"Witness to an Execution" an Essay

I Cried Until I Had No More Tears. Witness to an Execution
by Jonah Zern, Oakland Resident and Teacher

I stood last night outside the gates of San Quentin Prison as the State of California murdered Robert Lee Massie and cried until I had no more tears, but more and more kept falling down to the concrete smothered earth bellow me. I cried for a pain so deep it ran through the dead earth paved beneath my feet, through the dead tree in the shape of a cross I held in my hand, and the emptiness and silence in the faces around me. I felt the pain in everything I had ever done in fighting for justice, and it gave a whole new meaning to everything I will do into the future. I cried for Robert Lee Massie, as I envisioned him being taken heavily guarded strapped down to his death by injection of chemicals into his body in a precise and calculating manner; killed on an assembly-line where each person knew her or his part and no-one was supposed to feel responsible; killed on time on April 27, 2001 at precisely 12:15 AM. I cried for each of the other brothers and sisters held within the walls of those prisons for I could feel that each of them was closer to this death than I, that Robert Lee Massie was a sacrifice of the State as if to say to each of them "you're next". I cried for something so deep that I couldn't explain why I was crying, but I saw the same pain in the faces of those around me.

My friend asked afterwards "Why are we killing each-other?". I could not respond, all I could say is "they killed him on time" and cry.

Robert Lee Massie's death showed me the meaning of a concept that Angela Davis explains in her writings about the women's movement. In her book "Women Culture and Politics" she explains that to create gains that are deep and permanent that middle-class white women benefit most by fighting for working-class sisters of color. She shows this through a pyramid of oppression. At the top of the pyramid are wealthy white women, then white working-class women. At the very bottom are racially oppressed women
who are from working class background. She explains that when the women at the apex of the pyramid achieve victories for themselves that there is
rarely any change in the status of the other women. On the other hand she shows that if those at the nadir of the pyramid win victories for themselves their progress will push the entire structure upward, eventually winning advances for the entire pyramid.

This concept runs exactly opposite to Regan-omics trickle down theory where the poor are supposed to benefit by gains for the wealthy. This practice
of helping to rich to lift all of society up was proved false in the 1980's, but is still the root of the economic development plans currently being orchestrated by Jerry Brown in Oakland and Willie Brown in San Francisco. The practice of advancing the needs and values of the white elite is also still engrained within much of social justice and environmental activism movement, ranging from the women's movement which has been defined by its work for gains for white working women, to the US labor movement which until recently fought against immigration and rights for workers overseas, and the environmental movement aimed at preserving lands, but not fighting for environmental justice in communities of color.

Being present for Robert Lee Massie's death last night made me aware of how real this pyramid was in our society and how significant it is to be supporting and working on struggles to lift up the bottom. As I walked towards the prison gates, I looked into the eyes of Robert Lee Massie's murderer as a police officer stopped to hassle a parishioner with a truck full of crosses which he was passing out to those who wanted them as solace. I also think that part of the pain I was feeling was the killer
within me. A killer that lived a complacent life off the labor of the poor who are thrown out into prison and into death row because they are not valued in life. They live in the ghetto, the barrio, the reservation, the trailer park, and are Black, Latino, Indian, or White, and they are treated as workers, as slaves for the wealth of the richest Americans, and when they are not needed they are thrown into prison or killed. The rich Americans who discard them create crimes for them to commit, create a police force to catch them, wardens and jailers to watch over them, and an executioner to kill them.

Almost all of us suffer in some way under this system of valueless life making goods or creating services that go to help those with wealth, some of which is our own. We say when Friday comes that we are free, and know that as we "slave" through the week that we are not. As Robert Lee Massie stated in a letter before his execution, he hoped that his death would be
one that would inspire action towards an end of our current "criminal justice" system. In his letter he also explained that he knew that it was his life's position at the nadir of the pyramid, a life of poverty, without support or parenting that had lead him to where he was. He knew before his death last night that for us to truly live, to gain our collective freedom that we must start where he was. We must organize support through education and other social programs for every person starting at the base,
and through this organizing re-learn the value of life, that no life is discardable.

A man was killed last night. A beautiful person as each one of us is. I hope to never again feel such awful pain as I did last night again; that Robert Lee Massie's death wish of change for a true and meaningful justice in life is found, and I commit myself to struggle until it is.