Black Lives Matter, and Yes, You are Racist: The Parallelism of the Twentieth and Twenty-First Centuries
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INVITED PAPER
Black Lives Matter, and Yes, You are Racist: The Parallelism of the Twentieth and Twenty‑First Centuries Henrika McCoy1 Published online: 17 August 2020 © Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature 2020
Abstract The United States of America is at a crossroads, one that we have been at before. This is not the first time that we have battled a pandemic while experiencing an economic downturn, state sanctioned violence and racial terror against Blacks, the boiling over of racial tensions encouraged by the president of the United States, and a movement focused on forcing America to reckon with its endemic racism, anti-Blackness, and state-sanctioned violence against Blacks. This article provides a brief overview of that history and its striking parallel to what is happening today. It pushes White social workers to understand how they are beneficiaries of racism. It reminds social workers of their ethical obligation to be change agents. Finally, it provides basic suggestions for those who are willing to see their complicity and are still willing to work on dismantling the injustice that impacts Black people in America. Keywords Black Lives Matter · State-sanctioned violence · Pandemic · Racism · Privilege · Anti-Black Many Black people are experiencing today’s events while remembering the childhood stories they heard from their parents or grandparents about a child, sibling, spouse, or friend who died during the Spanish Flu. Others are recalling family traditions attributed to surviving the Great Depression. The American tradition of the family heading out to the open road for a summer vacation has also had a resurgence due to the COVID-19 pandemic (Mzezewa, 2020). However for many Black people, road trips serve as a reminder of times when driving south to visit relatives meant being fearful of what danger you might encounter from the police, while driving to your destination, or local Whites who did not want you stopping in their town to get food, gas, use the restroom, or spend the night (Mzezewa, 2020). For others, such as activists during the Civil Rights Movement of the 1950s and 1960s, the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement is invigorating. Representative John Lewis, inspired by protesters and supportive of the movement said, “We must use our time and our space on this little planet that we call Earth to make a lasting contribution, to leave it a little better than * Henrika McCoy [email protected] 1
Jane Addams College of Social Work, University of Illinois at Chicago, 1040 W. Harrison (M/C 309), Chicago, IL 60607, USA
we found it, and now that need is greater than ever before” (Capehart, 2020, para 13). Each of those experiences is like a piece of a complicated puzzle. Social workers must understand that Blacks in America are “both creatures and creators of history in that history has placed them where they are right now and has shaped their point of view, their identity, and their aspirations” (Martin & Martin, 1995, p. 252). History is the foundation for every person’s life
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