“How Do We Fix This?” : LeBron James Questions the Racially Discriminative Voting Experience in the US

Its election time! But are they fair and just for everyone? Is voting really the answer? These are the questions Los Angeles Lakers star LeBron James asked, as America geared up to vote amidst several issues.

Is the American voting racist?

Los Angeles Lakers star veteran, LeBron James, has been on the forefront of the virtual Black Lives Matter movement, even before the George Floyd incident.

As the protests continue, many encouraged their fellow African -Americans to vote, to bring change. And many went. Unfortunately, they had to face new struggles to even cast their vote!

With long lines, damaged polling machines, and polling sites that opened much later than they were supposed to, people went through hell.

LeBron James responded to an article by Politico, wherein a woman named LaTosha Brown, co-founder of Black Votes Matter, shared her voting woes. She told Zach Montellaro and Laura Barrón-López of Politico that she had to wait in line for three whole hours just to vote in Atlanta. She also revealed that her nephew had to wait six hours to vote during early voting hours.

And apparently, when Brown drove over to white polling site in suburban Atlanta, she saw that people were just strolling in and out of the polling centers! No lines, no waiting.

“I come over to this side of town, and white folks are strolling in. On my side of town, we brought stadium chairs,” Brown said.

Talking about how nothing seems to come easy for the Afro-American community, Brown continued,

“We have got to stop making voting a traumatic damn experience for black voters. Everything has to be a traumatic experience,” said Brown.

LeBron James asks America a serious question

This experience shared by LaTosha Brown seems to have hit LeBron deeply. As a response to this article by Politico and what Brown went through, James had a very important question to ask. James highlighted that whenever a change in the system is required people turn to voting. However, does that really work?

‘Everyone talking about “how do we fix this?”  They say “go out and vote?”  What about asking if how we vote is also structurally racist?,’ he tweeted.

LeBron’s question really makes us wonder. How deeply is the system flawed? Is it flawed just for the Afro-American community? Will voting help reduce and eventually diminish this, especially when the voting experience is this way?

Hopefully, we will all know soon.