This year is starting to feel like a horror film put together by a five-year-old Stephen King and directed by Tim Burton; at this point, I wouldn’t be surprised if dinosaurs were accidentally set free from a testing lab and a herd of flying pigs took to the air.
It’s literally been one disaster after the other, leading people to feel angry, frustrated, helpless and desperate: the perfect recipe for George Floyd’s truly horrific and needless death to lead to a nationwide spread of riots the likes of which have not been seen in years.
It is strange how the internet has managed to universalise, democratise and even monetise suffering.
Just two decades ago, it would have taken us days to see just a handful of riot photos brought into our homes via the Sunday paper. We would have been able to cluck in that removed way that people have when viewing someone else’s tragedy from a distance, and no sooner would we have cleaned our breakfast tables from the crumbs of a lazy Sunday morning than we would have returned back to our own protected bubbles. Now, we carry the world’s pain with us in the palms of our hands.
From Iceland to Timbuktu, people have been condemning the state of affairs in the US and, truly, who with a heart, eyes and any form of moral compass wouldn’t? But the truth is that for most people it has become an easy, idle distraction: a scapegoat to dress up and mock so that we don’t have to examine ourselves and our own equally heart-breaking stories.
A riot is the language of the unheard; let’s start listening
Lassana Cisse’s killers remain out on bail. An inquiry about the AFM conducted by the AFM (because impartiality is always key to our islands) found that there was no racism in the AFM. Justice is far from being served and then, just a few hours ago, a San Ġwann FC nursery official decided that it was a great time to racially insult a black Maltese goalkeeper who put up a post condemning the George Floyd murder.
This comes on top of the disgusting comments made by people over the last few days against a trans woman for doing nothing more than voicing her opinion. The most odious comments by far though were the ones concerning the refugee seekers who died at sea over Easter. If not even death can move you, then there’s not much else that one can say.
Standing up for those who have suffered at the hands of others and those who have been discriminated against is not a buffet breakfast. You can’t claim that what is happening in the US is a travesty and then ignore the racism that is happening in your own backyard. It’s like saying that you are pro-life and then leaving people to die at sea because they are a few shades darker than you. You can’t be pro-life if terms and conditions apply.
Change your profile picture and your Instagram squares to black all you want, but then, have the courtesy to stand up to be counted when it really matters.
We can’t change 400 years of slavery; we can’t unknot the heavy chains of the past but we can help others to carry their loads by educating ourselves and being present. We can be the change we want to see so that crimes like this won’t be repeated in the future, or might I say, present.
A riot is the language of the unheard; let’s start listening.