thehuffingtonpostuk--2020-06-04--How MPs Continued To 'Get The Job Done' Despite Coronavirus

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Jacob Rees-Mogg’s decision to force MPs back to Westminster despite the ongoing coronavirus pandemic has enraged politicians of all parties.
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The first example of how a socially distanced Commons would work was dubbed “batshit” by one MP, who along with others lined up in a kilometre-long queue for a vote which took 40 minutes to complete on Tuesday evening.
It has been particularly galling for MPs who have been “incredibly busy” in lockdown, dealing with a “relentless” stream of casework as constituents deal with the health and economic fallout of Covid-19.
HuffPost UK spoke to five MPs to find out how the heart of the UK’s democracy coped with the biggest peacetime restrictions in living memory, and whether the period could change parliament in the future.
‘The workload was huge’
All the MPs reported a massive increase in constituents seeking help with health and economic issues, and sharing heartfelt stories of their families’ experiences, particularly in the early stages of the lockdown.
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The SNP’s Hannah Bardell carried out an audit which showed a 300% increase in casework for her Livingstone constituents.
Tory Alexander Stafford (Rother Valley) described a “huge workload” with 300-500 extra emails a day.
And Labour’s Tracy Brabin said she still had 500 outstanding “policy” requests - work which requires a political response - that she had to push to one side as she dealt with urgent constituency work.
SNP's Hannah Bardell wearing a Scotland football shirt in the House of Commons - before the pandemic. PA Archive/PA Images
Veteran Liberal Democrat Alistair Carmichael noted: “Casework went through the roof in the first two or three weeks.
“Then the volume decreased but the complexity increased.”
Much of the complex work was helping constituents navigate ever-changing and knotty rules, from when to self isolate or go to work, to applying for universal credit, the furlough scheme or business grants.
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Labour’s Wes Streeting says he and his staff in Ilford North were “inundated”.
“We’ve been getting fewer generic campaign emails on issues people care about where you can send the same reply to everyone.
“What we’ve been getting is lots of very personal, individual cases that require personal focus and attention.”
As the crisis wore relentlessly on to its peak and the death rate rose, MPs’ work only increased and became more “urgent and emotional”, according to Brabin.
Veteran Liberal Democrat Alistair Carmichael noted: “Casework went through the roof in the first two or three weeks.
“Then the volume decreased but the complexity increased.”
Much of the complex work was helping constituents navigate ever-changing and knotty rules, from when to self isolate or go to work, to applying for universal credit, the furlough scheme or business grants.
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Labour’s Wes Streeting says he and his staff in Ilford North were “inundated”.
“We’ve been getting fewer generic campaign emails on issues people care about where you can send the same reply to everyone.
“What we’ve been getting is lots of very personal, individual cases that require personal focus and attention.”
As the crisis wore relentlessly on to its peak and the death rate rose, MPs’ work only increased and became more “urgent and emotional”, according to Brabin.
Dominic Cummings' apparent breach of lockdown rules sparked waves of complaint and heartfelt outpouring to MPs. EMPICS Entertainment
Brabin says: “The Dominic Cummings debacle, whilst I didn’t have thousands of emails, people came to me who never have before with very heartfelt, personal emails that need a personal response.
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“That is also a task where you have to handwrite a letter to everyone who has taken the time to share their family’s experience.
“So you need to take that empathetic approach that every MP should have.”
Combined with the “relentless” nature of working from home, it became “overwhelming” for some MPs, Brabin says.
And it is even more difficult for MPs’ staff, who are not being called back to Westminster.
Bardell says she has been hosting team quizzes and wellness sessions for her staff over video conferencing, and gave them a “free” week off without using up annual leave to give them a “mental break”.
It has been a “huge challenge”, she says, as “one of the major things for the team is being together to deal with complex, difficult and distressing cases”.
“We’ve dealt with a number of constituents who have lost a family member to Covid and they have been really really difficult cases,” Bardell adds.
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Streeting says his staff were “really putting in the extra hours and extra miles”
“A lot of people who work for MPs do so because they are motivated by public service and so they are just as committed to supporting the public as we are.
“I’ve had to say to my team they need to look after their work-life balance and take time out and have rest days.”
‘You had far more contact with people’
The crisis forced some MPs to experiment with new ways of working.
Stafford says he has held constituency surgeries over video calls and found it made things “a lot more efficient”.
He also plans to continue holding Facebook live Q&As.
“I was a bit sceptical starting off to be honest but I was amazed with how many people saw it,” the Tory MP says.
“Especially those people who aren’t necessarily politically engaged. You had far more contact with people for whom politics isn’t part of their day-to-day lives.”
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For others, like Brabin who is working at home with three furloughed adults, it has been harder.
“My office is a table in my bedroom, so I fall out of bed, there’s no travel time when you have the chance to reflect and think, I’m at my desk and then come 7pm I can’t do anymore,” she says.
“And then you almost want to fall back into bed.
“The relentless nature of it has made MPs feel it’s quite overwhelming.
“You lose that variety of meeting people, going to a factory, visiting a food bank.”
Tory MPs have also had help from ministers where others did not.
Stafford said the government had adopted a “sort of war time, hands to the pump” attitude and made themselves available to answer MP’s queries over WhatsApp.
“If you have had a particular question I can WhatsApp the minister or special adviser and get an official response straight away rather than going through the usual channels of writing a letter and doing that more official stuff,” he says.
“That has been a theme for this, it has worked a lot more efficiently for constituents when it comes to Covid.
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“You are getting answers much quicker.
“Obviously non-Covid issues have been massively delayed because every government department is up to its neck, understandably because of Covid.”
Labour MP Tracy Brabin's office has been an office is a table in my bedroom. PA
‘It was way too stilted’
While Cabinet Office minister Penny Mordaunt has been hosting Q&As with opposition MPs they have found much of their wider correspondence has fallen by the wayside.
On discovering Tories’ hotline to ministers, Bardell says: “That is news to me.
“We’re finding a complete deaf ear in terms of the small limited companies falling through the cracks for example.”
Streeting says: “I raised an issue about support for my council and I felt that phoning into Penny Mordaunt got that problem resolved.
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“But there have been countless other examples where the information and support for government departments hasn’t come back in the same way, so that’s made things more of a challenge.”
As well as helping constituents, MPs play another important role by holding ministers to account in parliament.
Most acknowledge that video conference Commons made that job harder, with preselected questions, narrow and time-limited debates and no opportunities to buttonhole ministers.
Stafford says: “It was too stage managed, it was going through the motions of parliament but not actually doing the job of holding the government to account.”
Defending the reimposition of physical voting, Stafford says it’s crucial to give MPs the chance to put pressure on ministers in the lobbies - although how this works with two metre social distancing is another question.
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But Carmichael admits on the lockdown: “You miss out on the social interaction, you miss out on the water cooler chat and the gossip.
“And in politics that is a lot.”
Brabin said she would take advantage of the return to Westminster to try and change the law by tabling amendments.
“You feel more able in the building to go into the table office and speak about things you are concerned about.
“And it is about being able to grab people.”
Streeting feels like the comeback will also help widen the debate as the severity of the pandemic declines.
“Normally you have many opportunities each day to get issues on the agenda but we’ve had question times curtailed, we haven’t had adjournment debates or Westminster Hall debates and government business has been quite narrow,” he says.
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“People sometimes forget that coronavirus is the dominant issue but there are others that need attention and we need to be able to put to ministers.”
‘People are being deliberately excluded’
MPs queue outside the House of Commons in Westminster, London, as they wait to vote on the future of proceedings, amid a row over how Commons business can take place safely Jonathan Brady - PA Images via Getty Images
Bardell however feels the lockdown has highlighted the dysfunctional nature of parliament, which thrives on informal chats in wood-panelled corridors and confrontational debates in the chamber.
The SNP says: “If that is the only way to hold them to account, then we have some real issues with our democratic process.
“In many cases the answers have been better and the discourse has been better because there’s less of the boorishness and the shouting and the nasty environment.
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“I’m sure it suits some people but it’s not a nice place to be a lot of the time, particularly during PMQs, and I don’t think the public like it either.
“The whole world of work is changing and I think it’s important that parliament leads that and reflects that.”
Boris Johnson has since relented to criticism and will now allow shielded MPs to cast votes by proxy.
But some MPs see the callback as a political move, designed to help the government rather than parliament.
“We hear talk about it being about getting an audience behind Boris Johnson but of course they’re not going to have that option because there will still only be 50 MPs in the chamber,” Carmichael says.
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“They are wanting to send signals about the lockdown ending but they are taking a risk.
“There are 650 MPs, that’s potentially 650 people picking up the virus in Westminster and taking it back home to their communities.”
Streeting says the approach epitomises where the government has gone “spectacularly wrong”, in making a “whole load of really weird decisions largely for political reasons”.
“If we were doing the stupid kilometre-long queue because Jacob Rees-Mogg was saying we haven’t got electronic voting systems set up and it’s going to take a while, that would be one thing.
“But given we’ve been using these voting systems for weeks it is so maddening because it’s clearly just dogmatic, there’s no need for it.”
He adds: “I think cynically they know not everyone is going to be able to return and participate and I think there is an extent to which people are being deliberately excluded.
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“We’ve shown we can work from home and that we can work from home quite effectively, and while that’s not an ideal situation and no one wants these arrangements permanently, I think we have shown and to their credit the parliamentary authorities have shown MPs can remotely, get the job done and keep people safe.


thehuffingtonpostuk--2020-06-04--'It's A Personal Choice': Christine McGuinness Reflects On Sending Twins With Autism Back To School

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Christine McGuinness has reflected on how she feels after sending her twins with autism back to school for a “couple of hours” each day.
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McGuinness, 32, the wife of Take Me Out host Paddy McGuinness, shared an emotional post on Instagram, where she echoed the concerns of many parents.
“Back to school,” the mum to six-year-old twins Leo and Penelope wrote. “It’s safe to say we have had a mixture of emotions the last couple of days, mainly from me but mostly good.”
Some British schools and nurseries have already reopened to select year groups, while others are delaying until later this month.
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McGuinness wrote: “It’s a personal choice sending your children back to school and not an easy one to make. We’re testing it out taking things one day at a time.
“Trying just a couple of hours, seeing if the twins are happier and more settled with some routine back. If they can do school life safely, then that’s we will do!
Ultimately, she wrote, she just wants her children to be “happy and safe”.
McGuinness is also mum to three-year-old Felicity, who she previously said is “showing signs” of autism. “We haven’t heard anything from nursery for our youngest yet,” she added. “I have no idea if/when they will open.
“And honestly she is struggling so much, I can’t wait to get her back in for her well being although I’m preparing for a difficult time settling her again.”
McGuinness, who has spoken out publicly before about raising children with autism, was praised for her honest approach, with some parents sharing their own concerns about their kids.
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“Thank you for always sharing the real life side of autism,” one mother wrote. “I am absolutely dreading the return date to come through for my eight-year-old autistic son. It physically pains my heart just thinking about how he is going to cope and react to it all.”
“Thank you for always sharing the real life side of autism.”
Another mum said that her son, two, who has autism, had gone back to nursery and “wasn’t happy about it” at first. “He kept signing ‘no’ then yesterday morning he was so happy to go back and he had a great day,” she wrote. “He always surprises me with how he adapts and copes with change.”
Much like McGuinness, the mum said that every parent had to do “what is best for our own families”.
“It was a very hard decision for me to make and in the end I had no choice because I’ve had to go back to work,” she wrote, “but as long as they are safe and happy, that is the main thing!”


thehuffingtonpostuk--2020-06-04--Exclusive: Oxford University Delays Publishing Diversity Data Because Of 'World Events'

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The University of Oxford has delayed publishing admissions data on the diversity of its students in light of “world events”, HuffPost UK can reveal.
Staff members were notified about the change in an internal email circulated on Wednesday afternoon.
In the message, seen by HuffPost UK, university heads said they “feel strongly that this is not the right time to share our data”.
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The data each year reveal how diverse the student intake is by ethnicity, age, gender, disability, economic background, what type of school they attended, and where in the UK or abroad they live.
“After careful consideration of the current world events and also learning that Cambridge will not be publishing its admissions data until late June, the decision to postpone the release of the annual admissions statistical report has been taken,” the email states.
“The delay also allows us more time to work on announcing our commitment to outreach through our digital outreach programmes, which are being delivered despite the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic and particularly the closure of schools since March 2020.”
At least 15,000 people gathered at Hyde Park in central London on Wednesday in a Black Lives Matter demonstration sparked by the brutal police killing of George Floyd in the US last week.
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Since then, anti-racism rallies have been held in cities around the world, from Paris to Nairobi.
More protests are slated to take place in the capital across the coming days including one outside of the US embassy on Saturday.
NurPhoto via Getty Images
Responding to “world events” and growing social unrest, Oxford University tweeted on Tuesday: “We’re committed to supporting our community in opposing racism in all its forms, including upholding anti-racist values.”
We're committed to supporting our community in opposing racism in all its forms, including upholding anti-racist values. — University of Oxford (@UniofOxford) June 2, 2020
The Tower of The Five Orders, Bodleian Library, Oxford University Sura Ark via Getty Images
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In 2019, Oxford announced that more than 22% of undergraduate students starting in 2019 were Britons from Black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME) backgrounds – up from 18% on the previous year’s UCAS admissions statistics.
The overall proportion of Black students admitted increased from 2.6% in 2018 to 3.1% in 2019.
Data highlights that a white applicant is twice as likely to get into Oxford than a Black applicant.
The educational institution has previously come under fire over the lack of diversity among its student body.
In November, Oxford union was forced to apologise after 25-year-old Ebenezer Azamati, a blind Black student, was “dragged by his feet” from a debate held by one of the university’s most prestigious societies.
In 2018, Stormzy revealed that Oxford turned down his offer to fund scholarships for Black students – leading him to take his proposal to Cambridge.
The same year, former universities minister Tory MP Sam Gyimah criticised both Oxford and Cambridge for failing to enrol sufficient students who are Black or from less privileged backgrounds, saying the situation is “staggering”.
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In 2017, it was accused of “social apartheid” by Labour MP David Lammy when it emerged that 10 out of 32 Oxford colleges did not award a place to a Black British pupil with A-levels in 2015.
Also in 2017, Oxford was accused of racism after one of its colleges, Harris Manchester, sent an email warning students to be “vigilant” after an unknown Black man was seen in the building.
A spokesperson from the University of Oxford told HuffPost UK:
“The University of Oxford was scheduled to publish its annual Undergraduate Admissions Report this week. However, as world events have escalated over the last ten days, it became obvious that now was not the time to share this content.
“In fact, some headline admissions figures have already been published, in January this year, and revealed that the university is now attracting more ethnic minority students, including Black students, than ever.
“Having already shared this core information, it felt deeply inappropriate to publish content that could distract from the important challenges and debate facing our society at this time and try to draw attention to our own progress on the figures.”
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“Oxford abhors racism and discrimination of any description and protecting the wellbeing of our Black and ethnic minority student and staff community is a University priority.
“Recent events have shone a light on imperfections everywhere, including at Oxford, and we are working hard to build towards a truly diverse community. Our admissions figures are an important indicator of our progress but we also need to guarantee an inclusive and respectful learning environment for all.”


thehuffingtonpostuk--2020-06-04--What Is The K Number? And How Is It Different To The R Number?

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For months, we’ve heard about the coronavirus R and K rate.
Both values are calculated by mathematicians and scientists working to combat the pandemic and used to influence public health policies. The experts analyse vast amounts of data – including hospital admissions, ICU admissions, deaths, self-reported symptoms and behaviour surveys – to estimate the R and K values. Each value offers a slightly different insight into the virus.
Confused about these terms and the difference between the two? Here’s what you need to know.
What is the R number?
The R number – sometimes referred to as the R0 – is the “basic reproduction number”. It’s used to measure the transmission potential of a disease.
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The R value represents the number of people that one infected person will, on average, pass the virus on to. It’s influenced by characteristics of the specific disease (in this case, Covid-19), such as how easily it passes from person to person. Human behaviour – i.e. how closely we follow social distancing measures – will also impact the R number.
When the R number is below one, this suggests the number of cases is shrinking. Anything above one suggests cases and subsequent infections are growing – and is a cause for concern, because cases snowball.
While it can help indicate if lockdown measures are working, the R number doesn’t offer the full picture; the R value can show if an epidemic is getting bigger or smaller, but not how large it is.
“R should always be considered alongside the number of people currently infected,” the government website explains. “If R equals 1 with 100,000 people currently infected, it is a very different situation to R equals 1 with 1,000 people currently infected.”
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What is the K number?
The K number, or K value, is a metric used to shed light on the variations of the R number across Covid-19 cases. It provides scientists with a more nuanced view of how the disease is spreading, rather than simply tracking if it’s spreading.
While the R number represents the average number of people a single infected person will go on to infect, the K number highlights that not all infected people will go on to infect the same number. It shows the difference in infection rates.
For example, if an infected person self-isolates straight away once contracting Covid-19, they are likely to infect fewer people than someone who has attended a mass gathering. The K value shows how much statistical variation there is in the spread of the virus.
When the K value is less than one, this indicates a high variation in spreading patterns.
“Once K is below one, you have got the potential for super-spreading” - Dr Dr Adam Kucharski
“The general rule is that the smaller the K value is, the more transmission comes from a smaller number of infectious people,” Dr Dr Adam Kucharski, an expert at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine told The Guardian. “Once K is below one, you have got the potential for super-spreading.”
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“Once K is above about five or 10, it tells you most people are generating pretty similar numbers [of secondary cases], you’re not getting these super-spreading events.”
Research indicates that before lockdown, the K number for Covid-19 was around 0.1 and 0.5, meaning a small amount of people were generating a large amount of new cases. In other words, “super spreaders” were influencing the R number.
As lockdown measures ease, the K number will help scientists identify what’s more likely to lead to super-spreading – be that pubs reopening, the use of public transport or mass events such as festivals, sports and weddings.
Alongside the R number, the K number may determine which areas of life can resume and which must remain on hold in order to control the virus.


thehuffingtonpostuk--2020-06-04--Thousands Of Protesters Gathered Outside The White House Last Night And Sang 'Lean On Me'

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Thousands of people protesting the death of George Floyd gathered outside the White House on Wednesday evening and gave a “surreal, beautiful and peaceful” rendition of the Bill Withers classic, Lean On Me.
Holding their cellphones aloft in unison, the crowd in Washington DC’s Lafayette Square provided a stark contrast to the heavily militarised police presence guarding the White House.
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Surreal, beautiful, peaceful scene outside the White House as a man sings “Lean On Me” and thousands and thousands of protesters raise lighted cellphones and join their voices with his. pic.twitter.com/iAr0WWYc3u — Hannah Natanson (@hannah_natanson) June 4, 2020
Two nights earlier, US Park Police drove peaceful demonstrators from the area before Trump walked through the park to a church to hold up a Bible for cameras, in a move that was widely condemned as an opportune and divisive stunt.
Another remarkable visual:
Peaceful #GeorgeFloyd demonstrators here outside the White House are now sitting, phone lights on, singing “Lean On Me” — all while military and federal police stand in front of military vehicles guarding the White House. pic.twitter.com/IzqC8snoxB — Taylor Popielarz (@TaylorPopielarz) June 4, 2020
Elsewhere, prosecutors on Wednesday charged all four Minneapolis police officers implicated in the death of Floyd, who was pinned by his neck to the street during an arrest caught on video, sparking nine days of nationwide protest and civil turmoil.
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Derek Chauvin, arrested on Friday on charges of third-degree murder and manslaughter, was charged with the more serious count of second-degree murder, Reuters reports.
The added charge, defined under Minnesota law as unintentionally causing another person’s death while committing a serious criminal offence, can carry a sentence of up to 40 years – 15 years longer than the maximum sentence for third-degree murder.
Chauvin, 44, was the white officer seen in widely circulated video footage on May 25 kneeling on Floyd’s neck for nearly nine minutes as Floyd gasped for air and repeatedly groaned: “Please, I can’t breathe,” before going motionless while bystanders shouted at police to let him up.


thehuffingtonpostuk--2020-06-04--Meghan Markle: ‘George Floyd’s Life Mattered’

Meghan Markle: ‘George Floyd’s Life Mattered’
The Duchess of Sussex, Meghan Markle, has spoken out about the death of George Floyd during a virtual graduation speech for her old school Immaculate Heart High School in LA. She apologised for not having spoken on the matter earlier and urged students to use their love to make change in the world following the death of the Black man, who died in police custody.


thehuffingtonpostuk--2020-06-04--How To Talk To Kids About Racism And The George Floyd Protests

MARK FELIX via Getty Images
As the protests over the killing of George Floyd continue nationwide, many parents are struggling with how exactly to discuss it all with their kids — particularly their young kids.
Parents know it is vital to teach their kids about race, racism and police brutality. But those conversations are hard and the stakes are incredibly high.
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HuffPost Parents spoke with two experts who provided some basic guidance for parents as they talk to their children about the current national outrage, and the ongoing struggle against racism.
First and foremost, do NOT avoid talking about what’s happening right now.
Some parents may not feel ready to have “the talk” with their kids about racial conflict and police brutality and how it will impact them; others have grown up steeped in a problematic “colourblind” ideology and feel unsure about how to lead open, frank conversations with their own kids. Also, all parents just naturally want to shield their children from anger and violence.
But experts said that just about the worst thing parents can do is avoid talking about what’s happening right now, and about racism more broadly.
“I would always argue for the earlier, the better for having these conversations,” said Howard Stevenson, a professor of urban education at the University of Pennsylvania’s Graduate School of Education.
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In part, that’s because kids are so much more aware than we often give them credit for. According to the American Academy of Paediatrics (AAP), babies’ brains can pick up racial differences by the time they’re 6 months old, and between the ages of 2 and 4 most kids can internalise racial bias. By age 12? “Many children become set in their beliefs,” the AAP says.
The window to profoundly shape how children perceive and react to racial bias is brief. Have a plan.
“Embrace their curiosity. There is no taboo topic.” - Reena Patel, educational psychologist
Before you sit down to talk with your kid about race, racism and the current protests, it’s important to spend some time thinking about what you want to say. “Parents might feel overwhelmed if they haven’t really thought it out,” Stevenson said. “I think those who have thought it out are going to be much more useful.”
A few pointers: Try and be calm (though it’s also OK to show your emotions); try and be factual; and really consider your child’s age and personality when determining what level of detail you want to get into.
But don’t shy away from the really thorny stuff, like police brutality. You could say something like, ”‘Some police are very good and kind, and some [do] not always follow the rules,’” Stevenson said. Use that as a jumping off point to talk about examples that apply to their lives right now. Talk to your kid about how you’d like them to respond or behave if someone calls them a racial slur or if they witness someone calling a friend a racial slur, Stevenson said.
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Encourage questions.
Kids have a lot of questions about the protests, about George Floyd and about race more broadly — and that’s a good thing, according to the experts. Don’t feel like you have to know all of the answers right away, and don’t shut down any questions they have, even if they feel hard or frightening.
“Embrace their curiosity,” said Reena Patel, an educational psychologist. “There is no taboo topic.”
One effective response if you want to think about things a bit more? Some version of: “That’s a great question! Let’s try and learn more about that together.”
Model the behaviour you’d like to see.
Just about every parent knows that kids not only pay attention to what you say; they pay extremely close attention to what you do.
“It’s often true that children bring up racial stuff to parents before parents bring it up to them, and that is another way children learn about race — by watching how their parents react,” said Stevenson.
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“Parents, this can be a really good time to reexamine your own behaviors and biases.”
They’ll pay attention to your more deliberate actions as well, which is why many parents opt to take their children to protests. (Here’s some guidance on how to do so safely during the Covid-19 pandemic.) Now is a good time to talk to them about what activism means to you and your family, and to invite them to participate.
“Protest is really about having a voice, so bring it down to their level. Say, ‘Have you ever felt the need to put your foot down and speak up for something that wasn’t right or fair?’” said Patel.
Make sure this is an ongoing conversation.


thehuffingtonpostuk--2020-06-04--Police Get Rough With Demonstrators In America And Around The World As Anti-Racist Protests Continue

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Cities across the world have seen thousands of people march in solidarity with protesters in the US over the killing of George Floyd by a police officer.
From London to Toronto, Rio de Janeiro to Perth and Stockholm to Auckland, protesters have gathered outside US embassies and taken to the streets to demand justice and to rally against police brutality.
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And across America and the world, some police have been seen responding to protesters with violence and brutality.
In New York, an officer was captured on video pulling the mask off a young, Black protester and pepper spraying him in the face.
This boy had his hands up when an NYPD ofcr pulled his mask down and pepper sprayed him. @NYPDShea? Mayor @BilldeBlasio? pic.twitter.com/YtXDOoVckA — Sherrilyn Ifill (@Sifill_LDF) May 31, 2020
In Minneapolis – the state in which George Floyd was killed on May 25 – police were seen spraying mace from their vehicles as they drove by peaceful protesters.
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Disturbing scenes as Police pepper sprayed peaceful protesters as they scramble to exit after a trucker attempts to drive through crowd at the I-35W Bridge, Minneapolis. #BlackLivesMatter #Anonymous pic.twitter.com/Yf9m11MAol — Sowtion👑 (@esowtion) May 31, 2020
In the Swedish capital, two people were arrested at a demonstration that saw thousands of people defying a ban of gatherings of more than 50 people due to coronavirus.
A video appeared to show police using pepper spray against people in central Stockholm.
Vice News reporter Michael Anthony Adams was at a gas station in Minneapolis when police poured out of a van and yelled at people to leave.
Despite repeatedly saying that he was a member of the media, one officer replied, “I don’t care,” before blasting him with pepper spray.
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Police just raided the gas station we were sheltering at. After shouting press multiple times and raising my press card in the air, I was thrown to the ground. Then another cop came up and peppered sprayed me in the face while I was being held down. pic.twitter.com/23EkZIMAFC — Michael Anthony Adams (@MichaelAdams317) May 31, 2020
Orange Is the New Black actor Matt McGorry shared footage of Los Angeles, where officers appeared to hit and shoot at protesters. McGorry claimed he was also hit with a rubber bullet in the stomach by at the protests.
More police brutality from the @BLMLA @WeBldPwr protest yesterday where cops starting swinging batons and shooting projectiles at people simply standing there with there hands up. pic.twitter.com/ibkKfZoAB3 — Matt McGorry (@MattMcGorry) May 31, 2020
In Uptown Charlotte, North Carolina, protesters were reportedly fired upon with tear gas, flash bangs and pepper balls.
I don’t have all the answers, but I have the video. pic.twitter.com/GkFvbjHeZf — Justin the Francois (@lafrancois_j) June 1, 2020
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Officers dressed in riot gear in Salt Lake City, Utah, were filmed repeatedly pushing an elderly man using a cane until he fell to the ground.
Salt Lake City cops shove down an elderly man with a cane for the crime of standing along the street: pic.twitter.com/PCLkHqQtJg — Timothy Burke (@bubbaprog) May 31, 2020
Joyce Beatty, an African-American congresswoman from Ohio, said she was hit with pepper spray at a protest in downtown Columbus.


thehuffingtonpostuk--2020-06-04--Mary Pat Gleason, Star Of Friends, Sex And The City And Mom, Dies Aged 70

Tributes are being paid to character actor Mary Pat Gleason, who has died at the age of 70.
Mary Pat’s manager confirmed to Variety that she died on Tuesday after being diagnosed with cancer, noting that “she was a fighter to the end”.
After landing her first acting role in 1982, Mary Pat would go on to rack up more than 100 on-screen credits on both the big and small screen.
This included small roles in shows like Friends – in which she played medical receptionist Nurse Sizemore in the first season – as well as Will And Grace, Sex In The City and Desperate Housewives.
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Her film career saw her starring opposite Hilary Duff in A Cinderella Story, as well as appearing in Basic Instinct and the Netflix original Sierra Burgiss Is A Loser.
More recently, she had a recurring role as Mary in the sitcom Mom, with her co-star Allison Janney paying tribute on Instagram.
Mary Pat Gleason pictured in 2013 Tibrina Hobson via Getty Images
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“We said goodbye to Mary Pat Gleason yesterday,” Allison wrote. “She was part of our [Mom] family and we loved her so much. She was one of our favourite guest stars.
“Her kind heart and warm smile will be missed. RIP dear Mary Pat.”
Fellow actor Leslie Jordan then paid his own tribute, writing: “Oh how sad. I worked with Mary Pat many times over the years. She was a real trooper and loved by ALL.”
In addition to acting, Mary Pat was an Emmy-winning writer, who worked on the radio and TV soap opera The Guiding Light.
Her nephew told Entertainment Tonight that Mary Pat had requested not to have a service, but instead her family will pay their respects with a personal memorial. She also asked that her memory be honoured with donations to charities which help those who have bipolar disorder.
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thehuffingtonpostuk--2020-06-04--TV Baftas 2020: Chernobyl Matches Record For Most Nominations

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The nominations for this year’s TV Baftas have been revealed, with Chernobyl storming ahead with a hefty 14 nominations.
Jared Harris and Stellan Skarsgard have both received nominations in the Leading Actor and Supporting Actor categories, while the show itself is also up for best Mini-Series.
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Most of its other nominations are in technical categories, including Costume Design, Make-Up And Hair Design, Production Design and Original Music.
With 14 nominations, it’s now among the most-nominated TV shows in Bafta history, joining Killing Eve, which received the same number last year, but in 2020 is only up for four awards.
Chernobyl is leading the charge at this year's TV Baftas HBO
On seven nominations is The Crown, with recognition in the Drama Series category, while Josh O’Connor and Helena Bonham-Carter are in the running for Supporting Actor and Supporting Actress, respectively.
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Just behind on six nominations are Fleabag and Giri/Haji, with the former being nominated for Scripted Comedy, while stars Phoebe Waller-Bridge and Sian Clifford are each up for Female Performance In A Comedy Programme.
It's a big year for Giri/Haji BBC
Meanwhile, Giri/Haji – which aired on BBC Two last year and has since gone on Netflix internationally – is up for Drama Series, Leading Actor for Takehiro Hira and supporting actor Will Sharpe.
It’s a big year for first-time nominees as well, with Sex Education star Ncuti Gatwa in the running for Male Performance In A Comedy Programme, Mo Gilligan being recognised for The Lateish Show With Mo Gilligan and The End Of The F***ing World’s Naomi Ackie in the running for Supporting Actress.
Sex Education favourite Ncuti Gatwa is up for his first ever Bafta Sam Taylor/Netflix
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Here are all the nominations for this year’s TV Baftas...
Drama Series
The Crown
The End Of The F***ing World
Gentleman Jack
Giri/Haji
Leading Actress
Glenda Jackson (Elizabeth Is Missing)
Jodie Comer (Killing Eve)
Samantha Morton (I Am Kirsty)
Suranne Jones (Gentleman Jack)
Leading Actor
Callum Turner (The Capture)
Jared Harris (Chernobyl)
Stephen Graham (The Virtues)
Takehiro Hira (Giri/Haji)
Supporting Actor
Joe Absolom (A Confession)
Josh O’Connor (The Crown)
Stellan Skarsgard (Chernobyl)
Will Sharpe (Giri/Haji)
Supporting Actress
Helen Behan (The Virtues)
Helena Bonham-Carter (The Crown)
Jasmine Jobson (Top Boy)
Naomi Ackie (The End Of The F***ing World)
Single Drama
Brexit: The Uncivil War
Elizabeth Is Missing
The Left Behind
Responsible Child
Comedy Entertainment Programme
The Graham Norton Show
The Last Leg
The Ranganation
Taskmaster
Scripted Comedy
Catastrophe
Derry Girls
Fleabag
Stath Lets Flats
Female Performance In A Comedy Programme
Gbemisola Ikumelo (Famalam)
Phoebe Waller-Bridge (Fleabag)
Sarah Kendall (Frayed)
Sian Clifford (Fleabag)
Male Performance In A Comedy Programme
Guz Khan (Man Like Mobeen)
Jamie Demetriou (Stath Lets Flats)
Ncuti Gatwa (Sex Education)
Youssef Kerkour (Jantaculum)
Current Affairs
Growing Up Poor: Britain’s Breadline Kids
The Hunt For Jihadi John
Is Labour Anti-Semitic: Panorama
Undercover: Inside China’s Digital Gulag
Entertainment Programme
The Greatest Dancer
The Rap Game
Strictly Come Dancing
The Voice UK
Entertainment Performance
Frankie Boyle (Frankie Boyle’s New World Order)
Graham Norton (The Graham Norton Show)
Lee Mack (Would I Lie To You)
Mo Gilligan (The Lateish Show With Mo Gilligan)
Factual Series
Crime And Punishment
Don’t F*** With Cats: Hunting An Internet Killer
Leaving Neverland
Our Dementia Choir With Vicky McClure
Reality & Constructed Factual
Celebrity Gogglebox
Harry’s Heroes: The Full English
Race Across The World
RuPaul’s Drag Race UK
Soap & Continuing Drama
Casualty
Coronation Street
Emmerdale
Holby City
Specialist Factual
8 Days: To The Moon And Back
Seven Worlds, One Planet
Thatcher: A Very British Revolution
Yorkshire Ripper Files: A Very British Crime Story
Features
Joe Lyctett’s Got Your Back
The Misadventures Of Romesh Ranganathan
Mortimer & Whitehouse
Snackmasters
International
Euphoria
Succession
Unbelievable
When They See Us
Live Event
Blue Planet Live
Election 2019 Live: The Results
Glastonbury 2019
Operation Live
Mini-Series
A Confession
Chernobyl
The Victim
The Virtues


thehuffingtonpostuk--2020-06-04--Meghan Markle Speaks Out: ‘George Floyd’s Life Mattered’

“The only wrong thing to say is to say nothing. Because George Floyd’s life mattered. And Breonna Taylor’s life mattered. And Philando Castile’s life mattered. And Tamir Rice’s life mattered. And so did so many other people, whose names we know and whose names we do not know. Stefan Clarke, his life mattered.
“And I was thinking about this moment when I was a sophomore in high school. I was 15 and as you know, sophomore year is the year that we do volunteer work, which is a pre-requisite before graduating. And I remember my teacher at the time said to me before I was leaving for a day of volunteering: ’Always remember to put others needs above your own fears.”


thehuffingtonpostuk--2020-06-04--8 Minutes And 46 Seconds: Remembering George Floyd And The Victims Of Police Brutality

8 Minutes And 46 Seconds: Remembering George Floyd And The Victims Of Police Brutality
George Floyd was killed in Minneapolis on 25 May 2020 after police officer Derek Chauvin used lethal force to arrest him. As Floyd, a Black man, lay face down on the street, Chauvin, a white man, kneeled on his neck for 8 minutes and 46 seconds as Floyd begged for air – and his life. In tribute to Floyd, the countless Black victims of police brutality and the Black Lives Matter movement, we reflect on the recent vigils held across the world in silence and compassion – for 8 minutes and 46 seconds.


thehuffingtonpostuk--2020-06-04--John Boyega Praised By Star Wars Co-Star Mark Hamill And Director Jordan Peele Following Rousing Ant

John Boyega Praised By Star Wars Co-Star Mark Hamill And Director Jordan Peele Following Rousing Anti-Racism Speech

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The actor told Black Lives Matter demonstrators in Hyde Park he was “speaking to you from my heart” as he delivered a rousing message through a megaphone.
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He paid tribute to George Floyd, the Black civilian who died in police custody last week, as well as namechecking other Black people who have died at the hands of police in both the UK and US.
The Star Wars star also said he thought speaking out could harm his career.
John was widely praised for the speech, with his Star Wars co-star Mark Hamill among those showing him support.
Mark Hamill and John Boyega at the Star Wars: The Last Jedi premiere in 2017 WPA Pool via Getty Images
Mark tweeted: “Never been more proud of you, John.” He signed off the message with “dad”.
Never been more proud of you, John. @JohnBoyega
❤, dad https://t.co/XcXvBcblPG — Mark Hamill (@HamillHimself) June 3, 2020
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The official Star Wars Twitter account said the actor was a “hero” for using his platform to speak out.
“Lucasfilm stands with John Boyega and his message that now is the time. Black lives have always mattered,” it read.
“‘Black lives have always been important. Black lives have always meant something’. The evil that is racism must stop. We will commit to being part of the change that is long overdue in the world. John Boyega, you are our hero.”
Jordan Peele, the Oscar-winning director of Get Out, said: “We got you, John.”
Actor Yvette Nicole Brown added: “Dear @JohnBoyega, I see you and I love you. Thank you for loving us.
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“And know this, being on the right side of history is better than any paycheck complicit silence would provide. I stand with you. WE stand with you.”
Dear @JohnBoyega, I see you and I love you. Thank you for loving us. #King 👑
And know this, being on the right side of history is better than any paycheck complicit silence would provide.
I stand with you.
WE stand with you. #BlackLivesMatter ✊🏾❤ pic.twitter.com/iv2yK06KHQ — yvette nicole brown (@YNB) June 3, 2020
Filmmaker Matthew A Cherry quote tweeted the star voicing concerns about how speaking out might harm his career and said: “I would work with John Boyega and I urge other Non-Black creators to affirm that they have his back as well.”
Director Olivia Wilde was among those to respond, saying: “Absolutely. I would be honoured to work with @JohnBoyega and can only hope to have the chance. We’ve got your back, John. Don’t hold back.”
Absolutely. I would be honored to work with @JohnBoyega and can only hope to have the chance. We’ve got your back, John. Don’t hold back. https://t.co/4d5gA3RRkj — olivia wilde (@oliviawilde) June 3, 2020
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John previously said he did not want to “work in fear” when in the US, as he addressed the unrest spreading across the US and elsewhere.


thehuffingtonpostuk--2020-06-04--Trump Went Full-On Fascist For A Photo-Op. What’s He Willing To Do To Keep Power?

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If Donald Trump was willing to have Americans gassed and beaten so he could stage a photo opportunity, what will he be willing to do to retain the presidency come election time?
Authoritarianism experts who worried about Trump’s tendencies during his campaign and his first years in office are now sounding fresh alarms following the clearing of a park adjacent to the White House on Monday using gas, flash-bang grenades, pepper pellets and other aggressive tactics ― all so he could stand in front of a church he does not attend and be photographed holding a Bible.
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“It was everything that an autocrat is,” said Gail Helt, who watched for signs of democratic decay in Asian countries during her dozen years as a CIA analyst. “Trying to show off the reins of power. That image of him holding the Bible. … I don’t know what that was, but it was disturbing.”
US President Donald Trump holds up a Bible outside of St John's Episcopal church in Washington, DC on June 1 BRENDAN SMIALOWSKI via Getty Images
Neither the White House nor the Trump campaign responded to HuffPost queries regarding Trump’s authoritarian tendencies and whether they might worsen the closer we get to an Election Day that may force him from office.
In recent months, Trump has begun aggressively attacking mail voting, a process that is standard in some states now and which many others are expanding because of concerns that in-person voting could spread the coronavirus. Trump has repeatedly claimed that expanding voting by mail will let Democrats cheat, even though he, his press secretary and a top adviser have all voted by mail in recent elections.
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“MAIL-IN VOTING WILL LEAD TO MASSIVE FRAUD AND ABUSE,” he claimed in a statement he posted to Twitter last week.
Trump critics, both Democrats and Republicans, believe that he is laying the groundwork to challenge the election results should he lose and that he could try to remain in office by invoking emergency powers.
Trump has shown at best a hazy grasp of his actual powers during his presidency and instead has made broad statements about his authority under the Constitution. “I have an Article II, where I have the right to do whatever I want as president,” he told supporters last summer.
He does not appear to have any authority to undo an election loss, but his critics warn that the outcome of such assertions on his part could largely be determined by his Cabinet members and Republicans in Congress. And that has Republicans who oppose him worried.
“The question is not what Trump is willing to do; it’s what the people around him are willing to enable him to do. We already know what Trump is capable of,” said Tom Nichols, a Naval War College professor and prominent Trump critic.
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“Trump is a thug surrounded by weak men and women desperate to be near power. Trump has no sense of right and wrong and will do anything,” said Stuart Stevens, a GOP consultant who worked on the campaigns of George W Bush and Mitt Romney. “The burden is on the Republican Party. In our system, parties should serve a circuit breaker role. Republicans have proven that most will not, and it creates a very dangerous situation.”
President Donald Trump leaves the White House to walk to St. John's Episcopal Church, across Lafayette Park from the White House, on Monday. BRENDAN SMIALOWSKI/AFP via Getty Images
Trump has long spoken admiringly of dictators and of violence as a tool for social control.
In 1990, following the brutal crackdown of protests in Beijing, Trump said: “When the students poured into Tiananmen Square, the Chinese government almost blew it. Then they were vicious, they were horrible, but they put it down with strength. That shows you the power of strength.”
Running for president in 2015, Trump repeatedly praised Russian leader Vladimir Putin, even calling him a better leader than President Barack Obama. In 2016, Trump professed respect for North Korea’s Kim Jong Un for murdering his uncle and others as a way to consolidate power. “It’s incredible. He wiped out the uncle. He wiped out this one, that one,” he said.
In 2018, he spoke wistfully about Chinese President Xi Jinping’s ability to change the constitution and scrap limits on the number of terms he could serve. And today he is trying to get Russia reinstated into the Group of 7, the organisation of large democratic economies, even as Putin seeks to extend his presidential term until 2036 and still retains control of a portion of Ukraine, the reason Russia was expelled from what had been the G8 in the first place.
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Trump has also in his years in the White House frequently praised the use of violence. He told police officers in 2017 that they shouldn’t worry about hitting suspects’ heads as they place them in patrol cars. And on a conference call with governors on Monday, he berated them for not “dominating” the streets of their cities.
“If you don’t dominate, you’re wasting your time. They’re going to run all over you. You’ll look like a bunch of jerks,” he told them.
“I am your president of law and order,” he declared hours later from the White House Rose Garden as police and troops were clearing a park of protesters so he could walk through to take his Bible photo.
“Trump is a menace. It’s almost pointless to try and guess what new atrocious thing Trump will come up with, but he has certainly made it clear that there is no line, moral, legal or otherwise, that he won’t cross if he thinks it could help him retain power,” said Daniela Martins, press secretary of the Priorities USA super PAC.
“It was everything that an autocrat is. Trying to show off the reins of power. That image of him holding the Bible. … I don’t know what that was, but it was disturbing.” - Gail Helt, former CIA analyst
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Ruth Ben-Ghiat, an authoritarianism expert at New York University, said Trump’s clearing of Lafayette Square on Monday was a textbook case.
“This was an authoritarian spectacle, backed up by the real force of sending military into the streets,” she said. “A cocktail of all the elements authoritarians have used in history: a lawless ruler attacking protesters, using religion as a prop and declaring war on his own people.”
She said what made it even more worrisome was the presence and support of Attorney General William Barr and Defense Secretary Mark Esper.
“They are his willing tools now,” Ben-Ghiat said. “He will do whatever he needs to to be reelected, starting with the military interventions he’s started with the aim of ending the protests.”
Helt, who now runs the Securities and Intelligence Studies program at King University in Bristol, Tennessee, said she saw democracy fall apart in Malaysia starting in 2011 following anti-government protests. She said she never dreamed it could happen here.
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thehuffingtonpostuk--2020-06-04--'Appalled': Former US Defence Secretary Jim Mattis Says Trump Has Divided The Nation

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Former US defence secretary Jim Mattis excoriated President Donald Trump’s response to nationwide protests over the police killing of George Floyd, writing Wednesday he had abused his power and sown division rather than working to unite outraged Americans.
“Donald Trump is the first president in my lifetime who does not try to unite the American people — does not even pretend to try,” Mattis wrote in a letter to The Atlantic. “Instead he tries to divide us. We are witnessing the consequences of three years of this deliberate effort. We are witnessing the consequences of three years without mature leadership.”
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(Read the full letter at The Atlantic.)
"Donald Trump is the first president in my lifetime who does not try to unite the American people—does not even pretend to try. Instead, he tries to divide us." -- James Mattis. Read more at @TheAtlantic:https://t.co/5fiRg9I9O7 — Jeffrey Goldberg (@JeffreyGoldberg) June 3, 2020
The comments are an extraordinary rebuke of the president. Trump has been roundly criticised by Democrats after he vowed to unleash the force of the US military on anti-racist protests around the country and for the violent removal of largely peaceful demonstrators near the White House this week so the president could have a photo-op in front of a nearby church.
But few Republicans have joined in.
Trump responded to the letter later Wednesday, saying he was “glad” Mattis was gone and didn’t like “his leadership style or much else about him.”
“Probably the only thing Barack Obama and I have in common is that we both had the honour of firing Jim Mattis, the world’s most overrated General,” the president wrote on Twitter. “I gave him a new life, things to do, and battles to win, but he seldom ‘brought home the bacon.’”
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Probably the only thing Barack Obama and I have in common is that we both had the honor of firing Jim Mattis, the world’s most overrated General. I asked for his letter of resignation, & felt great about. His nickname was “Chaos”, which I didn’t like, & changed it to “Mad Dog”... — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 4, 2020
Floyd, a Black man in Minneapolis, died last week after a white police officer knelt on his neck for nearly nine minutes. His death has sparked more than a week of demonstrations calling for dramatic police reform and accountability for the treatment of people of colour in custody.
Four officers were fired and have been charged in the killing, and the Minnesota attorney general upgraded charges Wednesday against Derek Chauvin, the officer who pressed his knee on Floyd’s neck, to second-degree murder without intent.
Mattis, a retired four-star Marine general, resigned at the end of 2018 in protest after Trump chose to withdraw US forces from Syria. He had largely remained quiet about his former boss, although he told The Atlantic’s Jeffrey Goldberg: “There is a period in which I owe my silence. It’s not eternal. It’s not going to be forever.”
That silence ended Wednesday. In his letter, he wrote that he had watched the week’s events “angry and appalled,” saying the protests were “defined by tens of thousands of people of conscience who are insisting that we live up to our values — our values as people and our values as a nation.”
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Mattis directly pointed to the response outside the White House on Monday when heavily armed officers used gas canisters and flash-bang grenades to clear Lafayette Square.


thehuffingtonpostuk--2020-06-04--Obama Offers Further Support Of Anti-Racism Protests: 'I'm Proud Of You Guys'

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Former US President Barack Obama held a virtual town hall on Wednesday in support of anti-racism protests, signalling his increasing willingness to step into the political fray after years of staying largely on the sidelines.
Obama’s remarks at the event largely focused on how protesters who are outraged by the police killing of George Floyd and systemic racism in the US can channel that anger into policy changes.
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“As activists and everyday citizens raise their voices, we need to be clear about where change is going to happen and how we can bring about that change,” he said during the livestreamed event that featured a number of other politicians and activists.
Addressing the recent “chatter on the internet” that encouraging people to vote won’t solve the complex injustices facing the Black community, Obama called for a different outlook.
“It is mayors and county executives that appoint most police chiefs and negotiate collective bargaining agreements with police unions, and that determines police practices in local communities,” he said. “It’s district attorneys and state’s attorneys that decide, typically, whether or not to investigate and ultimately charge those involved in police misconduct. And those are all elected positions.”
Fed-up Americans shouldn’t view their activism as a choice between two avenues, Obama urged. “This is not an ‘either/or.’ This is a ‘both-and.’ To bring about real change, we both have to highlight a problem and make people in power uncomfortable, but we also have to translate that into practical solutions and laws that can be implemented,” he said, then listed a number of things local leaders can do now to change how Black people are policed in their communities.
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The mayors of San Francisco, New York, Minneapolis, Chicago, Atlanta and Washington, DC, have already vowed to take the actions Obama outlined.
Obama has spoken out multiple times in the last week in support of the protests following Floyd’s death ― a noted shift from when he left office in hopes of unifying Democrats instead of focusing on the heated issues within the party. He urged many of the same actions and offered similar support to protesters in a Medium post on Monday.
He’s joined by all three other living ex-presidents in striking a drastically different tone from President Donald Trump, who vowed on Monday to crack down on anti-racism protests with “thousands of heavily armed soldiers, military personnel and law enforcement officers to stop the rioting, looting, vandalism, assaults and the wanton destruction of property.”
That same day, Trump had police tear-gas peaceful protesters near the White House so he could be photographed holding the Bible in front of a church. Elsewhere across the country, police have also used tear gas, rubber bullets and other violent means of stopping protests, even when they’re peaceful.
Obama ended his address with a very different message to protesters and activists: “I’m proud of you guys.”


thehuffingtonpostuk--2020-06-04--New Yorkers Said ‘F**k The Police,’ So The Police Rioted

Thousands of New Yorkers over the last few days have taken to the streets in all five boroughs, setting cop cars aflame, braving beatings by batons and suffering pepper spray to the eyes, all so they can scream an urgent message for all the world to hear: Fuck the police.
They marched in Manhattan, where the New York Police Department once gunned down Patrick Dorismond.
In Queens, where the NYPD shot 50 bullets at Sean Bell.
In the Bronx, where an NYPD cop choked the life out of Anthony Baez.
In Brooklyn, where the NYPD shot 13-year-old Nicholas Heyward Jr.
And they marched on Staten Island, where the NYPD stole the breath from Eric Garner’s lungs.
Nearly 2,000 protesters were arrested over five nights as America’s largest city joined a national uprising against police brutality that saw demonstrations in about 140 cities, a mass unrest the likes of which this country hasn’t seen in over a generation.
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There were moments in New York when it felt like this multi-racial coalition of protesters, led largely by young people of colour, was taking back the streets from the NYPD, a police force bigger than some nations’ armies that’s terrorized this city’s Black and brown residents since its founding.
It felt like more and more people here had come to question the cops’ monopoly on force and to embrace the radical idea of defunding the department, or even the abolitionist dream of a New York without New York’s Finest at all.
And so New York’s Finest erupted in violence.
The videos of tumult went viral. A cop speeding a patrol car into the middle of a crowd of protesters. A cop pulling down a man’s mask — worn to protect against the coronavirus — and pepper-spraying him in the face. Another using a car door to hit a man. One aiming a gun at demonstrators. Another shoving a woman into the ground so hard that she went into a seizure. And another could be heard saying “Shoot those motherfuckers” over the police scanner. The list goes on.
I witnessed cops brutalise and arrest people before being violently arrested myself.
And yet by Monday, New York’s Democratic governor, the city’s mayor and the country’s Republican president had settled on similar solutions to all the turmoil: suppressing this historic uprising with more armed agents of the state.
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To the protesters, it felt like their government still hadn’t heard them at all, and probably had never been listening in the first place.
“The Only Fucking Way They Understand”
On Saturday in the Flatbush section of Brooklyn, thousands gathered outside the Parkside Avenue subway station under the afternoon sun for a series of speeches before that day’s marches. People hung out of windows and draped Black Lives Matter banners off of fire escapes while listening to the speakers below.
“You know how fucked up it is to turn on the news and see another nigga that look like you dead?” a young Black man asked the crowd through a megaphone.
“If you white,” he added, “and you not in the crowd, not on the fire escape, not on the roof screaming ‘Black lives matter’ in New York City … then get the fuck out!”
He and all the other speakers, all Black or Hispanic or Native American, invoked the names of Americans whose recent murders had sparked the demonstrations rocking dozens of U.S. cities: Breonna Taylor, shot by police in Louisville, Kentucky; Ahmaud Arbery, shot and killed while jogging in Georgia by a former cop and his son; and George Floyd, killed in Minneapolis just eight days ago, when a cop pressed a knee into Floyd’s neck and kept it there like a noose.
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“We are George!” the crowd chanted.
Protest in Brooklyn getting big. Chants of “We are George!” and “Who keeps us safe? We keep us safe!” pic.twitter.com/aAI2kNn2H6 — Christopher Mathias (@letsgomathias) May 30, 2020
Constance Malcolm, the mother of 18-year-old Ramarley Graham, who was killed by the NYPD in 2012, was joined on the podium by her son Chinoor Campbell, who was only 6 years old when he witnessed a white cop shoot his unarmed big brother inside his own home.
A few years ago, Malcolm showed me the bloodstained bath mat she kept on a shelf in her home, from when the cop’s bullet tore through her son’s heart. She couldn’t bring herself to throw it away, she said.
Malcolm has marched in many protests against police brutality in this city, and I once visited her as she slept on the sidewalk outside a Department of Justice building in Manhattan, demanding a civil rights investigation into her son’s murder.
But to the crowd in Flatbush on Saturday, Malcolm argued that such nonviolent actions simply haven’t accomplished what needs to be accomplished.
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“We see all the looting and burning buildings down and everything going on, and they call us thugs,” Malcolm said, referring to all the volatile demonstrations across the country, particularly in Minneapolis, where protesters ransacked and then burned down a police precinct.
“I’m not condoning the burning and stuff,” she continued, “but it’s the only fucking way they understand!”
The crowd roared. A short time later, Malcolm grabbed onto a banner that said “Justice for George Floyd,” her surviving son at her side, and led the crowd as it started to march through the streets.
Chants of “Who keeps us safe? We keep us safe!!” and “NYPD, suck my dick!” and “Fuck the police!” filled Flatbush Avenue.
Residents — many of whom have been stuck in their homes, out of work and sheltering from COVID-19, which has devastated predominantly Black and brown working-class neighborhoods like Flatbush — piled out onto the sidewalks to watch and sometimes join in.
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An old man inside a bodega explained to another old man what the march was all about, pointing to his knee, and then to his neck.
People in cars — including sanitation workers in a garbage truck, and the drivers of Flatbush’s one-dollar vans, who are regularly harassed by the NYPD for providing cheap rides for locals in an area with scant subway service — honked horns to cheer on the protesters.
Auto shop workers stepped out of their shop to dance and throw up fists of solidarity. A crying woman screamed “I love each and every one of you!” out of a fourth-story apartment window.
Every single car the protesters pass in Flatbush is honking and cheering pic.twitter.com/h33KRgdQBn — Christopher Mathias (@letsgomathias) May 30, 2020
Auto shop workers cheer on protesters marching past in Brooklyn pic.twitter.com/g4wSgVIumm — Christopher Mathias (@letsgomathias) May 30, 2020
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The protesters marched for blocks and blocks. A Black organizer occasionally chided white protesters to stay in the back, to let the Black and brown voices be front and center.
Some in the crowd wouldn’t talk to journalists, and why would they? The predominantly white local and national press has drummed up fear of Black New Yorkers or acted as stenographers for the NYPD.
A New York Police Department SUV is burned Sunday during a Brooklyn protest over the police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis. Michael Nagle/Xinhua via Getty Images
As day turned to dusk on Saturday, some protesters torched their first NYPD vehicle, a cruiser. Flames curled out the windows, just above the car decals declaring the “Courtesy, Professionalism, and Respect” of the department. Protesters warned others not to get too close in case the car exploded.
Cops in riot gear pushed back the protesters. A firetruck arrived, put out the fire and then left. And then the battle lines formed.
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The NYPD stood in rows in the middle of the street, near a Shell gas station. Protesters formed a line directly in front of them. Both Black and white protesters called for white protesters to stand on the front lines, and the white protesters obliged.
A cycle emerged: protesters would throw projectiles at the cops — glass bottles, stones, the occasional fireworks — and cops would charge into the crowd, tackling and arresting protesters before dragging them back to waiting police vans as the melee subsided and the two sides resumed formations.
Michael, an attorney from Brooklyn, stood on the sidewalk during a brief interlude with his friend Jerome, who did not give their last names.
The violence didn’t start with the burning cop cars or the glass bottles flying through the air, Michael argued. The police started the violence a long time ago.
“Every other week, every other day, we hear another story of a Black man being gunned down or a Black woman being gunned down, and that’s not fair, and then they just get away with it, and enough is enough,” Michael said.
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“We’re tired, and, no, we don’t want to be out here destroying cop cars and destroying our own neighborhoods and stuff like that, but that’s the way to —” Michael continued, before his friend Jerome interrupted.
“I’m fucking tired of that shit about ‘We are destroying our own fuckin’ community,’” Jerome said. “We do not fucking own the fucking community! We don’t own this shit! Every year we do not fucking own it. Stop fucking telling us that we destroy our own community. We don’t own shit that is fucking here!”
Activists carry protest signs during a march in the Prospect Heights section of Brooklyn on Sunday over the May 25 police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis. Kevin Hagen/ASSOCIATED PRESS
Throughout the day, some protesters had carried signs calling for the defunding of the NYPD, a proposal that’s moved from more radical corners of the left to mainstream discourse in recent years. The idea is to reallocate a big chunk of the department’s mammoth $6 billion annual budget and instead invest it in housing, employment, mental health services and other non-police remedies for the problems of public safety.
“Just imagine if all of that money, or some of that money, was redistributed in the communities, to the broken schools, to our health care system,” Michael told me as the police prepared to charge again. “Like, come on! These are the communities that need it, and yet we don’t see that. We see police cars patrolling.”
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The cops were getting angrier. When they charged this time, a white cop screamed “C’mere, you motherfuckers! You bitches!” while chasing after a young Black man.
A woman who gave her name as Jennifer L. yelled after a cop who had just violently tackled and arrested a protester.
“They don’t have no reason to be scared!” her voice trembled. “We should be scared! We should be scared! What are they scared for? Oh, a few bottles? A few bottles?! How about a knee? How about a knee?!”
Nearby, a young white couple stood stunned and silent holding hands and looking out across all the chaos. Their coronavirus masks were stained with baking soda, used as a treatment for the pepper spray that had left their eyes red and irritated. They’d been roughed up in the last police advance, they explained. A cop had hit the woman in the stomach with a baton.
They declined to tell me their names. “Our names are irrelevant in this whole thing,” the man said. “The lives that were lost are the only names that need to be repeated.”
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NYPD officers keep an eye on protesters in Brooklyn on Saturday while they clash during a march against the death in Minneapolis police custody of George Floyd. Eduardo Munoz/Reuters
After every time the cops charged, the protesters reassembled, staring down their heavily armed attackers, preparing for the next onslaught. They chanted, “Say her name! Breonna Taylor!” and “Say his name! George Floyd!”
They taunted the cops with chants of “NYPD, suck my dick!” and climbed atop a city bus abandoned in the street by its driver, arms outstretched as if, for a moment, the city where they lived actually belonged to them.
The battle lines started to dissolve. Cops ran riot after protesters all along Church Avenue as helicopters circled overhead, occasionally shining spotlights down onto the scattered melees.
I started to film the police charge as I walked backward with a group of retreating protesters, my press pass dangling from my neck.
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A sprinting cop veered toward me and bumped into me with his shoulder as he ran past, yelling “Get out my way!” even though there was plenty of room around me.
I’d been watching the cops toss around young New Yorkers all day, pressing their faces into the concrete and cursing at them. I was worked up.
“Fuck you,” I told the cop.
He stopped charging after the protesters and circled back to me, shoving a baton into my chest and knocking me to the curb.
I don’t know how many cops piled on top of me, but there were a lot. A knee or a foot pressed my head and neck into the concrete. Hands tugged at my legs and arms in different directions while different voices issued impossible demands.
“Put your left hand behind your back!” The way my body was twisted, I couldn’t. “Stop resisting!” I wasn’t.
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I asked them to look at my press pass. I told them I was a journalist. I begged them to get my phone, which had fallen out of my hand during the fracas.
“Shut the fuck up,” I heard one cop say.
When they cuffed me and stood me up, a white cop, maskless and with rage in his eyes, came within a few inches of my face. “Fucking asshole,” he called me.
Again and again, my press pass clearly visible on my neck, I pleaded for the cops to get my phone, worried that I’d lose so much of what I’d documented that day. The cops refused, leaving it on the street before escorting me to the police van.
If this is how they treat a white journalist, I thought.
HuffPost senior reporter Christopher Mathias is taken into custody after being roughed up while covering the clash between police brutality protesters and New York Police Department officers on Saturday. Corey Sipkin/UPI/Newscom
“Nigga, I Ain’t George”
As the cops escorted us into the 67th Precinct, we passed a hulking white cop on his way out into the street. He wore a “Punisher” skull patch on his bulletproof vest, a popular fascist ode among cops to the murderous vigilante comic-book character.
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Inside the precinct lobby, a tired and demoralized cop stood by the front desk as new detainees were brought in for processing. He had only three years left until he could retire with a full pension, he told me. “If I could, I’d drop my belt and walk out of here right now.”
The officers then put me in a cell with 15 other guys. Everyone had been arrested at the demonstration; most were Black or brown, save for me and three other white guys. The cops wouldn’t provide anyone with masks, and it was impossible to socially distance.
One of the white guys had a badly broken foot, bare and swollen on the cell floor. He pleaded with the cops for medical attention, and the cops assured him it was coming.
“You’ve just been lied to,” one of the other guys in the cell quipped.
Despite the circumstances, there was camaraderie, and the mood was almost buoyant. One guy polled the cell: Was this anybody’s first time in jail?
Only a few hands went up.
“I’ve been arrested 16 times,” said one respondent, a seasoned activist and protest medic. The cell erupted into cheers and applause so loud that three cops came to check on us.
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Everyone started sharing their stories. One guy described liberating an NYPD riot shield from a police van earlier that day. He’d carried it through the crowd as everyone cheered.
Another guy described why he was dressed in sweatpants, an undershirt and Adidas slides.
He’d just stepped out of his apartment to check out the protests, he said, when cops tackled him. One of the cops pressed a knee hard into his neck.
“Nigga, I ain’t George!’” he said he’d told the officers, before using his strength to briefly free himself.
A little after midnight, cops arrived to take me to another precinct where they told me I’d be processed and released. My cellmates wished me luck and told me to stay safe.
The cops put me back into the van and we drove to the 72nd Precinct in Sunset Park. There they put me in a cell by myself and through the bars I could see a fresh batch of arrested protesters arrive in the lobby, including two Black women who were bleeding from the face.
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“You’re murderers for hire!” one of the women screamed at the cops as she stood cuffed and crying, waiting to be put in a cell. “You’re murderers for hire!”
I was released and issued a summons to appear in court later this year for a charge of “refusal to disperse.”
A short time later, a spokesman for the New York City mayor’s office told my HuffPost colleagues in a statement that they “apologize” for what I had “experienced tonight.”
It’s unclear if any of the other hundreds of people arrested over the last few days have received such personal apologies from the mayor.
Instead, Mayor Bill de Blasio said officers had shown “tremendous restraint” during the demonstrations. On Monday, de Blasio and Gov. Andrew Cuomo implemented a curfew in the city and announced they’d double the number of cops on the streets.
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President Donald Trump, while he was threatening to sic the military on anti-racist protesters, used federal police to tear-gas protesters near the White House to clear space for a photo-op in front of a church Monday.
New Yorkers continued to protest on Monday anyway. A woman in Brooklyn stood atop a car holding a sign that read “Radical action brings radical change. #BLM.”
As they took over the Brooklyn Bridge, the sun setting over the Manhattan skyline, a single car accompanied the protesters as they walked, driving slowly with “Fuck Tha Police” blaring from the speakers, a raised Black fist reaching out of the sunroof.
CORRECTION: This article previously misattributed a quote to Kerbie Joseph, a Black woman and community organizer with the Party For Socialism and Liberation. The quote was made by a different speaker at Saturday’s protest rally.


thehuffingtonpostuk--2020-06-04--My Pride Anthems: L Devine

My Pride Anthems: L Devine

The coronavirus pandemic has changed everything, and that includes how we’re all celebrating Pride in 2020.
With huge public gatherings out of the question, we’re asking a range of LGBTQ celebrities and allies for their personal Pride anthems, to help us all get into the Pride spirit from lockdown.
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Next up in our My Pride Anthems playlist is North East-born singer-songwriter L Devine.
Claudia De La Mata
As she reflects on some of her favourite Pride classics, she reveals how she found solace in Sam Smith’s music as a teenager, and how Charli XCX put on “the craziest, most mental party”...
070 Shake – Guilty Conscience
“I’ve picked mostly queer artists, and I’ve been a fan of 070 Shake for a while. She produced a song a few years ago called Honey and I’ve been listening to her ever since, she’s just a brilliant songwriter.
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“This song is kind of like a super-80s synth ballad, but with a hip-hop feel to it as well, so you can feel emotional to it, and cry to it, but also feel cool at the same time.”
Christine And The Queens – Girlfriend
“I could have picked so many songs by Christine And The Queens. She inspires me so much, everything from the live shows to the visuals, her style, the way she moves, she’s just amazing. I feel like she sets the bar for everyone for creativity. Everything she does, every part of her artistry, you can’t fault it. So she’s a huge inspiration of mine.
“And her live shows are crazy, it’s the perfect combination of theatre and pop. It’s kind of like going to see a musical or something.”
Sam Smith – Not In That Way
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“I picked this song because that [In The Lonely Hour] album meant a lot to me when I was a teenager. It was kind of one of the first times I felt like there was someone queer that I could listen to in the mainstream and in pop music.
“At the time, I was probably about 15 or 16, and the majority of that album is all about unrequited love, and I feel like it’s kind of a rite of passage for queer people. To love someone that didn’t love you back, or to love someone straight, that’s kind of what I was going through at school at the time, with one of my best mates, so I related to a lot of the songs on that album. So that’s an important one to me.”
Arca – Piel
“Arca is someone who has inspired me so much production-wise. She’s just amazing, I can’t wait for her new album. But I think also with this album [the self-titled Arca], it’s very dark, you can sense a lot of pain in all of the songs, and that’s something that every queer person has experienced, this certain type of pain. And a lot of us have had mental health journeys, and I really feel that through this album. And that’s why… I don’t know if any of it is linked to sexuality, but in my head it is. And a lot of my music, there’s pain that comes from that as well.
“So I feel like I can really relate to this album, even though I don’t know what even the lyrics are half of the time! I just love it, and the soundscape to it is absolutely amazing.”
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Charli XCX, feat. Brooke Candy, CupcakKe & Pabllo Vittar – I Got It
“I’ve included this because it reminds me of going out clubbing, and I miss going out clubbing, out at the gay clubs. I saw Charli live in New York a few years ago, when Pop 2 had just come out, and I remember when she did this song, it just went off. It was the craziest, most mental party.
“She’s so good at creating a party atmosphere and just getting the crowd going wild. This one is just a party anthem, and the features are amazing as well.”


thehuffingtonpostuk--2020-06-04--How White Parents Can Talk To Their Kids About Race

Catherine Delahaye via Getty Images
It’s no secret white parents are often uncomfortable talking to their children about race. But recent events confirm just how important it is to have these conversations.
Note: This guidance is generally geared toward white parents raising white children. While much of the advice can apply to white parents raising children of colour, experts have other recommendations for multiracial families as well.
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“Most parents want to raise children who treat individuals fairly regardless of the colour of their skin, and they want children who embrace diversity and are successful at building relationships with others from backgrounds unlike their own,” said Rebecca Bigler, a professor of psychology at University of Texas, Austin.
“Many white parents believe that they can achieve these goals by avoiding discussions about race altogether,” she continued. “Research suggests, however, that children whose parents do not talk about race typically fall short of these goals. That is, parents who do not talk about race are likely to have children who are racially biased.”
White parents can and should begin addressing issues of race and racism early, even before their children can speak. Studies have indicated that infants as young as 3 months old can recognise racial differences. Avoiding the topic, rather than actively countering it with anti-racist attitudes and actions, simply opens the door for children to absorb bias from the world around them.
“Overall, it is important for parents to speak with their children in a way that they understand and that is developmentally appropriate,” said Eboni Hollier, a board-certified developmental and behavioural paediatrician in Houston. “As children get older, the way you communicate and engage with them should be reflective of their evolving language, cognitive, and social emotional development.”
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Amid the nationwide protests following the death of George Floyd, HuffPost spoke to Bigler, Hollier and other experts about steps white parents can take to raise anti-racist children through the various stages of development. Read on for their guidance and recommended resources.
Ages 0-2
Babies are born as blank slates when it comes to perceptions of race, but that changes very quickly.
“Research has taught us that infants recognise differences in skin colour. To believe that babies are colourblind is not based in fact,” Hollier explained.
By 3 months of age, babies can categorise people according to race and spend more time gazing at faces that match the race or races of their primary caregivers. As their brains develop, their understanding of the world stems from what they observe in their parents and others around them. Thus, it’s important for caregivers to model inclusivity and unbiased conduct.
“With pre-verbal children, parental behaviour is especially important,” said Bigler. “White parents should make sure that their children see them interact in close, warm, intimate, trusting, and caring relationships with individuals whose race and ethnicity differs from their own.”
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Babies also pick up cues from their surroundings, like the people they see in their communities.
“Things like where you choose to live and send your child to daycare and school will influence how they think about race,” said Erin Winkler, an associate professor of African and African Diaspora Studies at the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee. “Of course, it’s a hard thing to tell parents to pick up and move, but it’s important to recognise the power of these choices we make about the environment they’ll be in.”
She also emphasised the importance of creating a home environment that exposes infants to diversity, whether it’s through board books with characters of colour, artwork in the house or even the people invited over.
Ages 3-4
As babies develop into toddlers and preschoolers, parents should continue modelling unbiased behaviour and exposing their children to diversity through books, TV shows, food and other aspects of everyday life. They can also have conversations about race tied to the media kids are consuming or people they see around them.
Around the ages of 3 or 4, many children remark on race or ethnicity-related differences they notice, like skin tones or hair types. Bigler noted that these observations may imply bias (“That man has weird hair”) or may be more neutral (“That man has dark skin”).
White parents should resist the urge to hush or dismiss these comments, which are developmentally understandable. Instead, they should normalise talking about race and respond in a calm, matter-of-fact way.
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“In response to children’s statements, use the opportunity to explain the racial differences that your child has noticed ― including what such differences do and do not mean ― and state your own personal views on the trait,” she advised parents.
She added, “In the first case, you might say, ‘That man is African American, and his hair is not weird. His hair is different than yours, but I think that it is really great! People often (but not always) have hair like others in their family. You have hair like your ____. But people’s hair doesn’t tell you anything about them! Sometimes people with curly hair like to play with cars and sometimes they don’t! Sometimes people with straight hair are friendly and sometimes they are not!’”
Young children benefit from learning about differences and similarities between various individuals. Preschoolers are starting to understand that people are complex and unique, so if they’re alike in one way, they’re not necessarily alike in all ways. And if they’re different in one way, like skin colour, they’re not necessarily different in all other ways.
“In response to children’s statements, use the opportunity to explain the racial differences that your child has noticed ― including what such differences do and do not mean ― and state your own personal views on the trait.” - Bigler
If a child points out that another child has darker skin, Hollier recommended that parents speak positively about differences but also point out something the two children have in common, like “Look, she loves riding her bike, too!”
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“It is equally important to talk about how those differences may cause them to experience life differently,” Hollier noted.
Parents can explain something that little kids may have noticed already, that people with darker skin are often treated less kindly than white people or have fewer opportunities and resources. They should frame the concept of racism in terms of unfairness, something that’s built into our society that people are still working to fix.
Winkler shared an activity that can help young children understand the complexity of systemic racism. She calls it the “spider web” activity.
“Give them string and ask them to weave and tangle it into a spider web. Then say, ‘Great, now untangle it,‘” she explained. “They’ll try for a few minutes and realise it’s difficult and not fun and give up. Explain that the unfairness against people with brown skin is a lot like this tangled web, and it’s been tangled up since before their mom was born, before their grandparents were born, even before their grandparents’ grandparents were born. Working to make society fair is really hard, like untangling the spider web. People have been untangling it for a long time, and you as a family can help untangle it even more.”
Winkler added that kids can keep untangling their spider webs whenever they do something to promote racial justice, though parents may have to explain that untangling unfairness in society will take longer if they manage to finish.
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Ages 5-11
Research has shown that around the age of 5, white children generally associate positive traits like intelligence and kindness more with white people than with those of other racial groups.
“Most children do not endorse extremely biased views but instead show consistent associations of whites with positive attributes,” Bigler said. “Children typically select white dolls, white friends, and activities that include predominately white children. Importantly, many white children in this age range become convinced that race is a taboo topic and that it is always inappropriate to admit that one notices or thinks about others’ racial group membership.”
Tetra Images via Getty Images Parents should pay attention to race-related statements their children make and hear from others.
To combat this, parents should pay attention to any statements or behaviours from their children that suggest bias. They should continue to choose racially diverse dolls and other toys for their children and expose them to books and shows that feature diverse characters. It’s also extremely important to foster conversation around differences to address the subtle messages they’re getting from media and everyday life.
“When you are watching a show, discuss why certain groups often are portrayed in stereotypical roles with accents or dressed a certain way,” suggested Reena B. Patel, a licensed educational psychologist. “Ask them, ‘Are there certain groups who never get to be the hero in comic books and movies?’ Then discuss this further by sharing that some people get treated unfairly based on their skin colour, culture or religion.”
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Bigler recommended explicitly acknowledging that racial diversity is a positive aspect in kids’ toys and media by saying things like “You have several dolls that are white. I think that it would be very nice to have dolls of other races as well. They are all beautiful!”
Parents should also exhibit interest in nonwhite cultures and histories and expose their children to them as well. It’s important to encourage children to have an ethnically diverse group of friends by modelling cross-racial friendships, placing them in racially diverse contexts like summer camps and activities, and frequently noting the value of relationships with people of different backgrounds and interests.
Said Bigler, “For example, a parent might say, ‘Do you remember my friend Cara? She is African American. I always learn a lot from having friends who are different from me in their race or gender or background. Cara shared her experiences about _____ with me. That hasn’t happened to me, so being friends with Cara has helped me to learn more about the world. I’m really glad to have Cara as a friend. Have you learned things from talking to your friends who are different from you?’”
Winkler cautioned against white parents using people of coluor in a voyeuristic way or engaging in a form of ethnic tourism by taking their children to visit communities of colour for their own edification.
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“Sometimes it’s well intentioned, but it leads to a patronising relationship,” she said. “It’s not ‘Quick, find some black friends to exploit for your own gain.’ It’s about pushing your own boundaries and doing the work.”
Ages 12 And Up
Tweens and teens are increasingly independent and may become more set in their beliefs and personal biases. They’ve been exposed to racial stereotypes in their media consumption and everyday lives, particularly if their schools and communities are more segregated. But they are also capable of talking about things abstractly in terms of structural racism.
“When the opportunity to discuss race presents itself, take a moment to have direct communication about it and offer a different perspective that may be more tolerant or inclusive than your child may have offered,” Hollier suggested.
“These discussions should help to prepare adolescents to both interpret disparities and oppose discrimination when they see it.” - Bigler
Events in the news or happenings at their schools may provide a jumping-off point for conversations about race. Parents should ask their teens what they think about these issues and emphasise the importance of diversity in their responses. They can also encourage activism and find ways to get involved in meaningful causes as a family.
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“Parents should also talk to their adolescents about the racial disparities that exist in our society,” Bigler said. “Parents should discuss the history of racism and white privilege in the United States with their teens. These discussions should help to prepare adolescents to both interpret disparities and oppose discrimination when they see it.”
Winkler advised parents to be mindful of their messaging around interracial dating and sexuality as their teens start to explore romantic relationships. She also suggested using shows and movies as a way to talk to their teens about race and racism.