Category: Advocacy

We, the Afghan American Artists’ and Writers’ Association (AAAWA), affirm that Black lives matter. This statement is not only a declaration of solidarity. It is also a commitment to sustained allyship with Black communities and an invitation to other members of the Afghan diaspora to commit to doing the same. We recognize that the struggles of our fellow Afghan Americans and other marginalized groups are intimately connected with those of Black people living in the United States. The continuing impacts of colorism, militarization here and abroad, economic and cultural oppression, and the intersection of white supremacy and American imperialism, have brought us to a critical point. We must play a more active role in creating a world that is just, equitable, and affirming for Black communities.

As members of the Afghan American Artists’ and Writers’ Association, we have been wrestling with a number of questions since the extraordinary uprising in response to the recent murders of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Ahmaud Arbery, Tony McDade, David McAtee, and the countless other victims of systemic racism in the U.S. How can the Afghan diaspora, particularly in the United States, actively support the Black Lives Matter movement in its mission for freedom and justice? How can we take responsibility for our complicity in the anti-Blackness and white supremacy that manifest within our Afghan American communities and families? Additionally, as relatively new immigrants from a Muslim-majority country in the age of the War on Terror, what are the connections between white supremacy’s oppression of our own communities and Black communities? As marginalized peoples who often share neighborhoods, scarce resources, and are subject to policing regimes, how can we defy polarization and build solidarity movements with each other?

Our commitment to engaging with these questions is motivated by a number of reasons. First, we oppose the system of white supremacy and racism that enable and actively encourage the systematic killing of Black people at the hands of the police and white nationalists. This system also facilitates the murder and oppression of Black people through state-sanctioned policies such as segregation, redlining, the school-to-prison pipeline, environmental racism, and the ongoing traumas of trans-Atlantic chattel slavery. 

Second, we feel compelled to convey to the Afghan American community the importance of standing with Black communities in their struggle for justice. As members of a diaspora, we have experienced racialized, gendered, and ethnicized forms of marginalization, but we recognize that our experiences are not the same as those of Black communities. In fact, our social and economic livelihoods in the U.S. have benefited from the ongoing disenfranchisement and criminalization of Black people, and the racial hierarchies on which these processes rest. These hierarchies have been instituted to divide communities of color. It is undeniable that many of us, as Afghan Americans, have participated in reinforcing them. Afghan Americans have participated in practices of colorism, gentrification, ‘white flight,’ allying with policing apparatuses post-9/11, and anti-Blackness. AAAWA commits to using our platform to raise awareness among Afghan American communities about these issues and the history of the country that we now call home. This commitment entails unlearning hegemonic ideals of whiteness. Uncovering this history means doing the intellectual labor of understanding the fundamentally racist, settler-colonial foundations that formed the U.S., and the economic, social, and political systems that sustain the status quo domestically and globally.

Third, we believe that Black liberation is bound with the collective liberation of Afghans and other communities of color. We recognize the Black activists and leaders who have paved the way for other communities to fight for equality for hundreds of years. It was the Civil Rights movement of the 1950s and 60s that paved the way for legislation that improved the rights and livelihoods of immigrant communities in the U.S. Some folks in our communities have asked, “How can you protest the death of Black people and not Afghan people?” We can do both. By saying “Black lives matter,” we are not saying that only Black lives matter or that Black lives are more important than all other lives, including Afghan lives. In fact, we are saying that if Black lives–their preservation and their flourishing–do not matter to the government and institutions of the United States (as clearly they have not), then how can all lives matter to them? If the occupation and militarization of Afghanistan is an extension of the domestic regime that polices Black bodies in the United States, then the Afghan American diaspora has a role to play in the liberation of Black communities here. 

We vow to adhere to the above statement through a range of projects we are organizing, as listed under “Long-Term Goals & Actions.” We also ask our fellow Afghan Americans to take specific actions now. We recognize that we will need to continue to develop and question this action plan as we continue to educate ourselves about movements for Black liberation.

LONG-TERM GOALS & ACTIONS

• Undertake a rigorous examination of the intersections between Black communities and Afghan American communities in the U.S. This includes: educating our communities about the history of African Americans in the U.S.; the history of immigrant communities particularly within the context of the Civil Rights Movement; the existence, manifestations, and impact of anti-Black racism in Afghan American communities; and drawing connections between the domestic police apparatus and U.S. militarization abroad (including of Afghanistan). 
  • Create conversation guides and facilitate workshops on unlearning colorism, white supremacy, and anti-Blackness in the Afghan diaspora. 
  • Develop and/or help distribute multilingual (English, Dari, Pashto, Uzbek) informational and educational resources.
  • Organize a monthly decolonial reading series that will address issues of colorism, racism, settler colonialism, and imperialism. 
  • Lead public dialogues about how the increase in surveillance and entrapment of Muslim communities in the U.S. post-9/11 is part of a long history of violence toward communities of color.
• Support national advocacy campaigns within our local communities. 
  • Concretely support campaigns that call for the abolition of the police and the redistribution of money to sustain initiatives that provide and improve housing, food security, medical care, mental health services, and education.  
• Foster durable and mutually nourishing relationships between AAAWA and other groups. 
  • Collaborate with other social justice groups within and outside Afghan communities, including Black-led organizations, to advance social justice for marginalized communities globally.

IMMEDIATE ACTIONS

DEMAND POLICY CHANGES: 

• Sign the Justice for Breonna Taylor Petition.
• Sign petitions such as this one from Reclaim the Block that call for defunding and abolishing the police, and redistributing money to services that help sustain communities, such as reliable housing, food security, schools, mental health support, and medical care. 
• Write emails and make calls to our local council members, representatives, and senators at the state and federal level that directly address the above. 

DONATE TO: 

• Bail Funds. Click here to find out why this ensures that poor people can fight for their freedom outside of the violent system of jail.  
  • National Bail Fund Network
  • LGBTQ Freedom Fund
  • Local bail funds throughout the U.S.

• Black-Led Organizations 
  • Black Immigrant Collective
  • Black Trans Femmes in the Arts 
  • Black Visions Collective 
  • For the Gworls 
  • Reclaim the Block
  • Trans Women of Color Collective 

• Fundraisers
  • George Floyd Memorial Fund
  • GoFundMe in memory of Ahmaud Arbery
  • GoFundMe in support of Justice for Breonna Taylor

READ, LISTEN, AND SHARE WITH OUR COMMUNITIES: 

• Letters for Black Lives multilingual resources for initiating conversations about Black Lives Matter in diaspora communities 
• Black and Asian-American Feminist Solidarities: A Reading List by Black Women Radicals and the Asian American Feminist Collective
• Against Policing & Mass Incarceration book list from Haymarket Books
• Reformist Reforms Vs. Abolitionist Steps In Policing from Critical Resistance
• “Police ‘Reforms’ You Should Always Oppose” by Mariame Kaba
• “Police Abolition” interview with Mariame Kaba by Call Your Girlfriend Podcast
• Worlds Without Police, Radical History Review, by Amy Chazkel, Monika Kim, A. Naomi Paik
• The New Jim Crow by Michelle Alexander
• Me and White Supremacy by Layla F. Saad
• Asian Americans Breaking Through, PBS Documentary
• “Racialized Villains and Agents of the Security State: How African Americans are Interpellated Against Muslims and Muslim Americans,” by AAAWA member Wazhmah Osman

Thank you to the many other groups that have provided resources on ways to support this movement, including the Asian/Pacific/American Institute at New York University.