In the ‘new normal,’ America must be a country that works for all Americans

COVID-19 has made it harder to ignore our failures as a society.

Workers are forced to choose between their health and a paycheck.

Children who lack internet access at home do not receive an equal education.

Tens of millions of people are forced to navigate a global health pandemic without health insurance.

Incarcerated people are locked in crowded facilities where social distancing is impossible.

People who lost their job face the loss of their home.

All these harms fall disproportionately on black, brown and indigenous people.

None of this is by accident.

These outcomes are the natural result of a system of racist policies and economic exploitation that has governed our society since the beginning. And while black, brown and indigenous people face the brunt of these injustices, poor white and other marginalized people are harmed, too.

The immediate steps that our country must take in the face of COVID-19 are clear and include providing paid sick leave and universal access to COVID-19 testing and treatment, expanding broadband access, reducing the number of people in our prisons and jails, and preventing evictions and foreclosures.

But if the root problems are left unaddressed, they will continue to destroy the lives of individuals, families and communities long after this pandemic is under control and life returns to “normal.”

In our normal, black, brown and indigenous people are stopped, arrested, convicted and incarcerated at staggering rates compared to white people — and they are more likely to be harassed, shot and killed by the police.

In our normal, black, brown and indigenous people are more likely to lack housing, transportation, a living wage, quality education, comprehensive health care, healthy foods, clean air and water and affordable credit, to name just a few things.

In our normal, we have two justice systems — one for the rich and one for the poor.

Again, none of this is by accident.

From colonization and slavery, though modern racist and exploitative policies that include regressive taxation, redlining and the war on drugs, America has systematically exploited and denied the basic human rights of black, brown and indigenous people.

Right now we have an obligation to dismantle America’s racist and exploitative system and replace it with a new system built on a foundation of justice.

To build a just society we must invest in people instead of police and prisons.

We must ensure that every child receives a quality public education.

We must ensure that worker earns a living wage.

We must ensure that every person has a roof over their head.

We must ensure that all people have comprehensive health care.

Yet in a country where a child’s future is too often determined by their ZIP code at birth, finally ensuring these basic rights is not enough.

Justice also requires America to confront its history.

The consequences of America’s racist and exploitative history are everywhere from the disproportionate number of COVID-19 deaths in black, brown and indigenous communities to a vast racial wealth divide that has left black families with a median household wealth of $17,000 (compared to $171,000 for white families).

To confront our history we must not only dismantle these racist and exploitative policies and the institutions they prop up, but also take affirmative steps, including reparations, to begin to repair the harms created through centuries of oppression — harms that continue to this day.

We must finally build a society where “We the People” means everyone. Now is the time.

Frank Knaack is executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of South Carolina..

This story was originally published May 22, 2020 at 11:12 AM.