To be honest, I don’t even think the protests in the US will have any effect on the situation. We’ve seen it all before and let’s not forget that thousands upon thousands of those people protesting didn’t even use their vote to keep the orange racist out of the White House. WTF?!
But yes, I stand by my comments that the protests in Dublin today (or anywhere in Europe) will do sweet feck all to reverse systemic racism on the far side of the Atlantic.
I’m well aware of our history of fighting for civil rights and in any other year, at any other time, I’d be proud as punch to see our streets full of people supporting the BLM movement. Even if it changes nothing’s it’s good to show we care. Not now though. Feck that. We have to find a different way to express solidarity. A way that won’t reverse the hard yards we’ve all fought together to win against this virus. It can’t be all that difficult, surely?
Kind of reluctantly seeing it this way to be honest. It’s great to see so many non black people taking a stand but the more I think about it, the more the cynical side of me thinks a massive amount of people are doing it just to sort of 'be there'.
I dunno, to me there needs to be action, more action from the white population backing this thing. And most of what has gone on before this doesn’t tell me this will happen.
Either one of two things are going on here.
one - the white people around the globe who back this protest (those we see marching/posting things on social media) are in the majority and have not done anywhere near enough to stop the continued institutional racism that is rank in the 'western world'.
two - the white people around the globe who back the protest are actually in the minority and have been doing their bit. However the dark reality is that the majority whilst not actively racist, do not care about racism. It can't be both and it can't be in between because we're seeing the same thing happen everywhere and the same minority of people saying the same things. You touched on this with America voting in Trump but it's not even just there.
I see protests in England yet in a majority white nation, the Prime Minister is a man with a history of racially abusive comments. Non white people in these nations are still repeatedly pointing to racism in their daily life, work and even just going out to shops or for a night out.
I see protests in Canada yet in a majority white nation, the Prime Minister is a man with a history of using black face. Again, non white people in Canada are still talking about widescale racism.
I see protests in Ireland yet in a majority white nation, politicians are actively using 'racist propaganda' to win votes. Again, immigrants are still talking about their racist experiences.
I see protests in New Zealand yet in a majority white nation, the Prime Minister said nothing for years as her close colleagues went on racist tirades. And once again the minority in this country are still saying racism is widespread.
It doesn't make sense, how can all the people protesting from all these countries be coming from countries where casual and open racism appears to be rewarded by you getting to run the whole fecking country. Something is not adding up here. How and why are these people getting into and staying in these positions? It should be noted that all of these politicians have also had their say on George Floyd.
As a white person at these marches, it's all well and good coming out now but when all of this is scaled back down to normal day to day life, the racism is going to continue and you need to follow through. Nobody has a problem criticising and calling out non-racist police officers for standing idle but when you go back to your normal life practice what you preach because if you don't you're just as bad as them.
Don't stay silent at your work drinks when your coked-up-middle-aged-six-figure-salary directors start racially abusing people and calling it 'banter'.
Don't stay silent when you're a white footballer and one of your team mates or opposition players is getting racially abused by the crowd. Walk off the pitch. And don't turn around and say they 'overreacted' in a post match press conference.
Don't stay silent when you're standing in a night club queue and the bouncer turns away a group of black guys in front of you because he saw them "causing problems around the corner", get out of that line, walk away.
Don't stay silent when you have a black partner and don't wanna upset your "traditional" parents by telling them about it.
Don't stay silent when you preach anti racism but allow Zenit St Petersburg to play in your football competitions (UEFA)
Don't stay silent when you're sat in your NHS management conference and look around the room and there are no black or Asian faces.
Don't stay silent when people from ethnic backgrounds have to send on average 60% more job applications than white people do just to get a call back and even have to lie about their name.
And also, for the love of god, stop calling the police on black men standing around doing normal things and describing it as 'suspicious' or 'drug dealing', stop it right now!