The U.S. was built and exists as we know it today because of theft and unrelenting violence, including chattel slavery. Here’s why that can never be overlooked, forgotten, or erased.
Settler colonizers came to the U.S., an already inhabited place, and pillaged the indigenous people who already called the land home. That is theft. Then the colonizers doubled down by kidnapping and enslaving Black people to build the streets we walk on today, literally.
From Wall Street to the White House, it's enslaved labor—blood, sweat, and tears—from Black people dragged here against their will that built the pillars this country stands on. Cash crops, like cotton and tobacco, built U.S. wealth.
Even unintentionally, glossing over the historical truths contributes to an anti-Black agenda that, for centuries and as we speak, works overtime to erase Black American history. But don’t get it twisted.
Immigrants, particularly our people, have contributed significantly to the U.S. for generations. Like Malcolm X often expressed, we are intrinsically linked. Black liberation leaders, including Martin Luther King Jr. and the Black Panthers, stood in solidarity with Black liberation movements worldwide because we all deserve to be free. Liberation requires us to know, hold close, and commit to truth-telling.