June 19
Today is Juneteenth. June is Pride Month.
I didn’t take the opportunity to address both at once lightly, and as Captain of the United States Pirate Party, I wish to leave you with my words.
I waited until today because Juneteenth reminds us of an important lesson in freedom, echoed by Hannie Lou Hamer nearly a hundred years removed from June 19th, 1865: nobody’s free until everybody’s free.
You can say the Fourth of July is the day that best represents freedom. It is, after all, the day of the USA’s declared independence from Great Britain.
But who was free on July 4th, 1776?
If all were free on July 4th, 1776, then would the emancipation of millions of Americans from chattel slavery have been necessary?
Frederick Douglass gave his famous “What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July?” speech on July 5, 1852. In it, he called the Fourth of July “Yours, not mine.”
It stirred a fuss then, and the statement stirs a fuss now, but how could you proclaim freedom for the people of the United States of America when that freedom is limited and selective? Douglass called it for what it was.
Not his.
The Fourth of July may not have seen freedom for all, but freedom would finally be delivered in a major way on June 19, 1865. Liberation Day, the last of those enslaved were told about their freedom.
Freedom their enslavers knew was granted, and a freedom they would continue to withhold; long after the Emancipation Proclamation, and even after the surrender of the so-called “Confederate States.”
Freedom wasn’t simply granted to all, but for the formerly enslaved, it had finally been delivered in full.
But does that mean we are truly free?
Chattel slavery is the darkest of dark stains on a Republic supposedly founded on the equality of man. To claim all men are created equal, whilst on stolen land and with men in bondage, is a foul reality we must reckon with as citizens of the United States.
But one cannot deny, whether the intent of those in charge or not, that we as a society at large are freer than we were 200 years ago.
Of course, we are not entirely free. We face an ever-growing surveillance state, robbing us of our right to privacy. We have sections of this country where people of color, and Black people especially, still cannot be out after the sun goes down.
And we live in a society where, for some, living your truest reality and self can mean a death sentence.
It’s Pride Month. That’s not just something that means rainbows and celebrations of love and acceptance. It means that the fight for that love and acceptance is never ending, and that those who have worked towards freedom of equality and expression of self have an opportunity to recognize how far they’ve come.
Pride means living freely and openly and being proud of the person that you are. What consenting adults do with their time and in their personal lives are only the business of those adults.
Pride means celebrating that.
Pride exists because there’s still work to be done. Nobody’s free until everybody’s free, and on the day which we recognize freedom’s true deliverance, we recognize we are not free until free means free.
I write this post with every member of the LGBTQ community in mind. Everyone in the community within the Pirate Party. Anyone in my family in the community. Those who are apart of the community, even if not openly.
I recognize what you have done for each other by the word you use to describe yourselves: community. To stick by one another through everything that has been through in your directions. You all truly deserve this month, because freedom has yet to be delivered in full.
I reiterate: as long as someone living their most honest self, living freely and openly, means a death sentence anywhere in world, then we are not free, and pride is wholly necessary.
I also write this with our trans brothers and sisters in mind. Especially trans people of color. The compiling difficulties and uneasiness of the current administration and society at large, I reach out with a promise:
The United States Pirate Party has been a safe harbor to all, except the enemies of liberty. You can find your safety here.
Where I find my personal failure is not being able to provide proper mutual aid links in this article. I feel as though I am ill-equipped to do so without the proper input from those within the community.
In the comments below, in our Discord server, in the replies to this post (be it Facebook, Twitter or Bluesky): I ask that you share whatever resources you can provide to that assist the LGBTQ community.
If you came here hoping for that mutual aid list to be readymade, I am truly sorry to have disappointed.
However, my hope is that we can compile a list for future use. One so comprehensive that every single need and area of concern can be addressed.
That doesn’t happen without a place to start.
Thus, I am starting here.
Today is Juneteenth. June is Pride Month. It is today especially that I remember what freedom actually means. It is that freedom that is robbed from our neighbors, those that bleed like you do, which is why Pride is so necessary.
Because the fight for freedom isn’t over. Because nobody’s free until everybody’s free.
uspirates.org/pride-and-freedo…
Marcel Geveler
in reply to netzpolitik.org • • •Claus Berthold
in reply to netzpolitik.org • • •