This unarmed, 25-year-old black man went for a jog in a neighborhood in Georgia. He was chased down and killed by a white father and son duo who assumed Ahmaud was a burglar. Then nothing happened for weeks. No one was charged. Thank goodness a video surfaced, and social media brought attention to the case. Outrage ensued, and now law enforcement is finally doing something about it.

Ahmaud was doing something I do most days: going for a jog. I am not a person of color, and privilege comes along with that. There have been so many cases recently of people of color being shot and killed for doing totally normal things, and social media has had to become the watchdog. Maybe this is a new form of democracy because our leaders aren’t doing anything about it. This heinous crime was an act of racism, which is, in simple terms, a failure to recognize someone who is different as an equal. It fosters hatred, which is the small-minded person’s hatred of his own inadequacies. 

My first response was, How could this happen in this country? The answer is, of course, that it has always happened in this country. Emmett Till, a boy from Chicago, died in 1955. That case is especially notable because it did gain national attention and is now taught in schools, but countless other black Americans died at the hands of racists throughout our history, before and after 1955, in anonymity to everyone but their family members. Slavery and racism has been here longer than the founding fathers. 

I obviously don’t have the answers. I do have a voice to vocalize my sadness and outrage, and if enough voices rise up together, maybe we can change something. Maybe all of the outraged voices can bring justice and effect real change in this country. We are in a position to learn from our own past, to remember our own history and go a new and better direction. It has to start with every person recognizing this massive problem of racism and inequality, and realize that if you’re just now recognizing it, you are living a life of privilege as well. The solution will not be simple since the cause is deeply rooted in our culture and national history, but we can come together in community, finding common ground, recognizing the complexity of each individual even as we recognize our similarities.

Let us remember Ahmaud Arbery today.