Help Bring Lorenzo and JoNina Ervin to California for Speaking Tour!

Announcement for crowd-funding campaign to help support west coast speaking tour for Lorenzo and JoNina Ervin. Donate and view here.

“Where there is repression, there is resistance…period.” – Lorenzo Kom’boa Ervin
“You still have to get out in the streets and do it.” – JoNina Abron-Ervin

It’s no secret our communities and the movements to defend them are under attack. Fascists relentlessly heighten political repression, using despair to overwhelm and immobilize us. Movement veterans who survived great sacrifices in their struggles against racist state oppression remind us that we have been here before—and that we can withstand it again. Now, more than ever, we must learn from them how to organize under dire circumstances.

We are raising $6,000 to transport, room, board, and support movement veterans Lorenzo Kom’boa Ervin and JoNina Abron-Ervin for a speaking tour in California:

• Saturday, October 4: Black Lantern Books (6533 West Blvd, Inglewood)
• Tuesday, October 7: West Oakland Library (1801 Adeline St, Oakland)
• Thursday, October 9: Black Panther Party Museum (1427 Broadway, Oakland)
• Saturday, October 11: Sacramento Anarchist Book Fair (1819 E St, Sacramento)

Lorenzo Kom’Boa Ervin was a member of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) and then shortly after, the Chattanooga branch of the Black Panther Party (BPP). While incarcerated for his contributions to the revolutionary struggle, Lorenzo connected Black liberation struggles to anarchist theory through writing, foremost of which is the contemporary classic Anarchism and the Black Revolution.

JoNina Abron-Ervin transferred from the BPP’s Detroit branch to the Oakland headquarters in the early 1970s, where she became the editor of the Party’s newspaper. JoNina was a key organizer in the BPP’s survival programs, participating in the free breakfast, prison visit transportation, and education programs.  Accounts of these experiences can be read in her forthcoming book from AK Press, Driven by the Movement: Reports from the Black Power Era.

Since these formative experiences, Lorenzo and JoNina have continued to explore the connections between contemporary organizing, social movements, Black Liberation, and anarchism. Bringing them to California will strengthen cross-regional and intergenerational ties to powerfully meet this critical moment.

Only our movements’ collective efforts can make this possible. Thank you for donating what you can; we look forward to forging connections with you in October!

Brought to you by Black Lantern Books (@blacklanterncoop), Black Rose / Rosa Negra Anarchist Federation – Bay Area (@blackrosebayarea) | @blackrose_rosanegra), NorCal Resist (@norcal_resist), and the Sacramento Anarchist Book Fair (@sacramentoanarchistbookfair).