Dream Big, Stay Focused

Beyond the Paint: Counterinsurgency, Symbolism, and the Ongoing Fight for Material Change

This week crews started work to remove the “Black Lives Matter” from Black Lives Matter Plaza in Washington, DC. The removal of the words (does this also mean that Black Lives Matter Plaza is no more too?) comes as DC’s Mayor, Muriel Bowser, navigates threats from a Republican controlled Congress and the new Trump Administration to take over and clean up DC. But what is to be made of the removal of government painted Black Lives Matter from the streets of DC?

To figure out exactly what this means and how we might begin to make sense of how to feel about it, let’s go back to 2020 when this country erupted in oceans of protests and political action in response to the deaths of Breonna Taylor, George Floyd, and many many—too many to name—Black lives ended by anti-Black police terror. These protests in response to state violence were both prolific and historic. Estimates calculate that around 15 to 26 million people participated in protests in reaction to anti-Black police terror. Some call these the largest protests in United States’ history. What did we win?

Despite the most popular demand of many of these protests being “defund the police,” cities across the United States increased police budgets. Schools named after confederate generals dropped their odes to the confederacy from their signage. City councils voted to remove confederate statues from public displays. The Democrats proposed the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act (a bill that largely supported increased funding for police while encouraging police reforms that simply do not work to derail anti-Black police terror). And, corporations pledged their commitment to diversity equity and inclusion (DEI). Some estimate that companies publicly pledged $340 billion to support racial equity. Black businesses received a bump in sales from campaigns urging consumers to support Black businesses. And perhaps, most significantly, former President Joe Biden and former Vice President Kamala Harris won the 2020 Presidential election despite their unwavering support of funding the police and policing as an institution.

Much has been written about how electoral politics often serve as counterinsurgency measures; they channel what might otherwise be radical anti-state energy back into the hands of the state for the ultimate purpose of pacifying social movements and ending resistance. Many times, electoral politics—especially the election of moderate democrats like Joe Biden and Kamala Harris—make the majority of the american public feel just comfortable enough to lessen demands for meaningful material change.

In the wake of 2020 protests, most of the other actions listed above might also be better understood as counterinsurgency tactics. What good is it to paint Black Lives Matter on the street when actual Black people in the nation’s capitol suffer under state surveillance, anti-Black police terror, deplorable conditions in DC’s jail, public schools without heat in the winter, rodent infected public housing, food desserts, and rapid gentrification that make the city unaffordable for many DC natives—conditions that might better be understood collectively as state harm and organized abandonment under racial capitalism.

Black Lives Matter Plaza ironically did not make Black lives matter anymore to the state. Black life suffered under state harm before the plaza and has continued to suffer after it, even if individual people felt good seeing the pretty yellow paint on DC’s streets. In large part, I also think that corporations (despite still terribly exploiting Black workers) proclaiming to support DEI efforts felt good. It’s a capitalist dream to feel like you can consume ethically. Buying from Black businesses just feels better, right? Despite our individual feelings, it doesn't change that in large part, what we got in exchange for historic, massive protests was materially minimal. And many of us were content with feeling better rather than actually being better.

The funny part about counterinsurgency is that when we can’t recognize it, it actually does feel good. It felt great to get Trump out of office. For many, it would have felt inspiring to see a Black woman become the head of empire had democrats not so poorly fumbled the last presidential election. It also felt really nice to pretend that corporations cared about Black people or that supporting Black businesses could somehow buy our way to liberation. These days I am thinking a lot about counterinsurgency, and I am thinking a lot about how we often become so depressed by this country that we will jump at ANYTHING that puts us out of our misery for a few minutes. Even if that same exact thing is trying to kill us.

This brings me to another point. Seeing Black Lives Matter removed from DC’s streets might actually feel bad but what does it even matter? There are a lot of things that feel really bad these days, and a lot of the time I’m asking myself: does this matter? Of course everything has meaning, but beyond symbolism, what do things matter? I’m reminding myself that a lot of things that feel bad aren’t actually worth fighting for. Sometimes, they are barely worth being enraged over. I’ll give an example of this to make what I am trying to get across more clear.

Like the Black Lives Matter mural, USAID funding cuts feel like a crisis, but we must ask whether the institution itself has truly served who it claims to. Cuts to USAID funding have left many sprawling over the past few weeks. Recently, the new administration announced that they plan to end 90 percent of USAID’s foreign contracts. Articles have surfaced about life saving programs ending in the global north. This is horrifying, and the immediate impacts of cuts to USAID funding will be felt by many. This all feels really bad. At the same time, the horror around cuts to USAID funding obscure a lot of what USAID is and how USAID functions. As Aida Chavez points out, the uncomfortable truth is that USAID “has been an essential arm of American imperialism that often serves as a tool for regime change, election interference, and the destabilization of countries around the world.” Many of the HIV/AIDS clinics that exist because of USAID funding are only needed because of the way that the United States and other western counties have intentionally underdeveloped and exploited countries in the global north. Is USAID worth fighting for? Probably not.

We’ve got a long road ahead of us. It’s confusing, full of twists and turns and it feels like there are infinite possibilities of all the ways that things could get increasingly dire. There’s no shortage of possibility for tragedy and the dread that fills many of us is overwhelming. What I am trying to do and invite you to do the same, is to not assume that because something feels really bad that it is.

I want to focus on the material realities of this political moment. We quite literally don’t have time to get caught up fighting for things and being enraged by things that are not worth fighting for. We also don’t have time to repeat the mistakes of 2020. Yes, let’s boycott Target but not because we want them to recommit to DEI. Lets boycott corporations because of how they treat workers, how they harm the planet, and because collective action against capitalist giants moves us closer to ending capitalism all together. We cannot continue to celebrate (or mourn) symbolic gestures that do nothing to change the material realities of oppressed communities in this country—that is in large part how we got where we are now. We must stop begging to be recognized by our oppressors, by empire. We must continue to dream big about what type of world we can build together and be tangible about what types of political action we are willing to take to get there.