Every fall, (PSL) pumpkin spice latte season rolls in with its own ritual. This year, (like last), it collided with calls to boycott Starbucks in solidarity with Palestine (as well as unions). And when I showed up, PSL in hand, the comments lit up.
Some accused me of hypocrisy. Others lectured me about unions or Palestine’s struggle. A few got downright hostile. But here’s the truth:
This isn’t about coffee. It’s about empire.
Why Either/Or Isn’t Liberation
Supremacy culture thrives on binaries. It tells us:
* Either you boycott Starbucks or you don’t care.
* Either you’re “with Palestine” or you’re “lost and confused.”
* Either you choose the perfect moral action or you’re complicit.
But binaries flatten the real work. They erase that America itself is a settler-colonial project built on Indigenous land and Black labor. They allow white-bodied people to feel righteous about skipping Starbucks while never reckoning with the settler colony they wake up in every single day.
This is either/or thinking, one of the 15 pillars of supremacy culture. And it’s killing our ability to move in nuance, in community, in practice.
Boycotts, History, and Harm Reduction
A little history: boycotts trace back to Irish tenant farmers in the 1880s, who refused to pay rent to an English landlord named Charles Boycott. That act of refusal sparked a global tactic that remains powerful today.
And let me be clear — I’m not anti-boycott. In fact, as someone who once bought a PSL damn near daily, I’ve shifted my practice. Last year, I set a boundary: two PSLs a season, the rest I make at home. Why? Because harm reduction isn’t just about individual health; it’s about how we resist empire without losing joy.
Shaming people for finding delight in small things ignores the whole person and the whole of oppression. Liberation requires nuance, not austerity.
The Contradictions We Live Inside
Let’s be honest: arguing with me about Palestine from an iPhone with a watermelon emoji in your bio is diabolical. That device was made possible by child labor, extraction, and genocide in the Congo.
And before you pivot to “buy local” as the moral high ground, let’s tell the truth: your mom-and-pop café still sources beans from lands where farmers are underpaid, exploited, and dispossessed. They operate on stolen Turtle Island land. They pay taxes to a settler state that funds war, police, and pipelines.
There is no consumer purity under empire. None of us get to stand outside complicity.
The question is not: Are your hands clean? The question is: What are you doing, here and now, to dismantle the settler-colonial systems you benefit from?
The Shame Trap
Social media thrives on performance. A 60-second clip becomes a morality play. Virality rewards outrage, not nuance. And empire loves this because performance collapses into shame.
The cycle looks like this:
* Shame: “You’re not doing enough.”
* Apathy: “Nothing I do matters.”
* Inaction: “So I won’t do anything.”
* Empire Wins.
Shame is the perfect tool of empire because it immobilizes us. Shame → Apathy → Inaction → Empire Wins.
When we compete over who is “more oppressed,” when we argue oppression Olympics instead of building solidarity, empire wins again. Even our oppression becomes unimaginative — recycled talking points that block us from imagining something beyond empire.
Embodied Liberation
Living in constant atrocities takes a toll on our nervous systems. Palestine. Congo. Sudan. Turtle Island. Everywhere, empire is extracting, exploiting, and killing. If we try to hold it all without care, we burn out.
Regulation, rest, and joy aren’t luxuries. They are liberation practices. My PSL is not about coffee — it’s about reminding myself that joy exists even in empire, and that joy fuels resistance.
Rest is resistance. Pleasure is protest. Joy is fuel.
Local and Global Solidarity
It is hypocrisy to scream “boycott” abroad while ignoring genocide, poverty, and land theft here. Cop City in Atlanta? Same playbook as U.S. military bases in the Philippines, Okinawa, and Palestine: land occupation, militarization, suppression of resistance.
Empire exports its strategy. If you can see Gaza but not Standing Rock, if you can name Palestine but not the child in your neighborhood going hungry — your solidarity is shallow.
Land Back begins under your feet.
Harm Reduction and Accessibility
Yes, divestment matters. Yes, boycotts can shift power. But not everyone can opt out equally. Disabled folks, poor folks, rural communities — sometimes Amazon is the only accessible option. Sometimes the “cheap” store is the only one within reach.
Divesting is not about consumer purity. It’s about harm reduction. Take stock of your capacity, then redirect what you can. Maybe it’s $5 a month to a mutual aid fund. Maybe it’s pooling a Costco membership with neighbors. Maybe it’s buying a bus pass for someone else.
Small acts are not small when they interrupt empire’s flow of resources.
The Cycles We’re Caught In
Empire’s Cycle
Shame – “You’re not doing enough, you’re a bad person.”Apathy – “Nothing I do will ever matter, so why bother?”Inaction – Silence, collapse, opting out.Empire Wins – The system remains untouched, supremacy unchallenged.
Liberation’s Cycle
Clarity – “I am the settler. I am complicit in empire.”Accountability – “What am I doing to dismantle settler colonialism here?”Action – Land back, moving resources, building parallel systems.Liberation – Joy, solidarity, and collective care sustain us.
Praxis Analysis: Empire’s cycle immobilizes us with shame. Liberation’s cycle moves us through clarity into accountability, into embodied action that sustains joy and solidarity. The question is not: Are your hands clean? The question is: Which cycle are you feeding?
What Reckoning Looks Like
Before we argue coffee, I want white-bodied people to start with these words:“I am the settler. I am actively participating in settler colonialism.”
And for Black Americans, I want us to start with these words:“I am not the settler, I am the stolen. I was forced into the settler-colonial state, and I am still entangled in it. Though I am no settler, I live on stolen land. My reparations and my liberation are tied to divesting from its systems, supporting Land Back, and building liberated Black futures.”
This reckoning is not about shame. It’s about clarity that moves us into practice.
3 Acts of Land Back You Can Take
* Support Land Return. Contribute to Indigenous-led rematriation and land trusts.
* Move Resources. Redirect money, time, and labor into Black and Indigenous co-ops, mutual aid, and sovereignty projects.
* Build Parallel Systems. Invest in food sovereignty, community care networks, and collective governance so we are less dependent on the state that harms us.
Reflection Prompts
* Where am I still clinging to either/or thinking instead of embracing both/and?
* How do I use shame (toward myself or others) in ways that block action?
* What daily practice of joy can I reclaim as resistance fuel?
Practice Your Praxis
Self: Notice where shame keeps you from action — and replace it with a harm reduction step.Home: Redirect one expense (streaming service, daily coffee, fast shipping) into a Black/Indigenous-led project.Work: Challenge either/or thinking at work. Bring nuance into conversations about justice, solidarity, and DEI.
Closing
But this is not about Starbucks.It’s about empire, land, and complicity.
Boycotts can be one tool, but don’t confuse them for liberation. Don’t center corporations when the real question is: how will you divest from the settler colony you are standing on?
And as we reckon with Palestine, with Congo, with Turtle Island and beyond, let us hold both/and:
* Joy and solidarity.
* Resistance and tenderness.
* Harm reduction and empire dismantling.
Because liberation isn’t purity. Liberation is practice.
"Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself that you have built against it." — Rumi
Signed with love,Desireé B. StephensLiberation Education — Where Reflection Meets Transformation
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