The Ida B Wells Coalition 2015 Conference ~ May 23-24

This year’s conference will be Saturday and Sunday, May 23-24 in Kansas City. We will also have socials/events/demonstrations the evenings of May 21st and 22nd and in the daytime on May 25th.

Presenters include: Lorenzo Ervin, JoNina Abron Ervin, Zero Prophet, Daryle Lamont Jenkins, Lost Voices, Anthony Rayson, and more!

Apply to attend here:

https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1_yQm30x4CQVBbed0u6fgZBJBfGZK-FnL-Iya2FC4gUY/viewform

Donate funds here:

https://fundly.com/the-ida-b-wells-coalition-against-racism-and-police-brutalit

Conference Description:

See the fundraising page for video clips from the 2014 conference as well as coverage of other events attended by IBWC members.

The Ida B Wells Coalition Against Racism and Police Brutality conference is an advanced activist course and we expect many of the participants to host workshops or panels. After our first conference in March of 2014, we began to modify our unique and separate approaches to organizing so that we could work together efficiently and effectively. In 2015, we expect to introduce new panels and workshops designed to further increase our effectiveness. The conference will be in early spring, before it gets too hot in Memphis, and we expect expect to announce the exact date in November of 2014. There are no paid staff for the Ida B Wells Coalition. Funds will go toward travel costs and lodging for participants as well as space rental and food. All funds raised in excess of what is needed for the 2015 conference will be held over for the 2016 conference.

Coalition Description:

The Ida B. Wells Coalition Against Racism and Police Brutality (IBWC) is an anti-authoritarian group, with working class leadership shared among people of color, women, LGBT persons, and white activists. Its revolutionary work is to authentically support and enable a mass protest tendency against capitalist unemployment, war, racism, police brutality, and mass imprisonment.As a pro-liberation protest movement, IBWC’s current efforts to bridge the racial and class gap in the U.S. include calls to activism, which you may read about in more detail at the group’s website, http://idabwellscoalition.noblogs.org/In solidarity with its parent organization, the Black Autonomy Federation, the Ida B. Wells Coalition holds the needs of the most oppressed persons as their highest consideration in all things and recognizes the needs of black and other people of color as most essentially emblematic of the demands of the entire working class.IBWC efforts to unite all workers in a common struggle preclude pro-government relationships with current elected or appointed government officials, nor does it work with current or past law enforcement officers.As it develops what is needed to adopt a mass program that supports a genuinely national liberating potential, IBWC has identified structural elements of that valence:• Build a mass unemployment movement to fight poverty and joblessness in communities of color;• Defeat racial profiling and police brutality of black workers and people of color communities;• Stand in opposition against mass imprisonment of blacks, people of color workers, and the poor;• Stand in opposition to government and corporate austerity measures and against the diversion of funds from schools, hospitals, and community centers. To read more about the Ida B. Wells Coalition Against Racism and Police Brutality, to see the information that it is collecting about racism and police brutality nationally and in the Kansas City area, and to communicate with the IBWC community please visit its website at http://idabwellscoalition.noblogs.org/Ida B. Wells Coalition Against Racism and Police Brutality (IBWC) is an anti-racist liberation support group created by the Black Autonomy Federation to support its programs and its movement.Black Autonomy is a mass protest tendency against capitalist unemployment, war, racism, police brutality, and mass imprisonment.IBWC is pro-liberation protest movement, an anti-authoritarian tendency whose major purpose is to bridge the racial and class gap in U.S. capitalist society. – by uniting IBWC with Black Autonomy movement in its anti-racist/anti-colonialist platform.IBWC: Not the usual liberal or phony radical support, but genuine revolutionary working class support and solidarity. Needs of oppressed must be the most important consideration. Must be a mass organization to unite all workers in a common struggle – BUT – must be able to recognize the duty to support and adopt the special demands of black and other people of color as those of the entire working class.IBWC does not have to recruit or organize black people, but does have to make it possible for BA to do that in KC and elsewhere, while carrying out a local program around local issues.IBWC not a true national tendency, we need to adopt a mass program:- build a mass unemployment movement to fight poverty & joblessness in the black community- defeat racial profiling & police brutality of black workers & people of color communities- stand in opposition against mass imprisonment of black & people of color workers & poor & the diversion of funds from schools, hospitals, & community centers- stand in opposition to government & corporate austerity measures.IBWC is an anti-authoritarian group, with leadership shared among people of color, women, LGBT, & white activists. IBWC does not work with current elected or appointed government officials or with current or past law enforcement officers.

Who we are:

The Ida B Wells Coalition is made up of individuals, not organizations. The IBWC Steering Council is comprised of phenomenally dedicated and determined individuals who are founders and/or lead organizers of significant grass roots organizations including: Black Autonomy Federation, AGITArmy, New Abolitionists Radio, Free Alabama Movement, One People’s Project, Committee to Abolish Prison Slavery, Food Health and Environmental Justice Coalition, X-Vandals, SouthSide Chicago ABC Zine Distro, Missouri CURE, Move to Abolish 21st Century Slavery and Human Trafficking, IWW’s Incarcerated Workers Organizing Committee, and the author of the book Prison Slavery. IBWC members seek to build a mass movement between people in prison and out. We are in direct contact with thousands of prisoners and through our extended networks, we are able to reach thousands more with messages of solidarity, hope, and revolution. On the outside we are actively engaged in the current Ferguson-inspired uprising against racism and police brutality as well as ongoing struggles dating back more than 50 years.