The Collective by Von Balanon

Race & Culture Magazine

‘We belong in these

SPACES

Sashsa Garcia reflects on navigating a PWI Vol I Issue IV

Editorial

being good to people and being good to the planet go hand in hand

aya

paper co.

Von Garcia Balanon Gregorio Valdivia Omar Rashad Sheemla Sanjida Cassandra Garibay

Editor in Chief Assistant Editor Copy Editor Marketing Director Special Projects

Design Elaine Do Brynna Barton Christina Ventura Katherine Olah Durga Badrinarayanan Teresa Bui

Creative Director Advertising Director Photo Director Art Director Graphic Designer Graphic Designer

Production Donna Templeton Ruoxi Ma Lorraine Donegan Katie Sauer Jayson Salvador Qashat Rosales

Production Director Print Manager Prepress Technician Bindery Manager Distribution Manager Digital Director

The Collective is intended for educational purposes only and abides to all laws and regulations as much as it can. Photography taken from Unsplash and Google Image Search. Please don’t sue me.

CONTENTS

THE DISSECTION

EVERYTHING, EVERYWHERE, ALL AT ONCE

STAFF PICKS

SASHA GARCIA

PODCASTS OF THE MONTH

REFLECTS ON NAVIGATING A PWI

SPOTLIGHT

DERECKA PURNELL

SPEAKING TO THE ABOLITION CURIOUS

64 THE LAUGH

AN INSIDE LOOK OF ZIWE SEASON 2

STAFF PICKS

PODCASTS

OF THE MONTH

ACCORDING TO NEED: TULICIA

THE FIRE STILL BURNING

Many people who are not able to afford a place to live end up sleeping on a friend’s floor or inside their car. This is what Tulicia did for years, until finally, she reached out to the system for help.

Throughline covers the most urgent lessons we can learn from James Baldwin, whose life and writing illuminate so much about what it would really mean for the United States to reckon with its race problem.

99% INVISIBLE

CODE SWITCH

THE YOKUTS: 60 TRIBES

THE BIRTH OF U.S. MUSIC

This explores one of the largest tribes in the history of California. The Yokuts lived all the way up near Stockton and all the way down near Tehachapi. They consisted of up to 60 tribes speaking several languages.

Black music, forged in captivity, became the sound of complete artistic freedom. It also became the sound of America. In this 1619 Project episode: Wesley Morris a-critic-at-large for the New York Times.

HISTORY OF CA

THE 1619 PROJECT

THE DISSECTION

PARENTAL APOLOGIES, QUEERNESS, & SUPERPOWERS IN

EVERYTHING, EVERYWHERE,

ALL AT ONCE BY EMILY ST. JAMES

hat I love about Everything, Everywhere, All at Once is how it understands the power and the ultimate emptiness of the fantasy of the apology that fixes everything. It situates the bad behavior of Evelyn on a continuum going all the way from “struggling to accept her daughter as gay” into “destroying her own daughter’s mind in the name of science.” One of these two things is worse than the other, but the emotional effect on the child is incredibly devastating either way. The final scene of Everything Everywhere All at Once involves an Evelyn and a Joy who have seen all the multiverse has to offer and chosen to be versions of themselves with very prosaic concerns, because those versions of themselves might be able to move past the worst of what they have done to each other. Yet as Evelyn attempts to go about her life, the

Evelyn can’t shut out the chaos of the multiverse because of her other actions.

chaos and noise of the multiverse crowds into her mental space. She’s seen the worst she is capable of, and she cannot entirely shut it out. There is at least one version of herself who was incredibly abusive to her daughter. Everything, Everywhere, All at Once is told from the point of view of the parent not the child—a different approach to the wave of apologetic Millennial directed movies. And that turns out to be the key decision that gives the film an added boost. As the movie ends, she’s accepted Joy’s girlfriend, but she remains overly critical of both younger women. Evelyn can’t shut out the chaos of the multiverse because of her other actions. The fantasy of an apology that will forgive all sins is something the child wants, sure, but it’s something their parent wants even more. Such a thing is impossible to find, no matter how many universes you look for it in.  The Collective· 5

SPOTLIGHT

Derecka Purnell

Is Speaking to the ‘Abolition Curious’ BY QASHAT ROSALES

or more than a century, many activists in the United States have attempted to reform the police. There’s only so much longer we as a society will tolerate police killing three people per day. Millions of people continue to protest police violence because these “solutions” do not match the problem: the police cannot be reformed. In her book Becoming Abolitionists, Purnell reflects from her experiences as a lawyer, writer, and organizer initially skeptical about police abolition. She saw a lot of sexual violence and buried too many friends to consider getting rid of police in her hometown of St. Louis—let alone the nation. The police were a placebo. Calling them felt like

a burden—something feels like everything when the other options felt and seemed like

There’s only so much longer we as a society will tolerate police killing three people per day. sadly nothing. Purnell details how multi-racial social movements rooted in rebellion, risk-taking, and revolutionary love pushed

her and a generation of activists toward abolition. The book travels across geography and time, and offers lessons that activists have learned from Ferguson to South Africa, from Reconstruction to contemporary protests against police shootings. Here, Purnell argues that police can not be reformed and invites readers to envision new systems that could work to address the root causes of violence. Becoming Abolitionists shows that abolition is not solely about getting rid of police, but a commitment to create and support different answers to the problem of harm in society, and an opportunity to reduce and eliminate harm in the first place. Derecka Purnell’s writing is freeing and draws you in on... Continued on page 38. The Collective · 37

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