https://www.rt.com/information/602433-kamala-harris-black-votes/Why Black votes are wasted on Kamala Harris

Loads is being stated about US Vice President Kamala Harris and her possibilities of turning into the subsequent president. Many are optimistic that she will be able to result in optimistic change with regard to gender empowerment, racial equality, and a rational international coverage, whereas outstanding commentators similar to Mehdi Hasan imagine she could possibly be “marginally higher than Joe Biden” in coping with the Israeli-Palestinian battle.

Famed American election forecaster and professor Allan Lichtman favors Harris to win this November. She grew to become the Democratic Occasion’s presidential nominee after President Joe Biden introduced that he wouldn’t stand for reelection and later endorsed her.

Some political commentators within the US and different components of the world are portraying the 59-year-old Harris as a brand new image of gender and racial equality within the world political panorama. As a Black Asian girl, they argue that she can overcome racism and break via the toughest ceiling in American politics.

Is this actually so? Or is the complete PR train to depict her as a brand new messiah a part of an American technique to manufacture consent and weave a story to hoodwink the worldwide group? It has occurred earlier than. It will probably occur once more.

From 2009 to 2017, Barack Obama served because the forty fourth US president for 2 four-year phrases. His victory as the primary African American president within the nation’s historical past was additionally glamorized and romanticized as a radical shift in an identical method as is being executed now with Harris – as if a brand new daybreak of hope and peace has arrived.

Did Obama ship and reside as much as the hype created round his persona? Did his presidency make the world a greater place? Did he change the tough actuality for atypical African Individuals? And would a Harris victory see any enchancment within the lives of Black folks in America?

Knowledge relating to poverty within the US means that black and Hispanic folks proceed to reside on the margins. Practically 17% of them reside under the poverty line. Individuals of coloration proceed to be the prime goal of hate crimes and racially motivated violent incidents.

Recall the immortal strains of Martin Luther King Jr’s ‘I Have a Dream’ speech on August 28, 1963 on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, DC. He should be handing over his grave right now as a result of, six many years after his historic speech, America stays a nation the place Black individuals are nonetheless “judged by the colour of their pores and skin” and never “by the content material of their character.”

Fairly in tune with King’s well-known line, “We should rise to the majestic heights of assembly bodily drive with soul drive,” George Floyd, a hapless 46-year-old African American man, didn’t act violently whereas dealing with unimaginable brutality by the hands of Minneapolis police on Might 25, 2021. In line with an unbiased investigation of CCTV footage of the horrific incident, the sufferer uttered “I can’t breathe” a minimum of 16 occasions after he was grabbed and held face down on the bottom by police officer Derek Chauvin and his colleagues.

Floyd was arrested after being accused of shopping for cigarettes with an alleged counterfeit invoice price $20. An worker of an area comfort retailer that known as the police stated the person was “awfully drunk” and “not accountable for himself.” For greater than eight minutes, Chauvin utilized excessive stress on Floyd’s torso, legs, and neck. This proved deadly. Floyd was pronounced useless on the hospital.

Maybe it’s simple for some to dismiss Floyd’s dying as an exception, not the norm, whereas some would be aware that this incident occurred when Republican President Donald Trump was on the helm. The rot, nevertheless, is full. No matter whether or not Republicans or Democrats are in energy, the underlying points associated to racism within the US stay systemic. Black folks will proceed to face the warmth. Some may also argue that the US has made nice strides in racial and gender equality since then. Information and knowledge, nevertheless, converse on the contrary.

In line with a report by the Pew Analysis Middle, Black Individuals see “little enchancment of their lives regardless of elevated nationwide consideration to racial points.” The research discovered that almost 18 months after George Floyd’s dying in Might 2020, “almost two-thirds (64%) of all Black adults, together with those that are multiracial or Hispanic,” believed the nationwide reckoning instigated by the Floyd incident failed to reinforce the deal with problems with racial inequality as desired or anticipated. Solely round 13% of respondents, as per the October 2021 survey, anticipated that “Black folks will obtain equality in the USA.”

Racial discrimination stays a “prime problem” for an amazing 82% of African Individuals, whereas hate crimes primarily based on race, faith, coloration, and sexual orientation proceed unabated.

In Might 2022, an 18-year-old white American man shot 13 people, 11 of whom have been Black, on the ‘Tops Pleasant Market’ in Buffalo, New York. Police officers stated the assault was livestreamed on social media and was eliminated minutes after it was posted. Racially motivated assaults and hate crimes in opposition to African Individuals usually are not unusual within the US.

In August 2023, in one more racially motivated assault, a gun-wielding man focused Black folks at a Greenback Basic Retailer in Jacksonville, Florida. At the least three African Individuals have been killed within the taking pictures incident.

Transferring on, allow us to not idiot ourselves by believing the propaganda and falsehoods peddled by American commentators. Certainly, Kamala Harris didn’t attend the current tackle by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to a joint assembly of the US Congress. She was not, nevertheless, boycotting Netanyahu; she was busy along with her election marketing campaign. Later, she met with the prime minister and was elated over the “frank and constructive assembly with Netanyahu.”

She advised Netanyahu that “I’ll all the time be sure that Israel is ready to defend itself, together with from Iran and Iran-backed militias similar to Hamas and Hezbollah.” In a press briefing after assembly with the Israeli chief, Harris stated: “From once I was a younger lady amassing funds to plant bushes for Israel to my time with the US Senate and now the White Home, I’ve had an unwavering dedication to the existence of Israel, to its safety and to the folks of Israel.”

She went on to talk concerning the colossal humanitarian disaster in Gaza, peace talks, the precise to self-determination of Palestinians, and the necessity for a two-state resolution. But it surely all gave the impression of a passing reference and a craftily woven balancing act.

In opposition to this backdrop, pinning hopes on Harris to result in optimistic change within the lives of African or Asian Individuals or to make critical and honest efforts to finish the struggling of tens of 1000’s of Palestinians is a pipe dream. American symbolism associated to racial and gender equality is as misleading as its ‘morals-based’ international coverage.

American symbolic gestures lack sincerity of objective. Harris’ father, Donald Harris, is Jamaican, they usually determine as Black. Harris’ mom Shyamala Gopalan hailed from the southern Indian metropolis of Chennai, previously Madras. Utilizing ethnic identification as a bonus and portraying it as success of the disempowered and marginalized Black group is one factor; altering issues on the bottom is kind of one other. Harris’ makes an attempt to benefit from her minority standing and depict herself as a messiah for the deprived is mere lip service as a result of she has did not be an envoy of the Palestinian girls and kids.