"“Por mi raza hablará el espíritu” ~José Vasconcelos

With the approaching day of genocide and celebration of stolen land from Natives, I take you with me to Thankstaking day 2013.

 The climate in Arizona following passage of laws like SB1070 a direct attack on the undocumented community (as if there was a need for more stigma) the ban on ethnic studies with SB2281.....was definitely not good.

With such actions, a civil unrest began. It made the communities in Arizona live in fear, and made many people come together to fight back. However, its effects caused more than separations of families, dehumanization of peoples.....it brought great distress and trauma.

A drive to the grocery store became a sacrifice for a mother running out for milk, feared to be stopped by the police department, because the outcome would be that border patrol would be called....and the children awaiting their milk from their mother would stay waiting...while their mother was taken and criminalized by an unjust system.

The month of October of 2013 appropriately has been called the "Tucson Uprising." After months of stops between the Tucson Police Department and community......On October 8th, 2013, the police department stopped one of the workers from the Southside Worker Center. Fortunately or unfortunately the stop took place at the intersection near the church, on the night that a humanitarian group met. Down the road about a few blocks we were preparing for our action for the 11th.

We all received the text alert, finished up our preparations and got there. Arriving to the scene......I saw lots of flashing lights. I immediately thought something terrible had gone on.

There were so many cops there and many border patrol agents. I could hear screaming, and chants.....screaming from comrades, and demands from cops.......I realized that this is what a war zone must look like......there was a lot going on......but we simply stood in line with each other......and then waited for them to attack us.

By this time the border patrol had taken the people they stopped and put them inside one of their vehicles......the activists inside the church created a barrier between the vehicle and the agents. Elderly people were thrown and pushed in their haste to move their vehicle and take our friends.

At the front of our unified group.....shots rang out as the police department began firing rubber bullets, and then they began to mace our groups.......

I ran around.....having arrived late.....I found a professor and mentor on the floor.....several comrades in agony from having been directly sprayed and shot. One of our comrades had been knocked down and was disoriented.

The Border patrol took this moment to leave.....we had just experienced the dire consequences of the fucked up effects of SB1070. we cried together that night.....as we held each other......and wondered why.....

We knew this was our war....and we were done, we were angry.....we were ready to shut it down.

I got home, and grabbed my son....I held him while I cried......I cried for all those peoples who couldn't hold their loved ones that night, for those who never made it here, whose families never heard from again.........