Jan 2, 2025
Welcome to episode three of “Over the Wall: The
Abolitionist Hour with Critical Resistance.” For listeners new to
Beyond Prisons or our collaboration with Critical Resistance, this
is a new, regular series that premiered in September of 2023.
Hosted by members of Critical Resistance’s The Abolitionist
Editorial Collective, “Over the Wall” discusses articles and key
interventions made by Critical Resistance’s cross-wall, bilingual
newspaper, The Abolitionist.
This special episode focuses on both issues of the newspaper that
Critical Resistance (CR) published in 2024: Issue 41 on ecological
justice that printed in June and Issue 42 on anti-war organizing
that printed in December. Episode 3 is titled, "For a Livable
Future: Building Movements to Stop War and Save the Planet," and
Dylan and Molly are back, analyzing the shifting political terrain
ahead and what this means for organizing against the prison
industrial complex (PIC), against war, warmaking, and militarism,
for ecological justice and collective liberation.
Together, they discuss key articles within both Issues 41 and 42,
which foreground organized resistance to climate change, ecological
collapse and crisis, war, genocide and imperialism, alongside
policing and imprisonment. This episode includes a few contributing
authors of both issues, including Rehana Lerandeau, Eva Dickerson,
Judah Schept, Masai Ehehosi (who Issue 42 is dedicated to), Misty
Pegram, and Tia Marie.
Issue 41 is available for free download on CR’s website, along with
some early release articles from Issue 42 while the latest issue is
still in print circulation. Check out the newspaper, Issue 41 in
full and the Issue 42 sneak peeks, as well as all past issues at:
criticalresistance.org/abolitionist.
The time is always right to support radical political education!
Subscribe today to receive your own copy of each issue and support
circulation of the paper to imprisoned people. Every single paid
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Announcements:
Support one of CR’s closest movement partner organizations–The
Freedom Archives by giving a donation this year-end or new-year
season. The Freedom Archives is an essential movement history
resource based in the Bay Area that is celebrating 25 years since
its founding. The Freedom Archives contains over 12,000 hours of
audio and video recordings as well as print materials dating
primarily from the late-1960s to the mid-90s. These collections
chronicle the progressive history of the Bay Area, the United
States, and international movements for liberation and social
justice more broadly. The Freedom Archives have been an ongoing
resource for CR’s editorial collective, helping us with research
and archiving each of our issues of The Abolitionist. Check out the
archives online and donate today: freedomarchives.org.
Host Bios:
Dylan Brown is a 24-year-old Black organizer and educator based
in New York City, and has been a member of Critical Resistance
since 2020. As a member of the New York City chapter of Critical
Resistance, Dylan is organizing within the Abolish ICE New York/New
Jersey Coalition on their current NY Dignity Not Detention
campaign, which seeks to build power to end immigrant
detention throughout NY State. For the past three years, Dylan has
been an editor for The Abolitionist Newspaper.
Molly Porzig is a Bay Area based organizer and educator in
California with nearly 20 years of organizing experience with
Critical Resistance (CR). Molly is currently CR’s National Media &
Communications Manager, as well as the organization’s project
manager of The Abolitionist.
Contributor Bios / Guest Interviews:
Eva Dickerson: Starseed eva (they/themme/baby girl) believes in a
freer, greener future and is on a journey alongside their
world-expanding friends to get there. The apple of their eye is the
city of Atlanta, where they live, work, play, and experiment with
the people in the city about how we might practice a more
compassionate way of being together. Much of their organizing in
the city is concentrated within the Ashview Heights, Vine City,
West End, Bush Mountain, and now Gresham Park neighborhoods where
their abolitionist ideology comes to life by way of childcare
collectives, neighborhood farmers markets, community gardens,
popular education campaigns, and earth-based projects.
Rehana Lerandeau: Rehana is the National Membership Organizer for
Critical Resistance (CR). Based in Atlanta, Georgia, Rehana’s roots
flow from her hometown of Oakland. A previous member of CR’s
Oakland chapter, Rehana supports CR members develop abolitionist
projects and campaigns across our chapter regions of Oakland, Los
Angeles, Portland, New York, and (newly) Kentucky. In Atlanta,
Rehana is supporting the campaign to stop Cop City and the campaign
to end the Georgia International Law Enforcement Exchange
(GILEE).
Judah Schept is a Professor in the School of Justice Studies at
Eastern Kentucky University. He is the author of Coal, Cages,
Crisis: The Rise of the Prison Economy in Central Appalachia (New
York University Press, 2022) and Progressive Punishment: Job Loss,
Jail Growth, and the Neoliberal Logic of Carceral Expansion (NYU
Press, 2015). He is co-editor of The Jail is Everywhere: Fighting
the New Geography of Mass Incarceration (Verso Books, 2024). Judah
has been active for more than two decades with organizations and
campaigns fighting for decarceration and abolition.
Masai Ehehosi was a co-founder of Critical Resistance and the
organization’s longest standing member who passed away April 1,
2024. A Muslim, and Co-Minister of Information for the Provisional
Government of the Republic of New Afrika, Masai had over over 50
years of experience organizing for Black liberation in the New
Afrikan independence movement. Learn more about Masai’s extensive
movement contributions in Issue 42 in the Feature Reflection piece,
or on CR’s website:
criticalresistance.org/updates/long-live-masai-ehehosi
Misty Pegram: A Filipina organizer with the Education Committee of
the International Cancel RIMPAC Campaign and a member of Anakbayan
Hawai‘i, Misty is currently living in the illegally occupied
kingdom of Hawai‘i, on the island of O’ahu in Waikiki.
Tia Marie: Tia is a Hawaiian youth organizer with Hawai‘i Peace
& Justice also based on O’ahu, born and raised in the Punahou
neighborhood north of Honolulu, near Manoa Falls.
Music Credits:
Show theme song: “Taste of Freedom” by Steven Beddall
Transition sound effects: “I Wish - drum loop” by Artlist Original
and “Organic Drum Loops - Chill Calipso Groove” by
AMUSIA
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