‘Racism a sin before God’, says prominent US civil rights leader
UNITED NATIONS, (MILLAT ONLINE):Racism is “a sin before God” and a ruthless tool of oppression, exploitation and profit that “must be made illegal with costly consequences,” Rev. Jesse Jackson, the American civil rights icon, has said at a U.N. event.
The veteran leader of the struggle for racial justice was at UN Headquarters to speak at the event marking the Decade of Recognition for the Contributions, Achievements and Challenges of People of African Descent Worldwide.
He took part in a panel discussion for the event; part of a programme celebrating the International Decade for People of African Descent, running from 2014-2024, as well as the International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, held each 21 March.
“Racial idolatry is a mental health issue” he added, which “manifests itself in so many ways, even in our politics,” Jackson said.
The head of the Chicago-based Rainbow PUSH Coalition, which fights for social change, Jackson ran for President as a Democratic Party candidate in 1984 and in 1988, and pointed out that next month also sees the 50th anniversary of the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
Jackson was with the civil rights icon as one of his aides, when he was shot and killed on a hotel balcony in Memphis, Tennessee on April 4, 1968.
Addressing the same event, UN Human Rights Commissioner, Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein, said that people of African descent continued to face racism and racial discrimination across the world.
“This racism is fuelled by messages of fear and violence that are propagated for political gain,” he said, and “it impoverishes, humiliates, oppresses and excludes millions of women, men and children.”
Following the event, Jackson told reporters that the student-led protests to ban rapid-fire assault weapons, following the gun rampage at a Florida high school last month, was a “watershed moment” that should be accompanied by a similar tipping point against poverty and violence overall.
He said that “too few” have too much, while “too many have too little,” and that although there was racial equality for African-Americans in principle across the US, “we don’t have economic equality and race was used to oppress us and deny us access to resources.”