Over the past few weeks we have seen the veil lifted and torn regarding the state of racial cohesion throughout America -with the public lynching of Ahmad Arbery, and the murder of George Floyd by the Minneapolis police. Mr. Floyd was suffocated to death as the police knelt on his neck for almost ten minutes. We hear him call out for his mother as his cries of “I can’t breathe” went unheard by the police officers who actively and passively allowed his life to be cut short. Whether it was a lawful or an unlawful arrest, Mr. Floyd deserved due process and the opportunity to plead his case in the court of law.
These incidents of police brutality through harassment and assault tactics continue to go vastly under-reported across the globe. Although police brutality may be expressed differently throughout the word, its abuse of power and perpetuation of corruption is undeniable no-matter where you are. For many African Americans it’s just another day dealing with corrupt law-enforcement personnel with fragile egos, and we as a society have internalized and normalized behavior that should never be tolerated in the first place. Many African immigrants discover their new racial identities once they enter these nations where they are no longer the typical face. It is important that we document and report these incidents in real-time to better reflect their pervasiveness, and to root them out. The Harassment and Assault Reporting Platform (H.A.R.P) is one avenue that aims to efficiently and conveniently gather crowd-sourced data on harassment and assault incidents globally.
Although some may think this movement is in response to a singular event, the reality is that this cry has been long overdue; given the continued unjustified killings of black people -underlined with strong racial tensions. George Floyd’s death has since triggered a global call for change in policing not only in America, but everywhere the African diaspora may be found. The current day police system is rooted in the history of catching and killing of slaves by slave patrols. All these years later, African Americans are still asking for basic human rights. Rights their grandparents and ancestors before them protested and demanded for but never quite received.
Slavery turned into The New Jim Crow and systemic racism which continues to disenfranchise people of African descent in America and across the globe. Be it police brutality, economic under-representation or post-colonial oversight and brain-washing, these issues continue to erode the fabric of our communities both within the continent and across the diaspora. It is time we speak out, share our experiences and call out for justice for ALL children of the motherland. The freedoms we enjoy in these western nations today are the fruits of the labour our African ancestors bled and died for -that we may be free.
When we say Black Lives matter, it’s not to dismiss other lives mattering, but rather to remind us all that Black Lives Matter TOO -something that the descendants of the European colonizers seem to forget has been inherently weaved into the fabric of present-day capitalism and the constitutions of many Euro-centric nations. To truly heal the rift caused by racism, and its many derivatives around the world, we must first call it out by its name, and see it for what it truly is; a CHOICE. A choice to be willfully ignorant of our brothers’ and our sisters’ needs; for the comfort of a select majority populous. It’s 2020 and it is high-time we called for a drastic overhaul in the cultural and societal norms in America and similar nations; normalized practices and beliefs that continue to divide us and keep true progress at bay. We must remember we are One Africa, at home and throughout the diaspora, and when the tides of change roll in we rise together.
