Like the rest of you, I’ve been puzzled by white people’s mobilisations for Black lives in this moment. Why now? Why George Floyd, particularly? I suspect it’s connected to COVID-19 and a shared experience of vulnerability and watching, in real time, the state fail to protect.

I reckon that many white folks have finally and dramatically experienced state failure and the protests are a way to vent this anger. There are, of course, other issues at play and this episode of Code Switch does a great job of thinking things through https://www.npr.org/2020/06/16/878963732/why-now-white-people

Protests are always educative spaces. I think many white folks have been shocked by the police violence meted out to *them* and this further fuels their protest and justifies their understanding of state failure.

I will also note that many of the first generation BLM activists were also involved with the Women’s March and I also suspect that the Women’s March catalysed/primed more white folks for action than I think we appreciate.