Serena Williams Opens Up About Social Injustice in Powerful Facebook Post

Riding in the car with her nephew led Serena Williams to share her thoughts on social injustice.

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As Serena Williams rode in the passenger seat as she was driven around to her meetings, it hit her. "Today I asked my 18 year old nephew (to be clear he's black) to drive me to my meetings so I can work on my phone #safteyfirst. In the distance I saw cop on the side of the road," Serena wrote on her Facebook page. "I quickly checked to see if he was obliging by the speed limit. Than I remembered that horrible video of the woman in the car when a cop shot her boyfriend. All of this went through my mind in a matter of seconds." 

Williams went from regretting that she wasn't the one behind the wheel to admitting she would never forgive herself if something were to happen to her nephew. "I even regretted not driving myself. I would never forgive myself if something happened to my nephew," Serena penned. "He's so innocent. So were all 'the others.'" 

"I am a total believer that not "everyone" is bad It is just the ones that are ignorant, afraid, uneducated, and insensitive that is affecting millions and millions of lives," Williams wrote. "Why did I have to think about this in 2016? Have we not gone through enough, opened so many doors, impacted billions of lives? But I realized we must stride on- for it's not how far we have come but how much further still we have to go."

Williams questioned why she has been vocal about these problems. "I than wondered than have I spoken up? I had to take a look at me," Serena wondered. "What about my nephews? What if I have a son and what about my daughters? As Dr. Martin Luther King said 'There comes a time when silence is betrayal.'" Serena says she will no longer be silent. 

 

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