THE OVERDUE AWAKENING - by - magzDB
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DOUBLE ISSUE JUNE 22 / JUNE 29, 2020
THE
OVERDUE
AWAKENING
by
JUSTIN WORLAND
time.com
Let’s
rethink
how the
world
works.
Businesses and communities around the Let’s work Let’s make
world are in various stages of reopening. safer and business more
As they do, changing how they work isn’t smarter. resilient.
a consideration for tomorrow—it’s an The way we Data needs to
imperative for today. work is being be protected.
reimagined Business
Perhaps this isn’t a restart. at every level— operations need
It’s a rethink. not just where to stay up and
A time to reimagine how business and we do it, but what running. IBM is
society work. A time to reinforce the we do. And, most helping businesses
viability of our companies and the health importantly, how. quickly adapt their
of our workforces. A time to reconsider With data, insights IT infrastructure
how we can solve today’s problems—and and the industry so they can
actually thrive in the years to come. expertise of IBM, efficiently respond
we can create to cyber threats
At IBM, we believe that when people workplaces where and maintain
and technology work together, our world people feel safe, business
can emerge in a way that’s more resilient. confident and continuity.
Stronger. Smarter than ever before. secure.
So let’s get to it.
IBM, the IBM logo, ibm.com, Watson, IBM Cloud and Let’s put smart to work are trademarks of International Business
Machines Corp., registered in many jurisdictions worldwide. See current list at ibm.com/trademark. Other product
and service names might be trademarks of IBM or other companies. ©International Business Machines Corp. 2020.
Let’s protect Let’s work Let’s build Let’s engage
against new with greater smarter customers
cyber risks. agility. supply chains. anywhere.
Sensitive data For many Changing People want
can be vulnerable businesses, cloud customer needs answers sooner.
to attack. IBM has transformation can make it difficult With Watson
proven security has gone from a to predict buyer Assistant,
solutions to two-year plan to behavior. AI businesses
help businesses a this-month plan. solutions from IBM can quickly
uncover hidden With experienced can allow for more- provide services
threats and teams and open- accurate demand to customers,
make informed source solutions, forecasting and employees and
risk-based businesses are greater inventory citizens—
decisions, so modernizing apps visibility so reducing wait
operations run and making data businesses can times and
as usual while AI-ready on respond faster increasing
vital records the IBM Cloud.® to an ever- customer
stay protected. Securely. changing world. satisfaction on
any channel.
Together, let’s emerge smarter
and stronger than ever before.
Let’s put smart to work.
ibm.com/smart
VOL. 195, NOS. 23–24 | 2020
7 | From the Editor
8 | For the Record
The View Features Time Off △
Nurse Jamwanti
The Overdue Awakening
Ideas, opinion, What to watch, read,
Persaud holds the
The Brief innovations
How systemic racism works By Justin
see and do
hand of a patient
News from the U.S. 19 | Rushing 91 | Summer on oxygen on
science in the Worland 26 Memorial portfolio by
and around the world movies: Pete April 16 at
pandemic Ruddy Roye 30 The movement to Davidson in The
9 | Global Wyckoff Heights
protesters find
defund police By Lissandra Villa 34 King of Staten Medical Center
21 | George the Protesters and the pandemic By Island; back in
common ground in Brooklyn. “It’s
Poet on Black Vietnam with
excellence Dr. Brooke Cunningham 38 I am not right for them
11 | India and Da 5 Bloods to be alone like
George Floyd By Von Miller 39 Plus:
China hope for this,” she says
peace, not war
21 | Zachary How to support racial justice 40 94 | Reviews:
Karabell decodes a new Ottessa
jobs numbers American Life and Death Photograph by
12 | Black-owned Moshfegh novel; Meridith Kohut
businesses shut The decisive hierarchy of race HBO’s Perry for TIME
22 | Quarantine Mason; Hulu’s
out from aid questions By Khiara M. Bridges 42
Love, Victor
14 | Unpacking the
for advice Portrait of a New York City hospital
columnists under siege By Simon Shuster 46 96 | Artists think
controversy over
asymptomatic outside the
24 | Ian Bremmer gallery
spread on the countries
The Cost of Isolation
that have The loneliness plague By Jamie 98 | Food: missing
16 | TIME with .. . ON THE COVER:
Atlanta Mayor
best handled Ducharme 68 Missing touch ingredients A protester speaks
COVID-19 By Lauren Slater 72 The struggle to at a Black Trans
Keisha Lance
Bottoms sustain recovery By Sam Lansky 76 100 | Joy-Ann Lives Matter rally
Reid’s 6 Questions in Baltimore on
Mr. Green for Spike Lee June 5
Jay Powell reinvents the Fed Photograph by
By Christopher Leonard 80 Devin Allen
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From the Editor
director of photography Andrew Katz, documented
Where we stand the crisis from the vantage point of nearly everyone
it touched at Wyckoff, and shows in devastating de-
during one of our recent TIME 100 talks, tail its disproportionate impact on Black and brown
the singer, actor and activist Andra Day made a neighborhoods.
point that resonated deeply and echoes words I
have heard repeatedly in recent days from col- At TIME, we will always stand for the equality of
leagues and other people in my life. Being a true every person. That is not a partisan or a policy
advocate of change, a true ally to the Black commu- position. It is a basic human value that runs
nity, requires “the willingness to be uncomfortable.” through our coverage. We also recognize that we
This has been a time of essential discomfort for must hold ourselves accountable for ensuring that
the U.S.—“a moment of reckoning that has been it runs through our company. Across countless
a long time coming,” as my colleague Justin Wor- conversations all over the globe, we are pushing
land writes in this issue’s cover story, a searing and one another on turning discomfort into action.
personal accounting of American denial about sys- Where do we need to challenge and change existing
temic racism. “Politicians, activists and everyday structures and ways of working? How, as people
people can and should debate what to do about this who are in the business of words, do we get better
reality,” Justin writes, “but it is a reality, one evi- at naming what we see and doing something about
dent in volumes of data, research and reporting, it? We know that amplifying underrepresented
not to mention the lived experience of millions of voices in our newsroom and increasing the diversity
African Americans.” of our teams will make our coverage stronger. We
The photograph on our cover was taken by Devin also know that we need to do better, and we will. I
Allen at a Black Trans Lives Matter protest on June 5. am grateful for the trust of our team in pushing us
We frst put Devin’s work on the cover fve years ago forward with candor and courage.
when he was 26 years old, an aspiring professional TIME is a 97-year-old institution but only a
photographer documenting the protests that broke 19-month-old company, since our acquisition by
out in his hometown of Baltimore after the death Marc and Lynne Benioff. As I wrote to you after
of Freddie Gray in police custody. The image Devin their purchase of TIME in November 2018, the
made in 2015 so powerfully evoked scenes of Amer- △ Benioffs have challenged us to think about how to
ica in 1968 that we used both dates in the headline, Allen’s new cover build for the long term. What will TIME mean to
and his photo
a recognition that far too little had changed. Soon from 2015, a
people decades from now? We are committed to
after the killings of George Floyd, Ahmaud Arbery, version of which making equality a constant on that journey.
Breonna Taylor and Tony McDade, that 2015 cover has recently This is the frst of a series of double issues this
began circulating again on social media, with a circulated on summer, which means you will be getting your issue
superimposed third date: 2020. social media with every two weeks. At a moment when the world
The issue includes a portfolio from Ruddy Roye, the year 2020 confronts multiple crises that are changing so much
who was with Floyd’s friends and family as they pre- added about the way we live and the ways we need to think
pared to memorialize him in Houston. And as mil- about the future, these special issues allow us to
lions search for ways to support what has become explore topics at particular depth. I hope you’ll also
a worldwide movement for equality, TIME’s Sanya visit TIME.com/newsletters and sign up for one
Mansoor provides guidance on how to help. of our 12 newsletters, including The Brief, which
We are also publishing one of the most ambi- delivers the most important stories from TIME to
tious projects we’ve done on the COVID-19 pan- your inbox daily.
demic. For four weeks, starting in April, correspon-
dent Simon Shuster, photographer Meridith Kohut
and a team of videographers, including TIME’s
Julia Lull, spent nearly every day and many nights
at the Wyckoff Heights Medical Center, the site of Edward Felsenthal,
New York City’s frst death from COVID-19. The editor-in-chief & ceo
team, led by senior editor Tina Susman and deputy @efelsenthal
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7
For the Record
‘ELIMINATION
‘Like in
1989, we are
facing the
same brutal
IS NOT A POINT
regime.’
LEE CHEUK-YAN,
chair of the Hong Kong
IN TIME; IT IS
Alliance in Support of
1,870 ft.
Patriotic Democratic
Movements in China;
thousands of Hong Kongers
defied a ban against holding Maximum estimated
a vigil in remembrance of the diameter of an asteroid
A SUSTAINED
June 4, 1989, massacre in that flew by earth on
Tiananmen Square June 6; luckily the miss
wasn’t too close: the
object passed the planet
at about 13 times the
distance to the moon
EFFORT.’
‘George’s
calls for ‘I am very
help were sad now.
ignored. Because of
Please JACINDA ARDERN,
New Zealand Prime Minister, announcing June 8 that the
the virus,
country had eliminated COVID-19 transmission nobody can
listen to be here.’
the call I’m CHARLES SHAY,
making to ‘Jair Bolsonaro has put an end WW II veteran, who was
the only U.S. D-Day
you now.’ to the little seriousness that survivor to attend an
remained in the way his mockery anniversary event in
Colleville-sur-Mer, France,
PHILONISE FLOYD,
brother of George Floyd,
of a government is dealing with a on June 6
asking lawmakers to now out-of-control epidemic.’
hold law enforcement
accountable, in testimony A JUNE 8 EDITORIAL in the Brazilian newspaper
June 10 before the House Folha de S‹o Paulo, after the nation’s health ministry
Judiciary Committee removed cumulative counts of COVID-19 cases
and deaths from its website
GOOD NEWS
8 of the week
I L L U S T R AT I O N S B Y B R O W N B I R D D E S I G N F O R T I M E
Astronaut Kathy
Sullivan, who in 1984
Number of passengers
became the first U.S.
who disembarked from the
woman to conduct a
MV Artania cruise ship in
space walk, on June 7
Bremerhaven, Germany, on
also became the first
June 8, after a six-month journey
woman to reach the
around the world; the ship was
Challenger Deep, the
the last cruise liner in the world
deepest point in the
still carrying passengers
ocean—nearly 7 miles
below the surface
8 Time June 22–29, 2020 S O U R C E S : A P, C N N , N E W YO R K T I M E S
SPREADING
THE WORD
Protesters in
Paris speak
out on June 6
against police
brutality in the
U.S. and France
INSIDE
AN UNEASY PAUSE AT THE THE SMALL BUSINESSES MISSING UNDERSTANDING COVID-19’S
CHINA-INDIA BORDER OUT ON CORONAVIRUS AID ASYMPTOMATIC SPREAD
PHOTOGR APH BY MOHAMMED BADR A
TheBrief Opener
WORLD indigenous communities are protesting the dispropor-
The reckoning tionate levels of policing and violence they face. “We
marched to defend Black Lives overseas and to fight for
goes global our own lives against our own racist police,” campaign
group Arms Down NZ told TIME in a statement after
By Suyin Haynes/London marches took place in several cities across New Zealand
W
on June 1. In Australia—where aboriginal and Torres
hen London-based Lawyer and Strait Islander prisoners account for 28% of the prison
women’s-rights activist Shola Mos- population, despite making up just 3.3% of the total
Shogbamimu first heard the news of population—tens of thousands marched nationwide on
George Floyd’s killing on May 25, her gut June 6 against racial profiling and police brutality.
reaction was raw anger. “George Floyd was every black Meanwhile, at London protests on June 6 and 7, a chant
person in that video,” she says. “Every one of us can iden- of “The U.K. is not innocent” took aim at those who claim
tify with that knee on our necks, not letting up, with that racism is uniquely bad in the U.S. In Britain, black people
pressure increasing until it suffocates us.” are nearly 10 times as likely as their white counterparts
Floyd’s final words, “I can’t breathe,” have been em- to be stopped and searched by police, according to police
blazoned on placards and chanted by crowds from Syd- statistics. “As black and minority people, we’re more at
ney to Cape Town, Paris to Seoul, who have gathered in risk if we are infected with COVID,” said Landa George,
global solidarity protests since May 30. “We’re trying to who wore a mask as she protested in London’s Parliament
show that despite being bombed and losing people and Square on June 6. “We’ve got more at stake because we’re
then being called terrorists, we still feel empathy. We actually here.”
still feel for people like George Floyd who are being op- Many activists are hopeful about the current moment,
pressed in other parts of the world,” says Syrian artist Aziz saying it presents an opportunity to address historic in-
Asmar, who painted a mural of Floyd on the remnants of a equalities. On June 7, protesters in Bristol, England, pulled
bombed building in Idlib. down a 125-year-old statue of slave trader and philanthro-
With the coronavirus pandemic laying bare pist Edward Colston and threw it into the city’s
systemic inequalities and racial discrimination, ‘It is an harbor. In Belgium, statues of King Leopold II, who
people around the world are seizing the mo- uncomfortable oversaw the murder of an estimated 10 million Con-
ment to push for change in their own countries. golese, were vandalized in June. A statue of King
P R E V I O U S PA G E : E PA - E F E /S H U T T E R S T O C K ; K H A N : S T E F A N R O U S S E A U — PA I M A G E S/G E T T Y I M A G E S ; F U E L S P I L L : K I R I L L K U K H M A R — TA S S/S I PA U S A
As they stand in solidarity with protesters in the
truth that our Leopold in Antwerp was removed permanently on
U.S., they’re also calling for a reckoning with nation and June 9 after being lit on fire and damaged the pre-
past and contemporary injustices in Europe city owes a vious week. “The protesters were doing an incred-
and the Pacific region. “Historically it’s a differ- large part of ible job in calling out King Leopold for what he is:
ent journey,” says British community activist its wealth to a colonizer and a genocider,” says Brussels-based
Patrick Vernon. “But it’s still the same impact: its role in the scholar Adeola Aderemi.
structural racism, stop and search, poverty, slave trade.’ At Oxford University, campaigners have been
exclusion.” fighting since 2015 to remove a statue of British im-
SADIQ KHAN,
mayor of London
perialist Cecil Rhodes from the campus, inspired
In some countrIes, common ground with the by the Rhodes Must Fall movement in South Africa.
U.S. is not hard to find. In France, where young And amid calls to address past injustices, London
Arab and black men are 20 times as likely as Mayor Sadiq Khan announced on June 9 a review
white men to be stopped by police, thousands of the city’s landmarks and said that all statues and
of people have taken to the streets of Paris, Mar- street names with links to “slavery should be taken
seilles, Lyon and Lille. Many are protesting down.” That same day, a statue of slave trader Rob-
in the name of Adama Traoré, a 24-year-old ert Milligan was removed from its plinth in Lon-
Malian-French man who died in police cus- don’s West India Docks to “recognize the wishes
tody in 2016. While police say officers are not of the community,” said the U.K.’s Canal and River
responsible for his death, an independent Trust.
autopsy commissioned by Traoré’s family “There’s really an opportunity for everyone
ruled on June 2 that he died of asphyxiation to critically reflect on a racist and racialized
as a result of violent arrest. In Paris, his sis- past,” the organizers of Rhodes Must Fall in
ter called for justice, telling crowds, “What Oxford said in an interview. Now, with bLack
is happening in the United States has today Lives maTTer protest placards lying where
brought to light what is happening in France.” Colston’s statue once stood in Bristol, that reck-
On June 8, as pressure mounted, France an- oning with the past is meeting the urgency of the
nounced a ban on choke-hold arrest tactics. present. —With reporting by Joseph hincks/
The protests have also struck a chord in isTanbuL, and mÉLissa Godin and biLLy
Australia and New Zealand, where black and perriGo/London •
10 Time June 22–29, 2020NEWS
TICKER
North Korea
stops talking
to South Korea
Pyongyang said June 9
it would cut off all lines
of communication with
South Korea and start
treating the nation as
an “enemy.” Relations
between the two have
deteriorated since
nuclear negotiations
with President
Trump collapsed in
February 2019.
Election
trouble in
CATASTROPHIC CURRENT More than a week after 21,000 tons of diesel fuel spilled into the Georgia
Ambarnaya river from a heat and power plant, containment operations continued on June 6 in the
Siberian city of Norilsk. Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered a state of emergency to help Primary elections in
support the effort, but conservation groups warn that such an incident could still take years to clean Georgia were marred
up and could have a devastating effect on the delicate Arctic environment. by hours-long waits
and problems with
new voting machines
THE BULLETIN on June 9, prompting
the Georgia secretary
In border standoff, India and of state to open an
China try to keep the peace investigation and
summoning echoes of
Generals from IndIa and ChIna met PRIDEFUL The problem, experts say, is that the state’s disputed
high in the Himalayas on June 6 for talks with strongmen leading both countries, the governor’s race in
2018. Some of the
aimed at defusing border tensions between situation is more volatile than usual. “What worst issues occurred
the world’s two most populous nations. you have is essentially two very nationalistic in majority African-
Each nuclear-armed side has accused the administrations under [Chinese President] American areas.
other of provocations along their 2,000- Xi and [Indian Prime Minister] Modi,” says
mile disputed frontier. China believes a new Steve Tsang, director of the China Institute
Indian road near the border upends the bal- at SOAS. “I don’t think either wants to en- Iran sentences
ance of power; Indian hawks say China has gage in a military conflict with the other. ‘CIA agent’
moved troops into their territory. In early But neither government wants to be seen as to death
May, fstfghts broke out between soldiers. backing down either.”
Weeks on, officials are still trying to stop the An Iranian blamed
scuffles from escalating into a shooting war. HOME CROWD For Modi, the situation is for sending the U.S.
especially tricky. Analysts say an Indian in- information about
the whereabouts
BLURRED LINES Although troops from both telligence failure may have allowed the Chi- of General Qasem
sides reportedly pulled back in some places nese encroachment, and India is also the Soleimani, a powerful
on June 9, the situation remains tense. Accu- underdog both militarily and economically; figure killed by a
rate information is hard to come by, but ana- but Modi has cultivated an image at home U.S. drone strike
lysts say there has been a Chinese buildup of as a security-frst leader so can’t be seen to in January, was
sentenced to death by
military hardware behind the “line of actual back down. One possible way to save that the Iranian judiciary
control” in some areas, with troops patrol- reputation: play to Indian disdain for for- on June 9. The alleged
ling on the Indian side. A mutual agreement eign help. President Trump offered to me- agent, Seyed Mahmoud
not to use weapons in border clashes appears diate what he called the “raging dispute” Mousavi Majd, was in
to have held so far, but observers don’t know on May 27, but so far, that offer hasn’t been an Iranian prison at the
time of the strike.
how long that will last. taken up. —BIlly PerrIGo
11TheBrief News
GOOD QUESTION small businesses conducted in May found
Is COVID-19 aid that just 12% of them received the full assis-
NEWS tance they requested, with two-thirds report-
TICKER getting to black- ing they did not receive any.
owned businesses? Experts who studied the program contend
Case closed in that its structure rendered this outcome in-
Swedish PM’s When The Paycheck ProTecTion evitable. Allowing banks to administer the
assassination Program (PPP) launched in April, it came loans, says Ashley Harrington, senior coun-
with promises of equitable relief for U.S. sel at the nonprofit Center for Responsible
Swedish officials said
June 10 they believe small businesses ravaged by the coronavirus. Lending, imposed “major structural disad-
they’ve identified who By June 4, when the employment report vantages for businesses owned by people of
killed the country’s showed 2.5 million U.S. jobs added in May, color from the very beginning.” Though Con-
Prime Minister Olof President Donald Trump framed both the gress urged lenders to prioritize businesses
Palme in 1986. The
program and the report as good news for mi- owned by women and minorities, banks often
suspect, graphic
designer Stig Engstrom, norities. “A great day in terms of equality,” he prioritized those with whom they had exist-
died in 2000 in an said as he prepared to sign legislation easing ing relationships. Federal data show that 46%
apparent suicide. PPP forgiveness requirements. of white-owned businesses accessed credit
In fact, those same figures showed unem- from a bank in the past five years—double the
ployment had grown for African Americans figure for black-owned companies. So, when
U.K.’s Prince to its highest point in over a decade. African applying for a loan, the latter were frequently
Andrew not Americans are disproportionately suffering made to wait.
cooperating, from both COVID-19 and its economic fall- Policymakers, recognizing these inequities
DOJ says out, and the PPP system looks like an exten- when re-upping PPP dollars, reserved a subset
sion of the problem. The Small Business Ad- of funding for lenders serving minority and
Prince Andrew, a friend ministration, which runs the program, has rural communities and passed the bill to
of the late sex trafficker not released a list of businesses that have re- loosen forgiveness requirements. But experts
Jeffrey Epstein, has
declined interview
ceived the loans, but data that have emerged are skeptical these measures are enough to
requests and sought through voluntary disclosures and public combat years of economic inequities. Jessica
to “falsely portray filings—coupled with interviews with small- Fulton, vice president at the Joint Center for
himself to the public business owners and advocates—paint a Political and Economic Studies, a public-
as eager and willing bleak picture for minority-owned companies. policy think tank in Washington, D.C., says the
to cooperate,” a U.S.
federal prosecutor
A June working paper from the National PPP’s implementation is yet another reminder
insisted in a statement Bureau of Economic Research found that the of systemic racial inequality. “This is all part
on June 8. The prince’s number of active black small-business own- of what happens,” she says, “when you’re not
lawyers earlier said ers in the U.S. fell by 41% between February including black communities meaningfully
he’d offered to assist and April—nearly double the national rate. in policy conversations around issues that
the Justice Department
three times so far in
A survey of 500 black- and Hispanic-owned matter.” —aLana aBramSon
2020.
T R E A S U R E : K I R S T Y W I G G L E S W O R T H — A P ; P O I N T E R : E C H O E S/ R E D F E R N S/G E T T Y I M A G E S
LOST AND FOUND
Feds waive
environmental Unburied treasure
rules On June 7, a decade after he’d hidden a treasure chest in the Rocky Mountains, a New Mexico
Citing the economic art collector announced the cache had been found. Here, more recovered riches. ÑCiara Nugent
fallout caused by the
coronavirus pandemic, FORTUNE PALACE PRIZE DIVING DISCOVERY
UNDERFOOT In 2011, workers Divers exploring
President Trump issued
A man with a metal were renovating the harbor of
an Executive Order on
detector found a 16th century Caesarea on Israel’s
June 4 directing federal
$4.2 million worth palace in Mediterranean
agencies to set aside
of silver, gold Kathmandu, once coast in 2015
environmental-impact
and gems buried used by Nepalese found some 2,000
requirements man-
under a farm in royalty. In an old gold coins on
dated by laws like the
Staffordshire, storeroom, they the seabed. The
National Environmental
England, in 2009. came across 1,000-year-old
Policy Act. The change
It’s the largest three large coins, in a range
would affect projects
hoard of Anglo- boxes filled with of currencies,
such as new pipelines
Saxon treasure gold and silver shed light on
and mines.
ever found. ornaments. ancient trade.
12 Time June 22–29, 2020Milestones
DIED BANNED
Champion U.S. gym-
nast Kurt Thomas, on
Confederate
June 5, at 64. flags,
BAILED OUT by the U.S.
Airline Cathay
Pacific, by the Hong Marine Corps
Kong government,
for $3.5 billion, on a flag Can Be a symBol
June 9, after the pan- of enormous power, espe-
demic brought travel cially in the military—but
to a near standstill. not every flag’s power is
DELISTED positive. On June 5, amid
Pangolin scales, a national reckoning over
from an official white supremacy, the U.S.
index of traditional Marine Corps released a
Chinese medicine.
The anteaters are
detailed memo banning
the world’s most display of the Confeder-
trafficked mammals ate battle flag. The de-
and may have hosted cree clarifies an April an-
a form of the novel nouncement by Marine
coronavirus.
Commandant General
CANCELED David H. Berger, explain-
Long-running reality ing that the ban extends
show Cops, by to displays of the symbol
Paramount Network, on clothing, mugs, bum-
on June 9, in the
wake of protests over per stickers and elsewhere
the death of George at the service branch’s
Floyd. Bonnie Pointer, above in 1970, scored hits both with her installations. On June 9,
family group, the Pointer Sisters, and on solo records the U.S. Navy said it was
WARNED
Chinese students,
developing its own ban
DIED
to reassess any order.
plans to study in Bonnie Pointer Removing Confeder-
Australia because
Genre-defying pop star ate imagery may only
of “discrimination,” go so far. About 22% of
by China’s Ministry
of Education, in a
It dIdn’t matter whether BonnIe PoInter was sIngIng jazz, U.S. service members—
June 9 statement. soul or disco; if she was on the Grand Ole Opry stage or on the set and more than half of
Australia has called of the film Car Wash next to Richard Pryor. Pointer had talent, cha- nonwhite service mem-
for an investigation risma and ambition that transcended conventional bounds; she was bers—report seeing ex-
into the emergence constantly rewriting the limits of her career. amples of racism or white
of the COVID-19
pandemic in China.
Pointer, who died June 8 at 69, grew up in Oakland, Calif., sing- nationalism within the
ing gospel in her father’s church alongside her sisters. It was a col- military, according to a
RESIGNED laboration that would eventually take them far beyond the congrega- 2018 Military Times poll.
New York Times tion. As the Pointer Sisters, they started out by dressing up in 1940s The Marines, for their
editorial page editor
evening gowns to sing jazz licks at breakneck speeds, but their first part, seem to acknowl-
James Bennet, on
June 7, after drawing major hit was the Allen Toussaint–penned “Yes We Can Can,” an edge that fighting racism
backlash from Times exuberant slice of funk filled with splashy harmonies and lyrical will take more than ban-
staff over an op-ed by optimism. In 1974, the group pivoted once again when a song that ning the Stars and Bars.
Republican Senator Bonnie co-wrote, “Fairytale,” crossed over into the country market, “Current events are a
Tom Cotton titled
landing them the Grammy for best country vocal performance by a stark reminder that it is
“Send in the Troops.”
group. At the Grand Ole Opry, where black women rarely appeared, not enough for us to re-
BLOCKED the group won raucous applause, with Bonnie even performing a move symbols that cause
The removal of the tap-dance cadenza. division,” Berger said
Richmond, Va., A few years later, Pointer did it again, launching a solo career in a June 3 statement.
statue of Confeder-
ate General Robert that brought her success with disco versions of Motown soul hits, “Rather, we also must
E. Lee, by a judge’s including “Heaven Must Have Sent You.” Over the years, she strive to eliminate divi-
temporary injunction, would continue to perform with and without her siblings. Her sion itself.”
on June 8, pending a sister Ruth Pointer, in a memoir, described her as “wild, fierce, and —alejandro
lawsuit hearing. not to be denied.” —andrew r. Chow de la garza
13TheBrief Health
The risks of COVID-19’s There are even hints that the virus may be causing
silent damage. In one of the 16 cohorts included in
asymptomatic spread the study, among 331 passengers on the cruise ship
By Alice Park Diamond Princess, which docked in Japan in Febru-
ary, who tested positive but did not have symptoms,
One Of The mOre insidiOus habiTs Of The new 76 people had CT scans of their lungs and nearly half
coronavirus behind COVID-19 is its tendency to set- showed signs of lung-tissue damage typical of corona-
tle into unsuspecting hosts who never show signs of virus infection.
being sick but are able to spread the virus to others. And there are other critical questions that experts
A new study out of Scripps Research Translational can’t answer about what it means to be asymptom-
Institute reviewed data from COVID-19 patients atic. Are people infected but not showing symptoms
around the world and found that up to 40% to 45% because their immune systems are better at control-
of coronavirus cases can likely be traced to people ling the virus, or because the virus they harbor is less
who spread the virus without ever knowing they potent? Or are these people asymptomatic because
were infected. they have immunity to other, less virulent corona-
“The range of what can happen with SARS-CoV-2 viruses that are responsible for the common cold and
is from no symptoms to [death],” says Dr. Eric Topol, so might already have a level of protection against the
director and founder of the institute and one of the pandemic virus as well?
authors of the paper. “That’s not at all similar to any While widespread testing of populations could
virus or pathogen we’ve experienced that has killing capture more of these asymptomatic cases, and help
potential in the past.” public-health officials to educate these people about
the need for social distancing and other measures to
In the revIew of the data, only a small fraction of prevent the spread of the virus, Topol says there’s a
people who were asymptomatic when they tested need for other options as well. He and his team are ex-
positive the first time went on to develop symptoms. ploring changes in heart rate that could be captured
That means they were not simply presymptomatic— on smart-watch apps and fitness bands and might sig-
or tested positive but eventually developed nal possible clusters of new infections.
symptoms—but truly asymptomatic. Combined with Such changes may not be useful on an individual
previous studies showing that levels of virus in people level, since they can be attributable to a number of
who are asymptomatic can be similar to those among factors including stress and heart disease. However,
people who develop symptoms, this suggests that if, for example, resting heart-rate levels for a specific
while they may not outwardly show any signs of ill- community rise and remain high for a period of time,
I L L U S T R AT I O N B Y J A M E S O N S I M P S O N F O R T I M E
ness, asymptomatic people might still carry a poten- that could indicate a possible COVID-19 outbreak
tially dangerous burden of infectious virus that can and flag individuals and their doctors to increase test-
keep the pandemic spreading from person to person. ing and follow-up care in the community.
Understanding this dynamic is especially critical now, “The priorities during a pandemic are abso-
as many in the U.S. surge onto the streets to protest lutely to look after the sick,” Topol says. “But we also
centuries of racism and social injustice. shouldn’t miss how important this area of asymptom-
The findings, Topol says, support “basically the atic spread is to understand. For every one person
reason why we have to all wear masks—because who is sick, there are a whole lot of people who have
nobody knows who is an asymptomatic carrier.” the virus and don’t know it.” •
14 Time June 22–29, 2020TheBrief TIME with ...
Atlanta Mayor criminal-justice realm, which is now at the top of
the national agenda. Under the leadership of Bot-
Keisha Lance Bottoms toms, Atlanta has done away with cash bail for
took the national stage in minor offenses, ended cooperation with ICE and
raised police pay by 30% while striking a blow
one galvanizing moment against mass incarceration. “We cut our correc-
By Karl Vick tions budget by almost 60%,” she notes. “We are
converting our city jail into a center of equity,
health and wellness.”
They say ThaT in naTional poliTics, you geT In the nation’s urgent quest for a new, less con-
only one chance to introduce yourself to the coun- frontational model of public safety, the Minne-
try. For Keisha Lance Bottoms, that moment is apolis city council had pledged the day before we
kind of a blur. It came on the evening of May 29 as spoke by phone to disband its police department.
Atlanta, the city she has led since 2018, was con- Bottoms was not ready to do that in Atlanta. “I just
vulsed by outrage over the killing of George Floyd BOTTOMS hope that people take it city by city, department by
900 miles to the north, in Minneapolis. As demon- QUICK department, and not get stuck on these one-liner
strations slid into vandalism in the city, the mayor FACTS messages, ‘Defund the police.’ Because it’s a lot
called a news conference. more complicated than that.”
“I just went out there, and I spoke my truth,” She spoke of the 2014 murder of her nephew
Close call
Bottoms recalls. “And when I was done speaking, Bottoms Darius Bottoms, killed by gang members who mis-
you know, I actually couldn’t remember what I had won by just took him for a rival. “We called the police,” she
said. I knew what I felt, but I couldn’t remember 832 votes says. “Who made the arrest of the people who mur-
what I had said. And I just remember thinking this over council dered my nephew? The police. And these people
either went really right or it went really wrong.” member Mary are now in prison.”
Norwood, who
It was the former. would have
“Above everything else, I am a mother,” she been the city’s Talking publicly about family trauma is some-
began. “I am a mother to four black children in first white thing Bottoms had to learn. Those who know that
America, one of whom is 18 years old. And when mayor since her father was the R&B singer Major Lance might
I saw the murder of George Floyd, I hurt like a 1973. remember the crossover hits “The Monkey Time”
mother would hurt. And yesterday when I heard Handyman and “Um, Um, Um, Um, Um, Um.” Her own memo-
there were rumors about violent protests in Atlanta, Husband ries are of the day in 1978 when he was led away in
I did what a mother would do. I called my son, and I Derek handcuffs; he served three years for cocaine pos-
said, ‘Where are you?’ I said, ‘I cannot protect you, Bottoms is a session and dealing. Bottoms, 8 at the time, recalls
and black boys shouldn’t be out today.’” The mayor vice president the day as “the death of our family.”
at Home
paused. “So, you’re not going to out-concern me Depot. “It’s very uncomfortable to wear your scars
and out-care about where we are in America. I wear publicly,” says Bottoms. “But what I saw run-
this each and every day. And I pray over my chil- For Biden ning for mayor was that it was necessary to show
dren each and every day. So what I see happening In endorsing my scars because there was a narrative, at least
on the streets of Atlanta is not Atlanta. This is not Joe Biden, during the campaign, that somehow I was out of
Bottoms
a protest. This is not in the spirit of Martin Luther defended touch and didn’t have any clue as to what it means
King Jr. This is chaos. A protest has purpose.” his remarks to struggle.”
Bottoms went on for 3½ minutes more and was about Indeed, Bottoms looked sleek and successful.
followed at the microphone by Atlantans making working with She had a bachelor’s degree in broadcast jour-
the same point at varying timbres: MLK Jr.’s daugh- segregationist nalism from Florida A&M and a law degree from
Senators:
ter the Rev. Bernice King and rappers T.I. (“This “The larger Georgia State, and she had been both a magistrate
is Wakanda. This is sacred. It must be protected.”) context was and a city-council member, closely allied with in-
and Killer Mike, whose own impassioned speech that you have cumbent mayor Kasim Reed. She was married to
went viral. Yet in a national uprising famously with- to work across a corporate executive, and their life appeared as
out leaders, it was the mayor who displayed the vul- the aisle with well ordered as the names of their kids: Lincoln,
people you
nerability, strength, exasperation and controlled don’t like.” Lennox, Langston and Lance.
anger that were driving hundreds of thousands into “I mean, I take as much responsibility as anyone,
the streets. Not 10 days later, she was being vetted because professionally you want people to think
for the position of vice-presidential candidate on you are together,” Bottoms says of the need to weave
the Democratic ticket, which presumptive presi- the story of her family’s setbacks into her campaign.
dential nominee Joe Biden has said will be filled by “And it was very difficult, because I used to not be
a woman and quite possibly a minority. able to even talk about that period in my life with-
Bottoms, 50, after winning office by less than out crying. I mean, I had lifelong friends who didn’t
a percentage point, has made her mark in the know that side because it was this well-kept secret.
16 Time June 22–29, 2020“But I knew in running for mayor, people had when Bottoms endorsed Biden shortly after he
to have a better understanding of who I was and had been dressed down in a debate by Senator
where my heart was. And the other thing I learned: Kamala Harris. Not anymore. Biden has promised
like, the more exhausted I became running, the to name a running mate by Aug. 1, and Bottoms
more authentic. I began to peel back the mask and ‘The more has entered a pool of contenders that already in-
let people see a deeper side of me.” exhausted cluded Stacey Abrams, a fellow Georgian. Which
She quotes poet Paul Laurence Dunbar: “Why may be awkward.
should the world be over-wise/ In counting all
I became “No, it’s not awkward at all,” Bottoms says. “I
our tears and sighs?/ Nay, let them only see us, running, think if anything it speaks to just the legacy of At-
while/ We wear the mask.” If the original subtext the more lanta and how Atlanta has really always been this
of the poem was race, Bottoms clearly suggests it authentic. place where leaders have been built. Especially in
also applies to politicians—not the kind of admis- I began to the African-American community.”
sion a politician usually makes. “Well, some of my The city famously had no riots after the 1968
B E N G R AY— T H E AT L A N TA J O U R N A L- C O N S T I T U T I O N /A P
peel back
staff would tell you they work for a politician who the mask.’ murder of Dr. King. And the recent disturbances
hates politics,” Bottoms says. did stop, with the onus returning to the cops. On
KEISHA LANCE
Yet when I ask about the Obama Adminis- BOTTOMS,
May 31, Bottoms and police chief Erika Shields
tration’s task force on policing, she calls it the mayor of Atlanta fired two Atlanta officers for using excessive force
“Obama-Biden Administration.” And in the flurry on two college students.
of media appearances since May 29, the mayor What is the country seeing? “What they’re see-
has proved a refreshingly effective Biden surro- ing is change,” she says. “The last time we’ve seen
gate. Her advice to President Trump was widely this kind of change in this country was over 50 years
quoted: “He should just stop talking.” A year ago, ago. Not in my lifetime. And so, what I would say is
it was mostly hardcore politicos who took notice that this is what change looks like in America.” •
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S ta ue r… Af fo rd t he E x t ra or di nar y .®HEALTH
SCIENCE IN
A PANDEMIC
By Alice Park
Research is normally a
plodding, tedious process.
Scientists check and recheck
their data; review and
re-review their conclusions;
then submit their hard work
to a scientific journal for
publication, where their peers
put it through further scrutiny.
But a viral pandemic doesn’t
adhere to a cautious timeline. ▶
INSIDE
BLACK EXCELLENCE IS PANDEMIC QUESTIONS THE GLOBE’S BEST
MORE THAN A HASHTAG FOR ADVICE COLUMNISTS COVID-19 RESPONSES
19TheView Opener
As COVID-19 has raced across the globe, involving hydroxychloroquine and another
public-health experts, political officials, doc- investigating blood-pressure medications,
tors and patients scrambled to find answers which were both based on data supposedly SHORT
READS
about the disease. Digital sites that posted from patients in hundreds of hospitals on six
▶ Highlights
manuscripts of scientific papers before peer continents. The scientists decided to pull the from stories on
review have flourished since January, and papers after the data-collection company they time.com/ideas
editors of prestigious medical journals have used refused to provide the peer reviewers the
asked their peer reviewers to complete their full set of data. “Without a doubt in the rush Doing
analyses, traditionally done over weeks, in to produce manuscripts for peer review, I am the work
just days. concerned that investigators may be under the
That pressure to publish is exposing the same pressure to rush their studies as journals Black and brown
tension between the desire within the sci- are to publish them,” says Dr. Howard Bauch- people have protested
for centuries, writes
entific community to only release informa- ner, editor in chief of JAMA. Savala Trepczynski,
tion once it has been fully vetted—a process In calmer times, prestigious journals executive director
that takes weeks and months—and the ur- such as JAMA vet every submission through of the Center for
gent public need for actionable information a team of editors and peer-review experts Social Justice at
in the midst of a devastating pandemic. It’s over several months. During this pandemic, UC Berkeley School
of Law. “It is white
not simply an academic matter for those in however, the volume of papers has surged, people (especially
the research com- and “there is progressive white
munity; increas- no way for a people) who are
ingly, policymakers traditional peer- responsible for what
have turned to review process to happens now.”
the scientific pro- keep up with that,”
cess to guide their says Jonathan
decisions—not to Eisen, professor Playing
mention the doc- of evolution and politics
tors who trust it ecology at the
L A B : M I S H A F R I E D M A N — G E T T Y I M A G E S ; G E O R G E T H E P O E T: A N T O N I O O L M O S — O B S E R V E R / E Y E V I N E / R E D U X ; N Y S E : J O H A N N E S E I S E L E — A F P/G E T T Y I M A G E S
for finding ways to University of Former Charlottesville
mayor Michael Signer
treat their patients California, Davis. sees parallels between
and save lives. Rather than wait, Trump’s behavior in
The result is scientists are 2017 and today. “Just
a confusing and Researchers at SUNY Downstate Health Sciences funneling dozens as in Charlottesville,
often contradictory University prepare samples from COVID-19 patients of COVID-19 Trump has seen
Minneapolis not as
set of messages papers daily to a grieving city to
from public-health experts. On June 8, a pre-print servers, or online repositories console, but as a
World Health Organization expert declared for scientific manuscripts that have not yet chess piece in his
that COVID-19 spreading from people been peer-reviewed. That’s raising concerns battle to figure out the
without any symptoms was “very rare,” then about the risks of publishing unvetted electoral map in his
favor,” he writes.
admitted a day later that the conclusion was studies related to patient care. “If there
a “misunderstanding” and based on only a are mistakes in those studies, there is no
few studies. The concern over asymptomatic capacity or limited capacity to correct them,”
spread is a major reason behind social- says Bauchner. Closing
distancing practices and advice for people to But it may be time to modify the scientific the gap
wear face masks in public. process so it can be more agile at providing
Working moms earn
Ever changing public-health advice is the experts with critical and reliable information less than working
cost of quickly collecting, digesting and mak- in a timely manner. Encouraging research- dads, and the numbers
ing sense of information about a completely ers to openly share data used in their studies, are particularly bad
new virus. For doctors treating patients with for example, would allow more scientists to for women of color,
writes Jennifer
COVID-19, the pressures of managing a pan- quickly evaluate the validity of their results. Siebel Newsom, first
demic illness are exacerbated by the fact that Eisen, who serves on the advisory board of a partner of California.
their North Star for treatment decisions— pre-print database, is also in favor of making “Identifying and
peer-reviewed reports in medical journals— the peer-review system more transparent, and correcting the places
are also facing steep challenges in finding boosting the numbers of reviewers by asking where intended
or unintended
ways to publish reliable information with far graduate students and other qualified people inequalities exist
less time than they are accustomed to having. to quickly audit studies. “There is no doubt is where we begin
In early June, for example, scientists from that [the pandemic] is making it easier for bad to rewrite the
prestigious academic research institutes re- players to play badly, but it’s also easier for status quo.”
tracted two papers related to COVID-19, one good players to play well,” he says. •
20 Time June 22–29, 2020SOCIETY People often bemoan the stereotype of
Black excellence is Black public figures falling into the sports ECONOMY
an economic lifeline and entertainment categories, as if it indi- Truth in
cates inferior intelligence. But sporting and
By George the Poet artistic excellence can also be seen as the
numbers
perfect distillation of human potential. Why are President Trump
The GeorGe Floyd proTesTs in From jazz to ska to hip-hop to grime and markets trumpeting
the U.S. hold deep resonance for Black to Afrobeats, our musical innovations very bad but better
Britons. We have long struggled to have passionately explained our journey. than expected jobs
keep our story at the forefront of the They give insight into our intellectual numbers as proof that
national agenda. And as conflicting as brilliance, win over hearts and minds the economic recovery
it is, the attention and outrage that is worldwide—and, most important, is under way? To some
felt around Black American injustices introduce wealth into communities degree, this is a classic
is useful for us to explain what we are that were at best overlooked, at worst case of outperforming
low expectations. If your
going through here. brutalized by their governments.
bar is sufficiently low, it is
By default, Black people are a political I grew up in a neighborhood in north-
always easier to exceed it.
bloc confronted with social and economic west London that is 46% Black. (The The fact that as many as
disadvantages that show up irrespective of U.K.’s population is 3% Black.) My mum 40 million people filed for
our individual lifestyles. In the U.K., Black used music to help me understand what unemployment benefits
men have double the unem- my skin color meant; when in the shutdowns was
ployment rate of white men, Sporting I was a child, she played me seen as a harbinger for
Black children are four times and artistic Bob Marley’s “Bufalo Sol- unemployment levels of
as likely to be arrested than excellence can dier” and used each line to 25% or more. Make no
white children, and Black also be seen explain the transatlantic mistake: it is good that for
women are five times as slave trade. Over the years, the moment, employment
likely to die from compli-
as the perfect as my consciousness took and the economy overall are
cations of pregnancy than distillation shape, I listened to more rap not as bad as the worst of
white women. And just as of human music and heard things that our fears.
Black Americans have a frac- potential aligned with my reality. It would be far worse
tion of the wealth of white To me, no industry has for all of us if stocks were
Americans, 40% of Black households in had a greater influence on race politics plummeting, business
the U.K. are living in poverty. than entertainment. The unique advan- completely cratering and
the financial system melting
This is not a coincidence. What drives tage that we have in the arts is the focus
down. But the disjuncture
our economic conditions is a shared his- on our story; in this space, our economic
between how some of us
tory of exploitation, sabotage and abuse activity is tied to the social needs of our are faring vs. others of us
at the hands of white societies. All of that community. Do we need more rappers? has sharpened divisions
comes rushing back when I see Derek We need the wealth that rap generates that were already there
Chauvin’s knee on George Floyd’s neck. and the discursive space it creates. Do we before COVID-19. The
need more athletes? We need to capitalize employment number is the
This momenT presenTs us with oppor- on the respect they command, and apply perfect chrysalis for our
tunities. For Black people, our position in it beyond the sale of products that have present: it shows that we
the economy is preventing us from build- nothing to do with our struggle. are more resilient than we
ing momentum against the efects of rac- Our focus should not be on convincing feared while also exposing
ism. Our jobs dictate our time, and that white people to work and think in that we don’t really know
time is currently dispersed in a way a diferent way; it should be on what is going on.
that stops us unifying our energy in playing to our strengths. We can —Zachary Karabell
an organized, sustainable manner. reinvest our energy and skills into
To redesign our freedom strategy this political bloc. Black
and plan an economic route for excellence is not just a hashtag:
Black children, we need a strong it’s an economic lifeline.
starting point—one that sen-
sitively acknowledges the George the Poet is a London-
past but ofers a truly blank born spoken-word artist of
canvas for the future. Ugandan heritage and the host
It’s already under way of Have You Heard George’s
in the arts, where Black Podcast?, an exploration of The New York Stock Exchange
people have refined this inner-city life through a mix of building reopened for trading
approach for a century. storytelling, music and fiction
21You can also read
