MESSAGE OF UNITY
Hero BLM protester delivers powerful message saying ‘it’s not black versus white, it’s everyone versus racists’
A BLACK Lives Matter hero who carried a stricken “far-right” rival to safety said: “I want equality for all.”
Patrick Hutchinson rescued the man during clashes in London on Saturday.
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Patrick, a martial arts expert, said: “It’s not black versus white, it’s everyone versus the racists.
“His life was under threat so I just scooped him up on to my shoulders and started marching towards the police with him.
“It was scary. But you don’t think about it at the time, you do what you’ve got to do.”
Footage of the incident showed Patrick and four friends forming a protective ring around the stricken white man, thought to be a far right protester.
It is believed he became separated from his group and was attacked during scuffles near the Royal Festival Hall.
Patrick took him to the safety of police lines.
I just want equality, equality for all of us
Patrick Hutchinson
Patrick, a personal trainer from Wimbledon, told Channel 4 News it is vital that people step in to stop violence.
He added: “If the other three police officers that were standing around when George Floyd was murdered had thought about intervening and stopping their colleague from doing what he was doing, George would be alive today.”
The image of Patrick rescuing the man went viral around the world. He and his friends uploaded a four-minute video from the protests on Saturday, showing hundreds of men fighting with police while singing England football songs and the national anthem.
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Far right thugs have been accused of starting the violence by attacking police and BLM supporters.
Pierre Noah, one of Patrick’s friends, said: “It would have turned out really bad because someone’s life could have been taken.
“And you know what would have happened straight away, ‘Black boys have killed somebody, they’ve killed a white man’.
“So we had to go out there.”
Another member of the group, Chris Otokito, added: “We saw it escalating. Myself, Jay, Lee and Pierre were trying to get around the guy to stop it happening.
“Patrick picked him up and tried to do what we could to hand him back to the safest place he could go.”
Several hundred demonstrators attended a protest at Parliament Square on Saturday organised by far right groups, including Britain First.
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They had claimed they merely wanted to protect statues, including Winston Churchill’s, from vandalism.
But fights erupted near the Houses of Parliament and Trafalgar Square with abusive chants and missiles thrown at police wearing riot gear.
The Met later confirmed 23 officers were injured and 113 arrests made. The violence contrasted with peaceful protests by Black Lives Matter supporters at Hyde Park and Marble Arch.
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We need to listen and need to act now
By Ray Lewis, Youth Academy Chief
MICHELLE Obama once said: “When they go low, we go high.”
Patrick Hutchinson embodied those very words in an act of humanity which has circulated around the globe.
This black superhero without a uniform could so easily have made a conscious decision to walk on by and leave his opposition in harm’s way.
But he showed the world what is at the heart of black consciousness — a sense of humanity and equality which we simply want reflected back at us.
Black and white, old and young, have been marching through London and other major cities across the world in protest. They take a stand — following the death of a man they don’t even know.
My own children, fuelled by grief and a sense of injustice, have marched and protested with my blessing. For this is an issue where you cannot be indifferent. Warnings to them about Covid and social distance go unheeded.
We must deal with the philosophy that holds one race superior and another inferior.
We cannot celebrate the BAME superheroes a.k.a. key workers on Thursday and then look for ways to deport them on Friday. It is their children who are campaigning and protesting.
As a black man in his 50s, I have become a master at being an undercover brother — utilising what the African American writer Du Bois calls “double consciousness” — the feeling that you have more than one social identity, which makes it difficult to develop a sense of self.
Our children should not need to compromise themselves similarly and so they march and shout. We need to listen and we need to act. This is no longer just a moment in time — it is now a movement.
- Ray Lewis, is CEO of the Eastside Young Leaders Academy — a London-based youth organisation which champions the rights of black and ethnic minority young people through education.
Statue-row protesters charge at riot cops as fireworks are launched in violent central London clashes
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