I, like so many people, have been in a lot of pain this week.
Having to witness the lynching of a black man at the hands of the police, whose very role is to protect, just compounds the murder and is deeply upsetting.
So when I see people protesting in the streets here against the murder of George Floyd and so many others by police in the US, it fills me with pride. I’m sure that attendees of these protests understand the risks of joining in during the current Covid-19 pandemic, and yet still they gather and march.
Some have even said they fear they’ll be killed by structural inequality before they’ll be killed by
coronavirus. People of all colours and classes are passionate for change and want to make sure their voice is heard. I share that desire.
And I know people will make their own informed decisions, taking the risk to themselves and those close to them into account. It goes without saying that I encourage everyone who marches to please be mindful of the need to maintain social distancing to protect the most vulnerable in our community.
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What concerns me is not the actions of these protesters, but that some are pushing a narrative that the people taking to the streets will somehow be responsible for a second wave of the virus.
This, in my view, is a cynical attempt to not only discourage people from using their right to protest but an attempt to shift the blame away from this Government’s incompetence if there is a second wave.
One Conservative MP even
tweeted a picture of a protest in Central
London with the words ‘Hope these people don’t blame the government if there’s a 2nd spike’. He has since apologised and said he supports the campaign for justice.
But he wasn’t alone and as I have publicly questioned, where was their outrage when people took to the streets for
VE Day? Matt Hancock has now encouraged people
not to attend Black Lives Matter protests for safety reasons. I didn’t hear this same attitude from the Government in discouraging VE Day celebrations.
Where was their anger when we saw people flock to the beaches in Devon, Cornwall, Brighton? Or even their indignation when people were forced to cram onto the tube and buses to get to work? The fact that so many people are willing to take to the streets at this time to stand up against racism shows the strength of feeling and the importance of this critical moment.
To not even be sensitive to the response to a lynching of a black man is inhuman at the very least.
Thousands attend Black Lives Matter protests in London
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We need support everywhere from our local shops to the ballot box (Picture: AP Photo/Frank Augstein)
Structural racism is prevalent in our society. We know it exists as we see it every day. People like me are subjected to it every day. I’ve talked previously about experiencing it on my first term as an MP,
when I was mistaken for a cleaner.
It must be stopped and that starts by coming together in solidarity to call it out. That is why I am so proud to see so many people marching against injustice.
It is so important we make clear that it’s no longer good enough to not be racist. What we need is for everyone to be anti-racist, as Angela Y. Davis has so perfectly said.
We need people to speak up when a group of young black men, for example, are handcuffed for no reason, as we have seen recently.
We need our allies to speak up when a white person is standing behind a black person at a counter yet somehow gets served first.
We need our white allies to speak up when they are in a boardroom and a black person is ignored, yet a white person gets praise for saying the same thing.
And we need solidarity to ensure that when our leaders say something racist, they are not rewarded for it.
We need support everywhere from our local shops to the ballot box, and more if we are to bring about fundamental and long-lasting change. It’s about coming together to say ‘In my lifetime I will be a part of ending racism and inequality’.
It is only with that solidarity from our allies that we will move the dial on racism. That’s when we will have social equity and equity in education, and economically.
None of us are perfect and we all hold inherent bias. But when those in power make decisions that have a clear and negative disproportionate effect on black and brown people, we must say no. We cannot stand for that.
abc7news.com
