Meghan Markle paid a moving tribute to George Floyd.
Los Angeles, United States:
Meghan Markle paid moving tribute to unarmed black man George Floyd whose death in police custody sparked nationwide protests as she pondered her own memories of racism as a child in Los Angeles.
Prince Harry’s wife admitted she had been nervous about breaking her silence on protests that swept through the United States, but said in a video message that she “realized that the only bad thing to say was to say nothing. “
“George Floyd’s life was important,” said Markle, whose mother is black, before listing the names of the other African-Americans killed by police and expressing support for the Black Lives Matter movement.
Floyd’s May 25 death in Minneapolis – a policeman kneeling around his neck for more than eight minutes – has sparked the most serious civil unrest in America since the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr in 1968.
Los Angeles, where Markle now lives with the prince and their son Archie after leaving the British royal family, was in the center of the march, with 10,000 protesters flooding downtown streets on Wednesday alone.
In the video, Markle described the Los Angeles scenes as “devastating.”
The 38-year-old also recalled the deadly riots that broke out in the city in 1992 after four white police officers were acquitted of brutality after “an act of senseless racism” – the beating of the black motorist Rodney King . The unrest spread across the country, killing 59 people.
“I remember the curfew and I remember rushing home and on my way home to see ashes fall from the sky and smell the smoke and see the smoke coming out of the buildings,” said Markle.
Although not mentioned in her video, the specter of racism also followed Markle when she moved to the UK, where she had a strained relationship with the national press – some of which have been accused by supporters of the couple of damaging reports.
A 2016 Daily Mail headline – before the couple’s wedding – wrote: “Harry’s daughter (almost) straight out of Compton: his gang-marked mother’s house has been revealed – so will he go for tea? “
A BBC radio presenter was fired in May of last year for posting a tweet showing a picture of the couple holding hands with a clothing-dressed chimpanzee after the birth of their son, Archie. The legend said: “Royal Baby leaves the hospital.”
– “Needs of others” –
In his message played on Wednesday during a “virtual graduation” for the Los Angeles high school she attended, Markle also named black victims such as Breonna Taylor, a medical worker killed in her apartment in March in Kentucky .
The short life of Tamir Rice, a 12-year-old boy shot dead while playing with a toy gun in 2014 in Ohio, “also mattered,” said Markle, “as well as so many others we know names and whose names we know don’t know. “
Markle called back a teacher from the Immaculate Heart High School who left him a lasting impression, telling him to “always remember to put the needs of others above his own fears”.
“I thought about it more than ever last week,” she said.
Markle and Harry have talked about their desire to “do something meaningful, to do something that matters” in California, where they plan to start a large non-profit organization called Archewell.
In April, they distributed meals to people with chronic illnesses in Los Angeles during the coronavirus shutdown.
The couple announced that they were retiring from their British royal duties in January and officially resigned in April.
They first moved to Canada before settling in California.
(With the exception of the title, this story was not edited by GalacticGaming staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
