Running Time: 7 mins 15 secs
*** WARNING: THIS VIDEO FOR SEAN TAYLOR”S NEW SINGLE, “BLACK LIVES MATTER”, CONTAINS GRAPHIC IMAGES OF MURDERS BY THE POLICE ***
Part of the reason that George Floyd’s horrific murder sparked worldwide protests was the amount of people who saw the footage, and what it exposed about the racist, white supremacist nature of the societies we live in. It carries on a tradition of showing video and photographic evidence of racist atrocities in the USA that started with Emmett Till’s mother bravely allowing photos to be distrubuted of the open coffin of her 14 year old son’s mutilated body in the 50s.
It was a point reinforced by relatives of Oscar Grant (murdered in Oakland in 2013) and other relatives seeking justice for police murders, early pioneers of the Black Lives Matter movement whom Reel News were privileged to meet in 2018. They pointed out that now that everyone has a camera on their phone, atrocities by the police are regularly recorded and uploaded to social media – and this has become a powerful weapon in building a movement for justice. They urged us to share the footage of murders as widely as possible.
So please watch this video, even though it may be uncomfortable at times. And then join us in redoubling our efforts to build the movement for black lives – because as we all know, all lives will never matter until black lives start to matter.
