Our second and final piece for the Funambulist’s Correspondents series dropped at the end of August. The essay, “Forcing Black People to Interact with Police Is Itself State Violence,” examines the city of Chicago’s recent announcement that the westside cop academy—whose construction begins this fall—will include a Boys & Girls Club. Our piece locates this project in a long lineage of copaganda efforts that coerce Black and brown youth into interactions with police, falsely naming “mistrust” as the root cause of state violence. We also did some brief consulting last month for our loves at Alternatives to Calling Police, supporting them in updating their trainings on disability justice and community responses to mental health crises.

We begin our fall quietly. This month we’ll lead an Intro to Prison Abolition workshop for Dissenters’ Disorientation 2021, the group’s annual anti-militarist youth convergence on September 3rd. We’ll teach a Linking Anti-Blackness and Anti-Immigration workshop to staff at Little Village Environmental Justice Organization mid-month. And we’re building a new relationship with Al-Shabaka: The Palestinian Policy Network, facilitating a virtual session for the international org’s staff retreat on September 20th. We believe in solidarity and the struggle for a free Palestine, and are honored to support their efforts!

Despite much pandemic delay, we’re thrilled to share that after 3 years since our last staging (not even we can believe it’s been that long!), we’ll be showing our in-progress piece World After This One on October 12th at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago. Check back here next month for more info on COVID restrictions and protocols for the performance, as well as virtual options for participation.

BH