This week I jumped on a call with bunch of people from the US for our book club around Alex’s new book, Always Day One, and all I could say was “wow”.
‘Wow’ to the scale of mass protests, the blatant police brutality, including at our own Aussie reporters (which apparently has gone viral within the US), the lack of leadership and, of course, the reason behind all of this – the the police killings and systemic racism that is alive and well through out the US and the world.
In an effort to better understand systemic racism in the US I’ve started to read more black authors which is a great way to begin to understand how the system is broken for minorities (open to good authors recommendations for Australia too).
The book I would recommend is Solitary by Albert Woodfox which runs through how he and others (part of the infamous ‘Angola Three‘) were held in solitary confinement for 40 years for a murder he did not commit. It’s an extraordinary recount of how he survived “unbroken” and what kept him going – hope and personal transformation. It’s such a powerful story.
The thing that struck me most about the book – and there is a lot – was how the American penitentiary system treated black prisoners (brutality you can see echoed in the treatment of arrested protesters today) – Woodfox mentioned how Angola jail has clear slave trader family and KKK links – and a judicial system worked against minorities and people of colour to systematically jail them and deprive them of rights afforded to white Americans. Something that happens world over, including in Australia, in various forms.
The other scary and astounding fact is just how the State can so comfortably lie in open court and use the judicial system (and media) to block appeals and paint an false image – something you can see in the US protests i.e. focussing on looters and police placing bricks in protests.
There is one section of the book where Woodfox posts the state prosecutors affidavit in which the entire thing is mostly fabricated lies – even after 40 years with new evidence and witness testimony they refused to accept that it was a lie.
I’m hopeful of change, this time and generation feels different and there are many people helping to try and change the system but there is still a long way to go. As I write this helicopters are buzzing overhead for the Sydney #BlackLivesMatter protest which was originally ruled illegal before being overturned just as the protest was mean to officially start.
As I’m entering early-stage VC and having been working with startups for better part of a decade I have been acutely aware of some of the diversity issues within tech broadly including gender, race, and sexual orientation (also soon to be one of the only gay ‘partner’ VCs in Aus…), has always been a constant issue. Things that we’ve tried to address before and will continue to do.
I think being at the beginning of the pipeline of ‘talent’, and in company development, we hold a unique position to help influence some of these issues, hopefully for the better in the next generation of business and company leaders.
As a side note its also been interesting how much attention has been devoted to what US VCs are saying and doing during a time of crisis – part of the trend of how VCs are now seen as (somewhat) important social figures and ‘lifestyle influencers’ as Joan Westernberg has noted.
Another way to help out is to donate to issues that help address inequality. I would recommend checking out in Australia:
- Change the Record, the only national Aboriginal led justice coalition of Aboriginal peak bodies and non-Indigenous allies helping end the incarceration of indigenous Aussies – https://changetherecord.org.au/donate
- A nice summary of indigenous organisations you can lend your support to – https://www.marieclaire.com.au/indigenous-organisations-to-donate-to
- Bridging the Gap is a research organisation aiming to reduce the gap in indigenous health and education in Australia – https://btgfoundation.com.au/how.html
- University of Sydney was the first university to admit indigenous Australians to study (and one of the first in the world I believe), you can donate to their effective education programs here –https://www.sydney.edu.au/engage/give/areas-to-support/education.html
- Sydney University also hosts the Poche Centre for Indigenous Health which is doing some incredible things in this space https://www.sydney.edu.au/medicine-health/our-research/research-centres/the-poche-centre-for-indigenous-health.html
- Indigenous women focussed organisations include ‘Sisters Inside’ that help to support incarcerated women https://sistersinside.com.au/about/ and Djirra which promotes women’s health and wellbeing – https://www.givenow.com.au/fvpls
- For free education also check Sydney Universities course on aboriginal Kinship – covers the systems of social organisation that traditionally govern Aboriginal societies and explains this significant cultural difference. https://www.sydney.edu.au/about-us/vision-and-values/our-aboriginal-and-torres-strait-islander-community/kinship-module.html
#BLM
