Statement from NYC Refuse Fascism: On May 26 in Portland, Oregon, Jeremy Christian, a white supremacist, stabbed three men on a commuter train. He killed two of them – Taliesin Namkai Myrddin Meche and Ricky John Best. He severely wounded the other, Micah Fletcher. These three men defended two young women, one wearing a hijab, as Christian shouted obscene racist and anti-Muslim slurs at them.
Taliesin Namkai Myrddin Meche, Ricky John Best, and Micah Fletcher are heroes. They did not ask, “What will happen to me?” They asked themselves what would happen to these teenage girls if they did not stand up. We cannot forget their sacrifice. Their deaths must NOT become the new normal.
We therefore call on the City of New York declare a “Day of Honor for Heroes Taliesin Myrddin Namkai Meche, Ricky John Best, and Micah Fletcher” on June 10. At this juncture, many will be pulled to turn away, to stay home, to avoid protesting injustice because of the very real dangers of Trump and his bloodthirsty alt-right supporters. We cannot do this; we must recognize that our silence means complicity, our fear means horrors for humanity.
Jeremy Christian is a known alt-right racist. He sought to attack anti-Trump protesters with a baseball bat on April 29. He posted vile comments on social media explicitly expressing Nazi sentiments. In his court hearing, he said of the killings: “You call it terrorism; I call it patriotism.”
On June 10, fascist forces will rally in dozens of cities across the country. They claim to oppose Sharia Law, but really they are against all Muslims. They claim that Islam is a “political ideology,” not a religion. Therefore, they insist that Muslims don’t deserve legal protection under the Constitutional right to Freedom of Religion. Most dangerous of all: they are closely aligned with – and in many cases directly tied to – the fascist Trump/Pence Regime, which has whipped up violence and vicious rage among these increasingly organized alt-right forces.
We call for this Day of Honor on June 10th in order to express complete solidarity and unfaltering support for our Muslim brothers and sisters who are in extreme danger in this moment, and for all those who stand up for them and come under attack.
Some see all this and think the stakes are too high to speak up. Right before he intervened, Meche himself was cautioned by a loved one on the phone not to get involved. But he did so anyway – and he was right to do so! The truth is, the stakes are too high not to speak up.
His last words were, “Tell them, tell everybody on this train, that I love them.” We recognize, and call on others to proclaim, that Taliesin Myrddin Namkai Meche, Ricky John Best, and Micah David-Cole Fletcher are heroes. They did what everyone should do, stand up to anti-Muslim bigotry and harassment and white supremacy. They did the right thing. Declare June 10 the “Day of Honor for Portland Heroes Taliesin Myrddin Namkai Meche, Ricky John Best, and Micah Fletcher”.