Oppression Transcends Borders

Dear NDSU,

I was looking the other day at a video from the fare evasion protests in New York City. On Sept. 15th, the New York police shot four people. They accused Derell Mickles of fare evasion and in the crowded subway they thought the best plan of action was to shoot him, two bystanders, and another cop. The police thought it would still be worth it to shoot one of their own if it meant they could shoot three of you. The New York police committed a mass shooting over $2.90 fare evasion. Unfortunately, this is not an uncommon occurrence in the US but there is something important about this resulting protest that I want to talk about. When I was watching the footage from the fare evasion protest, I noticed some of the people leading it and getting arrested by those same police are wearing Keffiyehs, a traditional Palestinian headscarf. They saw the brutality that the state of Israel is committing daily against the Palestinians for the last year, and 76 more. They saw the brutality that the police here in the United States are committing daily against our black and native communities. They see that the struggles are not disconnected. They look at programs like deadly exchange where the Israeli military trains United States police with tactics they developed to abuse Palestinians. Derek Chauvin was trained on that technique through this deadly exchange… Palestine knows about deadly exchange. They know that our fights are connected. They painted murals for George Floyd and trained protesters in Ferguson, Missouri on how to fight against tear gas. 

All this to say that our struggles are connected, so we need to show up daily. Daily, we must show up for our Palestinian brothers and sisters as they endure and persist through the first live streamed genocide. Daily, we must stand up for our African American brothers and sisters who are fighting for representation in Fargo as the city cuts the only shred of representation they’ve won through the Department of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion. Daily, we must show up for our native brothers and sisters who are fighting for their environment as the government tries to run hazardous materials through their land or next to their water like with the Dakota Access Pipeline and Line 3 in Minnesota. Daily, we must show up for our trans and queer brothers and sisters who are fighting against anti-trans legislation in every state and fighting against the hate that killed Nex Benedict. Daily, we must show up for our unhoused brothers and sisters who are fighting for dignity and survival, which the city of Fargo has only worsened by criminalizing poverty. Daily, we must show up for each other. Daily, we must live for each other and, daily, we must fight for each other.

Sincerely, Asher Lorentzen