We all know – or most of us know – that black lives matter… The fact is, ALL lives matter.

There is so much going on in the world at the moment to contend with… Not only the COVID-19 pandemic, but now the ugliness of racism. With the very public and tragic death of George Floyd in the United States has come a tidalwave of raw emotion and outrage.

The emotion and outrage is most definitely justified, but I don’t think it justifies turning that outrage into physical acts of rage. Attacks on others who happen to be innocent members of the various ethnic groups that have exhibited this racism does nothing but turn the victims into perpetrators.

We cannot change history. We can, and do, certainly regret events within all our histories, but we cannot change what is. What we can do is learn from those events and show our regret by changing how we behave into the future. Instead of allowing these past injustices to fuel the fire and pave the way to future regrets, let us lament these terrible acts, and allow the existing icons and statues to be reminders of not the worst of our history, but of how far we have come since those times.

I know there will always be racists – it seems to be a part of human nature – but I hope that one day we can all look into each other’s eyes and see the person, not the colour of their skin. We are all the same underneath – we are all a part of the HUMAN race.