Lying by telling the truth: Black Lives Matter, Covid19 and racial injustice / Jordan Phillips
A few days ago I attended a local protest march with my friend down Queen St in support of the Black Lives Matter movement. In the wake of the tragic death of George Floyd at the hands of Police, along with other innocent black individuals who’ve lost their lives in similar unjust circumstances, outrage and cries for justice have rung out across the globe. This is happening around the same time a white high school student here in Auckland has been outed for taking a picture of herself in blackface captioned with the N word. Of course this would be ’triggering’ to any thoughtful, socially conscious, culturally sensitive person, but it was the litany of comments that added more cause for concern.
As I followed this incident on Facebook, scrolling through comments, I was disturbed by the number of people that couldn’t grasp the fact that underlying racist ideologies are essentially sustained through things like ‘jokes’ and ‘harmless fun.’ But even more disturbing were the few white, well-meaning, individuals that were basically saying “We shouldn't talk about it publicly as it may affect her mental health in a negative way.”
Mental health is a huge issue in Aotearoa, complex and delicate. To be absolutely clear, responding to ignorance and racism in an abusive and bullying way is completely unacceptable and falls guilty of the same type of divisive, hurtful wrongdoing it attempts to fight against. However, what I find troubling is when people deploy the issue of ‘mental health’ as a way of obfuscating the seriousness of racism in our country.
To put it plainly, this is tasteless. Here we see the monster called ’systemic racism’ rear its ugly head. To refer to an emotionally charged and complex issue like mental health, as a way to vie for control of the narrative surrounding racial injustice, is taking a step closer to adopting racist ideology. The reason it seems acceptable on the surface is that, in a sense, the appeal to be sensitive of the students mental health is true. This is an important point and should be taken seriously. But we must be very cautious when we see something that is inherently true, used to sustain a lie. That lie is ‘Racism is wrong but we really should first put our attention toward caring for mental health.’
This is the underlying message that is communicated indirectly. We reinforce racism when our go-to response is to paint those responsible for racist actions as victims by appealing to the fragility of their mental health before extending empathy to black, indigenous and people of colour who are the subject of the students racial insult. To do this is to unnecessarily pit one issue against another, subsequently making racism a secondary issue to mental health.
It was in this series of comments that I saw systemic racism completely exposed. To sum it up in this tragically ironic way- the call to treat this situation with sensitivity in order to minimise the possibility of mental trauma, was directly in favour of the white student while completely neglecting the fact that these racially discriminatory acts almost certainly have some permanent affect on the mental health of black, indigenous and people of colour.
In the aftermath of the Black Lives Matter protest, we are seeing this type of reactionary attitude come into play in relation to the Covid 19 pandemic. The outrage of people publicly condemning the protest for breaking social distancing guidelines and “selfishly putting our country at risk” seems to make some sort of sense on the surface. But hidden beneath is the same sort of hidden racist ideology.
We unintentionally disavow racial injustice when the first response is to immediately highlight other real problems, present them in a more vulnerable light, and then claim that attempts to bring solutions around racial issues adversely affect these other problems. This is the pattern that emerges when we begin to examine the responses to other peaceful protests like the kneeling of Colin Kapernick who was publicly shamed, labelled unpatriotic and disrespectful. But the powerful image of him kneeling on the sidelines, paralleled with the knee on the neck of George Floyd serves as a poignant reminder that when white hegemony chooses to ignore the cries of the oppressed then the result is violence, chaos and a breakdown of society.
How do we overcome this type of evil? I don’t think anyone has the answer. But I am committed to go on the journey. And my hope is that here in Aotearoa we all begin to identify where racism is, visible and invisible, that we may work toward building communities of love, acceptance, understanding and relational health for the sake of those that suffer now and for future generations to come.
Jordan Phillips is born and raised in Auckland. He's a husband, father of one, and follower of Jesus. He loves all things creative and is currently planning on heading to uni to study philosophy and psychology.