OUR MOVEMENT IS REGENERATIVE
We have entered the season of the 6-year remembrance of the uprising for racial justice that was ignited by the murder of George Floyd. I’ve had a difficult time writing this reflection. It’s complicated.
To this day, the movement for Black lives remains the largest protest movement in modern U.S. history. The 2020 uprising for racial justice, which began in Minnesota and inspired a global movement, is part of our founding story here at The Collective. I am also sharing my reflections as we witness the remnants of harm left by the largest DHS immigration enforcement operation in U.S. history, Operation Metro Surge. Sometimes, it feels as though our communities have been abandoned. And so, I offer these thoughts to place this year’s remembrance in the arc of social change that was born from that remarkable year and to charge us all with the work that our remembering asks.
First and always, may George Floyd and all who have had their lives taken by state-sanctioned violence rest in peace. May their families be forever held.
Do you remember what it felt like when we collectively transformed pain into possibility in 2020? The demand for racial justice that came out of our community inspired the world to reckon with and value Black lives. I remember witnessing systems many thought would never move begin to shift. Our community rose, through organizing, systems change, love, and solidarity. It was imperfect, but it was beautiful.
The people of Minnesota were making international headlines then for bold efforts to reimagine public safety, including the proposal to establish a Department of Public Safety in the city of Minneapolis. While it did not pass, 44 percent of voters supported it because of Black-led organizing and broader community efforts, signaling a growing appetite for meaningful change.
In addition, while working to transform existing systems, community members were also creating new models. You might remember Relationships Evolving Possibilities (REP), an initiative born during the 2020 uprising that built networks of community care and crisis response rooted in the belief that communities have the ability to protect one another without relying solely on systems that have too often caused harm. Through localized support pods, transformative crisis response, community trainings, and emergency support systems, REP prototyped what community-centered safety could look like in real time. It was an inspiring example of people showing up for one another in moments of urgency with dignity, care, and collective responsibility.
In the most difficult days of the pandemic, the people of Minnesota were creating, defending, innovating, building cross-culturally, and strengthening systems of mutual aid to support communities, something we have seen show up again recently during Operation Metro Surge and Operation PARRIS.
Across this state, as thousands of federal agents descended on our communities, we saw neighbors organize grocery deliveries, rent support, rapid-response communication channels, mutual aid hubs, neighborhood protection efforts, and community defense networks as families navigated fear and uncertainty. At the height of the federal invasion, I came across a video of poet and community leader Tish Jones speaking in an MPR Town Hall, explaining that many of the systems we are relying on today “came directly out of the work and labor” that emerged after George Floyd was murdered. She pointed to the mutual aid networks, neighborhood pods, communication systems, and multicultural solidarity movements that helped communities organize, educate, and protect one another.
I was reminded that while we have experienced painful retrenchment in investments, coordinated attacks on DEI and race-conscious work, efforts to weaken voting rights protections, growing criminalization of protest and charitable activity, and an administration working to weaken our multiracial democracy, our movement was not in vain.
Our movement is regenerative.
Since 2020, the Black Collective Foundation has worked to center Black culture, collective genius, and possibility in ways that serve both our community and all communities. At that time, we called on all of us to change at the speed of courage. The courage that ignited a once-in-a-lifetime uprising for justice is still within us, and we must recenter it as we continue working toward change.
As Dr. Chera Reid and I defined for Candid, changing at the speed of courage means being in constant practice of ideas, processes, and relationships that push us beyond our comfort zones, but are necessary to imagine and create a new world. It prioritizes our individual and collective willingness to transform, rather than settling for short-term outcomes that uphold the status quo. It also means extending grace for experimentation and failure, understanding that both are part of addressing challenges of this magnitude.
As we honor the 6-year remembrance, may we also remember: we still have each other. Yes, we are living through difficult times, but we must continue participating in shaping our future. Audre Lorde wrote this in her own reflections on the social change movements of the 1960s: “Each of us must find our work and do it, actively working for change, sometimes in the absence of any certainty that change is coming.”
Our movement is still here. And so are we.
The Black Collective Foundation is a legacy of 2020. Support The Collective's critical work across narrative change, grantmaking, leadership development, capacity building, and more:
With deep love for our community,
Lulete Mola
President & Co-Founder
Black Collective Foundation MN
P.S. This weekend, I joined Insight News and its CEO and Editor, Al McFarlane, for a livestreamed conversation from George Floyd Square alongside community and business leaders as we reflected on the remembrance and the work ahead - view it here.
