A Guide to Allyship

office has compiled a guide on how to use your privilege to challenge the systems that oppress the Black community.

ON SOCIAL MEDIA

- When sharing graphic images and/or videos of Black death, think about what your sharing first.

Videos of George Floyd’s corpse attracted virality and spread across the internet. In both life and death, physical and virtual, George Floyd has no claim over his body as a Black American, like so many others. As important as this video is, Black death shouldn’t be commodified for likes and retweets. Black lives are already devalued, and sharing videos of Black death normalizes these actions and desensitizes us from the brutality. So many videos are already out there for viewing, and your Black peers’ mental health will not sustain at the visual of their peers dying due to the color of their skin.

- Be aware of everything you post and see on social media.

When black squares flooded IG timelines on #blackouttuesday, the initiative was criticized by many voices in the Black community. From countless people misusing the #blm hashtag to promoting silence at a critical time for information, a lot of damage could have been prevented if people had properly done their research on the subject and made informed decisions on whether or not to participate. So please, please do your research first, and continue using your presence on the Internet to share postiive resources that actually help the cause.

ON DONATING

We encourage you to donate if you are in a position to do so, because every dollar counts. We'll update this list, but here are some places that you can contribute to:

- George Floyd’s memorial fund is set up to cover funeral and burial expenses, mental and grief counseling, lodging, and travel for all court proceedings. All proceeds will go directly to George Floyd’s family.

- Ahmaud Arbery’s fund was designed to assist Ahmaud's mother, Ms. Wanda Cooper-Jones, and her immediate family with financial support during this extremely difficult time in their struggle for justice for the murder of Ahmaud Marquez Arbery.

- Justice for Regis supports the Regis Korchinski Paquet's family in their quest for justice against the officers responsible for her death. Regis fell 24 floors to her death after police were called to her home in Toronto.

- NAACP Legal Defense Fund aims to "protect voting rights, reform our criminal justice system, achieve education equity, and ensure economic justice for all."

- Brooklyn Community Bail Fund secures the freedom of New Yorkers who would otherwise be detained pre-trial due to their poverty alone and their inability to pay bail.

- Tony Mcdade Fund was founded to treat funeral and burial expenses, mental and grief counseling, and to support Tony's family in the days to come as they continue to seek justice. On May 27th, 2020, Tony McDade, a Black trans man was shot and killed by a Tallahassee Police Department (TPD) officer.

For other funds or more information on donating, please visit https://blacklivesmatters.carrd.co/#donate.

ON EDUCATING YOURSELF AND OTHERS

The act of understanding or acknowledging your privilege will not be easy, but it is necessary. It’s not enough to not be racist; it’s taking the steps on educating yourself, challenging oppressive systems with your privilege, and correcting your family members and peers when they are being oppressive. Learn about George Floyd’s case and the officers involved, pay attention to the numerous amount of Black lives being affected daily, and prepare for the hard and uncomfortable conversations that need to happen in order to take a step toward solidarity and unity.

Good places to start:

- Three activists—Tatum Dorrell, Matthew Herndo, and Jourdan Dorrell—have compiled a list of resources called the “Anti Racist Allyship Starter Pack,” which consists of a multitude of books, articles, and films that provide the education of Black history, allyship, protests, and white privilege.

- The Black Lives Matter Movement has a podcast series called What Matters, which combines documentary narratives with interviews to illustrate particular, appropriate subjects, aiming to create a conversation about the promotions of freedom, justice, and democratic liberation.

- The “Anti-Racism Resources For White People” is a guide that serves to provide resources for white people. This document is intended to provide methods that help white people and parents unlearn internalized racist ideologies to deepen their anti-racist work.

- Patia Borja, founder of @patiasfantasyworld on IG, compiled an extremely comprehensive database designed to help people dismantle systemic racism.

ON USING YOUR VOICE

When using your voice, it is important to avoid making this issue about yourself. As important it is to empathize and relate with those who are struggling, do not make the narrative about your personal experiences. This is harmful and takes away from the severity of the situation and from those who are hurting.

Vote

The first step to enact change is using the power that can really influence the system—by becoming a registered voter and playing your part in electing officials who stand for a stronger, diverse and unified future through radical reform.

Petition

You can use your voice as a weapon by signing petitions, correcting and confronting racism in active conversation with your family, sending emails to administrations, posting links to donations, and physically speaking out with messages on social media. Sustain the legacy of the victims’ names and hashtag #BlackLivesMatter to show your allegiance to the cause.

Some petitions even allow you text and sign. The following text messages help sign petitions, demanding that all the police officers responsible for the murder of George Floyd are arrested:

- Text “JUSTICE” To 668366
- Text “FLOYD” To 55156
- Text “ENOUGH” To 55156

Contact Government Representatives

Get in contact with the District Attorney and Minneapolis Mayor. Leave a message for them DEMANDING that the four officers, including Derek Chauvin (Badge #1087) and Tou Thao (Badge #7162), be arrested for the Murder of George Floyd.

Minneapolis Mayor, Jacob Frey...... (612) 673-2100
Minneapolis District Attorney, Mike Freeman..... (612) 348-5550 or citizeninfo@hennepin.us

Minneapolis PD E-mails:
police@minneapolismn.gov
minneapolis311@minneapolismn.gov
policereview@minneapolismn.gov
Internal Affairs Number...... (612) 673-3074

Breonna Taylor was murdered in her house by police who raided the wrong house and was shot eight times while she was sleeping. Call or e-mail the Louisville Mayor’s office and demand that the chief of police be fired.

Louisville Mayor, Greg Fischer..... (502) 574-2003

ON PROTESTING

A great way to display your alliance for your Black peers is by showing up physically. Go to local protests in your area and let your voice be heard in the streets when marching. If it comes to it, use your white privilege as an ally. Exercise your privilege as an active barrier in front of those most targeted and try to diverge violent situations with the police and other people of color. Do not make the protest about yourself by looting and causing obstruction, as this only does more harm to the Black community. Pay attention to your surroundings, notice and become familiar with undercover cops and transfer helpful messages to your peers. Show up, support, and listen.

When protesting, it is important to record and photograph active brutality that is happening as this can be applied as a political influence on the media. But ensure that you are not exposing the faces of the protestors as this can be used to identify and harm them. If you have photos or videos, blur out the faces of protestors and anyone within the scene. If you are using Photoshop, the clone stamp tool is much more effective than using the blur tool for this purpose.

As an alternative, if you are not considering protesting, aid those protestors in supplies and care. Buy masks, water, milk, goggles, a first aid kit, etc to ensure the wellbeing and safety of those putting their life on the line to make a change. Write down the number to your local national Lawyers guide or bail fund on your arm or in your phone to help those arrested.

More tips and helpful research surrounding protests can be found here.

ON SUPPORTING BLACK-OWNED BUSINESSES

During the riots, numerous amount of Black businesses have faced damage among big corporations. With showing your allegiance, it is important to give back to these businesses that have been affected through donations.

ON CHECKING UP ON YOUR BLACK FRIENDS

With the multitude of events taking place surrounding the ongoing pandemic and injustice to their community, your Black companions may feel exhausted, overwhelmed, and helpless. They are fighting their own battles on top of this issue and are still being asked to show up and perform like an active and functional citizen in America. In reality, your Black friends want your alliance. Shoot your friends a call or a text and check up on their mental well-being. Be there for them in their time of need, recommend them mental health resources, and sympathize and listen to them in this difficult time.

_________________

Using your voice and doing your part is absolutely essential in order to combat the countless injustices you see taking place. Silence and inaction are deafening to your Black peers and speaks volumes about your lack of consideration for their Black lives. If you choose to remain silent, not only are you picking the side of the oppressor, but you are using this silence as a representation for your anti-Blackness.

Culture

The Club Is Coming to the Stage

We enter and make our way to what is approximately front left of the DJ booth, where we’re accustomed to dancing at clubs in New York. “So is this a techno club or a dance performance?” yells an uncertain participant in my boyfriend’s ear. He laughs, bouncing along to Ben UFO, and yells back, “It’s both!” The club has long been a hot topic in European contemporary dance but it is only now making its way into New York performance venues, largely through transatlantic tours. R.O.S.E. follows recent examples like Michele Rizzo’s HIGHER xtn. at MoMA PS1 (May 2024), (LA)HORDE’s Room with a View at NYU Skirball (October 2023), and Gisèle Vienne’s Crowd at BAM (October 2022).

Do these performances compromise the club’s spirit — a space idealized for its anonymity, dark lighting, and thundering music? The notion of the club as a utopian escape is admittedly just that — an ideal — because of how its intense conditions can create barriers to entry. Still, the club remains sacred for many, a place to forge connections and embrace an alternative state of being. Looking at how performances transfer this spirit to new settings reveals what aspects of the club are essential and those that aren’t.

Sharon Eyal, R.O.S.E. 2024. Photography by Stephanie Berger, courtesy of Park Avenue Armory.

Eyal’s dancers make their entrance. The lighting shifts from roving blue to yellow spotlights as Ben UFO’s tracks transition to more melodic beats. Clad in deconstructed lace Dior lingerie with dark red tears painted on their faces, the dancers move cautiously in a tightly maintained pack, slicing paths through the horde with hoof-like steps and jerky leg extensions. After around ten minutes of this controlled choreography, the dancers vanish as the lighting shifts back to blue and Ben UFO picks up his dubby beats. The club, as we knew it, resumes. This cycle of tightly executed movements and free-flowing club-goers repeats several times, each time emboldening the dancers to plunge further into the crowd.

Clubbing in a building once built for the U.S. Army National Guard on Manhattan’s Upper East Side turns out to be surprisingly successful — at least for the audience. What starts as an awkward, scattered group searching for their non existent seats gradually gels into an engaged, bouncing crowd that erupts in cheers each time the dancers enter and exit. Performance patrons who might never step foot in a club find themselves swept up in its potential for communion, moving in unison with fellow ticket holders. But it isn’t until the very end of R.O.S.E. that the dancers finally break free from Eyal’s choreography and join the fired-up audience in a brief moment of improvisatory movement with the music. By keeping her dancers at arm’s length, Eyal seems more interested in the club as a backdrop for her signature movement style than wholly as a space with meaningful stories to be told.

Michele Rizzo, HIGHER xtn. 2024. Photography by Cameron Kelly courtesy of MoMA PS1.

Back in May, I attended Wire Festival, a multiday electronic music event at Knockdown Center that had no shortage of organically united dancefloors. It attracted a crowd of seasoned ravers who were eager to celebrate the start of spring as they danced alongside DJs who played well into the daylight. I left Wire in an afternoon daze to see Michele Rizzo’s HIGHER xtn. at MoMA PS1. My sleepless euphoria only deepened as the performance unfolded, starting with a lone dancer who looked plucked out of the festival.

The dancer, dressed in sneakers, baggy jeans, and a tight tank top, shuffled slowly into the gallery, perfectly in sync with the looping bars of an understated electronic melody. Soon, other dancers, clad in the same staple rave uniform, joined him — each having traveled from Europe for the U.S. museum debut of HIGHER xtn., which premiered at the Stedelijk in Amsterdam in 2018 and quickly became a fixture at kunsthalles and festivals across the continent. As the score’s tempo climbed, the choreography locked into a 16-count sequence, which the dancers executed with precise synchrony. They remained intensely focused, never making eye contact with each other, as they sought release in the endless repetition of synthesized beats. Once the dancers reached their limit, they stopped the sequence and exited the gallery, one by one.

HIGHER xtn. used the focused daylight of the gallery to highlight the meditative release found in the repetitive movements that dominate dark dancefloors. The performance’s restraint brought more consistency and intentionality than Eyal’s all-encompassing club construction in R.O.S.E. Yet both performances offer enticing entry points into club culture for those who may not frequent raves. Rizzo’s ecstatic, hypnotic repetitions reveal how the club can mirror other meditative practices, while Eyal’s interpolation of performance and clubbing helped hesitant audience members blossom by the end. Still, both works overlook one of the most underappreciated aspects of clubbing — its potential for individual expression. HIGHER xtn.’s pristine uniformity especially risks promoting the outdated techno trope that there’s a “right” way to dance to electronic music.

Maybe this shortcoming is, in fact, a benefit. For habitual ravers jaded by one too many sunrise sets, it’s a reminder to return to the club with more intention. If you pause and peer through the darkness, you’ll see hundreds of people moving to the same beat, each with their own subtle variations. This collective choreography is a ready-made spectacle that doesn’t need validation in a theater or museum. And when the music shifts slightly, you can watch the ripple effect sweep through the crowd while feeling the new beat in your body. Maybe this small bit of magic is best left on the dance floor.

Culture

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Culture

Porsche SCOPES Brings Art, Music, and Design to Toronto

The festival was a full immersion into Toronto’s dynamic creative energy. Day one set the tone with DJ collective Living Room, followed by an experimental performance by Claire Rousay that captivated the crowd. Jewelry designer Steff Eleoff unveiled her Porsche Taycan 4S art car installation—a bold fusion of automotive and wearable art inspired by her Sedona ring—while OVO Sound’s Naomi Sharon and DVSN wrapped up the night with powerful, genre-defying performances.

We witnessed SCOPES Toronto bridging underground and mainstream with day two’s lineup. DJ Korea Town Acid’s set paved the way for Angelphroot and Dameer’s debut of BASSMATI, a track blending South Asian influences with bass-driven sounds. Chippy Nonstop’s return to Toronto and Richie Hawtin’s extended set were milestones of the evening, proving that the city’s underground scene has a global resonance.

The final day featured standout performances from local pianist Harrison, Indigenous artist Tia Wood, and hip-hop visionary Sean Leon, who elevated his set with a live choir. Moonshine Collective’s film and musical performance explored themes of African utopia, showcasing art’s power to bridge culture and technology. Rising Toronto star SadBoi, who paused her tour to perform at SCOPES, further underscored the festival’s commitment to nurturing local talent.

Throughout the weekend, we experienced installations from artists like Mitsu Mitsu and culinary creations from Bar Mordecai, capturing the multifaceted creativity Porsche SCOPES brought to Toronto. This milestone 10th edition, open to all, allowed Toronto’s vibrant arts scene to thrive, underscoring SCOPES’ mission to celebrate local talent while connecting it to a global audience.

office had the chance to connect with rising star SadBoi ahead of the event. In our conversation, she shared insights into her creative journey and reflected on what performing and growing up in Toronto means to her and her work.

How are you, and where are you at right now? You told me you were traveling.

Um, I’m good, I’m feeling really good right now. I’m traveling back to Salt Lake City. I had a show yesterday in Seattle. I’m on tour right now with Coco and Claire.

How is touring life treating you? Do you like it?

I love being on the road. To be honest, I feel like I don’t know—like I’ve had good experiences and bad ones—but this time it’s really fun, especially with the people I’m surrounded by. It’s also the longest tour I’ve been on; I have about four more weeks to go. I’m trying not to think about how many days I have left.

Do you feel homesick?

Yes, because when I start thinking about how many days are left, I start to miss my dogs. I’ve just been trying to stay in the moment—I don’t even know what day of the week it is, to be honest with you.

Oh, sweet! What are your dogs’ names?

Jillian and Winston. I know, they’re crazy names.

You’ll be performing at SCOPES in Toronto, which is where you grew up. Do you feel like the crowd is different when you perform in Toronto compared to other cities?

Yes, I mean, Toronto just feels different because it’s home. Every time I come back to perform, something in my career has changed. The last time I performed in Toronto, people just wanted to have a good time, and I’m excited to perform back home again to see everyone’s reactions. I know it’s going to be different from the last time. It’s exciting to see your own growth. Toronto is a tough crowd, though. If we’re with you, we’re really with you.

So, they’re super picky? You have to gain their respect, or what is it?

I think Toronto people are in their own world, but when something really connects with them, they’ll lose themselves in the moment. But it takes something to bring them out of that. Toronto crowds are tough because even if they like you, they won’t show it outright until they’re really vibing with you.

It’s like a vibe check, right?

Exactly. They’ll enjoy your performance, but it’s hard to explain. When people visit Toronto, they often say, “Oh, you guys are so nice,” and I’m like, “I don’t think we’re that nice, we’re just polite.” Like, you can walk down the street, and no one will say anything, but it’s just our mannerisms.

You mentioned Toronto can have a moody energy, especially at night, and that the underground night scene there really inspires you. Can you talk more about what makes Toronto's nightlife so influential for you?

Absolutely, Toronto has this unique energy that comes alive at night. Similar to New York, there are the popular clubs everyone knows, but you need to find your niche—the people who know where the real parties are. I remember going to raves in high school yards, sneaking in because I wasn’t old enough. Events like Baby, Jerk!, and Yes Yes Y’all were pivotal, exposing me to DJs blending dancehall with EDM—something I hadn’t seen before. Toronto nightlife is moody and intense, but when everyone’s out, it’s like the whole city is alive.