Author Description

By the second term of President Obama, Black communities were fully protesting and resisting racist violence from police through the Movement for Black Lives (M4BL). But M4BL organizers cared about more than police violence, and continued in efforts like #SayHerName campaigns to expand the political concerns of followers. In response, elected elites and their supporters engaged in their typical movement-ending tactics - but in addition to the explicit violence of police and capitalism, now they also use invisible weapons.Invisible Weapons uncovers exploitative politics that operate in spite of the largest social movement in history, the M4BL. Agenda-setting elites push against structural change and accountability, convincing grassroots masses that oppression is inevitable and radical resistance is misguided. This is contemporary cooptation - convincing even those who actively participate in the M4BL that change is not a real possibility. This systemic hopelessness is not only the demise of U.S. democracy, but more fundamentally the destruction of grassroots radical resistance. Without this foundational center of grassroots community, all social movements are bound to falter. And without a politically empowered community, so too is the country.Following the story of political cooptation and its destructive impact on Black, Latino/a, Asian, and white communities, Invisible Weapons reveals how everyday people get coerced into neglecting their own power.