A Report On The National Raza Youth Liberation Summit:
Editor’s Note: The following is a summation of the “Raza Youth Liberation Summit,” submitted by the organizers of the summit, Somos Raza.
On Saturday, November 18, 2000, Somos Raza, a youth project of Unión del Barrio, organized the “Annual National Raza Youth Liberation “ meeting. The meeting this year took place in the form of a summit, hosted by “Homey’s Foundation” (youth program whose purpose to keep youngsters out of trouble), was held at a community center located on Federal and Euclid Avenues, near “Barrio Market Street” in San Diego, Califaztlan.
In a spirited and serious fashion, with shouts of “Que Viva La Raza” and Tierra Y Libertad, over 50 young people, activists, and representatives from over a dozen progressive and revolutionary organizations, listened and dialogued over the question of youth and the liberation of the Mexicano people. United under the theme of “Si La Juventud Vive.... ¡La Lucha Sigue!, over 13 organizations endorsed or participated in this event. This large representation of groups currently active within the liberation struggle and the quality of the presentations, made the summit one of the most important Mexicano movimiento gatherings of the year 2000.
Some of the groups who participated or endorsed the day-long summit included: Barrio Defense Committee (San Jose, Califas), Committee On Raza Rights (Oxnard), Chicano Park Steering Committee (San Diego), Brown Berets de Aztlán (Califas-wide), Sherman Unidos (youth group, San Diego), Homey’s Foundation (San Diego), Save Our Centro Coalition (San Diego), Mexicanos Unidos En Defensa del Pueblo (North County San Diego and San Bernardino), Raza Rights Coalition (San Diego), Voz Fronteriza (student newspaper collective UCSD), Chicano Moratorium (Oxnard and San Diego Regions), Todos Somos Raza (Denver), Enrique Cisneros (Tijuana), National La Raza Unida Party (Califas and Nuevo Mexico), Unión del Barrio (Califas-wide), Association of Raza Educators (San Diego), and Danza Popokatepetl (San Diego).
ELEVATING OUR UNDERSTANDING OF THE STRUGGLE: PURPOSE AND GOALS OF THE SUMMIT
A major objective of the summit was to address the current situation in which our movement exist and the type of oppression faced by a large majority of our gente, as it relates to Raza youth. As most of us agree, it is important to understand the nature of our oppression, because only by truly understanding those who oppress us and the various methods that are used to oppress us, can we develop strategies and tactics that will liberate us.
The panel discussions included:
Education and Culture and its relationship to Liberation
Prisons, The Judicial system, Police/Migra brutality: Weapons of Colonialism
Building Raza Unity
THE SIGNIFICANCE AND OUTCOME OF THE SUMMIT
To the organizers this year’s junta was important to our movement for numerous reasons:
First, it represented a voice within our people and our movement that the gringo colonial system had attempted to silence. We're talking about a voice that calls for the complete and total liberation of the Mexicano people, our lands, and our resources. It is also a voice that today’s youth rarely gets to hear.
Second, the consistent yearly organizing of the National Raza Youth Liberation Juntas provides our movement with a “continuity” and legacy of struggle which will serve present and future activists from having to “reinvent the wheel”, enabling us to learn from our experiences (errors as well as victories) and thus moving our liberation forward at a much faster pace.
Third, by bringing together a broad spectrum of activists from the liberation struggle, the Summit was able to contribute to the unity of our movement and thus to the growth of the liberation struggle.
Fourth, the information and dialogue that took place at the Summit brought clarity to the real issues facing Raza youth and concretely challenged the “mumbo jumbo” lies and half-truths being spoon fed by the Hispanic types, to our people in an effort to keep them from getting involved in the struggle for Mexicano national liberation.
Fifth, the Summit literature and presentations identifies capitalism, colonialism, imperialism as the root cause of poverty misery and oppression of the great majority of the people on this planet
And finally, the organizing of the Summit reveals to those active in the movement the historical leadership that Unión del Barrio has played in the struggle for the liberation of nuestra Raza.
Based on the presentations and dialogued that took place, we have identified six key outcomes or conclusions that materialized from the summit:
(1) There was a general consensus by those in attendance to continue to the unity of forces present and a commitment to continue the liberation struggle to overcome the colonial oppression in which our nation exists.
WHAT MUST THE REVOLUTIONARY NATIONALIST MOVEMENT DO?
Our understanding of the current situation in which our movement finds itself, including the lessons drawn from the National Raza Youth Liberation Summit, first of all, informs us that we should continue to the unity process which has been taking place for years among organizations such as Unión del Barrio, Brown Berets de Aztlán, National Chicano Moratorium Committee, La Raza Unida Party, and numerous other formations. Second, we (all movement groups) must take to heart the conclusions that came out of the summit, and, to the best of their abilities, resources, and conditions in areas in which they are active, begin to implement them immediately. And third, we begin to respond, in a revolutionary and scientific fashion, to the influence that Hispanic/Latino left-wing of the Democratic Party has over a significant sector of the student movement.
¡Si La Juventud Vive... La Lucha Sigue!
In this panel we discussed critical pedagogy, Chicano Studies, and culture as a form of resistance and survival, alternative schooling, and a student perspective of the current educational process, etc.
In this panel we summed-up and exposed the role that the police/migra, courts, and prisons play in our colonial oppression and in defending the interests of the rich capitalist ruling class. We also discussed how ex-pintos can help in educating youth to the realities of prison life as way of keeping youth out of trouble and into political struggle.
This panel discussed the importance of unity among our youth, strategies and tactics for ending barrio/clique violence, organizing in the barrio, role of Mexicano/Raza campus/school organizations (MEChA, Brown Berets, etc.) on campus and in the community, and creating unity among Raza from north and south of the militarily imposed border.
(2) There was a general agreement that our struggle is centered in the community, barrios, prisons, and the work place, all areas in which our youth are found, and that it is here where we must concentrate our efforts and resources.
(3) Everyone agreed that education must be critical and liberation oriented; that culture must be a form of education which serves as a form of resistance against colonialism; and that we struggle for an education at public schools that teach youth to be critical.
(4) The importance of activists in the movimiento to recognize that the police, migra, judicial system, and prisons are central components of capitalism-colonialism’s subjugation of nuestra Raza.
(5) That movement activists at all times be in the “trenches” with the masses of our pueblo, working on issues that are important and real to them and which are guided by progressive and revolutionary principles.
(6) Everyone recognized the importance of youth in the liberation struggle, and the importance of making youth issues a central component of our movement; allowing our movement to recruit Raza youth into organizations committed to the liberation of all Mexicanos.