Black Lives Matter: The Global Battle Against Racism

On May 25, 2020, African-American George Floyd was tragically murdered in Minneapolis by the city's police in front of rolling cameras. Immediately afterwards, an unparalleled wave of protests broke out against the racism of the US police force, which quickly spread to major parts of the country and many countries across the world.

And rightly so. Today, 145 years ago, slavery was abolished in Texas—the last state in the US to do so. Nevertheless, people of color are still not on an equal footing with white people: they are constantly subject to racism in their everyday lives, have less lucrative jobs, and even have a significantly shorter life expectancy.

A white family is on average 10 (!) times more wealthy than a black family. Just how implicitly this chasm runs through all areas of life is highlighted by the coronavirus—for black people, the risk of dying from the virus is three times higher than for white people. 

The fact that the Black Lives Matter protest was also so widely adopted internationally demonstrates a solidarity which we as editors of GROOVE, a magazine for electronic music and club culture, affiliate ourselves with unconditionally. We are attempting to understand what the US's institutionalized racism does to its black victims and how racist violence occurs

Here it is particularly important for us not just to talk about the situation in the US but also the racism in Germany, which may usually end up being somewhat more subtle but is no less destructive. Racism is a challenge everywhere and is different in each society.

Racism in Europe is often shaped by the colonial history of the affected countries and by anti-Semitism. African-Americans had a different fate: they were forced to live as slaves on another continent and have suffered under the consequences of slavery to this day.

However, solidarity with the repressed population in the US should not lead to us overlooking or downplaying racism in our own country. For us as Germans, solidarity with George Floyd and other victims of police violence and racism in the US is just as important as remembering that people of color face comparable structural racism here in Germany.

The names of those who were murdered in the xenophobic terror attack in Hanau on February 19 of this year should be just as familiar to us as George Floyd (even if we don't know their last names for the purposes of victim protection). They are Ferhat U., Mercedes K., Sedat G., Gökhan G., Hamza K. Kaloyan V., Vili P., Said H. and Fatih S.

Where do we stand today? How have Black Lives Matter activities influenced our work? On the one hand, the movement reminds us of our musical roots. How can we shape our relationship with African-American artists in such a way that we do not exploit them and their music?

In general we want to better ensure that we feature as many POC artists as possible who produce relevant electronic music. In addition, we want to directly address the topic of racism in the club scene more often.

Black people in Germany are victims of verbal and physical abuse. They do not have the same career opportunities and are disadvantaged in many life aspects, such as when looking for apartments. Before the wave of immigration towards Berlin in the 2000s and 2010s, electronic music in Germany was dominated by white people.

We want to tell the stories of these musicians. We want to know what kind of repressive measures they were exposed to, how they fought against this, and how they made music and our scene what it is. Certainly we do not want to relativize their status as German musicians, but instead give them support in a racist environment.

Berlin is fashioned as one of the most open cities in the world. This especially rings true for white people and expats from other industrialized countries. But not for Berliners with Turkish, Arabic, or African roots—altogether about 10 percent of the population. They're often turned away at the doors of the city's clubs.