Following the harrowing murder of George Floyd by a white police officer in the US, the Black Lives Matter movement has gained huge momentum. Despite the common misconception that we have had equal racial rights since the abolition of slavery, the modern world is seeped with deep-rooted, institutional racism. Here in the UK, you need only to look at our history to recognise that we are far from innocent.
Here are some statistics show that it is not enough to post a black square for #blackouttuesday on Instagram. We must empower the Black Lives Matter movement in the UK in order to eradicate systemic racism. I have compiled a list of tips and resources to help you to be actively anti-racist.
YOU ARE A PART OF THE SYSTEM. BE A PART OF THE CHANGE.
1. We in the UK have a greater disproportionality of black people in prisons than the US according to The Lammy Review.
2. Black people are 54% more likely to be fined for breaching coronavirus restrictions than white people.
3. Black academics at top universities earn 26% less on average than their white colleagues.
5. Black people are 3 times more likely to be kicked out or denied entry to a club, restaurant or bar for no reason.
6. 76% of 103,379 hate crimes recorded between 2018 and 2019 were race hate crimes (78,991 incidents).
7. Diane Abbott was the first black woman MP to be elected into Parliament in 1987. In the run up to the 2017 general election, she received 45% of all abusive tweets against women MPs and 10 times more abuse than any other woman MP according to Amnesty Global Insights.
This disproportionality will not go away on its own. I have compiled a list of tips and resources to help you to be actively anti-racist.
EDUCATE YOURSELF
Understand your white privilege
This short video explains systemic racism and white privilege in the US, but applies to the UK too
Learn about colonialism and its suppression of black people
Sign here to make Boris Johnson to speak up against Trump’s response to George Floyd’s murder
Sign here to make British imperialism and colonialism part of the school curriculums
Sign here to update GCSE reading lists to include Good Immigrant by Nikesh Shukla and Why I’m No longer Talking to White People About Race by Reni Eddo-Lodge, two books that highlight our society’s social inequalities.
Sign here to introduce mandatory reporting of the ethnic pay gap
Sign here to ban the use of police horses in protests
Support black businesses. Finimpact has outlined proactive tips to show your support. Read them here.
As we enter a post-pandemic world, let’s ensure we go back to better and not back to normal. As students and young people, we have a duty to drive change. We must increase diversity in our schools, universities and later employment to begin the process of unlearning implicit racial biases. We have a responsibility to ensure that our children can grow up in a safer and more accepting world.
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