America at ‘breaking point,’ activists say
Curry calls for systematic change in policing policies
America is at a “breaking point” with systemic racism in the wake of a police killing of a black man, Boston activists said on Sunday as they called for political action to address inequality in the U.S.
“People are upset, and they’re tired,” Michael Curry, past president of the Boston Branch of the NAACP, said during a livestream discussion on Facebook.
“They’re tired of seeing folks who look like us murdered in the streets.”
“Black America has decided that we’re going to be like the Boston righteous mob — the Revolutionary group that tore up the city of Boston,” he said. “Black America is tired of trying to wait for the system to change itself.”
George Floyd last week was killed after a white Minneapolis police officer put his knee on Floyd’s neck for more than eight minutes.
Floyd said, ‘I can’t breathe,’ as the officer had his knee on his neck.
“That could have been me, that could have been Mike (Curry), that could have been Rahsaan (Hall), that could have been Ricky (Grant),” said the Rev. Willie Bodrick II of Twelfth Baptist Church of Roxbury. “That could have been my brother, that could have been my child, their children.”
If the U.S. doesn’t address the issue of racism, it won’t go away, said Curry who added that America is at a “breaking point.”
“We’ll be here again if we don’t address the sort of systemic issue that deals with race in America,” he said. “We’ll be angry again. We’ll lose more lives again.”
Curry called on leaders to advance policies that will address systemic racism. He said white individuals “with a civil rights compass” need to be bold on body cameras, reparations and more.
The Facebook discussion was organized by Massachusetts Sen. Ed Markey.
“It’s our duty and my duty as an elected official to dismantle the same systems of racial injustice, profiling that are a death sentence for black people in America,” he said. “We need to be on the front lines in demanding change.”
People are hurting, Bodrick said, but, “We don’t hurt without hope.”
“Because we come from a people that fight, and I believe we’re going to keep fighting,” Bodrick said. “And we’re going to keep doing the work that needs to be done.”