#BlackLivesMatter started off as a Twitter movement. African-Americans had been fed up of being shot down and denied the right to plead due to prejudice time and again. They have been denied the right to fair trials, the right to be represented, and they have been victims of police brutality. People decided that it had been far too long, and that it was time for a change in 2012.
Bigotry: The idea that self is better than inhabitants of another community with separate ideologies based on superficial characters such as the color of skin or the place of birth. Bigots justify discriminating against marginalized communities premising their arguments on the fact that the community is by default inferior.
Why do Black Lives Matter?
It is unfortunate that we have forgotten about young Trayvon Martin. George Zimmerman, a former police-officer gunned him down claiming that it was self-defense. The audio-recorder in his car later revealed that the officer pulled a gun on him despite being instructed otherwise from dispatch because Zimmerman thought Martin “looked like” he was carrying drugs. This is a very common example of profiling, and many black people have already lost their lives to it. It was later found that the 17-year-old had been carrying Skittles and Coca Cola.
The case against Zimmerman only hit court after 40 days when a certain hashtag “#BlackLivesMatter” became trending on Twitter. Black people all over the world were tired of police brutality. However, Zimmerman passed off with no charges.
#BlackLivesMatter became a fierce movement a year later with the Ferguson case. A civilian Michael Brown was shot down by officer Darren Wilson. The entire country came out to the streets in protests under the banner “#BlackLivesMatter”. Social media faced an uproar. Little changed. In 2014, Eric Garner was attacked on the street and his throat was stepped on, choking him to death; because he had been allegedly selling cigarettes without a license. His last words were, “I can’t breathe.”
The movement resurfaced, fierce as ever, with the killing of one George Floyd on the 25th May. Former Minneapolis police-officer Derek Chauvin has been charged with third-degree murder. Three others are undergoing trial following the same incident. Floyd had been knelt on by Derek Chauvin for 8 minutes and 46 seconds blocking his windpipe after being accused of using a counterfeit bill. His last words were also, “I can’t breathe.” The most recent of these killings was Rayshard Brooks, who was killed in a Wendy’s drive-thru by former officer Garrette Rolfe. Black Lives activists set fire to the Wendy’s demanding justice for all the black deaths. The officer is undergoing trial currently.
Police brutality against African-American communities is very real. The death of George Floyd and Rayshard Brooks is the outcome of over a century of police brutality, extrajudicial killings and wrongfully convicting African-Americans. The movements are not only just, they are the last resort. President Donald Trump however seems to be downplaying the movements when he says, “All lives matter.”
There is no doubt that all lives deserve protection. But when trying to change the banner “Black Lives Matter” to “All Lives Matter”, this dilutes the problem, and neglects justice to people who need it. The blacks have been victims of police brutality, not anyone else. This movement is about them. Because “All Lives” would include members of different communities, both marginalized and non-marginalized, each having their own struggles, the attention shifts from the problems African-Americans face. This new banner keeps the oppressed blacks oppressed, because now there are a bunch of other problems. We miss out on the severity of the actual problems. The new banner also includes the oppressors, and therefore cancels out backlash for the oppressor communities. Even if we consider “All Lives Matter” to not support the oppressors, it does not demand accountability from them either. Most important of all, the people that need representation in the scenario, the African-Americans, due to the history of violence imposed on them for so long, do not get this representation. They are forced back to the ghettos.
It is not too surprising that white supremacists would suddenly try to dilute protests with their vague “equalist” AllLivesMatter views. People demanding accountability are serious, and if they were to achieve this accountability in anyway, it would not be very nice for these supremacists. White supremacists feel threatened. If my liberal use of the term “white supremacists” offends you, then it proves that you feel threatened as well, meaning that you probably are also a white supremacist.
Both Presidential candidates Donald Trump and Joe Biden seem to have taken strict stances against protesters’ message on Fulton Street “Defund the Police”. To understand the significance of this, we need to understand the history of policing.
Defund the Police
Long ago, people did not feel the need to have a separate regiment in order to ensure the safety of their property. The concept of modern policing comes from England. People wearing red were mobilized on the streets in 1829 to ensure each citizen abided by law and order. However, any faction entrusted with power over people in the past have all gone rogue. For this reason, the English policemen were not allowed to carry lethal weapons to ensure they could not get too powerful. The United States adopted policing principles from their colonizers. However, we all know how Americans feel about their guns. The US police carried guns and were permitted to open fire if they felt lives were “threatened”.
The Problem
The police have a massive concentration of power. People still do not feel safe. Rather, history repeated itself. Marginalized communities (African-Americans in this case) met the other end of the stick. The protectors became the oppressors.
Why defund?
The police department receives four times as much funding as any other departments. Other departments in need of funding are homeless services, health, housing, youth and community development and jobs programs. All these sectors are heavily under-funded. They do not have skilled personnel. What’s worse is, under any problem related to any of these other sectors, 911 dispatches the complaint to a police-officer because they lack people to deal with the problem! We are talking about a regiment that has failed their duties throughout the times, misused power, exploited the weak, yet are not running out of tear-shells and weapons. A question arises, do we need the police? Perhaps we do, but it is also evident that the funds would be better utilized under any other sector. If the funds are not cut off, they at least need to be reduced significantly to the point where the police sector does not feel more powerful than anyone. New York and Minnesota have already started this process of defunding.
African-Americans have been the victims of oppression. They have been forced out of representation. They have been misrepresented. Crimes against them have been justified by white supremacists, and they got applauded. Now their movement is being rebranded. Let us take the death of George Floyd to be a marker, that it’s been enough. The states need a change. We have lived among bigots for far too long.