Quotessence
Home / Quotes / Quote by Michelle Alexander

Quote by Michelle Alexander

“One of those lies is that all we need to do is elect more Democrats. No. That actually isn't going to get us to the Promised Land.”

Quote by Michelle Alexander

Author

Michelle Alexander
Michelle Alexander

Michelle Alexander is a distinguished professor of law at the University of California, Berkeley. Born on October 7, 1967, she is recognized for her expertise in criminal justice and civil rights. Alexander has authored numerous articles and books on the subject of mass incarceration in the United States and its effects on African American communities. more

You May Also Like

“My own view - and I'm very open to hearing other perspectives - is that this movement-building needs to begin at home, in local communities. It isn't about trying to launch a brand new national party overnight. It's about people in communities coming together across lines of difference, bringing with them their movements, their families, and coming together and saying, "How can we together build a movement of movements here at home? What would that look like? What do we want to do right here in our communities?"”

“I think that we need to begin talking about what does it mean to create these safe spaces in our communities, to begin welcoming one another into our homes and into our communities when they're returning home from prison, people who are on the streets. We need to begin doing the work in our own communities of creating the kind of democracy that we would like to see on a larger scale.”

“I hope that we will also take seriously the necessity of building alternative parties, and do that work in our communities of organizing movements of movements, creating safe spaces and sanctuary, coming into dialogue, figuring out what a common platform might be for all of us, and building on the work that is happening elsewhere around the community. Even as we resist Donald Trump, doing so with an eye toward building a truly transformational, even revolutionary movement that can become a meaningful alternative to the Democratic and Republican parties.”

“We live in this culture of endless extraction and disposal: extraction from the earth, extraction from people's bodies, from communities, as if there's no limit, as if there's no consequence to how we're taking and disposing, and as if it can go on endlessly. We are reaching the breaking point on multiple levels. Communities are breaking, the planet is breaking, people's bodies are breaking. We are taking too much.”

“Thing that we wanted to do was redefine what a green job was, what a climate job was. We said: "Wait a minute. There's all these people out there who are doing low-carbon work." It's not just guys in hard hats putting up solar panels. Teaching is low carbon. Caring for the sick is low carbon. Daycare is a green workplace. Overwhelmingly, this is work that is done by women, overwhelmingly women of color, on the frontlines of austerity clawbacks.”

“330,000 members of the Fraternal Order of Police see Trump's commitment to law and order. But they also - they also hear the bad mouthing, the bad mouthing that comes from people that seize upon tragedy in the wake of police action shootings as - as a reason to - to use a broad brush to accuse law enforcement of - of implicit bias or institutional racism. And that really has got to stop.”

“I just think what we ought to do is we ought to stop seizing one moments of tragedy. We ought to assure the public that we'll have a full and complete and transparent investigation whenever there's a loss of life because of police action. But, you know, enough of this seeking every opportunity to demean law enforcement broadly by making the accusation of implicit bias every time tragedy occurs.”