2 — Monday, April 13, 2020
News
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com

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DOMINICK SOKOTOFF/Daily

Kevin Leeser bags 3D-printed medical face shield components donated to Operation Face Shield, the organization he created in response to the
COVID-19 pandemic.

Social justice virtual webinar
features activists, students

Event highlights ways to remain involved with activism despite COVID-19

Students and community members

attended a virtual webinar event on

reproductive,
environmental
and

criminal justice Saturday afternoon.

Students for Reproductive Rights and

Justice in conjunction with Earth Day

2020 hosted the event. The webinar

featured speaker Siwatu Salama-Ra, an

advocate for the liberation and dignity of

women, an organizer for environmental

justice and a prison abolitionist.

Salama-Ra
also
took
questions

from several students and community

members about her experiences and

highlighted ways individuals can get

involved in activism even during the

COVID-19 outbreak.

Salama-Ra
first
introduced
her

platform by linking it to the global

coronavirus pandemic, referring to our

current time as a time of war.

“Some would describe the days

amongst us to be a time of war,” Salama-

Ra said. “The intersecting work of

reproductive
justice,
environmental

justice and climate justice are ingrained

in my story, and I am grateful to share

how community power and the power

of story freed me from prison.”

In addition to organizing programs

and legislation for these issues, Salama-

Ra said there is a need for a change in the

culture as well.

“In addition to all of the organizing to

resist systems of oppression, we need to

create a culture of care instead of cops,

cages and surveillance,” Salama-Ra said.

“This is why things like the approval of

facial recognition in Detroit and in other

Black cities is an assault on us all. If we

really know that the criminal justice

system had very little to do with justice

and truth, we would all go down to the

courthouse and disassemble it brick by

brick.”

Salama-Ra
shared
her
personal

experience with incarceration and

emphasized the importance of change

to our current justice system.

“I, like so many others, are living

examples of how prosecutors weaponize

felony firearms and other heightened

charges in order to corner people into

taking plea deals regardless of their

innocence,”
Salama-Ra
said.
“This

vicious system must come to an end.

I saw nothing but Black and brown

bodies going through what seemed like

an assembly line into the jaws of this

monster and there (were) no words

to express how devastating it was to

experience.”

Salama-Ra continued by connecting

her work within the prison system to

environmental justice, showcasing the

parallels that lie within these issues.

“If a community is polluted and

poisoned, it is also likely to be policed

and prisoned,” Salama-Ra said. “This

same system that exploits the planet

and its resources is the same system that

exploits our Black and brown bodies in

the criminal justice system.”

Salama-Ra discussed how an oversight

bill to create an advisory committee

in the prison system could improve

physical and mental health of prisoners.

Especially during the current COVID-

19 outbreak, these individuals are most

vulnerable.

“The oversight bill is so necessary

now, more than ever, as thousands of

people inside prisons and jails are most

vulnerable to the COVID-19 pandemic,”

Salama-Ra said. “My last outing before

Governor Gretchen Whitmer closed all

non-essential businesses was to the state

capitol building where we introduce

these bills.”

She emphasized the importance of

communities coming together to support

a movement that connects prison reform

and environmental justice.

“I’d rather not be a leader in this

movement — I’m no leader — I’d rather

be part of a collective movement where

all of us are leaders,” Salama-Ra said. “I

survived something so damaging that our

community was able to see up close what

the prison industrial complex is, how

aggressive it is and what it would take to

abolish it … I invite you to join me on this

path (in a) grassroots lead (organization)

that connects all of these threads.”

LSA sophomore Kiley Lowery asked

during the Q&A portion of the talk

about ways people can get involved in

activism, especially during the COVID-

19 outbreak. Salama-Ra responded that

individuals should connect with those

who are in need and may lack support.

“Reaching out to loved ones who are

imprisoned and need help navigating

through isolation — be in contact with

them,” Salama-Ra said. “The way that

I’ve been handling it is staying in constant

communication (with) people I know

who need some support. Sometimes I

do not have the support that they need

and sometimes it is me forwarding a

message and I reach out to people in our

community who are more equipped (to)

dealing with prisons, we call on our allies

to intervene.”

Public Policy senior Brianna Wells,

president of the Students for Reproductive

Rights and Justice organization, told The

Daily these discussions are important

especially during these unprecedented

times.

“Hosting this webinar with Siwatu in

collaboration with Earth Day was really

important for people to understand the

intersections between racial justice,

reproductive justice and environmental

justice,” Wells said. “We wanted to shift

the conversation about reproduction

in relation to climate change from

harmful rhetoric about overpopulation to

conversations about how we build more

just and sustainable communities in the

face of climate crisis.”

Wells also told The Daily this type

of work is more necessary than ever

amid the coronavirus pandemic, which

disproportionately impacts vulnerable

communities.

“This virus is not impacting everyone

equally,” Wells said. “We’re reminded

every day about the disproportionate

number of Black lives that are being

taken by COVID-19. Clearly, there’s

something deeply wrong structurally,

and highlighting the intersection of

these injustices with personal stories like

Siwatu’s can go a long way in getting to

the roots of these problems.”

SARAH PAYNE
Daily Staff Reporter