Why #BlackLivesMatter should matter to every fucking one of us
I’ve been drafting this out for a while now but with no fucking clue on how I was going to break the exhausting exposure to a perverse constellation of deaths of black Americans at the hands of the police.
America’s current incarnation of a civil rights movement, organized under the rallying cry of #BlackLivesMatter has never been more powerful than it is today.
The past week has been mad, emotional and liberating, for all blacks around the world. I couldn’t be more happy (not in the expanse of all the black lives lost -rip-, especially to police brutality) to see these folks having their time on the streets, protesting for what they believe in, right now. The resistance to #BlackLivesMatter is a token of the historical amnesia that penetrates a certain Western culture, a certain American culture, where the historically disenfranchised are asked to forget. But how can one forget when the present sometimes eerily mirrors the past? There is no romanticisation of history when you live in a disenfranchised body. The pains of those who came before you live inside the very skin that contains your body.
If we want the world to get better, we all have to stand together.
However, I’m struck by how tone deaf people seem when responding to powerful messages of #BlackLivesMattter with an argument that we should instead say #AllLivesMatter. When someone says all lives matter, they are clearly missing the point — and they’re most likely a middle class ‘non-black’ person. Someone even went on to exacerbate it by saying that all sentient being matters. No fucking doy?
Well, of course all fucking lives matter. What kind of idiot do you take us for? When you say to me #AllLivesMatter, what you are really saying is that only your life matters and you don’t give a flying fuck about anybody else.
“Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.”
Unfortunately, not everyone believes black lives matter. This may be a function of bigoted racism — the belief and insistence that black is less than, not equal to; seemingly inferior. But more than this blatantly racist belief, there is a certain ignorance that prevails in the mischaracterisation of what black lives matter actually means.
There are those who believe that black lives matter translates to only black lives matter. There are those who believe that the phrase is “divisive” to the American culture as a whole. And yet still, there are those who feel the desperate need to diminish the attention that ought to be paid to black lives specifically, by insisting that all lives matter.
I’m from Singapore, a country (we’re also a city, state and an island) popularly known as the ‘little red dot’ within the region of South East Asia. Racial inequality has also been recognized as a prevailing issue here despite its strong support for multiculturalism. Naturally, the building momentum of #BlackLivesMatter caused quite a stir within the community, and christ, all these calls here for unity have been divisive as fuck.
To everyone who aren’t *typically* racially marginalised, please stop measuring your morality in comparison with the far right. You don’t get kudos for being more open minded than neo-nazis and white nationalists. In fact, many marginalized groups are more frustrated with progressives than they are with bigoted conservatives. Liberals of the day felt MLK was being divisive. Today, liberals quote him out of context, in order to silence black radicals.
If you’re criticized by someone you have significant privilege over, resist the urge to defend yourself. Just listen. Your feelings (like those of your forefathers) are the very real reason oppression persists. And please realise that by wasting time rebuking marginalized groups, we’re actively helping those in power go unchecked and unchallenged. Our time can be better spent attacking the root causes of inequality, rather than mending our egos.
If this makes you uncomfortable, good. If you don’t like it, oh well. Get used to it.
It’s true that the problems with modern policing pose a risk to everyone, of every race. It’s also true that the same problems disproportionately affect black people. Not just in America, but every-fucking-where in the world. A lot of *white* (and maybe some asian) people hide behind pretending that it can mean only what it did 50 years ago, neglecting communal intellectual growth. Without acknowledging specific problems, platitudes derail communication, and this can easily make everyone feel hopeless.
So please, for fuck’s sake, we know all fucking lives matter but you’re also accusing black people of being selfish. All it does is neutralize the inertia that is built by prioritizing one particular issue. It’s also basically a sugar-coated way of saying “shut up about it already”, essentially shutting down the conversation. I’m not accusing everyone who says it of being racist or malicious, but I think that the statement needs to be counted for what it is: a passive-aggressive attempt to derail an uncomfortable but extremely important cultural conversation.
While I don’t necessarily think violence is the answer to everything, I hope all of us are taking this chance to educate ourselves on racism, like knowing the difference between skin colour and a violent criminal. Donate to organisations who are supporting the movement. This is an epidemic, so wise up ya’ll.
