Decolonial Path for Quakers 9 – Asking the right questions

In documenting this decolonial journey I’ve written about Quakers’ use of questions or queries as a spiritual practice. I thought we would need to modify our current queries to bring more attention to the colonial systems we have been living under.

Incommensurable

During this journey I found the use of the term incommensurable to be a crucial concept. Incommensurable means completely incompatible, or mutually exclusive. In the case of colonialization, our current, interlocking systems of Christian colonial capitalist violence are incommensurable with the decolonial repair mechanisms of LANDBACK, Mutual Aid and Abolition of police and prisons.

Settler Futurity

It became clear that many of our queries make assumptions about the legitimacy and ongoing presence of our current systems of Christian colonial capitalist violence. I recently wrote about settler futurity, which is the idea that settler colonialism isn’t just about taking land, but also about controlling the very idea of the future. It’s a way of thinking that presents the settler society as the only possible future—as a permanent and natural reality. A useful concept to push back against as part of our decolonizing work.

Decolonial Witness

IYM(C) Testimony	Traditional Expression	Proposed Decolonial Witness
Integrity	Truthfulness, plain speech	LANDBACK: Material restitution for stolen land and complicity in cultural genocide.
Equality & Community	Mutual care, recognition of “that of God” in all	Mutual Aid: Horizontal solidarity that dismantles charity hierarchies and builds beloved community.
Peace	Refusal of military service, nonviolence	Abolition: Dismantling the systemic violence of the carceral state (police and prisons).

Decolonial Queries

What is needed is a complete spiritual reorientation to systems of decolonial justice, i.e. LANDBACK, Mutual Aid, and Abolition. We need to work on advices and queries related to: