Black-Latino Summit Way Too Tame — Next Time, Invite Gang Bangers, Black Minutemen

“Editor’s Note: Black and Latino forums must reach beyond the rhetoric of political elites and bring new voices to the table — those of the undocumented, the formally incarcerated and even the black Minutemen. Daffodil Altan is a writer and editor at New America Media.

LOS ANGELES–It was hot as hell a couple of weeks ago in L.A. The air was musky. I was on my way to the “first annual historic summit” between black and Latino leaders, in a large mosque near downtown.

I won’t lie. I wanted the meeting to be sexy. I was looking for edgy. Revelatory. I was feeling nostalgic for something I’d never experienced firsthand: the steamy roomfuls of people who used to pack into churches and mosques on hot afternoons like this one, to be shaken by Malcolm or Dr. King or Cesar. I think we can all agree: those oratorical fests were damn sexy. They literally woke people up. Inspired them. Changed them. “

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