Black history month has been celebrated since 1976, it consists of celebrating and respecting the lives of black people living throughout the world and in history. This unfortunately hasn't always been the case due racism and discrimination. Racial discrimination has happened again and again during history. This has thankfully been reduced in certain sectors, but still is overwhelmingly constant.
It was in the 16th century when slavery became more and more frequent. Slavery had always happened, but slowly people were being moved from farms to households being forced to work 24/7. These people were brought from captured tribes in Southern Africa and then were trafficked around the world, mostly to arrive in North America. This wasn't banned until 1885, but discrimination did not end there.
Police brutality is an example of racism seen in our society today. George Floyd, an innocent man choked to death by former police man Derek Chauvin, who will only be serving 25 years for 3rd degree murder is only one of the many persecuted for the colour of their skin. Some people think that he thought Floyd had stolen something. The one thing we know for certain is that Floyd lost his life needlessly due to the prejudice of the police officer.
The death of Breonna Taylor, an medical worker who was shot and killed by Louisville police officers in March during a botched raid on her home is yet another terrible example of discrimination. But how it happened isn't the worst part, the worst part is that later on neither one of the police men were charged for murder. The murder of an innocent woman whose life has been thrown away because of a racist act. There is also a trend on social platforms spreading awareness of her death, that the US government has tried to keep hidden. There are hundreds if not thousands of similar cases, all resulting in deaths and people not getting their deserved punishment.
Black Lives Matter Protests have been happening ever since May and have spread awareness about the racism and police brutality, most participants are people from ages 15-25 ( and younger or older), these are the people who have social media platforms and can have others join in! Most protests are always peaceful, yet it is not uncommon for the police still to come to the protests, often causing people to have very serious injuries.
There are lots of people who are supporting BLM. At least 55% of adults support it at least a bit, but the other 45% percent support ALM which stands for All Lives Matter, I will not be getting to into it but people who support ALM are saying that every live matters which is true, yet even though every person matters right now we need to concentrate on stopping the racism that goes towards black/hispanic/asian people and those from ethnic minorities.
Some famous people have done actions raising awareness to the matter, some examples may include Ariana Grande, Billie Eillish, Halsey, Timmothee Chalamet and more, have been marching in the BLM protests and have informed their fandom about it. Some other influencers have also been doing smaller things like spreading awareness of it in their feed. I hope that their efforts will help solve this extremely important issue.
Maria Dieguez 8N