Recent events involving police officers and the black community have sparked nationwide protests and hostility as it seems we are once again finding our country split in two by race relations and police conduct. Black Lives Matter, a chapter-based national organization working on the "validity of Black life," has been in the news numerous times in the past few weeks as they protest the deaths of more unarmed American citizens at the hands of police. Saturday, a group of BLM protesters shut down a Portland, Oregon highway protesting the deaths of Alton Sterling and Philando Castile who were both killed at the hands of police.
Castile, a 32-year-old school cafeteria worker and resident of Minnesota, was shot during a traffic stop in Falcon Heights after reportedly being pulled over for a broken tail light. Castile was asked to get his license and registration for the officer outside his driver side window. As he attempted to inform the officer that he had a license to carry his registered firearm that was in the car, he reached for his wallet to get out his drivers license. According to Philando's girlfriend who caught the aftermath of the shots on video, the officer asked Castile to put his hands back up. As he did so, the officer shot him three to four times in the arm and chest.
Now, to be careful, this account of events has yet to be put on trial and confirmed. I watched the video the Philando's girlfriend put online and it was horrific to see the aftermath of the killing but nothing prior to Castile being shot was caught on camera.
However, one thing still stands true above all else: Castile was shot three to four times during a routine traffic stop over a broken tail light and I can not think of a time in my life as a white male that it has ever crossed my mind whether or not I would survive a situation like this.
Castile had been pulled over 46 previous times in his life prior to his death. Of those 46, six were for things an officer could see from outside a car (i.e. speeding, a broken tail light, running a stop sign). This leaves 40 interactions with police that had absolutely nothing to do with breaking the law or endangering others. 13% of our country's population is Black, however they made up 37% of all prison inmates in 2014. Racial profiling during things like routine traffic stops only catalyze this problem of over-incarceration.
These are the problems Black Lives Matter is trying to address. I personally disagree with some tactics utilized by the movement but I can see through and recognize an attempt to heal a problem of racism that still exists today.
Some, however, see a very surface area version of the BLM movement and this has created a lot of negative outcry from certain opposition groups and political party members. More and more individuals are fed up with the freeway shut-downs and protests and are calling for an end to it. Many ask: What is there to be angry about anymore? There's no more racism, right? Don't all lives matter?
Well, here are just a few examples of the racial inequality when it comes to the law.
-White youth are more than a third more likely to have sold drugs than African American youth. But African American youth are arrested at twice the rate of whites and represent 48% of all the youth incarcerated for a drug offense in the juvenile justice system.
-60% of people serving life without parole for crimes committed in their youth in the United States are African-American, 29% are White.
-73% of the people serving life without parole in U.S. federal prisons for a crime committed under age 18 are people of color.
-Black youth are 19 times more likely than White youth to be tried as adults when charged for the same crime with similar criminal backgrounds as their non-colored counterparts.
You don't need racists to have racism, it exists in ways that are difficult to see but absolutely appalling once uncovered. Every single person in this country is entitled to the same rights, the same chances and the same opportunity. Black Lives Matter is a movement not borne out of hegemony and divisiveness, but instead out of an affirmation that they, too, matter. Black Lives Matter does not mean White lives don't. When you see walks and fundraisers for breast cancer is your first thought, "Why does JUST breast cancer awareness matter? Don't all cancers matter?"
The events these past few weeks absolutely broke my heart when I heard them. Racism is not something that is static, it is dynamic and ever changing. Talking about it is not the same as admitting to it. As a white male, my ability to converse and recognize the problem of racism is not the same as an admission that I must be racist. Stop taking offense when the topic is brought up and lets come together to find some solutions because I for one can't live another day that I have to see headlines of these terrible killings of cops and fellow Americans.
America has got a problem, so let's do what we do best and solve it.
