Speak up.

Over, and over, and over again, we see the proof that America is not the country it claims to be. Not when George Floyd is murdered in broad daylight by the police in Minneapolis. Not when Breonna Taylor is murdered in her home by the police in Louisville. Not when Ahmaud Arbery is hunted down and murdered by white racist terrorists in Brunswick. Not when a white woman threatens Christian Cooper with police violence in New York. And these are just the stories we’ve learned about in the last few weeks. It’s the tip of the iceberg that will sink this country if we don’t change course.

And in the face of this suffering that white people have caused, too many of us will only speak out against the rioting or the protests or the consequences faced by the perpetrators of these crimes. They worry about the safety of Ahmaud Arbury’s killers and their familes. But not about the millions of people who live under the threat of racial violence every day of their lives with no police force to protect them.

If you’re a white person who understands that that is wrong, it’s not enough to know it. You have to say it. You have to put your time and your resources and your energy into changing it. Into empowering and fighting for the people who aren’t given the same advantages you enjoy. Into dismantling a system that’s built to protect you and terrorize your Black neighbors.

America is a country where racism has infected everything from the smallest sheriff’s office to the Oval Office and every level in between, and we will never change until we admit and embrace the truth: that even if we didn’t make it this way, it’s still our responsibility to change it.

Part 2