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ROAR is a 2-day conference focused on revolutionary anti-racism, solidarity, and strategy, rooted in the legacy of anti-colonial, anti-fascist, anti-imperialist, feminist, and queer movements – and fighters who have come before us. The conference event will be held on both sides of the Bay Area. Day one will be at the Omni Commons in Oakland. Day two will be held in San Francisco at the California Institute for Integral Studies.

ROAR will be a space to gather, build, and learn from each other’s struggles and continue to build an anti-racist front in the Bay Area and beyond. Both events are wheelchair accessible as are the bathrooms.

Schedule

Saturday, March 11th, OMNI Commons, 4799 Shattuck Ave, Oakland, CA

10:00am-11:30pm

Bay Area Indigenous Resistance – Corrina Gould

Indian People Organizing for Change, IPOC, has been leading the work in sacred sites protection and preservation in the Bay Area for over 20 years. The question is why this work is important?  What policies have historically been in place to create an environment where a tribe has to invoke community support from the general public and allies to stop the desecration of these places? What is our role as Indigenous People in this land and what is the responsibility of those that have settled on our traditional territories to help in preserving and protecting these places?

We will look at the history of the colonization that happened here in the Bay Area, US Policies and the Movements to stop the continued genocide of the Ohlone/Lisan people, including the current fight to protect the site in Berkeley.

12-1:30pm

Burning Down the American Plantation: Anarchist Abolitionist Organizing in NYC– The Base

The ascendency of Donald Trump to the presidency has polarized society and exposed the fragility of the political institutions in the US. With very little effort Trump and his administration have managed to erode the thin veneer of legitimacy that liberal democracy still retained. The foundation of the political conflict today does not begin with Trump, but is situated in the context of the US Civil War – a war that was never actually resolved. Slavery has never ended in the United States. Instead it was reinstituted after the war, expanded through mass incarceration, and normalized through the deputization of civil society against black people. The expansion and acceptance of terror in American society has now turned against many other segments of the population culminating in the conflict we have today.

Anarchists from The Base, a political center in Brooklyn, will look at how we can orient our struggle towards the abolitionist movement, and the black freedom struggle. Following the lineage of the black struggle, from Nat Turner to the Black Liberation Army, we can learn from the most revolutionary traditions of our society. We will talk about our projects and how we are trying to build 21st century underground railroad coupled with a militant strategy. Could the formation of these new political projects catapult us out of the cycle of protests and help us create revolutionary organization? For insights we’ll analyze the Rojava Revolution, the most advanced anti-state struggle in the world, as we chart out an insurgent direction for anarchist organizing today.

2-3:30pm

Black Women and Black Power :Dismantling Misogyny Patriarchy and Paternalism in Black Liberation Movements – Black Women’s Defense League

An interactive workshop experience that calls in to question the history and reality of a black power movement that often silences and dismisses the struggles of women , queer and other marginalized people of color. We will discuss how it has happened historically/ currently and what we must do now in organizing an intersectional, progressive and truly revolutionary path to total black liberation.

Website: www.bwdl.info

4-5:30pm

Combating State Repression to Strengthen Radical Organizing – Panel

Members of the Bay Area Anti-Repression Committee, Bay Area Committee to Resist Political Repression, and Tilted Scales Collective will discuss state repression of movements challenging white supremacy and the rising tide of openly neo-fascist white nationalist groups. We will discuss the repression strategies being deployed against anti-fascist and anti-racist protesters, including grand jury subpoenas, criminal charges (particularly felonies), and jail/prison sentences.

ICE Defense

Presentation of general information on knowing your rights when dealing with immigration police and other law enforcement, and how to plug into immigrant rights organizing and advocacy.

*This is not am opportunity to get specific legal advice. That must be done in a confidential setting with an immigration attorney. 

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Sunday March 12th, California Institute for Integral Studies, 1453 Mission St, San Francisco

10am-11:30am

TRACK A

Police Brutality, Activism, Poverty, Ableism & Answers Beyond The State – Panel (Annie Paradise, Lisa “Tiny” Gray Garcia & Leroy F. Moore Jr.)

Three panelists, Leroy F. Moore Jr., Lisa “Tiny” Gray Garcia and Annie Paradise will describe their work that goes beyond the state’s response to police brutality & policing in our communities: Cultural work, Poor Magazine’s Never Call the Police, People’s Investigations and more. Looking at what the state has forced us to swallow for years and decades i.e. focusing on what police need, training thus overlooking what the community needs. Each panelist will discuss their work with families, community and art arenas, switching the focus from state to community answers. We are hoping for open discussion with attendees, knowing that community has to look out for community.

TRACK B

Bannon, the Alt-Right, Violence and Possibilities for Resistance

In the wake of Trump coming to power, we’ve seen the growth of “a new political order,” as Steve Bannon described it at CPAC. Bannon the former head of Breitbart, a Vice President at Goldman Sachs, and influenced by Evola and a host of other far-Right, fascist, anti-immigrant, and neoreactionary thinkers, is pushing to link the Trump administration with fascist groups in Europe, mine the Alt-Right for talking points and thinkers, and execute an authoritarian “populist” program that seeks to strengthen white supremacy, ‘law and order,’ attack regulation, environmental protections, deconstruction of the welfare state, and cement the position of the United States as a global hegemonic power before the close of the millennial generation. At the same time, hate crimes and attacks on Mosques rise, the Democrats have remained in the center, and much of the media, while attacking Trump, has also sought to demonize autonomous anti-capitalist and anti-fascist resistance from below. Further still, the far-Right has attempt to paint social movements as being the work of “paid protesters,” which dog whistles to conspiracy peddlers such as Alex Jones.

What are the possibilities and realities of struggle in this terrain? What should people know and understand about Steve Bannon, Trump, and the Alt-Right? What does the growth of a nationalist far-Right in the US tell us about the failure of reformist and electoral Left politics in the US? How can we push back against liberal delusions of social struggle and connect with actual working-class and poor people in a real way? Join us for a presentation followed by open discussion.

TRACK C

African Ways of Knowing

This panel aims to shed light on student research at CIIS that centers and highlights African Indigenous and Diasporic Ways of Knowing in fields where they are traditionally underrepresented, discounted, or culturally appropriated. In a radical turn from traditional academia, emerging scholars of the African continent and diaspora will share their research and analysis on and for their own communities. Rather than have these knowledges presented about us and to us, we will be sharing our own narratives and those of our comrades. We will also touch on themes of black feminism, queer theory, restorative justice, creative resistance, artivism, and healing for the revolution. Our goals for this session are to offer a contribution towards the building of an Alternative African Epistemology that begins with lived and embodied knowledges.

12-1:30pm

TRACK A

Decolonization As a Strategy For Fighting Fascism and Capitalism – Michael Novick

This workshop by longtime anti racist organizer Michael Novick will specifically addresses 1) how racism and white supremacy are rooted in (settler) colonialism, 2) the significance of the privatization of (stolen) land in the development of class society, and 3) lessons from the history of anti-colonial resistance for current anti-fascist and anti-imperialist struggle. Included will be examples from his organizing history, around solidarity with liberation movements inside and outside the borders, political prisoner and anti-prison work, and opposing police and political repression.

TRACK B

Asian Americans Organizing for Abolition – Karyn Smoot, Andrew Szeto, Joyce Xi

What does the history of Asian American organizing look like through the lens of prison industrial complex abolition and Black liberation? How have Asian Americans understood their histories and positions in relation to systems of state violence and legacies of slavery and colonialism? Stories of resistance to prisons and policing are often marginalized within mainstream Asian American narratives, while at the same time instances of alliance with Black liberation movements are mythologized and misunderstood. This presentation will explore Asian American histories through this critical lens, while looking to past movements for valuable lessons for organizing today.

TRACK C

Fighting U.S. Fascism for 50 years: A Conversation with Elder Veterans of the Black Liberation Movement – Panel

In the days following Donald Trump’s inauguration, “fascism” became the most googled word in the US, revealing that much of the population is anxious about the subject. For members of Black communities across the United States, fascism has been an intimate reality for generations. Few recognize that the Black liberation and Civil Rights movements were in fact antifascist movements. Groups like the Black Panther Party for Self Defense, Deacons for Defense, and the Black Liberation Army are just a few of examples of antifascist organizations that confronted violently racist institutions and defended their community’s efforts to fight for dignity and health. Panelists Kiilu Nyasha, Richard Brown, other activist elders will speak on their personal experiences in the Black liberation movement during the 60s and 70s and the struggles that still continue today. Particularly they will discuss the importance of freeing our political prisoners, the way the carceral state continues its repression of Black power movements, and how this legacy of white supremacy must be considered a priority target in our antifascist organizing.
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2-3:30pm

TRACK A

Community Syndicalism and Community Self-Defense: The Twin Cities General Defense Committee Model – Panel

​Join us for a presentation and discussion with organizers from the Twin Cities General Defense Committee Local 14 of the Industrial Workers of the World. GDC Local 14 was founded in 2011, but in the aftermath of the police shooting of Jamar Clarke and the subsequent occupation of the 4th Precinct in Minneapolis in 2015, Local 14 grew from 10 people to more than 120 today.

Local 14 has used a Community Self-Defense model, a flexible framework of autonomous working-class organizing drawn from experience in labor struggle, the fight against police brutality, and antifascist action. The discussion will include an explanation of Community Self-Defense as a concept and its relationship to anti-fascism, community survival projects, and class struggle unionism.

Local 14 has been involved in many struggles, including the fight to convict the cop who shot Philando Castile in St. Paul, a victory in stopping a $40 million new youth prison, regular copwatch patrols, actions to stop fascist musicians from playing shows at local venues, community accountability actions against rapists, and other work. We will invite participants to share and reflect on their own experiences and goals, so we can trade notes, learn, and continue to develop a nationwide network of strong, interlinked campaigns.

TRACK B

Gender Oppression Under Fascism and The Feminist Fight for an Anti-Fascist Future – AF3IRM SF Bay Area

It is not enough to say fascism is patriarchal. We must understand what this means in practice, so we may recognize it & defeat it. The height of fascist political power gave rise to World War II and also reigned in an era of extreme, global, and systematic gender terror.

In this workshop, we will return to this moment to detail how these fascist regimes institutionalized gender oppression. More importantly, we will highlight various forms of anti-fascist resistance undertaken by womxn and queers transnationally. It’s crucial to learn from this history to effectively fight fascism today.

TRACK C

The John Brown Anti-Klan Committee: A roundtable on the fight against US fascism from the 70s on to the Trump era

Join this discussion of former members of the John Brown Anti Klan Committee as they discuss their experiences fighting the KKK, killer cops, and nazi skinheads in the 70s, 80s and early 90s. And how people see fighting the reemergence of a white supremacist movement now—especially in light of tacit endorsement from the White House.

4-5:30pm

TRACK A

Confronting Racism on the Left – TBA

TRACK B

Organizing with Immigrant Latino Families Hurt by Police – Adelita X

The Cases of Alex Nieto, Amilcar Perez Lopez, and Luis Gongora Pat (killed by SFPD 2014 2016) will be briefly introduced. Followed by a summary presentation of challenges faced by families, and lessons learned and best practices on organizing with immigrant Latino families drawn from these experiences.

TRACK C

Confronting Islamophobia: A Closer Look at the Political Strategies Intended to Inflict Fear – Palestinian Youth Movement

With its threat of a Muslim registry and a ban on Muslims entering the country, Donald Trump’s campaign has relied extensively on anti-Muslim sentiment and prompted urgent discussions about the nature of Islamophobia. Although Trump’s campaign seems to have normalized Islamophobia in bold and unprecedented ways, it is imperative to remain attentive to how Trump’s proposals and rise to power are in fact in keeping with decades of domestic policies, particularly as regards the question of Palestine.

We’ll discuss how has Israel’s colonial project always relied upon Islamophobia, and how has the US’s support for Israel resulted in the cultural demonization of Arabs and Muslims and discriminatory forms of surveillance and suppression well preceding 9/11? How can we move from a view of Islamophobia as an individual attitude of intolerance to a matter of state policy guided by geopolitical designs?

Join the Palestinian Youth Movement (PYM) as we explore these issues through an extended discussion as part of the ROAR conference. Also included will be a component on how to identify and combat Islamophobic attitudes in progressive spaces.

4-6pm
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TRACK D

First Aid for Demonstrations: Chemical Weapons

This 2 hour training on street related First Aid will focus on chemical weapons such as tear gas and pepper spray.  Come ready for lots of hands-on skills to keep you and your friends safe in the streets. Contact lens people- please wear glasses instead if you have them.

Contact NoCARA at [email protected] with any questions.

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