Why Dont People Understand the Ignorance of Blue Lives Matter
Following the death of George Floyd in Minnesota last month, institutional racism, police brutality and white privilege have dominated the world's conversation.
Days after his death, peaceful protests broke out across the world, with anti-racists showing their support for Black Lives Matter-focussed organisations and physicalising their desire to put an end to inequality.
The phrase 'Black Lives Matter' (BLM) is not just a statement of truth, but has evolved into a rally cry to right the wrongs that, over hundreds of years, we've yet to fully address.
In 2013, three Black women — Alicia Garza, Patrisse Cullors, and Opal Tometi — founded the BLM political movement, following the acquittal of Trayvon Martin's murderer, George Zimmerman, in Florida. While the movement has attracted international support, it has also been misunderstood and criticised.
Its opponents suggest that it implies Black lives matter more than those of others, with some proposing the phrase 'All Lives Matter' be used in its place.
However, in the last few days, a number of celebrities, including Keegan-Michael Key, Ashton Kutcher, Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos and Billie Eilish have spoken out against the term 'All Lives Matter,' pointing out its lack of both logic and empathy.
'If all lives matter,' Eilish recently asked on Twitter, 'why are black people killed for just being black?'
To get to the crux of the issue, we spoke to Professor Olivette Otele, Professor in History of Slavery at the University of Bristol and independent chair of Bristol City Council's Commission on Race Equality.
'It's such bad faith to say that "all lives matter",' Professor Otele states from the outset.
Referring to the anti-racist protests across the world, she adds: 'Surely this all started because they didn't all matter? It's so obvious. It's dangerous [to use the phrase]. It's laziness but, deep down, I wonder if it comes from the spectrum of racism?'
Why the phrase 'All Lives Matter' is problematic
Of course, on the surface, the phrase 'All Lives Matter' seems well intentioned, implying that all lives should be viewed equally.
However, the phrase contradicts itself. Well-intentioned or not, it can be received as 'all lives already matter,' which actually serves only to further defend the current state of inequality.
And as a rebuttal to the phrase 'Black lives matter', it acts to diminish and suppress the voice of Black people challenging the status quo. It mutes Black community's particular and acute sense of suffering, which can be viewed as insensitive and inappropriate at a moment when there is huge, palpable pain, as we mourn George Floyd and other similar cases.
This quote sums up the insensitivity quite succinctly:
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For those who use 'all lives matter' to denote the idea that many different groups of people currently suffer in the world, in Otele's eyes, is 'ignorance at its core'.
'Pain associated to specific context is unique because of what led to those moments. Certain comparisons are highly insensitive,' she explains.
'No one would make a comparison between the Holocaust and another time of suffering. Black suffering is unique.'
The term 'Black Lives Matter' is reminiscent of the 'Black Is Beautiful' movement in the 1960s, which began in the US to fight for equal rights and a positive perception of the African-American body. At the time, Otele says that like BLM, some people criticised the phrase and argued that '"all people are beautiful".'
'Of course, all people are beautiful, but you have to question why people say that "black is beautiful" or "black lives matter"?' she asks. 'For centuries people have been taught that black people aren't beautiful. We're reclaiming the fact that Black bodies are beautiful and that they do matter.'
'It would be fantastic if all lives mattered but all lives are not valued equally. You don't have to know about Black history but instinctively you have to understand that when people are saying "Black Lives Matter" it's because its Black lives that have been disproportionately suffering,' says Otele.
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Why all lives don't currently matter equally
To understand the need to assert that 'Black Lives Matter' in the UK, it's important to understand a bit of British history. A history which has quite definitively placed Black communities in a position of not-mattering, compared to their white counterparts.
A quick potted-history for you:
The abolition of the slave trade in the British Empire took place in 1807. However, it did not abolish the practice of slavery, which remained legal in the majority of the Empire until the Slavery Abolition Act in 1833. During that time, slavery continued across the world, with many slave owners choosing to evade the law and transport people from the Indian subcontinent and Africa to the British Empire to work in plantations and fields.
'Even after the abolition of the slave trade, poverty and exclusion continued for many Black people in the colonies of the British Empire,' Professor Otele explains.
Fast forward to the 20th Century and thousands of Black people were recruited from African colonies to fight for the 'Mother Country' in both World War I and World War II and again from the Caribbean to form part of the Windrush generation and help rebuild the post-war economy. However, despite being integral to the war and post-war efforts, Black people continued to lack access to the best jobs and to be ostracised in European, UK and US society.
'The circle of wealth was never distributed equally, so poverty prevailed,' Otele explains.
So, if racial inequality has long been a global pandemic, why then have there been recent suggestions that racism is more deeply-rooted in US history and society?
Last week during Newsnight's Emily Maitlis' interview with the spoken-word artist George The Poet, she argued: 'Our police aren't armed, they don't have guns, the legacy of slavery is not the same.'
The wordsmith refuted the presenter's claims, highlighting the role of the British Empire on the African content and its consequences.
The differences in law enforcement - particularly the use of firearms - between the UK and US are evident, but pointing them out diverts attention from the fundamental racism that inspired the behaviour we've seen displayed. In the case of Floyd, it was years of racism that caused his death, not the police officer's knee.
Otele argues that it's crucial that people are aware that 13 American colonies belonged to the English Crown and became independent after the American War of Independence (1775–1783), and to stop trying to point the finger at US as a smoke and mirror defence to avoid racist complicity.
'Britain was one of the key players in the slave trade and developed, like many other countries, a whole set of justifications for it. One of them was putting in place a hierarchy and ideology around the economic success [of Black people]. "We are able to dominate the world because we are cleverer," was the argument at the time.
'[Racism] started in Britain, I'm afraid. The only difference [between the US and UK] is that British colonies were overseas whereas in the US, slave people lived side-by-side for centuries.'
Racial inequality in the UK
The death of Floyd has resonated so deeply with people across the world because it not only revealed systemic racism in the US, but also closer to home.
Following his death, the names of several Black people in the UK like Sean Rigg, Mark Duggan and Leon Briggs, who died at the hands of the police, were shared on social media as a reminder that police brutality and racial inequality are British problems, too.
'We can use the instances in the US to highlight the issue of what's happening behind the scenes here in the UK, where families have been suffering for decades,' Rigg's sister, activist Marcia Rigg, recently told us.
Here's a brief breakdown of the UK's racial inequality:
Justice
The phrase 'no justice, no peace' has echoed across the world in protests last week, largely in reference to Floyd's death in the US, but it was also levelled at international racist justice systems.
According to recent statistics from the UK's Home Office, Black people are three times more likely to be arrested than white people in England and Wales, with racial profiling in stop-and-searches receiving much criticism. On average, Black people are four times more likely to be physically restrained, six times more likely to be struck with 'less lethal' firearms, and seven times more likely to be shot with conventional firearms.
In London, Black people accounted for 26 per cent of Fixed Penalty Notices and 31 per cent of arrests for breaking lockdown rules last month, despite making up just 12 per cent of the population.
In addition, race-motivated hate crimes are on the increase and Black people are still 9.5 times more likely to face stop and searches, despite police efforts to reduce its use as a deterrent.
To suggest that racism exists on a separate scale in the US is 'intellectual laziness' and a 'dangerous assumption' according to Otele. 'There's a whole list of Black people [in the UK] who have died at the hands of police and officers that have been acquitted,' she says.
Health
Black people have also found themselves disproportionately affected by the UK's recent coronavirus pandemic in recent months.
The Office for National Statistics (ONS) recently found that they are more four times as likely to die from the virus, compared to white people, and neither the organisation nor Public Health England were able to explain a definitive reason for this.
The report said its findings confirm 'the impact of COVID-19 has replicated existing health inequalities and, in some cases, has increased them'.
'BAME people are more likely to live in urban areas, in overcrowded households, in deprived areas, and have jobs that expose them to higher risk,' PHE stated.
Economy and socially
Financially and educationally, Black people continue to be worse off than their white counterparts in the UK.
The ONS has found that 22 per cent of Black children live in low income and materially deprived households (the national average is 12 per cent) and Black people are less likely to be in employment and earn less when it comes to hourly pay.
As for education and business, few than one per cent of the professors employed at UK universities are Black, there are no Black CEOs among Fortune 500 tech companies and there is not one single BAMP MP in Scotland, Wales or Northern Ireland.
Britain celebrated a very minor victory in becoming the most gender and ethnically diverse Parliament in history last December, with almost one in ten of the 650 MPs elected being non-white. However, that's compared with almost 20 per cent of the UK population recorded.
'Racism may not be new. It can be complicated, and often unconscious. But it is very real,' Labour's Kate Osamor MP wrote in February.
Is there a future for 'All Lives Matter'?
Until international institutions and citizens begin to recognise that and act like Black lives do matter then the phrase 'all lives matter' ignores the reality that not everyone's life is at risk due to their skin colour.
In 2014, Garza – who is a co-founder of the BLM hashtag – explained the importance of the world 'Black' in the phrase and what it means for wider society moving forward.
'Black Lives Matter doesn't mean your life isn't important – it means that Black lives, which are seen as without value within White supremacy, are important to your liberation. Given the disproportionate impact state violence has on Black lives, we understand that when Black people in this country get free, the benefits will be wide-reaching and transformative for society as a whole. When we are able to end the hyper-criminalisation and sexualization of Black people and end the poverty, control and surveillance of Black people, every single person in this world has a better shot at getting and staying free. When Black people get free, everybody gets free.'
Thinking about a future where racial equality does exists, Otele tells us: 'You're asking me to dream at the moment.
'I don't think it'll happen in my lifetime. I'm hoping people work really hard for it to come sooner rather than later. The future will see us all learn our history; all the ugliness and beautiful aspects of it but we need to teach it in a way that gives space to allow people to value their differences.
'People who tell me that they don't see colour worry me. If you don't see colour you don't see equality either. Equality is based on colour. 'All Lives Matter' is a future where [Black people] can fight over ideas, verbally, without being shot.'
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Source: https://www.elle.com/uk/life-and-culture/culture/a32800835/all-lives-matter-fake-equality/
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