Standing Together, Let’s Be the Change We Wish to See
The horrific and senseless deaths of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor and Ahmaud Arbery among others, are yet another painful reminder of the systemic racism and pervasive violence Black Americans face every day as they fend off presumptions of danger and guilt. We can wring our hands and wonder, “What will it take to make people see, to make this end, to make things different, to make it better?” Or, as Ghandi once said, we can be the change we wish to see.
We must support the protesters bravely expressing the anger, despair and grief so many of us feel. We must commit to digging deeper and sitting in the discomfort of hard, overdue conversations about our country’s history of racial inequality and the ways it haunts our Black and Brown brothers and sisters. We must demand better of our leaders. We must fight for justice and equality so communities of color are no longer disproportionately impacted by pandemics, or gun violence, or exposure to polluted air and water, or unequal access to healthcare and education, or the deep-rooted biases so prevalent in our society. And we must do this work together.
We don’t have the answers and we know we have work to do if we want to play a positive role in bringing the change we want to see. The Broad Foundation is committed to help re-imagining Los Angeles as it recovers from the current crises by listening to, learning from, partnering with and building on the work of others who share our commitment to making our city better, especially for communities of color.