2 ways we’re showing up for racial justice
By Taylor Weech, SURJ committee chair
Our Showing Up for Racial Justice (SURJ) committee is gearing up for a big summer and we want you to join us in building community support for campaigns impacting racial justice in our community. SURJ is a national, chapter-based organization that focuses on undermining white support for white supremacy, and our local chapter lives right here at PJALS. We have focused on dually working to tear down and unlearn white supremacy within our institutions, organizations, schools, and selves while also finding concrete ways to support and show up for the impactful organizing led locally by people of color.
We have built structure for the internal work by launching a book group this winter and we just finished reading and discussing “So You Want to Talk About Race” by Seattle writer Ijeoma Oluo. I think I speak for the committee in saying that we highly recommend it and there are now multiple copies floating around the PJALS community for the borrowing. On Thursday, June 13th we will begin our next read, “White Fragility” by Robin DiAngelo. We do 3 chapters at a time and new folks are always welcome!
Turning outward, we have planned a summer of canvassing to reach out beyond our usual base to spread the word and build support for key campaigns heating up in Spokane. We will be at community events and, more crucially, going door to door in neighborhoods to engage new people in the fight against a new jail and in sharing tangible ways to support our immigrant and refugee neighbors as they are targeted by federal enforcement and local discrimination. We know that many people in our community care about these and other issues of racial justice, and we hope to have deep conversations and ultimately, get more folks to show up with their support in ways that make real change.
We want you to come have these conversations with us so we can have even more impact! Never been door to door? We want to push all of our skills by supporting each other with training and education. We are scheduling our (mostly Saturday) canvasses from June-September now, so to get more information and make sure you’re in the loop, contact Shar at [email protected].
We hope to see you at SURJ this season!
Book group–2nd Thursdays at 5:30 PM, Regular business meeting–4th Thursdays at 5:30 PM, both at Community Building Mezzanine Conference Room (35 W. Main, Spokane, WA)