Last month I met with Dre Miller, David Myers, Alaska, and Sky from Portland's pro-activists coalition J.U.I.C.E to talk about their outlook on the year 2021. Dre, David, and Alaska are part of the J.U.I.C.E de-escalation team that ensures the safety of marchers by resolving issues and calming down intense situations. Sky is part of traffic control and route planning for events to ensure the safety of marchers. J.U.I.C.E was created during the 2020 movement by Dre Miller and David Meyers. As they were out protesting every night they started meeting other activists that shared the same ideologies as them and they banded together and began protesting together creating the coalition J.U.I.C.E that stands for Justice Unity Integrity Community and Equality.
What hopes and changes do you want to see in 2021?
Alaska: “I’d like to see more policy changes regarding police accountability and transparency” Alaska said as we talked about what changes the group wanted to see take action this year. She also added how she would like to see another board be responsible for investigating the police board rather than them investigating themselves, and how the money from the police unions should be reallocated into mental health crisis coalitions that can respond to mental health crisis with a de-escalator or social worker than the police. Alaska then mentions the other day she had witnessed an incident in the ER where a woman was having a mental health crisis and was met with 6 armed men, four that were police and two security. She said that all that women needed was one mental health crisis worker and one de-escalator to protect the women having the crisis and to mental health care workers rather than being met with 6 armed men.
Sky: Sky talked how they hope to see more conservatives understand police brutality as a larger systemic issue then how they once understood it to be.
“I’m also hoping with changes on the federal level that we’ll be able to see more bipartisan conversations happening, because this party over politics perspective on the US and how it should be run is not working for anyone. It’s also particularly damaging to BIPOC individuals and communities.”
First steps and actions that can be taken this year.
Alaska: Alaska shared her thoughts on the first steps to be taken saying
“I think it would be a good first step to start talking to street response teams and see what steps we can take to support them. Whether it’s protesting to raise more funds for them, letter writing, or even fund raisins are some good first action steps”.
David: “There's a lot of ways that we can apply pressure to keep protesting for the changes we want to make,” David mentioned. He then leads into ways they can continue protesting and advocating for change. The first way David talked about continuing to be on the streets and uplifting the black lives matter movement in a positive way. Another is the letter writing campaign, which allows the organizations like IPAC and Rotary club, that aren’t necessarily within the BLM community, to write letters and spam mail boxes of city and state officials, allowing them to overwhelm these important figures with the voice of the people and the actions they want to see take place. Last action David talks about is the opportunity for J.U.I.C.E to have virtual meetings with the community to talk about actions they want to see take place within their community.
Dre: Dre Miller talked about how he's really into the idea of creative activism and how the recent banner drop inspired him,
“I think we can get even more creative and do stuff that a lot of protesters and activists haven’t seen.” He then talked about how it's really important to building up the youth and amplifying their voices saying “I don't want to say just educating the youth because the youth also educates us” he mentions that it's super important to start hearing the youth on how they want to be policed and how they want their communities to look like. He ends with saying “we need to push and inspire the youth to be in the positions as criminal defense attorney, judges, state official, city council member, governor, or mayor. That's what we really need to be pushing the next four years. We need to find those youth that we want to be put in those seats so when the time comes to be able to vote and elect those people, those people we've been pushing for are ones we can vote for.”
Can we expect to see an increase in protest going into warmer months?
Alaska: Alaska shares her thoughts of the increase in marches and protest saying that she thinks marches along with creative activism will increase, stating:
“I look forward to 2021 because we were all learning. A lot of us have been marching for many years, but it was nothing we saw in 2020 so I think we are going to be more organized and cohesive. I also think we are going to see an influx of a variety of different kinds of action and protest."
David: “Going into the colder months there's no doubt that the amount of people going to protest have decreased from what they were in the summer months and that's not necessary because protests have stopped but because the amount of people attending stopped which comes from the part of being a reactive activist vs a pro activist” David mentioned. He then said “I think for us to guarantee the upswing in summer months we have to take responsibility for making these winter months key to educating the public on why this movement still matters in a heavy way and is a positive thing to back. With the dying out of positivity of the movement so did a lot of the support. So if we can really drive the narrative to the movement and educate the public on why this movement is important and a proactive thing to get behind, then yes I can see an increase in protests.”
Dre: Dre Miller ends with stating “There's going to be a time again, unfortunately, where black people are going to get murdered while we're still out here protesting. So when the uprising happens and people get on board we're gonna have numbers and be ready” He also talked about how they’re building relationships within different coalitions like IPAC and Rotary club that don't necessarily go out and protest black lives matter and are on the front lines, but by them creating these relationships and those coalitions backing the movement they will now have a lot more support and they will understand what will happen in the event of another uprising.
What do you expect from right-wing extremists after seeing the insurrection that took place at the US capitol?
Alaska: Alaska expressed her concerns of Trumpism and how she feels like it will turn into a cult-like movement saying “These people believe they are part of a revolution and that they have this big very wealthy leader. I think trump and Trumpism isn’t going to stop after January 20th and I think we are in it for another year of more attacks and more violence from right-wing groups."
David: David expressed that what happened at the capital was something that was planned for a while and for some reason the world didn’t take it that seriously.
“As far as expectations of right-wing extremists go I think we have to take everything they say and do very seriously” David said.
Sky: Sky mentioned how they tend to agree that Trumpism isn't going to go away and the underlying issue that leads to Trumpism, not only Trump himself but the proliferation of conspiracy theories even beyond election fraud, those aren't going anywhere. The media sources that conservative extremists have really soaked up aren't going anywhere just because Trump isn't in office anymore. “I think we really need to be careful with the invisibility of their emotions crashing down” Sky stated.
There's no way to know exactly what will take place this year, but after sitting down with members of J.U.I.C.E and getting to hear their expectations, hopes, and actions they want to take this upcoming year I’m excited to see the work they put into the community.