Spike Leeis denouncing racism in America on the international stage.
On Tuesday, the acclaimed director, 64, spoke to reporters at the Cannes Film Festival, where he’s serving as the event’s jury president.
Lee said very little had changed since his filmDo The Right Thingdebuted at Cannes in 1989.
“When you see brotherEric Garner, when you see kingGeorge Floyd, murdered, lynched, you would think, you would hope that thirty-some motherf—ing years later Black people would stop being hunted down like animals,” he said, viaReuters.
“Agent Orange, this guy in Brazil, and Putin are gangsters,” Lee said, viaYahoo! News. “They have no morals, no scruples. That’s the world we live in. We have to speak out against gangsters like that.”
Spike Lee.Theo Wargo/Getty
In June 2020, Lee spoke to PEOPLE about the deaths of Floyd,Breonna TaylorandAhmaud Arberyand the resulting nationwide protests. The director said the only real solution to fixing systemic racism in America is to overhaul the entire system.
“We have to look at everything as we enter A.C., or After Corona,” he told PEOPLE at the time. “The inequality between the have and have nots, the racial injustices. This country has to, and must, rectify what’s wrong. We have to make a concerted effort at all levels to address American life, and the areas where we’ve been lacking. All those deaths will have been in vain if we go back to the same thing.”
In May 2020, Lee appeared on CNN where he spoke about the murders of Black Americans, telling Don Lemon, “What we’re seeing today is not new. We’ve seen this again and again and again. Now we have cameras, but the attack on black bodies has been here from the get-go.”
Never miss a story — sign up forPEOPLE’s free weekly newsletterto get the biggest news of the week delivered to your inbox every Friday.
Breonna Taylor.Instagram
The 74th Cannes Film Festival runs from July 6-17.
To help combat systemic racism, consider learning from or donating to these organizations:
source: people.com
