On Silent Pogroms

If a Jew and a Gentile happened to be arrested on the same charge, it was certain that the Gentile would go free while the Jew would be sent to prison and sometimes even shot. They were all the time exposed to insult and indignities, not to mention the fact that they were doomed to slow starvation, since all trade had been suppressed. The Jews in the Ukraina were suffering a continuous silent pogrom.

From My Disillusionment In Russia by Emma Goldman.

In contemporary America, black people, much like the Native Americans before them, are victims of a seemingly never-ending silent pogrom. By passively sitting in our comfortable houses while black people struggle against an unfair and white supremacist system, we are an active part of the problem. We have to stand in solidarity with black folks, or our desire for equality is nothing but empty words. The question we each have to ask ourselves is this: Am I willing to play an active role in the struggle for social justice, or am I just trying to make myself feel better about doing nothing during the silent pogrom?

Black lives matter.