16 The Voices of the People

Created by Olivier Matendo

 

A man holds a placard reading "Black Lives Matter, Refugee Lives Matter" during a demonstration outside the Greek parliament in Athens June 26, 2020.
Photo Credit: CNS photo/Alkis Konstantinidis, Reuters, 2020

 

This video presents my story and it explains the way I have come to understand how race, racism, discrimination, and racial justice work locally and globally. In telling about my own refugee experience, where I faced a mixture of hopelessness and discrimination, I explain how this has affected my life and my understanding of the discriminatory forces that marginalize some people and ruin our society. I believe that the ways discrimination and racism work create misunderstandings among the communities we live, and seeing and experiencing this has helped me to better understand the Black Lives Matter movement and its mission. Through this video story, I appreciate the way storytelling can help people have a better sense of the different experiences that take place in society. I believe we should all know that there is no lesser being or person in society, but that all men are equal. The beauty of a society can be seen in the way it accepts all people equally regardless of race, ethnicity, belief system or status. In a modern society that’s more diverse, people need to work together to create opportunities that can support everyone equally.

Media Attribution/Credit:
CNS photo/Alkis Konstantinidis, Reuters, 2020

License

Icon for the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License

Black Lives Matter Collective Storytelling Project Copyright © 2020 by A University of Washington Tacoma cross-course collaboration between TSOC 265 and TCOM 347 courses. is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License, except where otherwise noted.