Black equality activists don't like white people.
Why is this not considered racist in the US?

Millions of Americans turned out to protest racism after the death of a black man, George Floyd, who died in custody.
At the same time, many participants in peaceful demonstrations that turned into pogroms do not hide their negative and even hostile attitude towards whites.

This is not surprising, since there are many supporters of black left-wing groups among the protesters.
However, their hostility cannot be called racism in the modern sense of the word — and in 2020, any progressive American knows this. «Tape.ru "figured out where the roots of the protests that have engulfed the United States go and why phrases like "all lives matter" in modern America are also considered a manifestation of racism.

"This is a black business", "Black owners" - such inscriptions many American entrepreneurs put on the doors and Windows of their stores and restaurants. This did not help much: aggressive mobs smashed and looted such establishments, among others. But the very fact that people hope that the inscriptions will help is an illustration of the undoubtedly racial nature of the riots that have engulfed the United States.

The peaceful part of the protests involves Americans of various ethnicities and races. The main slogans of the protesters do not concern police brutality as such — mass demonstrations are focused on the oppression of black residents of the United States. "Black Lives matter" (BLM) — this slogan of the eponymous movement became the key to the nationwide speeches. Their participants demand systemic changes to combat racism, not short-term measures.

There are also aggressive people among the protesters who break Windows, set fire to police stations and cars. There is another category of citizens — judging by numerous videos, mostly black-who do not try to convey their demands to the authorities, but engage in banal looting, using the riots as a cover. Across the country, rioters attack stores with clothing and electronics and take out anything of value.

However, a certain ideological charge in the actions of the rebels can still be traced: they feel impunity and even justification for their actions, not hesitating to attack those who disagree with vandalism and looting. This is justified (if justified) by the injustice of the system that has oppressed blacks throughout history.

President Trump has already incurred the wrath of the public by offering to disperse the rioters with the help of the army, and state governors are in no hurry to follow his call. The protest was supported by the entire progressive press and most celebrities. In the first days after the death of George Floyd, the entire English-language segment of the Internet was overflowing with support for BLM. The attitude to vandals and robbers in most cases is negative, but in public statements and comments, this side of the protests try not to touch.

Shoot whites!

However, mass pogroms and looting, for all their entertainment, do not overshadow the main agenda of recent days in the United States. According to a significant portion of Americans, the death of George Floyd is the result of racism pervading American society.

Both social media users and major corporations, including firms whose stores were looted, remind us that" black lives matter " these days. The protests are supported by politicians, including members of the Republican party. Major media outlets during the riots got their own motivation to speak out against the government: the police sometimes treated journalists very harshly.

The problem of racism and police brutality is now covered by the media only in relation to African-Americans, without Recalling similar cases of white people being killed in custody. Behind the scenes, there is also the fact that the rioters in the mass clearly dislike the ethnic majority: in some videos with rioters, you can clearly hear calls for the massacre of white people.

At the same time, hostility to white compatriots is not only characteristic of the aggressive part of the protesters: inscriptions like "to hell with white America" on walls and monuments are quite popular for protests against police violence in recent years. Even memorials of war victims and monuments to historical figures who fought against slavery were desecrated with such slogans.

What is surprising is that not only opponents are attacked, but also white supporters of racial equality: they allegedly attract public attention by depriving minority representatives of a platform to speak out. The emphasis is on the fact that it is African-Americans who should Express the position of the movement — and the rest are destined to play the role of allies and sympathizers.

It would seem that the fight against racism should proclaim the unity of Americans. However, the alternative slogan All Lives Matter ("All lives matter") was considered" ambiguous " at the beginning of the movement for black rights, and by 2020 it is recognized as racist and hostile.

Whose life metter?

Even before the emergence of the newest black movement, the American white majority began to note discrimination against them. A 2011 study found that white Americans recognize the oppression of blacks in the mid-twentieth century and later, but believe that biases against their own ethnicity already outnumber biases against blacks.

American voters in General do not tend to despise their countrymen because of their dark skin color-this is evidenced by the two presidential terms of Barack Obama, and the fairly active involvement of black representatives in public policy, and on both flanks of the party struggle. At the beginning of the twenty-first century, the United States proclaimed a "post-racial" era of universal equality — but, apparently, they were too hasty.

Over the next decade, issues of racism in American society began to be discussed much more frequently, and more and more progressive Americans became convinced that a black President did not prove that racial inequality was being overcome. This and related topics have become incredibly popular in the media — for example, the word whiteness ("whiteness"), usually used to negatively describe a social phenomenon as "too white", was in the headlines of the New York Times in 2015 four times more often than in 2008.

In 2013, Black Lives Matter — a movement of black nationalists that widely uses the symbols of radical groups "Black Panthers" of the 60s and 70s of the last century-emerged and began to develop.

Initially, American conservative Philistines were afraid of its name. It seemed to them too dividing society: so there was a counter-slogan about the importance of all lives — All Lives Matter

The BLM slogan has long been considered controversial by many. In 2016, for example, Facebook's management, which allows employees to write whatever they want on the walls of their workplaces, wanted to force employees to replace it with an even more "politically correct" version of ALM. But immediately after it became known outside the company, it backed down, and its co-founder mark Zuckerberg came out with an explanation and support for the slogan.

In the same 2016 year, millionaire blogger Joey Salads conducted a small social experiment: he stood with a "Black Lives Matter" poster in a predominantly white neighborhood, inviting passers-by to Express their support for the movement. Only a few agreed: he was mostly told that they did not discriminate between people by skin color. But he failed to do the opposite: when he appeared in a black neighborhood with a "All Lives Matter" poster, he was immediately attacked. "In 2020, he would not have come home to edit this video," "would you Try to do it in Minneapolis in 2020," read today's comments on that video.

So it is not surprising that in recent years, the conservatives ' slogan about the importance of all lives without exception can be found less often at demonstrations against racism and police brutality. The understanding of equality that he proclaims is now increasingly recognized as not just wrong, but quite racist.

Without halftones

"No lives matter until black lives matter" is a position shared by a wide variety of celebrities today, not excluding pop stars who sing about love, such as Billy Irish and Justin Bieber. And if during the previous riots among celebrities there were those who carelessly called all lives important (they then had to apologize), now the very possibility of public speaking with such a position is reprehensible.

An observer unfamiliar with the current agenda of the United States may be shocked by episodes where blacks openly Express dislike for whites, emphasizing that they, blacks, should not be called "racists"for this. Meanwhile, the explanation of this phenomenon has long been the norm in the English-speaking segment of the Internet — "reverse racism" is declared nonexistent, and to declare its existence is racism in itself.

The fact is that the word "racism" in the United States has long been understood not as an isolated manifestation of xenophobia, not as a sharp statement against a representative of another ethnic group

We are talking about a system of institutional oppression — a bias against a certain group of people that has permeated all levels of public life.

The popular formula for racism is " prejudice plus power." And power in the United States, according to supporters of this point of view, is established by whites and assigned to them. So the Ku Klux Klan, which prohibits racial slurs and lynchings, is just the tip of an iceberg that more and more Americans are now certain exists.

Since the advent of slave labor in North America to this day, the state that owes its prosperity, including to blacks, has not made any real steps toward granting them equal rights with whites — or if it did, it stopped in the middle, today's agenda tells us. Now discrimination against African-Americans is observed everywhere — from Eurocentric beauty standards and problems with obtaining a position or promotion to "racist" artificial intelligence systems that are not able to distinguish women's faces from men's, if we are talking about blacks. But the key point, of course, remains the brutality of the police and judicial system towards blacks.

At the same time, well-meaning white citizens of the United States have always believed that their personal kindhearted attitude to blacks is enough to not worry about the problem of racism. And in this they were, according to human rights activist Martin Luther king Jr., unwitting supporters of the existing unfair system.

Now this idea is being returned to the US more often. One of the popular slogans at the protests sounds like "White Silence is Violence" — " white Silence is violence"

The author of How to be an anti-racist, ibram Kendi, echoes king: according to him, inaction in support of the status quo is the same as if the people of the Northern American States would condemn slavery, but not fight it. Candy argues that it is no longer possible to simply "not be a racist" — there can be no middle ground between racism and its opponents. Either the person is for the oppression of minorities, or actively fights against it.

Black division

The current protests show that the idea of total rejection of racism has gone to the people — which is worth just a prank from the blogger Smooth Sanchez. During demonstrations in new York, he walked the streets calling himself a representative of the BLM movement. He would approach white new Yorkers and ask them to get down on their knees and apologize to black people. Some refused, but the vast majority of the interviewees at least got down on one knee.

On social media, the same thing happens, albeit with great dignity: white Americans massively share lists of literature about racism, addresses of charities fighting for black rights, and messages about transferring their money to their accounts. And the co-founder of the Reddit site, Alexis Ohanian, resigned from the company's Board of Directors, refusing to profit, and demanded to put a black employee in his place.

State agencies also buckled under the pressure of the protests: Minneapolis has already agreed to disband the police (it is not yet clear exactly how it is planned to update its composition), and authorities across the country are reducing spending on police officers. In addition, a section of the street near the White house in Washington was renamed Black Lives Matter Plaza, and new York mayor bill de Blasio promised that driveways with this name will appear in every district of the city.

Amid protests in Richmond, Virginia are going to dismantle the monument to the head of Confederate General Robert E. Lee stood on this spot for nearly 130 years. The demolition of the memorial dedicated to the defeated side of the Civil war shows that the current movement for justice is a bid to break the old social contract and conclude a new one.

But there is a difference between the peace agreement of the North and the South (as well as the agreement of the fighters for black rights in the 60s and the then state) and the current situation. Modern supporters of racial justice do not assume the coexistence of different opinions: this is not an attempt to find a common language with an opponent, but the intention to put a brand on those who disagree with the new world order.

And in General, there is no need to talk about any search for a common language: the BLM movement can not negotiate with racists, who by default are considered all who are not among their supporters

In contrast to the followers of king, unpleasant to the public opinion of the time, the current advocates of equality have a clear majority, and the conservatives can no longer give any clear answer to the accusations of racism. At the same time, celebrities, big business, politicians and the media are actively trying to ride the rising wave of total struggle against racism. This means that in the United States, those whose opinions do not coincide with the generally accepted ones will be heard less often — the "spiral of silence" will deprive even more citizens of their voices. As a result, ideas designed to reunite a nation split in two, among other things, risk only exacerbating this split. And this will be a difficult challenge for American society — and then, thanks to the global influence of the United States, for the whole world.