken word - especially when done well, this usually means by Black and brown folks; something about that internal cadence. I love an earnest moment; I think people try to act too cool for school most days and end up looking I especially admire the vulnerability of people standing on a stage and asking their fellow humans to listen for a moment to their shit. There is bravery in that movement, even when the technique and skill is mid, you still got to zaghrouta courage.

In other zaghrouta moments, old Kissinger finally died. #dingdongthewitchisdead

Homie left a murderous legacy in US foreign policy including his instrumental role in strengthening US-Israel relations at the expense of anything and everything else, isolating the Palestinians, and supporting authoritarian regimes in the Middle East. Rip Bozo.

Ending here by reminding myself and all the homies, “never lose hope, my dear heart; miracles swell in the invisible. and remember even that old decrepit hot dog/ war criminal George W. Bush had hope for humanity. As he said in Saginaw, Mich. back in Sept. 29, 2000 "I know the human being and fish can coexist peacefully." 🐟 💃🏾

Until next time, all my love,

Wided

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