The People’s Justice Festival, July 15, 2023
On a hot summer Saturday this past week, Black Lives Matter celebrated its tenth anniversary with a sprawling celebration in the Leimert Park Village, now called AfricaTown, in Central Los Angeles.
The simulcast is from 12:00 – 6:00 PM on the Black Brilliance Stage!
On Saturday July 15, Black Lives Matter Los Angeles celebrated its 10th anniversary with the People’s Justice Festival in Leimert Park.
According to BLMLA organizers, the advocacy group was “birthed July 13, 2013 in Leimert Park to build ‘a movement, not a moment’ to end state-sanctioned violence against Black people in the wake of the acquittal of #TrayvonMartin’s murderer.”
A decade ago, following George Zimmerman’s acquittal in the homicide of Trayvon Martin, the first protest in the name of BLM took to the streets of Los Angeles
On July 13, 2013, the Black Lives Matter movement was born in response to the acquittal of George Zimmerman, who mercilessly stole the life of Trayvon Martin. For the last 10 years, we have unceasingly committed ourselves to doing the work that uplifts the names of those stolen by white-supremacy and police violence.
“We are stunned and dismayed by the court ruling…Still, the work continues.”
-Dr. Melina Abdullah, Co-Founder, Black Lives Matter Grassroots
When thinking of Andrea Ritchie a string of power words come to mind to describe an ordinary person activated by injustice. Words like unapologetic, commitment, liberation, love, transformation, determination, unwavering, tireless, purpose, abolition and relentless. Compassion, empathy, and humility ring true as well for this Black lesbian, immigrant, and survivor whose body of work defines a frame of transformative love.
In a word, Rev. Dr. Thema Bryant is a healer. She is a gifted poet, storyteller, dancer, scholar, psychologist, author, mother and ordained elder in the African Methodist Episcopal Church.
Karlene Griffiths Sekou is a Black Lives Matter organizer, intellectual, spiritualist, and mama. She has worked for more than two decades centering Black public health. When masses of Black people took to the streets in Ferguson, Missouri after the murder of #MichaelBrown she was among them and her life pivoted to more deeply commit to direct action which would usher in Black liberation, especially centering spiritual work and tools.
BLM Grassroots, Mississippi Organizers, and the family of 15-year old #JAHEIMMCMILLAN demand federal prosecution after the grand jury fails to indict the officer.
