The 'Star Wars: Rogue One' actor additionally expresses concern for how Muslims are being treated by India's government, and about how COVID-19 is hitting communities of colour particularly hard.
- Apr 28, 2020
AceShowbiz - "Rogue One: A Star Wars Story" actor Riz Ahmed has lost two members of his family to the coronavirus.
The British-Asian actor made the revelation in a WhatsApp interview with British GQ magazine in which he spoke about how the Covid-19 pandemic is affecting members of ethnic minorities, due to a disproportionate number working in frontline caring roles.
Speaking about losing relatives, he wrote: "I have lost two family members to Covid. I just want to believe their deaths and all the others aren't for nothing. We gotta step up to re-imagine a better future."
Riz hopes the virus can bring humanity together to tackle greater problems rather than focusing on what divides people - but worries it is just holding up a mirror to existing political and social problems.
"Coronavirus is on some level an alien invasion, isn't it? It's bringing humanity together against the common enemy," he continued. "So there is this potential for this momentous, unique-in-the-history-of-our-species moment, of us all going through this crazy challenge together and only being able to get through this together."
"And yet, in the midst of that, insofar as any crisis is a mirror, reflecting your priorities and patterns, this crisis is reflecting and revealing the faultlines in our society, the broken records that are stuck in our head, the f**keries and the power plays that are still dominating how we are running our planet, the rising intolerance."
The star also expressed concern for how Muslims are being treated by India's nationalist government, and about how the disease is hitting communities of colour in the U.K. and U.S., particularly hard.
"I'm looking at the fact it's hitting African-Americans twice as hard; I'm looking at the fact that 50 per cent of NHS (National Health Service) frontline workers - is it 50 per cent? - are ethnic minorities," the 37-year-old mused.
