We Shall Not Be Erased

Hello friends,

For some reason the song We Shall Not Be Moved has been reverberating in my brain. This often recorded Civil Rights protest song started life as a spiritual sung by enslaved and formerly enslaved people. It speaks of defiance, resistance and solidarity.

So it probably makes sense that it's coming to mind as we see rollback on DEI commitments, mealy-mouthed language, performative chickens coming home to roost, and literal attempts to erase Black people's history, culture and lived experience.

Removal and Erasure

This was always on the cards with 47 in the White House enacting Project 2025 with startling rapidity. Whole swathes of important information are being disappeared:

• Health disparities information

• Accessibility language and versions of websites

• Non-English language versions of websites

• Books of all kinds - though the bans started long before the current incumbent was in the White House

• Data on pretty much everyone but white cis men

• Language that's being banned in certain official forums

• Anything that doesn't reflect the supposed gender binary

There are people literally wanting to turn the clock back to when marriage was only accepted between a man and a woman and when men spoke on women's behalf - I kid you not.