On May 25, 2020, a man named George Floyd was killed in Minneapolis by a police officer, Derek Chauvin, who knelt on his neck until he became unresponsive. This incident enraged the entire United States. What was the reason that made the people of US so angry?
Floyd was an unarmed black man who was forced out of his car by four white police officers, even though he did not resist the police and cooperated fully, he was killed by one of the officers while the other three helped him nail Floyd to the ground. Bystanders recorded this inhumane incident and it could clearly be seen how Floyd was begging for his life for about ten minutes.
The concept of white supremacy has been around in the US for years but the death of Floyd send chill down citizens’ spine as they realised that there’s a group of people out there whose lives are in danger for nothing. People all across the US erupted in protest shouting: “I can’t breathe”, which were the last words of Floyd, and this incident was the beginning of the Black Lives Matter movement in the US.
The death of George Floyd fuelled the long-kept anger towards the on-going racism in the country. Racism has been long rooted in the history of the US. The African-Americans had to suffer for about 246 years of slavery (1619-1865), 89 years of segregation (1865-1954) and to this day racism is still in a lot of people’s blood.
Although the civil war officially abolished slavery but the discrimination against the African-American in the US did not stop. They were ripped off of opportunities, treated as inferiors and continued to endure a complete segregation by their white counterparts. But after every night comes dawn; people of the US started to voice their concerns and demanded equal status for all regardless of their race. They demanded basic human rights, i.e to be treated fairly and equally in the society by law. And so the new era of change began with anti-racist movements.
During the second world war, black men and women served bravely despite their sufferings but what is more historic is that the Tuskegee Airmen, a military unit, broke this racial barrier by becoming the first black aviators in US Army Air Corps. However, many black soldiers and veterans were still looked down upon. Another revolution can be the Montgomery Bus Strike by Rosa Parks. On December 1, 1955 Rosa Parks boarded a bus and was asked to yield her seat to a white passenger though she refused and remained seated, but this incident was not as small as it sounds. This event led to the first major demonstration against segregation of African-Americans in the US.
On August 28, 1963, 250,000 people gathered in the US capital, Washington DC for “March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom” to rally for the social and political injustice African-Americans faced even after 100 years of emancipation. The march was very peaceful and many important public figures participated such as Bob Dylan, Mahalia Jackson, James Farmer etc. The march is best remembered for Martin Luther King Jr.’s famous speech “I have a dream”.
However, these movements were of past which brought great changes to the present but is America free of racism today? No. Racism is ingrained in many people’s veins even to this date. This word is their only supposed power that they can assert when felt threatened.
After four days of protest, the Minneapolis police arrested Derek Chauvin and charged him with third degree murder which indicates he unintentionally killed Floyd. But this is not the end, there are so many people just like Floyd who lost their lives just because they were being “threatening” to the society by just having a walk in the park or casually lining up in a cafe. According to a CNN report, more people of colour are being affected by Covid-19 because of less access to care, more people of colour are losing employment due to the pandemic because of the obvious choice over minority, yet they make up the higher percentage of those who are providing essential services. In a nutshell, they are helping more and being helped less.
How long will the white supremacists hide behind systematic racism to fulfil their agendas? It is high time for another revolution to at least make it clear that every life is important regardless of their race. What’s more threatening is being able to kill people and get away with it because of being white but calling the people of colour as “aggressors”. It is high time for all of the America to realise that even black lives matter.