Over 8,000 people in Atlanta have joined Solange Knowles and moved their money to a black-owned bank.
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The #MoveYourMoney campaign has gained prominence and traction in the days since the heinous police-shooting deaths of Alton Sterling and Philando Castile.
Many African Americans frustrated by repeated police killings of unarmed black men and the ringing lack of justice against those who perpetrate the acts are searching for ways to empower their community and fight back. And as Martin Luther King Jr. once said, the best way to fight this system is to break its capitalist back.
In an excerpt from his famous 1968 “I’ve Been to the Mountaintop” speech—his last before his assassination—King had this to say about investment in ourselves:
Now the other thing we’ll have to do is this: Always anchor our external direct action with the power of economic withdrawal … we’ve got to strengthen black institutions. I call upon you to take your money out of the banks downtown and deposit your money in Tri-State Bank. We want a “bank-in” movement in Memphis. Go by the savings and loan association. I’m not asking you something that we don’t do ourselves at SCLC. Judge Hooks and others will tell you that we have an account here in the savings and loan association from the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. We are telling you to follow what we are doing. Put your money there … Now these are some practical things that we can do.
And to that end, nearly 50 years later, African Americans are starting to heed his word.
11 Alive Atlanta is reporting that in just five days, 8,000 people submitted applications to join a historic black-owned bank, Citizens Trust Bank, in the city.
There are also reports of the same in cities like Chicago and others posted on social media in recent days.
For a list of black-owned banks in the U.S., click here, here and here.
Read more at 11Alive.
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