Research Assistant 2022 - To Change We Must Reflect

Coming into conversation with the BLM Movement, many efforts of activism came about at ECU in the summer of 2020. What began as students and faculty seeking community transformed into unions, petitions, meetings with administration, and a social justice uproar.  

I was a part of all the groups that I will be discussing and these are the order of events from my perspective and my personal experience. 

A collective began to form, as students came together, calling themselves the ECU Anti Racist Initiative. Meetings took place on Zoom as a number of students, from all art practices and backgrounds, met to discuss the way the institution was failing its BIPOC students. The group quickly wanted to take action to demand justice and change but was being led mostly by non-poc students. This raised concerns and was discouraging for the BIPOC students. The BIPOC students formed their own collective, the ECU BIPOC Union, which then worked alongside the Anti Racist Initiative for a period of time. Initially, the purpose was for the BIPOC Union to have the main voice, in a safe space amongst themselves, and for the Anti Racist Initiative to do the work that was needed.

The petition was quickly written by the Anti Racist Initiative and unfortunately did not include the voices of the BIPOC Union as initially intended. The BIPOC Union was still in its early stages of formation, so it did not have a solid community yet to contribute and the Anti Racist Initiative was in a rush to release its petition. This created a great divide between the vision for change within the students as the students of colour were put at the forefront for harm with the petition and its aggressive approach. The substance of the petition failed to meet the needs of all BIPOC students as only a few of their voices were included in the document. Due to this the BIPOC Union decided to separate from the Anti Racist Initiative as they recognized their goals varied. It is important looking into the future for student activism to be intentional and inclusive. The manner in which the petition was written by majority white students caused great harm to the BIPOC students and failed a grand opportunity to make a difference through activism at the institution.

The petition was then released anonymously through the Anti Racist Initiative Instagram which received plenty of praise and support from students and most faculty. The petition initiated an uproar of demands for justice, equity, and change at the institution. It inspired conversations that led to the questioning of a system that was failing the community. For the first time in a long time, there was pressure on the administration and the institution to reflect on on the white supremacist systems it was upholding. 

Shortly after, an email (linked below) was sent to all ECU emails from Mimi Gellman providing an alternative approach to bring about change. In this email Mimi addressed the ways of her own Indigenous approaches of mutual empathy and understanding as activism while expressing her disappointment for the aggressive nature of the petition. This was an important step because it provided different perspectives of revolution and change in addition to emphasizing an Indigenous voice in the community. This email was followed up by support from Brenda Crabtree and Daniel Drennan ElAwar along with their own words and thoughts (linked below).

As I read these words from Mimi, Brenda, and Daniel I am reminded of the vast approaches to change that exist in the world in which the most powerful go back to love and community. Love as compassion and understanding, and community as connection and support. I deeply appreciate Mimi’s initiative of turning our attention on the Indigenous way of revolution along with Brenda and Daniel’s words that provided their own perspective. I want to highlight Daniel's statement for us that the petition does not indeed go far enough. In his words "it is still possible to push its basic tenets further in ways that actively decolonize our local acculturation up to the inter/national level, in alliance with similar movements globally speaking." His words act as a reminder for how much work is left to be done and that the work of activism does not stop at an institutional level but as a global society as a whole. His Letter to a Revolutionary Spirit brings forwards another important perspective to activism one "with the goal of a more egalitarian community and society." I want to keep in my mind Daniel's letter as we go forward in activism with the intention of decolonizing our activism practices as a decolonization of the self; for us to return to our source of liberation outside of the colonial structure we function in.

Daniel quotes in his letter Audre Lorde's important and famous words

“For the master’s tools will never dismantle the master’s house. They may allow us to temporarily beat him at his own game, but they will never enable us to bring about genuine change.”

Lorde, A. The master’s tools will never dismantle the master’s house. Penguin Classics. (2018)

Brenda states in her email,

“Activism and persistence are important methods of facilitating meaningful change within our academy and I believe it can be and should be done in a respectful thoughtful exchange”, her words act as a reminder of the humanness that should exist in activism. The words “respectful thoughtful exchange” lingered in my head as a wake up call to actively bring compassion to the front of activism.

Brenda quotes Shane Claborne in her email. I wanted to highlight these important words of love as revolution.

“Peacemaking doesn’t mean passivity.

It is the act of interrupting injustice without mirroring injustice,

the act of disarming evil without destroying the evildoer,

the act of finding a third way that is neither fight nor flight

but the careful, arduous pursuit of reconciliation and justice.

It is about a revolution of love that is big enough to set both

the oppressed and oppressors free."

Shane Claborne, Common Prayer: A Liturgy for Ordinary Radicals (2010)

Bridging these viewpoints, perspectives, and approaches reflect Mimi's words of using dialogue as activism through compassion. Mimi, Brenda, and Daniel's words are vital to keep in mind alongside the many teachings of global activists. Change is brought about in community, love and in perseverance. Going forward, we need to consider the wisdom of Indigenous and cultural activists and avoid the colonial methods of justice we are accustomed to working within. Change should be radical and within the practice of love to truly transform the structures and violence we function in.

As bell hooks teaches us,

"The moment we choose to love we begin to move against domination, against oppression. The moment we choose to love we begin to move towards freedom, to act in ways that liberate ourselves and others."

– Outlaw Culture: Resisting Representations, 1994

"For me, forgiveness and compassion are always linked: how do we hold people accountable for wrongdoing and yet at the same time remain in touch with their humanity enough to believe in their capacity to be transformed?"
– in conversation with Maya Angelou, 1998

This was when I along with many students of colour shifted our focus onto community building in the BIPOC Union as we believed before change could occur there needed to be unity and safety within the students of colour.

The Anti-racist Initiative slowed down as time went on but still has an active instagram that continues to push for activism and change at the school. Although it was hard to maintain a group where members each had their own objectives, the Anti Racist Initiative was a starting point for the future of ECU student activism, and I hope future students reflect and learn from the strengths and weaknesses of the group. 

The BIPOC Union, successfully formed an instagram community with about 400 followers in a short amount of time. We encouraged people to come to meetings and promoted BIPOC artists from ECU. We even raised about $1,000 as people kept coming to us asking if they could donate money to the organization; we decided to create a Go Fund Me. Unfortunately, due to COVID it was difficult to get interaction from the ECU BIPOC community and since we were on lockdown there was not much we could do for the community at the time.

Initially, the vision for the BIPOC Union was to create a space for BIPOC folks at ECU to feel safe, celebrated, and fought for. We ran on a communal system meaning there was no hierarchy, only roles assigned based on skills and interests, and decisions were made together. To have some kind of leadership, there were facilitators who organized and initiated but anyone was welcome to become a facilitator at any point and time. This was successful for a period until we were discouraged by the lack of support by the school. We attended a few meetings with administration and were disappointed in the interaction with them. This was due to the space not feeling safe and the administration’s intentions seeming performative. They expected emotional labour to be done for them with no compensation in return which seems like a recurring issues in institutions and their relationships to their students of colour. This led to the group slowly drifting apart as the effort seemed hopeless. The union was then given to the hands of the Emily Carr Student Union with the intention that new BIPOC facilitators would take over since, at the time, the founding facilitators were in their last year at ECU.

I wanted to highlight the work of these founding facilitators that had a vision to create a space, a community where our fellow students of colour could be supported and celebrated: Vance Wright, Vanessa Mercedes Figueroa, Yutaan Kito Lin, Sola Olowo-Ake, Tanvi Kapoor, and myself Liliana Martinez Castro. 

Since then, a new group has formed called the BIPOC Creative Collective at ECUAD: a student-run group that advocates for a sense of community for racialized students at ECUAD.