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tulsa massacre
At Least 5 Killed in Tulsa Mass Shooting
The incident is the 20th U.S. mass shooting since the May 24 massacre of 21 students and staff at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas.
Jun 01, 2022
Tulsa police confirmed Wednesday that five people were killed, including the shooter, during a mass shooting at a medical facility in the northeastern Oklahoma city.
The Tulsa World reports the shooting occurred Wednesday afternoon in a building just south of Saint Francis Hospital. Tulsa Police Capt. Richard Meulenberg described a "catastrophic scene" at the Natalie Building at 64th Street and Yale Avenue.
Deputy Tulsa Police Chief Eric Dalgleish said that the shooter--who used a rifle and a handgun during his rampage--died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound. Police also said they connected a bomb threat at a home in Muskogee to Wednesday's shooter.
\u201cACTIVE SHOOTER UPDATE: We can confirm 4 people are deceased, including the shooter, in the active shooting situation at St. Francis hospital campus. \nOfficers are still clearing the building. More info to follow.\u201d— Tulsa Police (@Tulsa Police) 1654125761
Tulsa City Councilor Connie Dodson was at St. Francis Hospital's emergency room when the shooting took place.
"They locked it down without announcing anything, but then people heard the large presence of police and responders in the area and were getting alerts on their phones," she told the World. "There were approximately 30 people in the ER at the time, but everyone was calm and watching the activity outside and live reports on the TV."
\u201cShootings unfolding simultaneously right now in America: At a hospital in Tulsa, Oklahoma; a Walmart in Pittson, Pennsylvania; and a high school in Los Angeles, California.\u201d— Shannon Watts (@Shannon Watts) 1654126149
\u201cBy the way, THIS IS TOTALLY FUCKING LEGAL in Oklahoma: "Police received a call of a man walking with a rifle near a medical office."\n\nA good guy with a gun in Tulsa until he opened fire. #okleg \n\nhttps://t.co/iveGIqAyZA\u201d— Shannon Watts (@Shannon Watts) 1654127023
According to the Gun Violence Archive, the incident is the 20th U.S. mass shooting--defined as acts in which at least four people are shot--since the May 24 massacre of 21 students and staff at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas.
It was also the second mass shooting in Oklahoma this week. One woman was killed Sunday and seven others were injured when a gunman fired more than 40 rounds during a Memorial Day festival in Taft, near Muskogee.
The Oklahoma shooting occurred on the 101st anniversary of the second and final day of the 1921 Tulsa Massacre, in which scores and possibly hundreds of Black residents of the city's prosperous Greenwood District, popularly known as "Black Wall Street," were shot, burned, beaten, and bombed to death by racist mobs of white people, at least 10 of whom were also killed.
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It's Been Two-Hundred Years, Not Twenty: Targeted Repression in the US Started Long Before 9/11
There is a terrible theme that runs throughout the story of the United States: when a group of people are seen as a threat, state power has been used to oppress them.
Sep 24, 2021
What comes after the anniversary of a tragedy? Earlier this month, many of us participated in memorials and retrospectives on the changes to American society in the two decades since the attacks of 9/11. We were among the many American Muslims who wrote about the impact of 9/11 on civil rights. As co-executive directors of Muslim Advocates, we were asked to document how the Patriot Act enabled mass surveillance and profiling of Muslims by local and national government, how a Bush-era immigrant registration program (NSEERS) effectively created a Muslim registry, and the many ways that the stereotype of Muslims as terrorists has fueled decades of anti-Muslim hate crimes and bullying. So what comes next?
Profiling, surveillance and over-prosecution of marginalized populations in this country are nothing new.
After 9/11, we were part of a group of Muslim lawyers who helped create a Muslim legal advocacy organization because we knew that things could get much worse for American Muslims. We knew and took seriously the way this country has discriminated against Black Muslims and other marginalized communities.
Simply put, profiling, surveillance and over-prosecution of marginalized populations in this country are nothing new. Trump's frenzy about an "invasion" of gangs across our southern border was not all that different from Democratic politicians' warnings about "super predators" during the passage of the 1994 crime bill. Martin Luther King, Jr. and Malcolm X were just two of many civil rights leaders under constant FBI surveillance, and the Black Panthers were targeted with the blunter, more violent end of that stick. Many in our families were alive when Japanese Americans were sent to internment camps upon zero evidence of wrongdoing. Anti-German sentiment led to bans against teaching the German language and COINTELPRO and the McCarthy hearings painted anyone with communist beliefs as an enemy of the state. Even further back in our history, the Chinese Exclusion Act explicitly banned an entire race from emigrating to this country, and Jim Crow laws did everything short of slavery to control non-whites. And of course, all of this took place on the land of the many Native peoples who were killed or forcibly removed from their homes over centuries of repeated falsehoods and betrayal by the United States government.
So, yes, it has been twenty years since 9/11. But it has also been 77 years since Korematsu, 100 years since the Tulsa massacre, 131 years since the massacre at Wounded Knee, 139 years since the passage of the Chinese Exclusion Act and 199 years since the Denmark Vesey rebellion. In other words, we need to see the bigger picture. We believe something much more transformative is possible if we demand that post-9/11 reflections are connected to the rest of American history and that we learn from all of it.
There is a terrible theme that runs throughout the story of the United States: when a group of people are seen as a threat, state power has been used to oppress them. More specifically, political interests have built and solidified their power by ramping up fear--not just stoking a fire, but creating it. American communities are thus pitted against each other, and eventually there is public support for government overreach that is outrageously outsized to the supposed threat.
Monuments and memorials should help us learn about our history and grow from it. When we were asked to opine about all the ways American Muslims suffered in the aftermath of 9/11, we knew it wasn't enough. We want to also talk about what this means for today. What does this mean for oppression in all its forms right now? And then the really difficult question: are we complicit in any of it?
Abuse of power hurts not just the abused, but also the abuser. Everyone needs to heal from these past harms, so we all must ask these questions. We could start on anniversaries. What if every commemoration of every atrocity was a step on a path toward truth and reconciliation? Maybe, then, we could see our way out of this dangerous cycle, heal the fractures in our society, and finally write a new American story.
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As Congress Approves Juneteenth Bill, Advocates Say 'We Must Not Stop Here'
"Black liberation in its totality must be prioritized," stressed Rep. Cori Bush.
Jun 17, 2021
As legislation to designate Juneteenth a federal holiday breezed through the U.S. Congress this week and was signed into law by President Joe Biden Thursday afternoon, racial justice advocates stressed the imperative for meaningful policies and actions to address systemic racism and inequality that go beyond what some called performative gestures.
"Many of the senators who voted for Juneteenth to become a federal holiday regularly vote to impede civil rights for Black Americans."
--Dr. Tarika Barrett
Several congressional lawmakers took the occasion to both welcome the new holiday and speak to the need to address what author and activist Bill Fletcher Jr. has called "America's incomplete emancipation."
Speaking on the House floor Thursday, Rep. Jamaal Bowman (D-N.Y.) expressed his "great excitement and joy" over the designation of Juneteenth--which celebrates the day in 1865 when Black people in Texas learned they were no longer slaves, two and a half years after President Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation--as a national holiday.
"But... we must not stop here. We must continue to go forward to fight for racial justice," he said, citing "housing discrimination and segregation, lack of access to healthcare, and wealth inequality."
"We must... do much more," asserted Bowman, who supports measures--including Medicare for All, a Green New Deal, raising the federal minimum wage to $15 an hour, and the For the People Act--that progressive campaigners argue will uplift tens of millions of Americans, especially people of color adversely affected by centuries of systemic injustice and inequality.
\u201cJuneteenth's recognition as a federal holiday is one step, with a long way to our destination.\n\nWhile we rejoice, we do so with an understanding that our fight for racial justice can't be complete without voting rights, housing rights, and reconciliation with our history.\u201d— Congressman Jamaal Bowman (@Congressman Jamaal Bowman) 1623939953
Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.) tweeted that "it's long past time for America to recognize Juneteenth as a federal holiday."
"But we can't just call this a win and move on," she added. "Congress needs to act on voting rights, police violence, poverty, environmental justice, and much more to tackle systemic racism in America."
Rep. Bonnie Watson Coleman (D-N.J.) tweeted, "As we take this time to acknowledge Juneteenth, I pray that we do not [lose] track of the fact that we have so much more work to do to ensure fairness, opportunity, and equality."
\u201cIt\u2019s Juneteenth AND reparations.\n\nIt\u2019s Juneteenth AND end police violence + the War on Drugs.\n\nIt\u2019s Juneteenth AND end housing + education apartheid.\n\nIt\u2019s Juneteenth AND teach the truth about white supremacy in our country.\n\nBlack liberation in its totality must be prioritized.\u201d— Cori Bush (@Cori Bush) 1623888169
Racial justice advocates went even further in their calls for equity, with Black Lives Matter tweeting, "We won't be bamboozled by political theater."
Unfit Christian founder D. Danyelle Thomas called the new holiday "yet another tokenized victory to point to in the delusion of a post-racial society."
"The Senate unanimously passing Juneteenth as a federal holiday--and the Biden [administration's] championing of the cause--while actively obstructing raising minimum wages, student debt forgiveness, and gun reform is a reminder that performative liberation/resistance won't do a damn thing," she asserted.
\u201cBoth parties making Juneteenth a national holiday but also agreeing not to cut police budgets is kinda like NFL painting \u201cEnd Racism\u201d in the end zone while banning Kaepernick & Eric Reid.\u201d— ChuckModi (@ChuckModi) 1623807461
\u201cWe didn\u2019t ask for a Juneteenth to be observed as a national holiday, we wanted an end to police violence.\u201d— zellie (@zellie) 1623808787
\u201cWe\u2019re going to have big corporatized Juneteenth celebrations where discussion of ongoing structural racism is considered political & a detraction from the focus on how the white Union army freed us.\u201d— \ud83d\ude37\ud83d\udc89\ud83e\uddfc COVID, FLU, RSV WAVES UNDERWAY (@\ud83d\ude37\ud83d\udc89\ud83e\uddfc COVID, FLU, RSV WAVES UNDERWAY) 1623805512
In a syndicated opinion piece published on Thursday, National Community Reinvestment Coalition (NCRC) chief of programs and strategic development Sabrina Terry and Dedrick Asante-Muhammad, chief of membership, policy, and equity at NCRC and an associate fellow of the Institute for Policy Studies, wrote that "Juneteenth reminds us to be critical of how progress is measured."
"In the last month alone, we had two national remembrances of racial injustice: the anniversary of the murder of George Floyd and the 100-year anniversary of the Tulsa Massacre," noted Terry and Asante-Muhammad. "Floyd's murderer, police officer Derek Chauvin, was found guilty this year. And this spring, President Biden became the first president to visit Tulsa and commemorate the massacre."
"Both events have been celebrated as turning points in popular American public opinion toward racial justice, yet there is still little evidence of meaningful systemic reforms," the authors wrote. "A year after Floyd's murder, Congress still hasn't passed the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act of 2020. And the few remaining survivors of the Tulsa massacre have yet to receive reparations from their federal, state, or local governments."
\u201cBlack people: Stop killing us. The government: How about we make Juneteenth a national holiday? Okay great. Thanks\u201d— Chris Williamson (@Chris Williamson) 1623860258
\u201cIf dismantling white supremacy & ending racism was buying a new car, then a Juneteenth holiday is those weird lights underneath the car that turn on at night when you unlock the door. I mean, I\u2019ll take it but that\u2019s not what I\u2019m here for. That\u2019s not what I need.\u201d— W. Kamau Bell (@W. Kamau Bell) 1623881639
Terry and Asante-Muhammad continued:
A year since the nation's 'racial reckoning' following the death of George Floyd, and 100 years since the massacre in Tulsa, our nation has still failed to even promise the type of repair--much less deliver the investments necessary--to bridge the centuries-old racial inequality that's maintained through economic inequality. But that doesn't mean we can't.
As we celebrate Juneteenth this year, the promise of freedom alone isn't enough to move us forward. Instead, we need to celebrate it every year with sustained action and investment to repair the inequality that even a general and his troops 150 years ago were not able to deliver.
"History... shows that without a sustained deployment of federal resources, the promise of Black freedom and opportunity were quickly dashed against the rocks of racially concentrated power and wealth, leaving African Americans vulnerable in a racially segregated society," they added. "And today, like then, there's huge division among states when it comes to racial justice."
\u201cAfter all, many of the senators who voted for #Juneteenth to become a federal holiday regularly vote to impede civil rights for Black Americans.\n\nMeanwhile, state legislatures across the U.S. are actively passing bills to prevent critical race theory from being taught in schools.\u201d— Dr. Tarika Barrett (@Dr. Tarika Barrett) 1623861286
Indeed, observers noted the irony of Juneteenth becoming a federal holiday at the same time that numerous states including Texas and Oklahoma are banning or whitewashing the teaching of the history behind events like Juneteenth and the Tulsa Massacre.
"Imagine making Juneteenth a federal holiday when laws are being enacted all over the country that will prevent people from being taught why it's a holiday," tweeted Monique Judge, news editor at The Root.
\u201cTexas is suppressing voting rights and teaching truths about racism and history while Juneteenth becomes a holiday.\n\nIt's the whiplash for me. \n\nTo be black in Texas = stuck between federal bread + circuses on one side - and the suppression of black political power on the other.\u201d— Karen Attiah ON MASTODON @karenattiah@journa.host (@Karen Attiah ON MASTODON @karenattiah@journa.host) 1623851902
\u201c@MajorPhilebrity "Why is Juneteenth a holiday?"\n"I'm not allowed to tell you"\u201d— Phillip (@Phillip) 1623797832
Screenwriter Kashana Cauley quipped, "This'll be fun to teach in the anti-critical race theory states: 'So we're all getting this day off because absolutely no one did anything wrong.'"
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