Seize this moment to crush systemic racism
We’ve seen the horrifying video: Derek Chauvin, a white Minneapolis police officer presses his knee on the neck of George Floyd, an unarmed Black man, for nearly nine minutes as Floyd cries out in agony, cries out for his mother, pleads for his life.
“I can’t breathe,” he said, struggling to expel the words as his existence is erased.
Three weeks later, we watched Rayshard Brooks cut down by two bullets to the back after he resisted arrest and tussled with two Atlanta police officers, before breaking free with an officer’s Taser and firing it while running away. The encounter was initiated because Brooks was asleep in his car in a Wendy’s drive-through.
The encounter ended, according to Fulton County District Attorney Paul Howard — relying partly on eight video recordings — with one officer kicking Brooks and the other standing on his shoulders as Brooks lay on the ground dying.
The videos still traumatize me. They haunt me. Floyd and Brooks have been laid to rest, but I haven’t slept more than a few hours a night in weeks. I walk and walk and walk, trying to rouse enough endorphins to get me through another day. I swallow tears while on Zoom calls with my colleagues and classmates. Most days I don’t want to talk about it, fearful I’ll do nothing but scream.
We carry the burden of their names, of their faces. We grieve them. Breonna Taylor. Alton Sterling. Tamir Rice. Laquan McDonald. Philando Castile. Michael Brown. Eric Garner. Walter Scott. Freddie Gray. Sandra Bland.
The sorrow, frustration and anger I feel is likely no different than how most other African Americans feel; we are simply exhausted. We think about our children, our nieces and nephews, our fathers, our brothers and sisters. What is their future? How safe are they? We think about ourselves, the pain we feel, the newly opened wounds and those racial gashes we’ve had to suture with emotional suppression for generations.
We’re done quashing our feelings and our voices. We’re done suffering in silence.
This time it feels different
Call it what you will: A national movement; a reckoning; an awakening. We’ve tip-toed around systemic racism in America for too long. I wasn’t alive in the 1960s, so for me this feels different. Tens of thousands of Americans took to the streets for weeks – multigenerational and multiracial protesters – screaming for change, demanding action, refusing to accept the status quo.
Advancements have been made: Numerous police departments have banned the use of choke holds and similar maneuvers that restrict airflow. Local elected officials in some cities have pledged to reform law enforcement policies and use-of-force guidelines in their communities. New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio has promised to divert money from the city's police department to social services.
Corporations have pledged support for eradicating racism and to the Black Lives Matter movement. Some have shuttered their decadesold branding of products, including the retirement of the packaging on Aunt Jemima pancake mixes and syrup. Statues and monuments of people with links to slavery have been removed by local and state officials – and sometimes by protesters. NASCAR banned the Confederate flag from flying at events.
Now what? It’s a weighty question with many answers.
I appreciate the symbolic gestures and cultural statements, but this social justice movement is nuanced and layered. America has a chance to reinvent itself, a chance to course correct the decades and centuries of inequality – in our workplace, in government, in education, in health care, in entertainment, in sports, and in corporate structures. We have an opportunity to be unabashedly bold in our journey toward real change, but it will require consistent diligence.
George Floyd’s death served as a touchstone in addressing police brutality nationwide. But this reckoning around racism goes well beyond Floyd, and well beyond police abusing Black people. Richard Pierce, a University of Notre Dame associate professor of history recently told me: “If this movement only refers to police reform, it will be a lost opportunity."
We must ask hard questions
We must start by asking ourselves what part we play in the systemic racism that exists in this country. Then we must be willing to do the work – by looking inward for answers that can help bring about peaceful change; by grabbing the hands of our brothers and sisters, unified with purpose; by showing compassion and empathy, by listening and truly hearing the perspective of others. This must be the work of all Americans. None of us can afford to sit on the sidelines.
I have read a lot about apartheid recently. It feels relevant. It offers lessons. When South Africa became independent from Great Britain in 1948, a legal system was implemented that institutionalized the separation of races and promoted white supremacy. Blacks were required to carry passbooks and permits when entering white neighborhoods, and the best housing, jobs, education and economic opportunities were reserved for whites.
Resistance to apartheid within South Africa took many forms over the years, including the uprising of hundreds of thousands of South African Blacks who participated in nonviolent demonstrations in their fight for equal treatment and opportunity.
Apartheid was dismantled in 1994. And under President Nelson Mandela, the country established a Truth and Reconciliation Commission, led by Archbishop Desmond Tutu. The purpose was to help bring healing and reconciliation by uncovering the truth about human rights violations that had occurred during apartheid. In short, they had uncomfortable conversations about race and the many inequities Black people endured.
We don’t have decades for similar dialogue. We know the injustices. We have the video evidence. And the economic evidence. We have test scores and health statistics. We are aware of the makeup of boardrooms and newsrooms. Oscars are so white. NFL quarterback Colin Kaepernick is unemployed. The disparities are endless. Unless we choose to be blind to racism, we have all the facts and data we need.
Honestly, this is an extraordinary time to be alive. Revolutions are painful and polarizing – but imagine what a nation of true inclusion, diversity and equity could bring. Imagine and then act. From pain comes progress.
Let’s use that haunting image of George Floyd’s death – that knee on his neck for nearly nine minutes – to empower ourselves. Let's rise up and be better. I have to believe this time we are capable.
America, keep your knee on the neck of racism. Strangle it. Crush the life out of it. This is our moment; this is our chance.
The sorrow, frustration and anger I feel is likely no different than how most other African Americans feel; we are simply exhausted.