Cobot’s Message in Response to the Black Lives Matter Protests

Amendment 20.08.2020 — We are responding to internal feedback regarding who is centered in this post and how visibility of racism in Germany vs the US is framed from a white perspective. We are working on a follow-up blogpost highlighting Cobot’s actions on this topic, as well as learning and work still to do.

Amendment 03.09.20 —You can find our follow up to this post here.

We’ve been watching the protests unfold across the US and we’re hoping that you, your loved ones, and your communities are staying safe while making your voices and values heard.

To make our stance clear — we’re fully opposed to police brutality as well as systemic and structural racism. Though the struggle that Black people and other POC face here in Germany is less visible than in the US, it is no less real and no less urgent to confront. We took a short pause on social media out of respect for the pain that people are feeling and to clear the way for posts that we feel deserve attention in this moment. But we don’t want to be silent.

We have sought to take firm stances in the past based on our values. In the environmental movement, we felt we could use our position to advocate for environmental responsibility in tech. When it came to workplace safety and combating harassment, we offered a free template and pushed every coworking event to offer a code of conduct. Now we want to support the leaders of the movement for racial justice worldwide by standing in solidarity — not just today, but in the days, months, and years to come.

So what are we doing? After lots of internal learning and responding to the advice given by racial justice organizations here and abroad, we’re opening our inbox and our communication channels (social media, blogs, Slack channel) to anyone in the community who wishes to use them. Just send us a message if you’d like to chat more about what we can do to support you or amplify a message that matters.

We will be devoting extra time and resources to finding coworking-related initiatives and discussions that center the Black and other POC experience in coworking, and we will use our channels and influence to highlight and support them.

We commit to listening, learning, and supporting people and organizations fighting for justice and anti-racism, because Black Lives Matter.