{"id":311865,"date":"2026-01-12T12:00:55","date_gmt":"2026-01-12T12:00:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=311865"},"modified":"2026-01-11T06:56:16","modified_gmt":"2026-01-11T06:56:16","slug":"from-minneapolis-to-here-and-there-one-empire-many-graves","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2026\/01\/from-minneapolis-to-here-and-there-one-empire-many-graves\/","title":{"rendered":"From Minneapolis to Here and There: One Empire, Many Graves"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Crime of Wanting to Be Free<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

9 Jan 2026\u00a0<\/em>–\u00a0Let us be clear. Let us not be deceived\u2014again. The murder of Rene Good, a mother and a poet, in Minneapolis, was not<\/em> an isolated incident. It was not a \u201ctragic anomaly,\u201d not a \u201cfailure of procedure,\u201d not a footnote gone wrong in an otherwise noble system.<\/p>\n

This is not about one murder, one massacre, one \u201ctragic incident,\u201d one regrettable \u201cmistake\u201d explained away by a press release and a blue-ribbon commission. This is about a system that perfects cruelty, routinizes violence, and then asks us to admire its efficiency.<\/p>\n

It was the system doing what it does best: enforcing order by erasing the inconvenient. A poet killed in a city that still sells diversity as a brand.<\/p>\n

Let recall or connect the dot, from Haiti\u2014punished for abolishing slavery\u2014to Palestine\u2014asked to disappear quietly\u2014to Congo\u2014mined to death so the world can feel \u201cconnected\u201d\u2014this is one long crime scene with different weather reports.<\/p>\n

The empire calls it security<\/em>. The empire calls it stability<\/em>. The empire calls it unfortunate but necessary<\/em>. But intriguing, how necessity never knocks on the doors of the powerful.<\/p>\n

This is not just American-style fascism\u2014though the symptoms are textbook: rule by big money, worship of the military, obscene inequality, and a permanent search for scapegoats\u2014Black people, brown immigrants, queer lives, workers who still believe unions are not a crime. No, this goes deeper. It\u2019s metaphysical. It\u2019s the theology of domination. And it does not spare anyone.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s the belief that might makes right. That power absolves sin.
\nThat morality is a luxury item for those not holding the gun. And it assumes\u2014adorably\u2014that everyday people will get tired. That organized people will fold. That despair will do the empire\u2019s work for it.<\/p>\n

Bad bet. Because there is a counter-invasion. Not with tanks, but with memory. Not with sanctions, but with solidarity. A healing force inside us and among us\u2014annoyingly persistent. The same force that animated Malcolm X when he named the disease without apologizing for the diagnosis; that carried Nelson Mandela through decades designed to break him; that sharpened the moral weapon of Mahatma Gandhi against an empire that preferred bullets to mirrors. In reality, empires hate mirrors. They reflect badly on quarterly earnings.<\/p>\n

So yes, we respond with love\u2014for people\u2014and with ruthless clarity toward systems that monetize death. We respond with justice in the face of terror, with freedom in the face of trauma so normalized it barely trends. We respond by bearing witness and paying a cost, because neutrality has become the empire\u2019s most efficient ally.<\/p>\n

Ask Patrice Lumumba\u2014silenced so Congo could remain \u201cinvestor-friendly.\u201d Ask Steve Biko\u2014killed because dignity is contagious. Ask the growing roll call of names that policy prefers to forget.<\/p>\n

The empire insists each death is separate. Local. Complicated. Too messy for moral conclusions. But as Arundhati Roy keeps reminding us, there are moments when silence becomes architecture\u2014load-bearing, intentional, lethal.<\/p>\n

Listen to the threats dressed as forecasts: If we don\u2019t act today, maybe tomorrow there will be no Iran. If not tomorrow, then Venezuela. Then Cuba. Then whoever is next on the spreadsheet. This is imperialism\u2019s bedtime story\u2014told softly, with charts.<\/p>\n

But people who are crushed, sanctioned, occupied, racialized, erased\u2014they have another option. Unite. Not as a hashtag, but as infrastructure. Not as charity, but as shared survival. Build a world free of domination and hegemony, where poets don\u2019t die for breathing, and mothers aren\u2019t collateral damage to someone else\u2019s \u201corder.\u201d<\/p>\n

Because the empire thrives on isolation. And it panics when we connect the dots. So let us be clear. Let us not be deceived. Rene Nicole Good was not an exception. She was evidence.<\/p>\n

And the verdict is global.<\/p>\n

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____________________________________________<\/em><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Ra\u00efs Neza Boneza is the author of fiction as well as non-fiction, poetry books and articles. He was born in the Katanga province of the Democratic Republic of Congo (Former Za\u00efre). He is also an activist and peace practitioner. Ra\u00efs is a member of the <\/em>TRANSCEND Media Service<\/em><\/a> Editorial Committee and a convener of the <\/em>TRANSCEND Network for Peace Development Environment<\/em><\/a> for Central and African Great Lakes. He uses his work to promote artistic expressions as a means to deal with conflicts and maintaining mental wellbeing, spiritual growth and healing. Ra\u00efs has travelled extensively in Africa and around the world as a lecturer, educator and consultant for various NGOs and institutions. His work is premised on art, healing, solidarity, peace, conflict transformation and human dignity issues and works also as freelance journalist. You can reach him at <\/em>rais.boneza@gmail.com<\/em><\/a> – <\/em>http:\/\/www.raisnezaboneza.no<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n

Go to Original \u2013 substack.com<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This is not about one murder, one massacre, one \u201ctragic incident,\u201d one regrettable \u201cmistake\u201d explained away by a press release and a blue-ribbon commission. This is about a system that perfects cruelty, routinizes violence, and then asks us to admire its efficiency.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":65324,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[40],"tags":[3480,3281,1660,70],"class_list":["post-311865","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-transcend-members","tag-anti-immigration","tag-evil-empire","tag-ice","tag-usa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/311865","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=311865"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/311865\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":311867,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/311865\/revisions\/311867"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/65324"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=311865"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=311865"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=311865"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}