The strong mobilizations against police violence and systemic racism raise important questions today in the social movement. Do these mobilizations participate in the struggle for a society of justice, equality, fraternity? Or are they just the expression of minorities curled up in themselves? Doesn’t the same hold true for gender issues?
Are these causes essential or do they divert part of the population from the fight, central for some, for the end of exploitation? At Mrap, the fight against racism has always been linked to social issues. Racism is a social tool that was built, among other things, to justify the slavery and colonization of peoples, to exploit them.
The great social “repressions” have always relied on racism to make accept the worst regressions, whether it is with Nazism, Pétainism or, today, Trumpism. When we work with those who fight against facies checks, we are in our specificity. But anti-racism also has a horizon, beyond its immediate objectives. This horizon is the emancipation of humanity. It is the preparation of a world where human beings will no longer develop hatred for others, from simple rejection to war. A world where everyone can move around and settle freely wherever they want. It is in all its dimensions that humanity must liberate itself, economic, ideological and mental. The convergences of the struggles seem natural and logical. But any fight involves the risk of sectoral withdrawal. This can be the case with the fight against discrimination, whether racist, sexist, homophobic or others. The question of identity can slow down these convergences and we must be attentive to the point of view of each group or collective. Convergences will only be built if each and everyone finds their place in a common project.
However, it is essential to articulate the specific character of these struggles with their inclusion in a global project. An association like the Mrap, whose purpose is certainly specific, strives never to forget the other dimensions of social suffering, issues of poverty, employment, town planning, democracy … It is involved, in its own way, in major social battles. He tries, with his means, to denounce the ideological constructions which seek to divide or to prevent the meetings and the common actions.
It is also in this perspective that he includes in his object friendship between peoples and peace. When he denounces armed conflicts, arms sales, ethnic massacres, when he defends the right of peoples to self-determination, he is working, for his part, for another future.
The Mrap therefore strongly affirms, in its field, the unity of racism in its various forms, but also the unity of all the injustices and various inequalities that plague humanity, racism, sexism, homophobia and all forms of domination and exploitation. It is in all of these areas that we will need to overcome, to build the world we want.
