(INTERVIEW LEROY MOORE)
Poète, écrivain et activiste communautaire noir américain, Leroy F.Moore Jr est aussi le fondateur de Krip-Hop Nation et co-fondateur de Sins Invalind. Il milite pour les droits des personnes noires handicapées notamment contre les violences policières dont elles sont victimes.Il travaille actuellement sur une thèse doctorale à l’université de Californie à Los Angeles (UCLA). Aujourd’hui, je discute avec lui de la place des personnes noires handicapées au sein des communautés handies, des communautés noires et au sein des études sur le handicap. Mais aussi de ses divers projets, de radicalisation Krip et de ses rêves d’avenir pour la communauté.
*Je travaille sur la traduction en ce moment.*
My first question is what or who made you take a step to avocate for black disabled people ?
L.M : My Father was an activist when I was growing up. And my mother fought for my rights being a black disabled little boy at the time. So, you know between those two I saw injustice against black people and I also saw police brutality against black disabled people in the 70’s and early 80’s. So when I saw that I also saw the differences of being black and disabled comparatively of being white and disabled. The white disabled people were protesting for the curb cuts at the time and I would look at police brutality and be like; I can’t enjoy the curb cuts if black people got the risk of being shot on the street by the police. So at the time I realized that being black and disabled was a whole different thing and that when I started to do my activism research around black disabled people.
Also, in the 1980s me and two black disabled people were turned to ask questions about where other black disabled people are. So we wrote letters to a lot of black leaders at the time. We asked : “where are black disabled people ?”. Like we weren’t seen on TV or anywhere. We did that letter campaign without computers, we wrote letters for like a whole month. So that letter campaign also sparked my entrance into activism.
You’re one of the co-founder of Sins Invalind. A “disability justice-based performance project that incubates and celebrates artists with disabilities, centering artists of color and LGBTQ/gender variant artists”. Can you go back to the origin of the project and its initial goals.
L.M : So me and Patty Berne, long time friend, got together and we were at this Cultural Center. We saw some arts and we realized : where are black and brown disabled artists ? We saw all kinds of other artists at that event. So we came home and we really discussed about doing one event around people of color with disabilities and people that are queer and transgender. And that one event turned into Sins Invalid and we realize that people really want this kind of platform. We also, because Patty Berne and myself are activists, came up with Disability Justice. Because we saw that the Disability Rights Movement was still too white and we wanted to bring our full self into the movement. So we started another movement called Disability Justice for trans, gay, queer people of color that were really left out of the movement.
I was in Sins Invalid since the beginning and I left in 2012 I think, because I really wanted to concentrate on Krip-Hop but also because I saw the limitations of Disability Justice. At the time black disabled people and disabled people of color had open wounds when it comes to peoples of color community and we still do because of ableism. And because of that Disability Justice hasn’t really got deeply into the black and brown community. There is a lot of work to be done before getting into disability justice. So when I saw that I said : “Oh you know, let me slip away and let me concentrate on Krip-Hop and concentrate on how to bring the black community into Disability Justice”. And that’s what I’m doing now in my graduate work by looking at black theories and black art to crip it, so black community can understand Disability Justice from a black perspective.
What is your P.h.d about ?
L.M : So the UCLA came and got me. I wasn’t thinking about doing a P.h.D but because of krip-hop the UCLA team said “You should do a Ph.D because you’ve been doing Krip-Hop since almost 17 years”. My advisor does hip-hop studies so when he saw Krip-hop he encouraged me to pursue my Ph.D. And now it’s my third year going into my degree under the anthropology department. My Ph.D will be in anthropology and my studies will be a mixture of Krip-Hop nation and bringing Disability Justice into Black theory and black practice in the Black community more deeply.
You are also the co-founder of Krip-Hop. Can you explain the history of this project?
L.M : Yeah, so Krip-hop started almost seventeen-eighteen years ago under Poor Magazine. Poor Magazine is an advocacy organization that I’ve been part of since the middle of the 1990’s, talking about race, poverty, hip-hop and disability. At the time I was also doing a radio show with a collective around disability issues and I convinced them to do a three part series on hip-hop and disability. After that I put a call out around disabled people in hip-hop on Myspace, it was before facebook and twitter, and got a lot of feedback from the african continent, the Uk and Germany and more. And that’s when Krip-hop really started. We put out I think about four albums already. We did a documentary on police brutality called Where is Hope- The Art of Murder. And now the big thing is that we want to start a Krip-Hop Institute virtually to make it accessible. We have chapters around the world in Germany, in the UK and in different countries in Africa. To organize a Krip-Hop chapter is really up to the people that’s on the ground. I keep in contact with the different chapters a lot to get updates on what’s going on. And because we are so close in contact, last year one of our chapters from Tanzania bought a piece of land to build a school for disabled youth. So we are also working on that.
Where does the term Krip with a K come from ?
L.M : I choose Krip with a K, because Crip with a C has a history of being negative you know cripple and so on. Also in the 60’s and 70’s here in California a black gang use Crip as a gang name. I interviewed one of the leaders of the gang, Tookie Williams, and he told me that they had a disabled member and playing with the word they came up with Crip. So that’s stuck in that gang. To go back to Krip-Hop what I’m doing is taking what is viewed as negative and turning it into a positive thing. And also putting Crip back into the black history of black disabled people because before the Crips and the Bloods gangs we had a lot of black blues artists, black disabled dancers that use the term crip. There was this dancer called Crip Heard and a lot of blues artists that use Crip as a statement. So what I’m doing with the term Krip-Hop is really taking that history from black disabled people and the gangs and saying that we as disabled people have always been here.
Talking about hip-hop, what is your music inspiration ?
L.M : Oh my god, I got a list of hundred and the first one is Ray Charles. I always love Ray Charles, he sang blues, soul and jazz. Also Curtis Mayfield who was a soul singer in the 70’s, he became disabled in the late eighties-nineties and his last album New World Order that he did on his bed is an incredible album. And of course hip-hop artists like Public Enemy, the Beastie Boys and The Fat Boys. Also a lot of Krip-Hop artists that you may never know about.
With your EP Krip-Blues Stories you pay tribute to disabled blues artists and with your book Black Disabled Ancestors you continue the work of remembrance by retracing the history of black and disabled ancestors. Why is it important for you to celebrate and remember these erased existences ?
L.M : Yeah, the reason I do that is because we have history as black disabled people. A lot of time people don’t see disability as a political-historical identity. But you know we do have ancestors that have done some incredible work. Like Harriet Thubman. She was a slave, she had a disability because her so-called master hit her over the head and she had seizures. And she used her disability to free other people. So, you know there are so many people like that in history that I could talk about. But, I wrote that book because young black disabled people need to see that there have been a lot of black disabled ancestors that did a lot of work. In hip-hop, activism and jazz. Another one is Al Hibbler , he was a blind jazz singer and he marched with Martin Luther King Junior, he was on the protest line. History of people like that needs to be told. Most of the time disability is seen as something to overcome and it’s not right. It’s an identity just like you’re black. We need to pass down these stories to the black disabled youth and other groups of disabled youth. And it’s up to us. There was a lot of black disabled movement internationally, in London or in Toronto for example and it’s important to write about this and put it in books and other stuff.
You worked on the concept of Black Ableism which you define as “a form of discrimination and social prejudice specifically against Black people with disabilities, perpetrated by non-disabled Black individuals. ». Can you explain it ?
L.M : It’s really discrimination or attitude against black disabled people in our own black communities. And that history comes from slavery, because during this time, disability was seen as a sin and you can be killed for it if you can’t work. Since slavery the black community never had a chance to heal or to learn other ways to see disability. Seeing that black community needs to deal with its own ableism, I put together the term Black Ableism so black disabled people can come back home to the black community. I think because of Black Ableism is so tied up to the black community it’s hard to come home and work in black organizations, since they haven’t worked on their own ableism. And it’s really up to us to really work to eliminate Black Ableism in our communities. It’s gonna take really hard work to do that, you know that’s education work. We need to really do the work on the ground to educate so our communities can be enriched and enjoy disability studies, disability justice and disability rights. But you can’t enjoy those things if you still have an outdated mindset around disability.
Yes, and we may face rejection in white disabled movement and in black communities but those two don’t feel the same. It’s even more hurtful when it’s coming from our own community.
L.M : Yeah and you know it’s not black communities’ fault either it’s the bad of the system that we live under. And we really need, like I always say, to find a way to come back home. It’s hard, it’s like open wounds so we first need to heal these open wounds so we can start education. And that goes back to the reason why I think I left Sins Invalid, because I really didn’t see them doing the hard work in the black community. And it’s not their fault I know it’s hard because it’s an open wounds for one thing and another thing is the lack of money. White disabled organizations have a lot of the grants and there is a lack of funding and a lack of support when you go back into black organizations. And that’s what a lot of black disabled movements and even my organization didn’t last since they didn’t get the support and funding that they needed from both the black community and the disabled community and funders.
The whiteness of disability studies has been singled out for several years and by several black people, notably Chris Bell and his work “Introducing White Disability Studies”. What do you think about that ?
We had so many black disabled activists that say this constantly, others black disabled activists say the same and put out great papers and put out good books but you know even after that, today there’s still not a lot of black disabled professors in disability studies. Here at UCLA, they just celebrated that they got the green light to do an undergrad major in disability studies, the first one in California. And I’m here. I went to their website but unfortunately I didn’t see a black face on that website. And I know it’s new and they are trying to change that and I hope they do. But disability studies in 2024 are still mainly white. Of course we have black disabled authors in academia and a couple of black disabled professors but still it’s little compared to the whole field. But not only disability studies you know, academia as a whole. Doing my Ph.d I find out in academia different departments don’t talk to each other. It’s just kind of strange to look at you know, black studies departments don’t really talk to disability studies and vice versa. It’s really weird either way, I think. I don’t want to be a full time professor but seeing that I think that black studies needs to be more inclusive to disabilities when they don’t talk to each other.
What future do you dream for black disabled people ?
Oh my god, I think I dream that we can come back home to the black community in order to do the work. That in the black community, black disabled organizations will keep growing in other areas in order to take over. I hope in the future to have black disabled thinking and that we can write and implement reports, studies outside of Academia. I hope my P.h.d studies and my papers and stuff can crip the black radical tradition and I think that’s gonna start you know, a new way of thinking, bringing black thoughts and black practices and black arts to disability and really coming up with black disabled philosophies and black disabled theories together. The thing I realize lately is that black people and people of color with disabilities have always followed the theories and the philosophies of mainly white disabled activists and thinkers. You know the Social Model of Disability was made popular by Mike Oliver, he was a white disabled academic. So if you look at that, it’s like no wonder our black community really struggles holding on to disability rights, theories and studies when it’s coming from a white standpoint. So really the work now is to create our own theories, our own philosophies and to also at the same time black crip the black theories, going all the way back to the black radical tradition. I even found out that Malcom X, was surrounded by disability but no one talks and writes about that, so the question is how can we crip Malcolm X’s thinking around black disabled people ? That is the work that we need to do and it’s the time to do it. I won’t live to see the fruits of it but you know the seed needs to be planted. People need to realize that planting these seed it’s not a 9-5 job, it won’t make you rich. But the seeds need to be planted.
It was my last question but If you want to add something you can. Thank you so much for this exchange.
I use the term AfroCrip, it’s a term that I came up with a couple years ago, to really try to organize afro disabled people from around the world. Because I looked at my activism on a global scale. And so I looked at disability on a global scale and I really wanted to see afro disabled activists and artists organize themself on a global scale.
Post-interview exchange
This is still only a draft of my thinking of the Stages, Reaching Up To Black Krip Radicalization
As a Black disabled person, we must see ourselves but you ask how?
Phase One: As a Black disabled person, we must see ourselves locally and globally. It can start as simply as seeing others who are Black, disabled doing work in the community, online or seeing or reading or hearing the work of a Black disabled person. This can lead to Black disabled self-empowerment and might by as opposed to and connote a stronger sense of action connecting experience, history throughout time locally and globally. This process must continue to be sustained in order to erase internal ableism to be replaced with an eagerness and agency to learn more. With growing agency and awareness, one starts to see that it is people’s ableism that kept you in an non-achievable and lonely path of trying to overcome disability and you realize that you must become an advocate and educator to connect as a community
Phase Two: a) Black Kripping for me means when we enter spaces that exclude or deny the existence of the Black disabled community’s accomplishments, history, music, arts, politics in the Black community, history and movements locally and internationally, we must first take inventory of the Black ableism in that space then engage with our Black Krip politics. Recognizing that we have often been wounded by our own and we must be prepared knowing it will take time to first get our Black community locally and globally to recognize their Black ableism and why they need to change. It be stress the importance of strategic approaches, but also communicating that it takes time to shift people’s understanding. Learning is a process, this is especially true when unlearning (speak to ableism directly) need to take place first.
b) Black Kripping is the illumination of the reality that Black disabled experiences and contributions have been a consistent, if not rendered less visible historical and contemporary reality action knowing that we were always there so we are making visible the Black disabled experience by centering with our own Black disabled expression, politics and more. This process must be ongoing and must push beyond/transcend the limits of social media activism go deeper than a hashtag. Black spaces can be movements, cultural expression, industries like Black music, arts like what Krip-Hop is doing in Hip-Hop and the work of Jade Bryan’s company, Deaf Talent in the movie industry etc. These example are powerful because they center Black disabled/Deaf artists with the firm statement that we have always been here laboring under the isms of our communities and the communities must come to our table to learn thus to shred their abelism. Making the point that ableism from w/in the Black community may is more devastating or detrimental than ableism from the larger society because ableism within the community forces Black disabled people outside their Black community thus never forming a solid identity as a full Black disabled individual and never feeling at home and supported anywhere.
Phase Three: During and after Black Kripping, we must/should continue to politicalize and mobilize our Black community, Black history, culture, art, music with Black disabled culture, politics, terminology, activism. Black disabled empowerment means living out loud and proud and putting ourselves, our politics, art, music and theories into Black politics, movements, history and future. We are moving/transitioning from our experiences of oppression, erasure, and self–pity, towards self–empowerment and centering disability as a political, cultural, historical, movement, one global in scope.
Phase Four: To reach the stage of Black Krip Radicalization one has to move beyond awareness and self-pride. One must develop a political and analytical view that invites questioning of how mainstream society defines and represents us. We shouldn’t be satisfied with inclusion and need agitate for liberation, transformation and revolution. We must also lean on our Black disabled ancestors who offered and made visible for us, paths to liberation.
As we more fully inhabit this stage, we are creating new theories, terminology, art, music for not only for ourselves, but for generations to come. At this stage we must leverage all tools at our disposal to stay united and to bring others into Black Krip Radicalization. Often, new language must be created to articulate/illuminate different realities or possibilities. One term I created coined was AfroKrip, (2016) to help unitedAfro disabled people around the African diaspora, and to center Krip-Hop as a tool for politicization and mobilization. As a Black disabled activist/artist living in America and desiring a connection with other disabled artists/activists in the African diaspora, I realized there must be terminology that we can utilize that speaks to our shared/common experiences. We also have to come up with our own words, original theory and politics to establish new frameworks to unlearn the way we, the Black community, view disability thus confronting Black ableism of the past to the present and relearn in our own empowering ways. Centering new language, theories and political analysis and practice will frame our experiences through a Black disabled lens. This transformation can help reclaim and make visible the role of Black Krip contributions throughout history, locally and globally.
Throughout the phases: While evolving into Black Krip Radicalization, we must continue to build locally and internationally. The expansion of Black Krip (Disability) Culture is an ongoing process to add to! You asked how?
1. Do our research of Black disabled ancestors
2. Empower ourselves outside mainstream
3. Come together to build a we story
4. Black Kripping Black and Disability theory
5. Continue to grow our arts and music…..
KRiPTiQUE 