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A Forceful History of Black Resistance
by Kellie Carter JacksonIn December 1934, W. E. B. Du Bois completed what I believe is the crowning jewel of his scholarship, Black Reconstruction in America, 1860–1880. With over seven hundred pages of forceful writing, the book is a sweeping narrative that centers the contributions of Black men and women who fought to liberate the enslaved during the Civil War and, afterward, to reconstruct the United States as a democracy that would uphold and protect workers and their labor. On the first page, Du Bois writes a letter to his readers, a preface of sorts, in which he claims this is a book for those who believe Black people are human beings. "If [the reader] believes that the Negro in America and in general is an average and ordinary human being, who under [a] given environment develops like other human beings, then he will read this story and judge it by the facts adduced. If, however, he regards the Negro as a distinctly inferior creation, who can never successfully take part in modern civilization and whose emancipation and enfranchisement were gestures against nature, then he will need something more than the sort of facts that I have set down." In America, Du Bois asserts, the interplay between these ideas has given shape to every historical moment and movement affecting Black people. When Americans argue over who should have access to schools, jobs, food, clean water, voting, health care, or justice, we are essentially wrestling with the idea of Black humanity as either a fact, an aspiration, or an aberration. Du Bois was not interested in persuading people of Black humanity. Neither am I.
This is a book about the ways Black people in America have responded to white supremacy—including through force. The intrinsic belief in Black humanity is essential to understanding Black resistance to racial terror. While many stories of resistance involve extraordinary courage, most are about ordinary Black folk demanding basic provisions or protections. This book pushes against and beyond the dominant civil rights narrative that conditions us to see Black people as worthy actors because of their commitment to nonviolence. Like Du Bois, I am going to tell this story with the implicit assumption that Black people are ordinary human beings. In a world where speaking about Black Lives Matter is polemical, I am fully aware that this will greatly reduce my audience. Moreover, my audience will likely be additionally curtailed by the fact that I am writing about how Black people respond to white violence and refuse white supremacy.
Black liberation is actually not revolutionary for Black people, but it is to white people. To white readers, my writing might sound extreme, but that's because most, if not all, white people are intensely invested in maintaining their position. In What Then Must We Do? , Leo Tolstoy wrote, "I sit on a man's back choking him and making him carry me, and yet assure myself and others that I am sorry for him and wish to lighten his load by all means possible ... except by getting off his back." The formula for full humanity and equality is not complicated. It's not a differential equation or even multiplication; it's subtraction. White people must be willing to relinquish and divest themselves from power structures that benefit only them. But often those in power cannot imagine change that is not amenable to their position or granted without a permission slip. We Refuse is not a permission slip, but it does show a way of winning equality and equity. Black liberation is possible. It can be accomplished and, equally important, sustained.
But just because something is possible and sustainable does not mean it is easy. In this book, I resist the urge to solve problems with three-point plans, slogans, DIY instructions, or how-to solutions. It combats the flimsy arguments that racism can be solved with a good idea, a kind word, or a stiff upper lip. Slapping "antiracist" on a work as though it can be certified and guaranteed like an organic fruit is a ruse. The work of liberation will not be solved or spearheaded by one person. The work of liberation will be collective, and once the work is concluded, it will not have to be done again.
Excerpted from We Refuse: A Forceful History of Black Resistance by Kellie Carter Jackson. Copyright © 2024. Available from Seal Press, an imprint of Hachette Book Group, Inc.
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