Prop 21 Passes--Angry Youth Resist
Revolutionary Worker #1047, March 19, 2000
On March 7, California's Proposition 21 --the so-called "Gang Violence and Juvenile Crime Prevention" initiative which criminalizes a whole generation of youth--passed in a statewide election. If upheld in courts and enforced, it will throw kids as young as 14 years old into the adult "justice" system and adult jails. It will expand the police-state powers of cops to brand youth, especially youth from oppressed nationalities, as "criminal gang members."
In the days leading up to the election, protests against Prop 21 erupted up and down the state. There were protests at dozens of schools, mass arrests in Oakland, and walkouts in East Los Angeles. At a recent protest in San Francisco, many youth were furious over the acquittal of the NYPD cops who murdered Amadou Diallo, and they connected this outrageous verdict to Prop 21.
The day after the election, several hundred youth pushed through police lines, braving clubbings, to occupy the lobby of the Hilton Hotel. The Hilton corporation is one of the sponsors of Prop 21. The action at the glitzy hotel caused chaos in the heart of San Francisco's downtown. The evening news featured kids being dragged out of the hotel in handcuffs. While supporters shut down the streets outside, 175 youth were arrested. They were released later that night after protesters took over the streets in front of the Mission District police station where the youth were being held.
Anger and Questions
In recent years there have been mass demonstrations against the passage of other propositions, like the anti-immigrant Prop 187 and the anti-affirmative action Prop 209. Now there is widespread anger among the people at yet another reactionary proposition being passed in California. And many activists are discussing and agonizing over how to fight the system's war on youth--and looking at the limitations of waging this struggle through the electoral arena.
One student occupying the Hilton said, "We're building up our ability to defend ourselves from attacks. These initiatives are passed time and time again. We're starting to come together in consolidated groups and saying that, actually, the way to fight isn't just voting. It's young people coming together and mobilizing, and young people speaking our minds."
Protesters at actions in San Francisco and Berkeley on Saturday, March 11 distributed a flyer targeting the forces behind Prop 21 and Prop 22--which also passed, outlawing gay marriage and re-enforcing discrimination against homosexuals:
"A criminal justice system which incarcerates two million people and uses their labor to enrich those who locked them up, disenfranchises them, and tries to silence voices of dissent. A racist occupying army (sometimes called a police force) which murders and oppresses communities of color under the pretense of `A War on Drugs.' A two-party dictatorship, corrupted by corporate greed, which continues to pass racist, sexist and homophobic legislation under the false pretenses of `cutting down on crime' and `protecting the sanctity of marriage.' A university system which fails to meet the needs of its students while committing its resources to developing weapons of war and other destructive technologies. Primary and secondary schools which are underfunded, understaffed, and neglected. A media, wholly controlled by those same corporate interests, which poisons our airwaves and our minds."
What's the Problem? What's the Solution?
One poet and activist demonstrating at the Hilton Hotel expressed his anger and frustration: "Prop 21 passed. Fucken devils."
So, who are the "fucken devils" behind Proposition 21, and the criminalization of a generation? And what is behind this "two-party dictatorship"?
If people aren't clear on who this attack is coming from, they can get sidetracked and demoralized. The way the system put this attack over on us, they made it look like Prop 21 was the "will of the people." But Prop 21 was not the "will of the people" or in the interest of the broad masses of people. And the reality behind the curtain is that elections are NOT a way that people determine government policy.
Elections are part of what we Maoists call THE BOOZHWAH STATE--the institutions (police, courts, media, and other institutions that serve the capitalist class)--that IMPOSE and LEGITIMIZE all the shit this system brings down on people.
As RCP Chairman Bob Avakian has said: "To state it in a single sentence, elections are controlled by the bourgeoisie; are not the means through which basic decisions are made in any case; and are really for the primary purpose of legitimizing the system and the policies and actions of the ruling class, giving them the mantle of a `popular mandate,' and of channeling, confining, and controlling the political activity of the masses of people."
This isn't just some rhetoric, it's reality. Look behind the scenes at what went down with Prop 21. Many of the provisions in Prop 21 had already been passed by California's state legislature. Major corporations and associations of police and prosecutors spent over a million dollars to get Prop 21 on the ballot. The voters--a group that excludes prisoners, ex-cons, youth, undocumented immigrants, etc.--were told they were voting on whether or not they were in favor of "gang violence and juvenile crime prevention." For years, the mass (that is, the boozhwah) media has been promoting the message that the biggest threat to the security of the middle class is the "criminal youth"--to the point that not just racists and reactionaries, but even many sections of the oppressed, have been convinced that there needs to be more jails, more police, longer sentences, etc.
If we are clear on who is hitting us with these attacks, we can aim our anger and outrage at the real problem. The passage of Proposition 21 has to be understood as a crime by the SYSTEM against the PEOPLE. One more reason to answer the system's war on the people with our own war on the system.
This article is posted in English and Spanish on Revolutionary Worker Online
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