The two potent images above provides us with a powerful reminder that the murder of Black people abroad and the murder of Black people at home is inspired, supported and perpetuated by Western Imperialism.
When 46 year-old George Floyd had his life mercilessly choked out of him by Minneapolis Police Officer, Derek Chauvin (Picture, top right), African-Americans and Black people from around the world were justifiably angry, outraged and hungry for justice.
We’ve been here before, with Trayvon Benjamin Martin, the 17 year-old teenager who was gunned down in Florida by George Zimmerman, the community watch who perceived that the young African-American teenager was a threat to his community because of the colour of his skin.
In Britain we had our share of black deaths in police custody. Forty-eight year-old David Emmanuel who went under the artist name Smiley Culture and is best known for his 1980s reggae hit, ‘Police Officer, died in March 2011 after police raided his home and told his family that David had stabbed himself in the chest.
Twenty-nine year-old Kingsley Burrell Brown, died after being sectioned under the Mental Health Act, both his five year-old son and his sister said that Kingsley was beaten by police before he died in Queen Elizabeth Hospital of his injuries. (Read Black deaths in police custody: We should never forget) The list goes on and the evidence points not only towards state sanctioned racism, but also a racism rooted in Western imperialism.
Returning to the Ideological Roots of the Civil Right Movement
The picture on the top left hand side of this article is taken from U.S. political magazine The Rolling Stone, who released disturbing images of American soldiers posing for photographs with dead Afghan children and innocent civilians that they deliberately murdered.
There is a similarity in the mindset of police officers who take the lives of Black men and women at home and the way American troops commit war crimes abroad. It is the mindset of Western imperialism, where you can kill, plunder and rape any man, woman or child of colour because the state will protect you.
With every not guilty verdict passed a clear message is sent from the state to those who still believe in white supremacy and Western imperialism that it is okay to murder people of colour. We will protect you. (Read The monstrous atrocities of U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan, and Black Lives Matter Has A Deep Historical Connection To The History Of Slavery, White Supremacy And European Colonialism)
The question has to be asked why current Black movements such as Black Lives Matter are silent on America’s murderous wars against people of colour overseas?
African-American civil rights martyr, Martin Luther King was not silent on this issue. He said in his speech, “Beyond Vietnam – a Time to Break Silence” given at Riverside Church in New York, April 4, 1967:
“The greatest purveyor of violence in the world today is my own government. For the sake of the hundreds of thousands trembling under our violence, I cannot be silent. Look across the seas and see individual capitalists of the West investing huge sums of money in Asia, Africa, and South America, only to take the profits out with no concern for the social betterment of the country. This is a role our nation has taken, … refusing to give up the privileges and the pleasures that comes from the immense profits of overseas investments. This is not just”. (Read King Condemned US Wars Maintaining Predatory Capitalist Investments and Was Shot Dead)
What mainstream Black civil rights leader speaks like this today? What spokesperson from Black Lives Matter condemns America and Western imperialism in general?
Who can forget the great Muhammed Ali who refused to fight in Vietnam, and had this to say in 1967:
“Why should they ask me to put on a uniform and go 10,000 miles from home and drop bombs and bullets on Brown people in Vietnam while so-called Negro people in Louisville are treated like dogs and denied simple human rights? No I’m not going 10,000 miles from home to help murder and burn another poor nation simply to continue the domination of white slave masters of the darker people the world over. This is the day when such evils must come to an end. I have been warned that to take such a stand would cost me millions of dollars. But I have said it once and I will say it again. The real enemy of my people is here. I will not disgrace my religion, my people or myself by becoming a tool to enslave those who are fighting for their own justice, freedom and equality. If I thought the war was going to bring freedom and equality to 22 million of my people they wouldn’t have to draft me, I’d join tomorrow. I have nothing to lose by standing up for my beliefs. So I’ll go to jail, so what? We’ve been in jail for 400 years.” https://alphahistory.com/vietnamwar/muhammad-ali-refuses-to-fight-1967/
What Black celebrity is speaking against Western imperialism today? What Black rap star would risk their career to speak the truth like Ali did?
Something does not quite add up about the Black civil rights movement today, nor indeed major protest movements such as Occupy Wall Street and I would go as far to say, Black Lives Matter.
Professor Michel Chossudovsky is an award-winning author, Professor of Economics (emeritus) at the University of Ottawa, Founder and Director of the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG), Montreal, Editor of Global Research. In his revealing article, Who’s Funding the Protest Movement? Who’s Behind it? , he revealed that, “Black Lives Matter…is generously funded by corporate charities and foundations ( Soros, Ford, et al) which are firmly committed to neoliberalism.” (May 1st 2016)
Western Imperialism has a long history of funding non-governmental organisations (NGOs) to infiltrate, subvert and control society. (Read Peaceful Assassins: How non-governmental organisations are the new agents of Western imperialism).
In a democratic society the link between corporate money and NGOs must be exposed. This is the same financial cabal that Martin Luther King exposed and was assassinated for, and it is the same enemy of racial and human progress for the ruthless pursuit of greed and power.
If we really want Black Lives to Matter, then I suggest we begin by returning back to our civil rights roots.
For more research:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-52915019
