racial justice
Image via Shutterstock/ Allison C Bailey
While many Americans, especially white Americans, expect the police to protect their privileges, they often criticize police for the tactics used to protect those privileges. While people should indeed be appalled by racialized police violence, racialized policed violence is actually a symptom of the underlying pandemic of racism — a socially constructed malady designed to protect white privilege.
New York Police Department (NYPD) officers are pictured as protesters rally against the death in Minneapolis police custody of George Floyd, in Times Square in the Manhattan borough of New York City. June 1, 2020. REUTERS/Mike Segar
That’s how fragile black life in the U.S. is. Our risk of being killed by police hinges on little things like the weather.
Voters line up to cast their ballots outside of a polling location after Democratic and Republican primaries were delayed due to the coronavirus disease restrictions in Atlanta, Georgia. June 9, 2020. REUTERS/Dustin Chambers
These types of failures in the voting process may become additional tools in the arsenal of voter suppression, and the Black community must be prepared.
White churches need to enter conversations of racial justice with sobriety.
A demonstrator waves an American flag during a protest against racial inequality in the aftermath of the death in Minneapolis police custody of George Floyd in New York City. June 9, 2020. REUTERS/Idris Solomon
Black people don’t always end up dead when encountering police. But we almost always end up wounded.
Black people have the most grace
You know why we insist that we strong
Cause for 400 years we have carried this weight
We got out okay
We are not okay
You are not okay
This is not okay
Terrence Floyd visits the site near where his brother George was taken in Minneapolis police custody and later killed, in Minneapolis, Minn. June 1, 2020. REUTERS/Eric Miller/File Photo
In Exodus, the Egyptians shed innocent blood. Then God made this blood visible for all to see.
A healthcare worker in protective gear treats a coronavirus disease (COVID-19) patient at the El Centro Regional Medical Center in El Centro, California, U.S., May 27, 2020. REUTERS/Ariana Drehsler
COVID-19 is culling the herd of humanity. Beneath the conversation about herd immunity lies a silent and unstated conversation about who will survive. Why are black and brown communities being hit so hard? Why are we more likely than whites to die if admitted to the hospital? Who gets access to health care of any kind, and with regard to COVID-19, to inequitably distributed tests? Who gets a ventilator and who does not?
A White House staff member gestures to move the press corps back as President Donald Trump walks between lines of police for a photo opportunity at St John's Church. June 1, 2020. REUTERS/Tom Brenner
Last night, Donald Trump used and abused a church, and a Bible, as presidential props for a photo-op. In a violent and authoritarian act, the president of the United States took the space of a church and used a picture of a Bible to make a political move.
Brazos Press
TO UNDERSTAND MY evolution as a reconciliation leader, you must first understand that I began my journey sincerely believing that if I could convince evangelical Christians that reconciliation was not some politically motivated agenda but a biblical calling rooted in Scripture, they would pursue racial justice. For years I tried to be biblical enough, nonthreatening enough, patient enough, persuasive enough, theologically rigorous enough, so that no one could say I had a hidden agenda.
That’s what my ministry was about for a very long time. I preached the good news of multiculturalism and diversity at churches and conferences. I led workshops and taught seminars and told people about inclusion and equity and how Jesus demonstrated these principles in his ministry.
But along the way, there were indicators that my approach, while good and well-intentioned, was not effecting the type of change I knew in my heart needed to take place.
A protester kicks the door of the Florida home of former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin in the Windermere neighbourhood of Orlando, Fla., May 29, 2020. REUTERS/Scott Audette
Derek Chauvin, the Minneapolis police officer who is seen on a bystander's cellphone video kneeling on George Floyd's neck on Monday, has been charged with third-degree murder in Floyd's death, according to Mike Freeman, Hennepin County attorney.
Photo by Jake Gard on Unsplash
COVID-19 reveals the artificiality of the urban/rural divide.
A man stands next to the memorial for Ahmaud Arbery, at the place where he was shot and killed in Feb. after being chased by two white men in Brunswick, Ga. May 8, 2020. REUTERS/Dustin Chambers
When will the lives of black people ever matter to America? Black people are tired.
Ahmaud Arbery, who was shot and killed in Brunswick, Ga., on Feb. 23, 2020, is seen in an undated photo provided by Marcus Arbery via REUTERS.
What value is there in circulating a depiction of innocent black death?
Jan. 13, 2019: Protesters gather in Hurt Park, Atlanta to protest and make demands in response to Brian Kemp being elected as the Governor of Georgia. Credit: Shutterstock
Governor Kemp's COVID-19 response, and the killing of Ahmaud Arbery, replay a longer history.
Members of a Southern bloc of senators, Sens. Tom Connaly, of Texas, Walter F. George, of Georgia, Richard Russell of Georgia, and Claude Pepper of Florida, filibustering an anti-lynching bill in January 1938.
The overwhelming vote last week in the House of Representatives to designate lynching as a federal hate crime shows just how sluggish the pace of change can be in America.
Martin Luther King Jr. and Ralph Abernathy in St. Augustine, Florida. June 1964. Floriday Memory / Flickr
All of them returned to the South’s frontline struggle for racial justice.
This is what slow death looks like for the families of victims of police brutality.
Photo by Chris Lawton on Unsplash
When we’ve decided to call ourselves woke, we are disregarding the journey of becoming woke along the way. When we say we are already decolonized, we are neglecting the seriousness of the journey toward decolonizing in all its complexities.
Kanye West performs at the Way Out West festival on Aug. 13, 2011 in Gothenburg, Sweden. Credit: Shutterstock.
Kanye West draws upon the storied history of black communal worship and gospel music.