#BlackLivesMatter. A phrase that must be familiar with everyone on the planet at the moment, certainly in the USA which approaches almost a week of consecutive rioting. There are many ‘angles’ on the issues of racism with numerous perspectives provided on any social media platform but ideally it only requires one: Acknowledge the plight of Black culture and heritage.
If you deflect Black Lives Matter with All Lives Matter. You don’t acknowledge the privilege (most) white people have from birth. Cop killings are just the tip of a systematically ignored iceberg. Whether you are talking blatant Neo-Nazi racism or subtle, Daily Mail institutionalised Imperialist programming. It’s all different sides of the same ‘white supremacist’ coin.
There are other ways to identify racism.
George Floyd was killed by four policemen with a diverse collective ethnic heritage, so it isn’t always simply a case of White man vs Black man. ( See the Internalized segment below)
In the current political climate, by saying ‘All Lives Matter’ you are infact saying White Lives Matter, more by default.
Why?
It’s because the average white person has a much more agreeable and easier existence, by far. We call this privilege.
Sure, Kanye West has it much easier than 60-year-old unemployed Fred White, who has to take two buses into town, where his nearest jobcentre is, dragging his arthritis stricken body after working 40 years at the same warehouse employer on minimum wage, only to be let go when his job was outsourced overseas. Likely to foreign labour that works far cheaper.
But how many Kanyes are there and how many Freds?
If Fred has a grievance he should be looking at his fellow rich white friends like Trump, who were born into a generational wealth that gives them more disposable income in a day, than poor Fred has seen in a lifetime.
These rich white people are never seen in Fred’s neighbourhood though, they live out near Kanye and it doesn’t take long for some Neo-Nazi activist to distract Fred’s anger and funnel it into the nearest (and probably only) Black person around.
Black citizens get targeted for racial profiling by a Police Force with a diversity recruitment agenda, that ends up breeding systematic racism, by painting Brown faces on it. Rather than challenging social attitudes and eradicating it. The few Black or Hispanic guys in the team don’t need the extra hassle of challenging and correcting their white superiors. They are probably too focussed on blending into the ‘locker room‘ culture.
Let’s face it. Nobody who has to work for other people to make a living, has the time or money to change the world.
When you are born into a society you are born into a social contract .This is the system.
Citizens in society waive certain rights and liberty in exchange for social security and stability. Well, White people and Europeans anyway.
A Social Contract is “an implicit agreement among the members of a society to cooperate for social benefits, for example by sacrificing some individual freedom for state protection.”
Even back in 1763 Jean Jacques Rosseau noticed it was designed by and for rich people. We all know how much rich people HATE giving things up.
I appreciate maybe some African –Americans aren’t as jaded about society as others but how do people who have descendants that were ‘introduced’ into this social contract as slaves, with no civil liberties to waive, get along in this system? By having to work twice as hard just to fit in to a crazy system built on a social capital they were not given at birth. When someone has no social capital, they cannot trade it for a better life.
(Especially when their ‘cultural capital‘ is exploited and robbed to line the pockets of richer ( whiter) involuntary business partners in everything from Black music to Fashion. Google ‘Manufacturing Cool’ or even just watch the Jordan Peele’s 2017 film ‘Get Out’.
In my blog, I make the argument that Memes are fast becoming an effective medium for cultural and sociological study, so these are the best examples I could find to illustrate the same argument as above. ( Some are actually just well-written Tweets.)
If you found any of the Memes in this Blog useful, remember they were taken directly from the social media accounts of Black people. ( Cultural appropriation, I know). All you have to do is listen and acknowledge your privilege.
#ByAnyMemesNecessary
Rant &Rave 