How We Can Take Action Today

There is a quote by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in which he states, “The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice.” While our communities are hurting, angered, and overwhelmed, we must ask ourselves what can we do to fight for justice? Words are not enough. We must take action. We’ve put together some different ways that you as an individual can take action today and help bend the arc faster.

1. Sign Petitions

Text FLOYD to 55156 and demand that officers that murdered George Floyd are charged with murder. 

Text ENOUGH to 55156 and demand justice. The officers that murdered Breona Taylor still have their jobs. 

Text JUSTICE to 55156 and demand that District Attorneys George Barnhill and Jackie Johnson are removed from office. 

2. Donate to Funds & Organizations Fighting for the Cause

Minnesota Freedom Fund: A community-based nonprofit that combats the harms of incarceration by paying bail for low-income individuals who cannot afford to pay the ransom of bail. 

George Floyd Memorial Fund: Organized by Philonise Floyd, brother of George Floyd, all funds raised will go to the Floyd family. 

Center for Racial Justice in Education: The center trains and empowers educators to dismantle patterns of racism and injustice in schools and communities. 

Equal Justice Initiative: This organization is committed to ending mass incarceration and excessive punishment in the United States, challenging racial and economic injustice, and protecting basic human rights for the most vulnerable people in American society.

Black Visions Collective: An organization dedicated to Black liberation and to collective liberation through the visioning and leading targeted collaborative local campaigns that advance a concrete impact for people’s lives here, while also advancing a shift in public narrative that connects to transformative long-term change.

Campaign Zero: This organization calls on local, state, and federal lawmakers to take immediate action to adopt data-driven policy solutions to end police violence and hold police accountable.

3. Seek Out Resources to Educate Yourself

There is still much to learn and that begins by seeking out resources to educate ourselves on history, what is still happening today, and changes that we can adopt internally. 

Here are some resources to get started: 

Podcasts: 

• 1619 (New York Times)
• About Race
• Code Switch (NPR)
• Momentum: A Race Forward Podcast
• Pod For The Cause (from The Leadership Conference on Civil & Human Rights)
• Pod Save the People (Crooked Media)

Books: 

• I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou
• Just Mercy by Bryan Stevenson
• Raising Our Hands by Jenna Arnold
• Redefining Realness by Janet Mock 
• Sister Outsider by Audre Lorde
• So You Want to Talk About Race by Ijeoma Oluo
• The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison
• The Fire Next Time by James Baldwin
• The Next American Revolution: Sustainable Activism for the Twenty-First Century
  by Grace Lee Boggs
• The Warmth of Other Suns by Isabel Wilkerson

Films and TV Series: 

• 13th (Ava DuVernay) — Netflix
• American Son (Kenny Leon) — Netflix
• Clemency (Chinonye Chukwu) — Available to rent
• Dear White People (Justin Simien) — Netflix
• Fruitvale Station (Ryan Coogler) — Available to rent
• If Beale Street Could Talk (Barry Jenkins) — Hulu
• Selma (Ava DuVernay) — Available to rent
• The Black Panthers: Vanguard of the Revolution — Available to rent
• The Hate U Give (George Tillman Jr.) — Hulu with Cinemax
• When They See Us (Ava DuVernay) — Netflix

*These resources are from a document compiled by Sarah Sophie Flicker and Alyssa Klein. 

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