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Anti-Racism Statement & Resources

The Yale Endowment Justice Coalition stands in solidarity with all those protesting racial state-terror and fighting for Black liberation. The movement for endowment justice at Yale has and always will be a fight against the systems of racial capitalism, neo-imperialism, and the financial instruments that continue to reproduce these systems. Yale has created the conditions of Black brutalization at the hands of law enforcement in the city of New Haven by depriving New Haven of the wealth and resources it needs for alternative community policing and funding the senseless growth of an over-militarized, armed university police force. Yale must answer the calls for justice from Black New Haveners and their allies. The university failed to do so in April of 2019 when Yale Police officer Terrance Pollock senselessly shot Stephanie Washington and Paul Witherspoon. It failed to do so when student organizers—led by Black Students for Disarmament at Yale—and New Haven residents protested for months, calling for the Yale officers involved in the shooting to be held accountable. Then COVID-19 hit, exacerbating the violence at the intersection of police brutality, imprisonment, and inadequate healthcare and housing. The university once again failed to listen to its own community as we called for the Yale Police Department to cease custodial arrests, freeze rent on Yale properties, and open student dorms to street-based New Haveners who needed a place to self-isolate. These demands are harm reduction measures that could have served as alternatives to a police occupation of the city.

 

An endowment justice framework means demanding that Yale both divest from oppressive institutions and reinvest in community power. However, our most public-facing demands have been centered around climate justice, calling on Yale to divest from fossil fuels and cancel their holdings in Puerto Rico’s debt. As part of the climate justice movement, it is our obligation to recognize when anti-blackness and white supremacy are present in the discourses, culture, and goals of the climate movement and to reckon with the racist foundations of American environmentalism. This anti-blackness comes in the form of silence among climate activists on issues of racial justice and police brutality or making “social issues” secondary to the needs of our climate and environment. We do not fight for Black liberation only because we understand it to be fundamental to climate justice. We fight for both Black liberation and climate justice because we believe in the fundamental right to life and oppose oppression in all its forms. They are, in effect, one and the same fight. 

 

The Endowment Justice Coalition has assembled a list of actions, places to donate, and resources, which we will be updating regularly. This list is not comprehensive, but it is what our community is pledging to act on and contribute to, with the hope that others will do the same.

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Call representatives

 

Donate if/as much as you can to these Black Lives Matter chapters, bail funds, and other organizations doing antiracist work. Then, circulate the donation links over social media, among friends and family, or through organizations you’re a part of, to get as many people as possible to do the same.

 

Sign these petitions and circulate them just like the donation links!

 

Engage in community mutual aid!

 

Support and/or attend protests in your area

  • Contact organizers beforehand if you can bring supplies (water, snacks, face masks, traffic cones to defuse tear gas canisters).

  • Circulate information about time, place, mask-wearing. Go with a buddy!

  • Thursday, June 4 at 8 PM ET: Sunrise Movement is holding a national call on safe protesting and showing up for Black lives in a pandemic

 

Miscellaneous ideas for how to help:

  • Check out Josie’s brilliant map of community alternatives to policing in NYC! If you’re up for the research, you can work on compiling a similar resource for your community. If you live in a major city, there are likely already lists of resources out there; compiling them onto a single map helps with consolidation and accessibility of information!

  • Long Youtube video featuring Black musicians and creators, with 100% of the ad revenue going toward bail funds, family funerals, and BLM/anti-racist organizations! Watch this with your adblockers off and don’t skip any of the ads to raise as much money as possible. Youtube is unfortunately smart and can tell if you’re just letting a video play while you do other things, so leave the volume on a low setting or plug in headphones while you do things on another device. 

  • Fi’s guide to distanced direct action

  • Check out the Movement for Black Lives Week of Action for daily ideas about how to take action.

 

Resources

There are countless lists of readings and educational resources circulating the interwebs. These are some that have been particularly helpful in recent weeks to our organizing community. Feel free to suggest more! 

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