Trump, a far remove from Kennedy, fans the flames of US unrest
The civil uprising after the killing of George Floyd has been centuries in the making, but perhaps Trump’s divisive militance will be US racism’s coda
The protests, riots and unrest that have gripped the US over the past week following the police killing of George Floyd have once again exposed the US as a nation in societal turmoil. While the causes have been deeply entrenched over several decades, it is the recent actions and narrative of President Donald Trump that facilitated a rapid escalation and ensured his nation became a global flashpoint for civil unrest.
The continued anguish of African-Americans over their place and treatment in American society is well studied and is rooted in long-term, socio-economic factors. The events of the past week have served as a vivid reminder that while the African-American civil rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s yielded legal rights and equality under the law, the struggle for respect for those rights and equal economic opportunity continues...
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