2020, take a workshop! You do not put devastating fires, killer wasps, a pandemic, economic crisis and the worlds largest civil rights movement into the first six months... what have you got planned for the rest of this year?
In case you really are on a foreign planet reading this the title of this post, "no more hashtags" is my way of saying no more deaths in black community at the hands of the people charged with protecting the general public. Each person who has died becomes a hashtag to get their names out into the world and get justice for that person. Ahmaud Arbery, George Floyd, and of course, Breonna Taylor are the names on the world's lips at the moment. If you don't know those names, where have you been? Why am I, a white person, writing this post on black lives matter? I have learnt this week that we should having uncomfortable conversations with our friends and family and I honestly believe the only way some people will access the things I have learnt over the last two weeks is hearing it from someone who's writing they like to read, instead of seeking out the voices they should be listening to. As well as that, I am part of the LGBTQ+ community, the comfortable relatively safe life I live with my girlfriend today may not have been possible if it weren't for black people like Marsha P Johnson and the Stonewall Riots.
Black people who may have stumbled upon this, rest assured this post will contain links to your voices and people that can tell your story properly. Please comment or contact me with me anything I may have fucked up here, I realise as an ally my journey is forever, and I will be learning as I go and that means sometimes I will fuck up and I apologise wholeheartedly- I am trying every day to be better, and to continue learning. I write because I enjoy writing, and do not get paid to write, so I am not profiting from your story, merely trying to share it with more people.
I felt compelled to write this because I am sick of seeing uneducated posts by people I know in real life on social media about ALL lives matter, or about how people didn't riot when Lee Rigby was murdered by terrorists. First up, black people know that all lives matter, but right now you shouting that isn't helping anyone, because as a white person you are not being oppressed. It's like your friend breaking their leg and asking for help because they're in pain, and you responding by stamping your feet, crossing your arms and saying "what about my legs?".
from @chrisstewart_esq_ on instagram via distinct today
Right now the focus is on black lives because black people are being murdered by police men. George Floyd was murdered for potentially having a fake bank note in his possession, which as it turned out wasn't fake anyway. Breonna Taylor was murdered in her bed at home when plain clothes police officers broke in and shot 14 times, 8 of which hit Breonna who was in her underwear in bed and died in her hallway. Yes, you will have heard that her husband was firing back- but if people came storming into your home and started shooting you would shoot back. He even called 911 for assistance not realising the police were the people who killed Breonna. The police's response to the murder was that they had the wrong address. Lee Rigby's mother has called for his image not be used against the Black Lives Matter movement. Lee Rigby's murderers were arrested on the scene. It took 74 days and a video being leaked of Ahmaud Arbery being killed to get his murderers arrested, even although the police knew who the perpetrators were. It took a week for Derek Chauvin- the police officer who held his knee into George Floyd's neck with his hands in his pockets whilst George Floyd said "I can't breathe", to be arrested for the murder of George Floyd, and even then it was only "Third Degree Murder" which is the American Equivalent of manslaughter. Derek Chauvin already had 18 complaints of brutality against him. One of the officers had been on the job for four days. Breonna Taylor's killers have not been arrested, suspended or even disciplined for murdering her.
There have been protests in all 50 states of America, and across 18 other countries, including Canada and Australia who both have racial issues with their indigenous people. However this is nothing new, this is only new to white people. Black people have been oppressed for hundreds of years by white people who brought them to their shores to work as slaves. Whilst the 13th amendment was added to the American constitution in January 1865 to abolish slavery there was a clause
13th Amendment
Section 1: Neither slavery not involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.
Section 2: Congress shall have the power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.
Except as punishment....
In the Southern states, immediately after slavery was ended, black people were rounded up and convicted of felonies such as loitering or vagrancy- because of course they were homeless after they'd been freed. The state perpetrated the view that all black men were rapists- a view held by many to this day- when white men attacking black women far outweighs black men attacking white women.The state allowed lynchings to happen and in 1955 14 year old Emmett Till was shot, mutilated and beaten to death for the crime of wolf- whistling at a white woman- a woman who has since come forward and admitted that it was a false accusation. This was 90 years after slavery had ended.
Then there were the Jim Crow laws that enforced the segregation of black and other POC (people of colour) from white people. Whole towns in the South became white only, and black people were forced to work in different areas or places than their white counterparts. White and Black people would have to use separate entrances to buildings. Black people were reduced to second class status. More than 360,000 black men served in World War I, and they were rewarded with 25 racially motivated riots when they returned home. In Chicago white mobs lynched black veterans in their uniforms. The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) fought for redress, and won support from both black and white people, however not enough. After World War II America was changed and they could not ignore the parallels between Hitler's Master Race and White Supremacy. It was President Harry Truman who fought for equality between white and black people, however this lost him the vote of four states in the following election. He enforced fair voting and hiring, and ended transportation between states.
Whilst President Eisenhower downplayed equal rights, it was Richard Nixon who introduced the "war on crime". The war on crime was a smokescreen to put black people behind bars:
"We knew we couldn't make it illegal to be either against the war or black, but by getting the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and blacks with heroin, and then criminalising both heavily... We could arrest their leaders, raid their homes, break up their meetings, and vilify them night after night on the evening news. Did we know we were lying about the drugs? Of course we did."- John Ehrlichman, top advisor to the Nixon administration.
Ronald Reagan's government continued this "war on crime" by giving black people in possession of drugs full, long sentences with high bail or no parole- white people, however, for the same crime would get a slap on the wrist. This example can be seen today with Brock Turner serving just 3 months in jail for the rape of Chanel Miller because serving longer would ruin his future prospects. Yet 16 year old Cyntoia Brown was set to serve 51 years in prison for murdering her rapist. Politicians, during election campaigns would use the Southern Strategy to get elected. Bill Clinton introduced 85% mandatory sentencing and the three strikes and you're out- life in prison. Many civil trials were cancelled in favour of a plea bargain, which meant many black people have been convicted of crimes they did not commit. The Southern Strategy is talking so vaguely that what you are saying appears to be about the economy, but in reality is about race.
There are 40,000 collateral consequences of being convicted as a felon in the USA. That includes the inability to get business licences, loans including student loans, food stamps, rent a house and the right to vote. In Alabama in 2015, when President Obama walked across the Edmund Pettus Bridge, 30% of black males were unable to vote because they'd been convicted of a felony.
So, now you've heard all that, let's talk about the American Legislative Exchange Council. They are a political lobbying group that write laws and give them, specifically, to republicans. The members are both politicians and corporations who then vote on which laws to present to congress. Perhaps their most famous law is Stand Your Ground, that got George Zimmerman off a charge for murdering the teenager Trayvon Martin. They are also the organisation that presented the 85% mandatory sentencing, and three strikes and you're out to Bill Clinton. The businesses involved in ALEC have included WalMart- the United States biggest retailer of guns and ammunition- altho' they have now left, the Corrections Corporation of America (I mean you couldn't make this shit up, the build and control 20% of the prisons in America), Securus Technology, Aramark, Corizon, and Unicor. What do these companies do? Well Securus provides phone lines for prisons, Aramark provides food for prisons, Corizon provides prison healthcare. They turn over $1BILLION in profit each year. You'll notice I missed unicor, they provide prison labour. Now yes, to a point I think if you're rightfully incarcerated for something then you should be doing something useful with your time. However that does not include making underwear for Victoria's Secret! That is slave labour, and THAT is exactly what the people in power, and people behind them have always wanted; for black bodies to be working for free and thus abusing that clause in the 13th Amendment.
Here's some Stats for you about the American Prison System:
The United States of America, land of the free, accounts for 25% of the global prison population.
Black males make up 6.5% of the population of the USA and yet they account for 40.2% of the American prison population.
A black male has a 1 in 3 likelihood of lifetime imprisonment
A white male has a 1 in 17 chance of lifetime imprisonment.
A white male has a 1 in 17 chance of lifetime imprisonment.
As I have said these facts and figures are all about things happening in the USA. You may think these things do not happen in the UK, but they do. In 1835 our government took out a loan to pay slave owners compensation for "loss of human property". If you are a British taxpayer, or were, until 2015 your taxes were paying off these loan payments. Some of which were being paid to Richard Drax's family, MP for South Dorset- good on you Dorset for voting that piece of shit in. Exclusions within primary schools are up 40% over the last decade for racism.
Last year in the UK 137 people died as a result of police contact, 126 (92%) were male and 11 (8%) were female. 78 (57%) were black or black British and 31 (22%) were Asian or Asian British.
Resources
Believe me, this is just the tip of the iceberg and there is so much more to learn. Not just why being accepting of black people isn't enough, you need to be anti-racist and you need to learn about the flip side of the history you were taught in schools. So please get yourself across to these websites, watching these netflix documentaries/ movies/ programmes, and reading some books- which, if you can, please buy from black book sellers, of which I will link to below. Please do not buy them from private sellers on amazon or eBay who have inflated the prices ridiculously, that money is not going to the author.
Books right now are not just out of stock, but out of print. Polly and I are awaiting the books we wish to buy to be printed and delivered to our local bookstore. However this anti-racism resource is a great start whilst we're waiting.
Instagram
@iamrachelricketts
@_wordsofmeraki
@accordingtoweeze
@laylafsaad
@themanacho
@nowhitesaviours
@osopepatrisse
@_wordsofmeraki
@accordingtoweeze
@laylafsaad
@themanacho
@nowhitesaviours
@osopepatrisse
Netflix UK
- 13th- almost all the information I have written on here came from the notes I took from watching that. It documents the criminalisation of black American's.
- The Hard Stop this documentary follows the family of Mark Duggan who was shot and killed in Tottenham in 2011.
- Time: The Kalief Browder Story this series follows the case of Kalief Browder who was accused of stealing a backpack (spoiler he didn't) and spent two of his three years in prison, without a charge, in solitary confinement.
- The Death and Life of Marsha P Johnson this is explores the suspicious death of Marsha P Johnson, one of the most prominent figures in the Stonewall Uprising.
- When They See Us- the story of the Central Park 5 who were convicted of attacking a white woman, a crime they did not commit, whilst the police pitted them against each other to try and get them convicted.
- Explained: The Racial Wealth Gap delves into the wealth gap and how slavery, housing discrimination and centuries of inequality have led to inequality
iPlayer
- Black and British: A Forgotten History BBC2
- Black is in the New Black BBC2
Books
Wow, there are so many books so I'm going to throw it to @idealbookshelf to show them all to you. Here are the links to British Black- Owned Bookstores you should try to buy them from
Hope Road Publishing
Jacaranda Books
New Beacon Books
Round Table Books (kids book store)
Dialogue Books
Jacaranda Books
New Beacon Books
Round Table Books (kids book store)
Dialogue Books
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