We Have the Right to Protest!
By Bekky Baker, Program Director
Protest, dissent, freedom of speech, these have all been integral to change, to making our communities and lives better. We saw it in Gandhi’s Salt March, throughout the civil rights movement, and as part of the Black Lives Matter Movement. Today, we are seeing those rights threatened as legislators in our own state put forth laws like Senate Bill 53 to restrict protests and as our executive government uses its overreach to attempt to control protests and people on university campuses.
Mahmoud Khalil, a student at Columbia University organizing for the rights and lives of Palestinian people, was arrested and is currently being detained in Louisiana. Khalil is a permanent resident who holds a green card and is being detained without a warrant despite a judge blocking his deportation and arrest. It is glaringly evident that the current administration is weaponizing immigration status as a way to curb dissent and perspectives they disagree with. We all have a right to speak our beliefs, a right to pursue a better life, a right to walk home without the fear of being abducted or taken away from our families.
Regardless of someone’s viewpoints, freedom of speech and the right to protest are fundamental rights, not serious crimes, and must be protected. Regardless of immigration status, the government cannot punish and harm them. Targeting the most vulnerable dissenters, such as immigrants, is only the beginning and will set a dangerous precedent moving forward. Khalil, a graduate student working on his masters degree with no criminal record, is accused of being a terrorist simply for organizing student protests on campus. History has shown us time and time again the ramifications of demonizing and detaining people based on their country of origin, religion, or other identity bearing status.
Right now it is imperative that we come together to demand justice and to protect our communities. We know that our voices have power because they are attempting to silence us. Ohio lawmakers are currently trying to make it more difficult for the public to engage with them through restricting access to their offices and the Statehouse. Our President threatens to expel students who participate in “illegal” protests, criminalizes dissenting views, and uses identities as weapons to create division and push people into submission.
In times of fear and hopelessness we must dig deep for our own “person power” to and use our voices to upend the injustices before us. We have the power and the obligation to speak up.
Demand the release of Mahmoud Khalil: