By: Karine Chan, Thunderbolt Editor-In-Chief

These protests are not your aesthetic. Combatting our broken system, racism, and police brutality is not your chance to capture visually appealing photos for your Instagram. 

The life of George Floyd was brutally taken on May 25th, 2020 by Derek Chauvin, a white police officer. Chauvin kneeled on Floyd’s neck for at least eight minutes while Floyd begged for his life and stated, “I can’t breathe.” This gruesome killing shed light on the racial injustice that is increasingly prevalent in our society. Since then, many protests and riots have sparked all over the world. 

These protests are a place to show your support for the Black Lives Matter movement, obtain justice for not only Floyd, but all the African Americans that have been killed by police officers simply due to their skin tone, and be apart in a much needed change. 

While they have the power and potential to reshape many inequalities in our society, a handful of individuals who attend seem to have gotten the message lost. Famous influencers as well as everyday teenagers have posted countless videos of BLM protests on the popular social media app, Tiktok. While these videos are not directly disrespecting the movement, it is still incredibly wrong. Individuals are at these protests risking their lives in hope of moving one step closer to obtaining basic human rights for all, yet the ignorance of some has them attending simply to chase likes on social media. Quite sad, isn’t it?

Many well known celebrities are taking advantage of these protests in a sorry grab to grow their following. One celebrity that has been given lots of  heat for this exact reason is American singer, Madison Beer. Beer was seen at a BLM protest in Los Angeles where photos of her kneeling on the roof of her car, hands in the air, and mask off were taken. It was later proven that Beer had hired a professional photographer to take pictures of her. Her, along with many others, saw the protest as an opportunity to appeal to the public, when instead her mind should have been on obtaining equality for all. 

If you are attending a protest and your intent isn’t to fight alongside many others to end racism and show you are an ally, please stay home. It is unsettling that people can turn a fight to end racial injustice into a shallow, heartless opportunity to post on social media. So please, sign petitions, donate money to BLM organizations if you can, and go to protests because you believe in equality for all, not because your social media is begging for a new post.