I Don’t Understand Racism

It’s one of the few things that I’ll never understand

As you all surely know already, another murder happened, that currently pushes an incredible wake of outrageousness across the USA. George Floyd, a 46-year-old black man, and father of a daughter, was brutally murdered by a white police officer by suffocation.

And with that introduction, I used two terms I’d otherwise never specifically use in that context. Black and White. Right here happened something which I can honestly only describe as a hate crime. Racist motives hiding behind a police officer’s badge.

Thanks to bystanders filming the ordeal, I am well aware of “how” it happened. What eludes me, however, is the “why” it happened.

Usually, I’d try to look at things objectively and to try and not end up being biased. Because I believe biased people are what destroys equality. Hell, someone with bias is the reason an innocent man died.

So my opinion on this might be biased. But I believe it’s the right one. I can’t in any way justify the behavior of the cop with “logic” or “reasonable action”. He kneeled on a man’s neck for 8 minutes while he was, again and again, begging him to let him breathe. Common sense and logic would kick in after less than a minute even in the slowest one of us.

Instead, the video shows that the officer kept his knee on the by then unconscious and unresponsive man until the very last instance in which paramedics put him on a stretcher. As if he wanted to make sure that this man never opens his eyes again.

And for what? An alleged try to use a fake $20 dollar bill?

I’m the father of a by now 18 months old daughter, and as such, I feel great grief and disbelief about what happened to George Floyd. I can only describe the whole murder as an act of racism.

Why does racism happen? Why does it have to happen?

Racism has no solid base

All humans are equal. We should all be equal. We may have different cultures, religions, and other factors, but the biological system underneath is the same anywhere in the world. We all bleed red. We all know joy and pain. We all want to be loved. The color of your skin or the language you speak has no meaning to me. It makes you different. But it doesn’t make you a different human.

Why is that so hard for some people to understand?

Why do people kill each other over these differences? Why do they become racist?

It has even gotten worse than it was centuries ago. If you look into history books, early forms of racism existed. It was Greeks vs. non-Greeks and such. But we live in modern times. And it’s not even Americans vs non-Americans, but Americans vs Americans. People aren’t using ethnic differences as cheap excuses to conquer a foreign land. They simply murder their own people for racism existing within their own community.

I will never understand this. And I’m German, coming from a country whose racist history couldn’t have been darker.

Usually, I’d never think of myself as special in any way. I’m as ordinary as can be. But if I compare my sometimes naive mindset to the current state of the world, then I’m pretty confident when I say: “If you people all were like me, the world would be a much better place.”

And I’m sure many of you think something similar. But instead, we have people in power who couldn’t care less about another man’s life if their worldviews don’t align perfectly with his.

If people were smarter, racism could stop

I’m almost sure that the age-old problem of racism could be removed once and for all if all people were educated properly. False ideologies and political games need to stop. People need to unite. All of us. It has to start with getting rid of the old “Us Vs. Them”-mentality.

Learn to accept all people for being different. Not as a race. As individuals. Start in schools. Teach children to be kind to each other. Racism is not a genetic thing. It’s a taught ideology. A flaw in human thinking.

To be completely blunt here: I honestly think, that if you are racist, then you are dumb. I don’t know you. Maybe you have made many, many, many bad experiences. Maybe you see them as a justification. I don’t. You’re being dumb. If you want to change the world, start with yourself.

If you hate someone for the color of their skin, their ethnic background, their religious beliefs, their favorite food, or their blood type, then you are being the stupid one in this relationship. And if you hate someone because someone else with the same skin color, ethnic background, religious belief or favorite food has done you an injustice, then that’s still no reason to hate the other guy.

I honestly feel a bit stupid for writing this down here. That’s something you teach a 5-year-old. But I know I write this so grown-up adults can read it. It should be common sense. I never said all this before because I always believed it is common sense. But the more news comes up with new hate crimes, the more I start to think that it couldn’t be further from being common sense.

Also, a big thank you to the brave bystanders who filmed the crime

I haven’t seen anyone giving a thank you to these people. Maybe they got a lot and I just missed it.

In fact, I found something rather disturbing. The bystander who filmed it is a 17-year-old teenage girl called Darnella Frazier. But instead of thanks, she received threats for not stepping in. She is currently receiving trauma therapy.

So if there’s any chance that you read this, Darnella, please know that not all people are as stupid as to accuse you of not doing enough. I wouldn’t expect a 17-year-old girl to go toe to toe with a group of cops who is visibly enjoying to kill a man in broad daylight.

I think you did a great job of filming this incident (how many people would have not filmed it at all?).

So thank you for exposing crime to the world. Your video will play a major role in bringing justice to George Floyd. Unless the US justice system wants to screw up against a public, countrywide backlash.

So the bottom line is, I don’t understand racism

I don’t understand its benefits. I don’t understand what you, as a person, gain from discriminating against a brother or sister. I don’t understand why it makes you feel any better. And I never will understand it. I don’t want to understand it either. Because nothing good will ever come from it.

I’m German. My wife is Japanese. Some of my friends are black. Some are Indian. I never felt that anyone of them is different than the rest. They are all unique. But I never see them as the color of their skin or the country they live in.

And I’m glad that many people see this the same way as I do. But unfortunately, “many” is not enough in this case. We all should see it this way. So for once in my life, I have an opinion that I feel valuable enough to call an unequivocal truth.

Racism should not exist. If you think differently, then it’s not a difference of opinion, as usual. This time, it is simply and 100% me being right and you being wrong. Not subjectively, but objectively.

If you think I’m wrong, feel free to speak up against me.

Racism is wrong. Period.

Nothing I or anyone else will say on the matter will ever bring back George Floyd. And this topic is nothing new. In fact, it’s an issue that has been debated ever since. And nothing ever seemed to change.

But I felt like writing it regardless. Maybe I’m another drop of water to carve a hole into that stone. Maybe this article will disappear into the vast space of the internet, never to be read.

I don’t know. But at least, I said it.

Kevin is an editor and writer for the ILLUMINATION and Polyglot Poetry publications. Follow him on Twitter and LinkedIn.