Started by Nikki Fernandez and Imani Daniel, FREEdehFOURth was a grassroots, creative, historically educating, anti-colonial pop-up protest and emancipation recognition held on Saturday, July 4th from 10am-12pm from the Fort Christian parking lot through Main Street to the Market Square and back on St. Thomas, Virgin Islands of the United States. Since it was planned within 48 hours, the protestors kept it simple, small and socially distanced. This march was just the beginning of their organized efforts as they then continued online via strategic community canvassing and surveying using social media and text messaging. Two Facebook groups, including the Voice of the VI, housed the live and recorded videos shared during and after the march with the Decolonizing the USVI group serving as the main dialogue center, continuing information sharing and discussions that have been lead within the group for years prior.
The meaning of Free deh FOURTH?
“… meaning we want to be free from all of the oppressive structures that the 4th represents. In short, frig deh 4th. We won’t celebrate the independence of our colonizers! Instead, we will gather and organize, organize, organize! We coming for ah we freedom!”
~Dr. Hadiya Sewer
In a little over 24 hours, 98 people joined the Facebook Event for updates and info. Interested people are encouraged to text DecolonizeDehVI to 55678 for future info about related events, activities, plans and calls to action.
Dr. Hadiya Sewer, an Africana theorist and activist from St. John stated that, “As a St. Johnian who bears witness to the continuous colonial subjection and displacement of Ancestral Virgin Islanders on St. John, I would like for the Freedeh4th protests to raise awareness and facilitate community mobilization. In a predominantly Black territory, we may not often recognize how American racism and colonialism impacts our day to day lives. Yet, our colonial status lays the groundwork for many of our challenges with debt, disaster recovery, political corruption, gentrification, healthcare, WAPA, food security, and cultural erosion. I got involved with decolonial advocacy because I do not want Virgin Islanders to continue to suffer the indignity of being second-class citizens in a racist empire. We must advance our Ancestors’ ongoing struggle for freedom, dignity, and self-determination by engaging in community organizing and decolonizing the USVI.”
Ancestral Virgin Islander, political scientist and community organizer, Imani Daniel stated, “From the first successful black liberation revolt in 1733, to the March on Frederiksted in 1848, to the Fireburn labor riots in 1878, the history, culture, and psyche of Virgin Islanders are deeply rooted in the process of protesting. We, the people of the Virgin Islands, reserve the right to self-determination, self-sufficiency, and regional collaboration.”
While the planning of these physical and virtual demonstrations were rushed, we felt that it would be a missed opportunity to not recognize the contradictions expressed by the celebration of “American Independence”. Not only were black Americans still enslaved and victims of human trafficking in 1776, but the Virgin Islands surely did not benefit on that day, historically speaking. Furthermore, we hope to shift future public awareness away from the American Independence holiday and, instead, toward our own Emancipation Day on July 3.
We hope to use this day, and the FreeDehFourth Movement, to continue the conversations of healing past colonial traumas, condemned the current oppression imposed by the modern American Empire, and encourage Virgin Islanders to pursue a future of self-reliance and self-governance.
‘We comin fo ah we freedom.'”
Throughout the virtual protest, Dr. Sewer shared reminders and encouragement to those interested in participating or supporting.
Other related posts and commentary:
“Both for practical reasons and for mathematically verifiable moral reasons, authority and responsibility must be equal – else a balancing takes place as surely as current flows between points of unequal potential. To permit irresponsible authority is to sow disaster; to hold a person responsible for anything they do not control is to behave with blind idiocy. The unlimited democracies were unstable because their citizens were not responsible for the fashion in which they exerted their sovereign authority… other than through the tragic logic of history… No attempt was made to determine whether a voter was socially responsible to the extent of their literally unlimited authority. If they voted the impossible, the disastrous possible happened instead – and responsibility was then forced on them willy-nilly and destroyed both them and their foundationless temple. Food for thought. It is decades of mismanagement and corruption on our own part that is keeping us down. The day we stop asking for help from the United States (700$ million last yearcaline) is the day we can truly self determine. Self reliance leads to self determination. Singapore is a fantastic example of this.”
~Anonymous
Email anticolonialvi@gmail.com or text DecolonizeDehVI to 55678 for future info about related events, activities, plans and calls to action.
This post will be updated throughout the day/weekend as content is added.
