“Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter” Dr Martin Luther King
To our brothers and sisters in America: We see you We hear you We stand in solidarity with you We say to you: Lives do matter. We all have the right to breathe. Whānau, we can speak out on social media, and we should. And even more than that, we have to stamp out racism right here in Aotearoa. Change needs to start at home. First, look at yourself. Take off the rose coloured glasses that make everything beautiful when you look in the mirror. What assumptions and judgements do you make about the people around you? We ALL have subconscious bias. And then, as we do that, we can more powerfully acknowledge, address, and change institutionalised and systemic racism. Let George Floyd stand as a warning to us. Each life and each moment is a taonga… So let’s stand up. And protect our whakapapa.