Just finished this brilliant article by Grace Gámez, PhD and Meghan G. McDowell:
https://lnkd.in/g6QQ3jKc
It is a must-read.
"Likewise, the modes of sociality identified herein – of being with and for one another – draw from a wellspring of Black, Brown, and Indigenous cosmologies (McDowell, 2022). Meditating on George Floyd’s death, Minneapolis poet Keno Evol considers utopias as ‘an infinite activity of relation.’ This too, approximates what we mean by insurgent safety and abolitionist commoning: not a possession, or fixed set of ideas and practices. Rather, a commitment to the practice of non-carceral forms of relationality. It is our position that insurgent safety is not meant to be scaled up – it is not a 'one size fits all' approach – but rather will (and should) be practiced differently in Tucson, in Durham, or in Minneapolis.
Jackson and Meiners (2011) argue that to dismantle the paradigm of public safety as carceral control, people must engage with and reframe ‘what it means and feels like to be safe’ (p. 271). Through their responses, survey participants challenge us to consider expansive understandings of safety that includes the sonic register of ‘good noise’ – laughter, play, the sound of neighbors taking care of each other and the land that houses them. Indeed, it is Flowers & Bullets’ capacious understanding of what safe communities look and feel like that makes their work critical. The placemaking activities of Midtown Farm and Cultural Center work, because there is a deep recognition and understanding of who the community is made up of, and what Southside and Barrio Centro residents need, as F&B reflects and responds to the beauty and strength of their neighbors."
