[Peace-discuss] GEO Statement of Solidarity with Black Students for Revolution

[Gus Wood]

[image: Inline image 1]


The Graduate Employees Organization Local 6300 IFT/AFT at the University of
Illinois at Urbana-Champaign stands firmly in solidarity with the Black
Students for Revolution. On Wednesday, November 18, 2015, they courageously
addressed a campus steeped in white supremacy, racial violence,
dehumanizing imagery, aggressive policing, and an apathetic administration
while also calling upon black students to organize themselves into a
conscious collective to challenge their oppressed position. GEO stands with
Black Students for Revolution in affirming that Black Lives Matter at the
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. The GEO also promotes other
oppressed groups ability to organize themselves as well to eliminate all
inequalities so that everyone has equal opportunities, safety, and better
quality of life on campus and in the community.

We denounce all forms of structural and private racism that permeate
throughout the campus, especially the formation of the “Illini White
Student Union,” a white supremacist group that advocates the monitoring and
data collection of black students and faculty on campus.  Additionally, we
condemn the university administration’s passive response to the threat
posed by the “Illini White Student Union.” By initially addressing the
group through a trademark infringement argument, the university
administration positioned black lives’ and campus safety at the periphery.
The university prides itself on its campus safety resources and its
particular involvement in the removal of the white supremacist Facebook
page. However, instead of finding the culprits behind this white
supremacist page, they simply issued mass emails suggesting “free speech to
speak out against discrimination” and information about campus safety.

We also agree with Black Students for Revolution in condemning the vast
racial disparities on campus: black undergraduate and graduate student
populations on campus have been in an alarming decline, black employment is
extremely low in wage labor jobs on campus while the black Champaign-Urbana
community desperately seeks work, and blacks are frequently stopped and
ticketed on campus more than any other racial group. We will not sit
silently while this ignorant, hateful, and violent white supremacy
continues to operate.

GEO will continue to support Black Students for Revolution’s resistance to
systemic and institutional racism that harms and excludes black people at
the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and in the United States.
The solution does not exist within the current framework of this
institution. A revolution, which is when organized oppressed groups utilize
self-determination to transform an institution and culture, is the only
path towards genuine justice.

In solidarity,

The Graduate Employees Organization UIUC
Local 6300, IFT/AFT, AFL-CIO
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