We thought we’d begin our 25th Anniversary season wth a deep dive into the problems with contemporary policing and the ways resources might be re-allocated to support healthy communities.
Erica Ifill, co-host of the
Bad + Bitchy podcast, hosts a necessary conversation on the state of policing
with Brandi Morin (Our Voice of Fire: A Memoir of a Warrior Rising) and
Desmond Cole
(
The Skin We're In: A Year of Black Resistance and Power
).
As the “convoy” settled into downtown Ottawa it was difficult not to notice the troubling differences in the way police welcomed these “protesters” and the militarized speed of police responses to BIPOC led protests and to the confrontational way the RCMP approaches land-defenders including the
Wet'suwet'en First Nation.
Desmond Cole systematically dismantles any lingering illusions of Canada as a beacon of racial benevolence by exposing the multiple forms of state violence facing Black peoples of all ages and genders. His text, further, compellingly highlights the ongoing refusal of Canada's Black diaspora to submit to conditions of subjugation, bringing to light both historical and contemporary legacies of rebellion. A powerful read.
