White people, please listen to what black people are telling us.
The brutal murder of George Floyd at the hands of Minneapolis Police Officers has sparked anger in all who have seen it. We all want the police who were responsible to be brought to justice, but this murder and the protests in response are about so much more than this one criminal act.
This murder sends a message to the black and brown communities that they are not safe when interacting with police, a message they have been receiving for many generations. This murder is not occurring in isolation. The history of black people in America is a history of white people using violence to oppress and subjugate brown bodies. This systemic oppression begins with the institution of slavery and is continuous to this day. The way racism and oppression present themselves has not always looked the same. Institutionalized racism has a way of being reshaped in order to persist as our society changes and evolves. As our societal norms shift, systemic racism adapts to take new forms and survive. From slavery, to Jim Crow, to segregation, to housing discrimination, to mass-incarceration and the war on drugs, black people have consistently and maliciously been targeted and subjugated in order to support white supremacy.
The country we live in has been shaped by the exploitation of the black community. Police brutality and the targeting of minorities by the criminal justice system are just a few of the many ways that black people are kept in a subjugated position in contemporary society. As white people we have a difficult time recognizing this because we have never experienced it ourselves. We cannot know what the experiences of our black people in our country are like. But we can be empathetic and support them in their struggle.
In order to create a better, more loving, more equitable future for ourselves and the next generation we need to listen to the messages the black community is sending us right now. And I mean really listen. Listen without doubt or preconceived notions, listen without being dismissive, listen and just consider the message that’s being delivered. We can’t begin to understand what it’s like to live as a black person in America, but they’re trying to tell us. Black voices have been silenced and ignored for centuries. It’s our obligation to listen to the voices of the oppressed and use our privilege to help them have their voices heard. To quote Angela Davis, “In a racist society, it is not enough to be non-racist, we must be anti-racist.” If you believe in equality, you need to get outside the comfortability of your white privilege and take steps to combat racism.
It’s easy for us to be dismissive of the protests because we are uncomfortable with the form the protests are taking. Frankly, it doesn’t matter what our opinions are on the form of protest, our white privilege blinds us. Historically, white people are always uncomfortable with black people making themselves heard, regardless of the form of protest.
We are numb to the suffering the white community has inflicted on the black community for generations. Today we look back on institutions like slavery and segregation and we are disgusted that these systems of racism and oppression ever existed. We condemn past racism while simultaneously being blind to the system of racism present in our own time, our white privilege blinds us. If you’ve been ignorant to the deeply rooted racism in contemporary society until now, the solution is not to continue your denial, the first step towards a solution is to acknowledge your privilege and not allow yourself to be blind any longer.
Staying silent only perpetuates the centuries old status quo of white supremacy. Human beings are being murdered in the street, taken away from their friends, their family, their children, targeted for the color of their skin. The only way to prevent more bloodshed is to take action and taking action means getting uncomfortable. Please, practice radical empathy and be a part of the solution, not a part of the problem. These are structural and societal problems, but each of us has a choice whether we will support the way things are, or if we will do whatever we can to change the worst parts of society. We all need to be better than we’ve been, lives are depending on it.
If any people of color reading this object to anything I said or feel I’m overstepping, please let me know so I can be better going forward.
-Ben Ebbs, DSHS ‘16
